Bendigo Trip
On Thursday, Mum and I drove to Bendigo to have morning tea-cum-lunch with my old Prep teacher, whom I haven't seen in years. I say "morning tea-cum-lunch", but it might just as well have been morning tea-cum-dinner given how long they ended up talking for. But that's just women. The dialogue covered the usual female conversational fodder - diets, holidays and the like and I sat between the two of them, shifting my head as though watching a tennis game in order to give both sides of the discussion my attention. It would've been a particularly slow paced game of tennis - the ball seemed to spend at least five minutes at each end of the court. Perhaps a tennis match isn't the most appropriate metaphor - it was more like a HAM radio conversation. At the end of each five-minute monologue, I almost expected them to say, "This is VK3ABC signing off. Over to you VK3KGB." I don't understand why so few HAM radio operators are women - I would've thought it'd be just the thing for them since they love the sound of their own voice so much. Anyway, despite the conversation being painfully mundane, I kind of enjoyed listening anyway just because I haven't seen this lady for so long. She'd hardly changed at all - it's funny how you can go for years without seeing someone or visiting a particular place, and yet when you meet them or go back to the place, it all seems precisely how you remembered. Even when you don't have particularly vivid memories of the person or the place.
After lunch, Mum and I drove into town and spent an hour looking around on our own. The visit was quite a milestone because despite having grown up in Bendigo, and despite having visited it many times since we left, this was the first time I had ever walked around it on my own. I had a look through the library, which I hadn't been to in probably ten years (!) and true to the theory, it looked exactly as I remembered it. Except the shelves looked considerably lower, but I guess that's to be expected when you factor in ten years' worth of adolescence. The music collection was awesome - it was like having the entire Classical section of a music store available for loan. I think I still have my old library card somewhere - next time I go there perhaps I should see if it still works! Ah well, the overdue notice will only go to my old house anyway.
I went up the lookout and used the 500 times zoom on my video camera to voyeuristically watch people going about their business on the streets. After that rather depraved and enjoyable five minutes, I looked through the Coles in Lyttleton Terrace, for old time’s sake and because I like supermarkets. I had a quick look through Target to see if I could spot one of my internet friends who works there (hi Ed if you’re reading this) but he wasn’t there. Then Mum and I went to the marketplace to have a cup of coffee at Michel’s Patisserie. Mum told me to stop filming their cakes with the video camera because it made me look like a weirdo, so instead I filmed the hot Asian girl who was serving at the Baker’s Delight. I got busted for that when she looked at me.
Bendigo still has a sacredness about it for me - partly because I don't get to go there very often, and partly because I really haven't spent a lot of time there since we left - I've probably made an average of two trips a year in the past ten years. Mainly though, it's because it's where I spent the best years of my life by far. And probably the best years I will ever have. Which is kind of depressing given that I can recall many bad times from those years too - but nostalgia tends to only focus on the good things. When you're young, you look forward to growing up, and when you've grown up...Well, what is there to look forward too, really? Forty years of work then death. The only thing that maintains one's anticipation is the desire to know what will become of their life.
We stopped at my old primary school on the way home and I had a look through the grounds. A lot has changed since we left, but I was surprised and comforted by the number of things that had stayed the same. Under the big tree out the front they have laid the pavers that the students engraved their names on back in '93. I wanted to buy one at the time but my parents told me not to waste my money. Most of my teachers' and classmates' names are there and mine isn't. It's an apt depiction of the way my life has always been.
If I was granted the answer to one question about the decisions I've made in my life, or those that have been made for me, I'd like to know what it would've been like if we'd stayed in Bendigo. I probably would've ended up loathing the place and would now be queuing up for the first ticket to anywhere like nearly all my friends from there have done. As it is, I can't help wishing we'd stayed there and wanting to move back. I can't count the number of times in these ten years I've dreamt that we've moved back to our old house, and then I've been bitterly disappointed upon waking up. But of course, if I moved back there now it wouldn't be the same.
OneStat
After lunch, Mum and I drove into town and spent an hour looking around on our own. The visit was quite a milestone because despite having grown up in Bendigo, and despite having visited it many times since we left, this was the first time I had ever walked around it on my own. I had a look through the library, which I hadn't been to in probably ten years (!) and true to the theory, it looked exactly as I remembered it. Except the shelves looked considerably lower, but I guess that's to be expected when you factor in ten years' worth of adolescence. The music collection was awesome - it was like having the entire Classical section of a music store available for loan. I think I still have my old library card somewhere - next time I go there perhaps I should see if it still works! Ah well, the overdue notice will only go to my old house anyway.
I went up the lookout and used the 500 times zoom on my video camera to voyeuristically watch people going about their business on the streets. After that rather depraved and enjoyable five minutes, I looked through the Coles in Lyttleton Terrace, for old time’s sake and because I like supermarkets. I had a quick look through Target to see if I could spot one of my internet friends who works there (hi Ed if you’re reading this) but he wasn’t there. Then Mum and I went to the marketplace to have a cup of coffee at Michel’s Patisserie. Mum told me to stop filming their cakes with the video camera because it made me look like a weirdo, so instead I filmed the hot Asian girl who was serving at the Baker’s Delight. I got busted for that when she looked at me.
Bendigo still has a sacredness about it for me - partly because I don't get to go there very often, and partly because I really haven't spent a lot of time there since we left - I've probably made an average of two trips a year in the past ten years. Mainly though, it's because it's where I spent the best years of my life by far. And probably the best years I will ever have. Which is kind of depressing given that I can recall many bad times from those years too - but nostalgia tends to only focus on the good things. When you're young, you look forward to growing up, and when you've grown up...Well, what is there to look forward too, really? Forty years of work then death. The only thing that maintains one's anticipation is the desire to know what will become of their life.
We stopped at my old primary school on the way home and I had a look through the grounds. A lot has changed since we left, but I was surprised and comforted by the number of things that had stayed the same. Under the big tree out the front they have laid the pavers that the students engraved their names on back in '93. I wanted to buy one at the time but my parents told me not to waste my money. Most of my teachers' and classmates' names are there and mine isn't. It's an apt depiction of the way my life has always been.
If I was granted the answer to one question about the decisions I've made in my life, or those that have been made for me, I'd like to know what it would've been like if we'd stayed in Bendigo. I probably would've ended up loathing the place and would now be queuing up for the first ticket to anywhere like nearly all my friends from there have done. As it is, I can't help wishing we'd stayed there and wanting to move back. I can't count the number of times in these ten years I've dreamt that we've moved back to our old house, and then I've been bitterly disappointed upon waking up. But of course, if I moved back there now it wouldn't be the same.
OneStat