Retcon.

It wasn’t actually love at first sight. That stuff is reserved for Tom Hiddleston, Beyoncé and the first episode I ever watched of Rick And Morty.

We formally met at a party of a mutual friend years ago. She was having one of her wild parties as a celebration of an “I’m fucking leaving the country TAKE MY STUFF OR I WILL BURN IT” kind of theme. I rocked up after work, it was not long after I had moved interstate, so I hadn’t seen her in ages. There was a few high pitched sounds, hugging, catch ups then heading into the house to say hello to friends old and new alike.

I was wary of him, truth be told. There were rumours that he and my friend were very close of the very close variety, and I was the overprotective type who didn’t want to see her heart broken. He on the other hand barely made eye contact and kept any conversations to the monosyllabic variety. The rumour mill should never be listened to mind you, because that was the furthest thing from the truth.

The conversations came more fluidly when we weren’t in the same room, with us arguing via text or facebook message over who was going to get our friend’s Doc Martens, discovering points of commonality, and the conversations gradually turned to the flirtatious variety. Me being the complete oblivious moron that I am, didn’t completely comprehend this until a few days before a movie weekend at my place my friend and I had planned that he was tagging along to.

My brother always has a way of keeping it straight to the point.

My friend pulled the plug 20mins before he was supposed to rock up, and to this day I swear she did it on purpose. It still went ahead anyway, with us both feeling like awkward teenagers watching movies, occasionally brushing hands accidentally and getting closer into each others personal space as the night wore on.

Contrary to all of my hangups and idiosyncrasies, I was the one that made the first move. “Do you find it as frustrating as I do that we have been this close and we haven’t kissed yet?” After a relieved sigh of “Jesus christ yes”, we kissed. We kissed and it was like all those stupid movies describe it. My first kiss was just after high school with someone that preferred to give an experience of making out with a waterfall. This was different. It was gentle, it was slow, it was all those goofy fireworks, cherubs with harps out kind of wow.

That was how it started. We went on an official proper restaurant date a few days later, he came back to mine and we hung out and watched more movies. I don’t think he left after that. A point I often remind him about much to his annoyance.

We always communicated. He knew of some of the messed up shit I had been through, he shared his own history with me and together we took everything step by step, each day at a time. He learnt how to move with any of my episodes, would distract me with pictures of kittens when I needed it, or would just curl up and hold my hand when I needed that instead.

He was studying in uni, I was working as a business manager 12hrs a day often 6 days a week at a motorcycle dealership that was slowly sapping my will to live. We went out to movies when we could get the time, had reading nights, tried not to lose our minds over puzzle nights and just set about carving out a life for ourselves. We are both competitive so when a pool table was involved it got heated, and the only time we would fight is over the playstation controller.

Oh and also hitting up Mind Body Spirit festivals because the material we collect there keeps her facebook page occupied for *weeks*.

Everything fit so easily. He helped me get out of a really terrible job and onto better things, I started really being able to work with myself and get through some of these dramas and really grow on as a person. Just over 6mths later, he proposed. That wasn’t quite how I had ever imagined it would happen, it was just slotted into conversation on the way home from the city on the bus.

“Did… you just propose to me on a fucking Logan bus?”

“Yeah I think I did.”

“You’re an unromantic ass but my answer is still yes.”

Neither of us had a lot of money but we managed to get rings for each other, I managed to find one made by a Buddhist monk at a local market that he still wears to this day, mine was located at a random store in the city. Both were less than $40 but it was the symbol behind them, not the karat of the material. Through thick and thin, rich or poor… especially poor… more than likely poor… we would be there for each other down to our last dollar and our last breath. I knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him.

That was as official as we were going to get at this point- it was time to introduce him to the family. I had met his by this time so it was only fair. We jumped on a plane and went to Sydney for both mine and my mother’s birthday (they’re a day apart in March). We rocked up to the venue, and I stood outside for a few minutes trying to remain calm while holding his hand. He squeezed it in solidarity and we headed inside. It was pleasant enough despite how daunting it would have been for him.

My little cousin who would have been about 5 at the time was there and asked about us. “Do you love each other like mummy loves daddy?” she enquired. I looked around at the rest of the table while everyone looked about as shocked and awkward as if someone had just ran naked through the restaurant. I simply nodded and she seemed to ponder this for a moment before looking at him and saying “They have a face painter outside, I’m going to get a butterfly on my face” and taking off.

He also saw this as an opportunity to get air and decided that he too was going to go get his face painted up like a damn skull, so took off after my cousin leaving me with my family.

“You guys are so great together. It’s so good to see you happy.”

“I think it’s wonderful you’ve found someone that makes you happy you look like an entirely different person!”

The compliments went on like this for a little bit, which on a surface level seemed lovely but there was this strange air of a “but” hanging around at the end of their sentences. One of them decided to address the elephant in the room.

“But why do you guys want to get married?”

“Is this because he proposed so quickly?”

“No it’s just…. I don’t have a problem with you two being together it’s just…. I just don’t understand why you need to fight so hard to get married why is it such a huge deal?”

“I..”

The conversation took a turn for the worst pretty quickly after that. They were attempting to not be offensive and kept telling me so, but kept bringing the conversation back to “But why do you want to get married?”

“Because we love each other and that’s what two people do when they want to spend the rest of their lives together?”

“Yeah but… why is it such a huge deal that you need to be able to get married? Isn’t just being together enough?”

“Is that what you were asked when your now husband proposed to you?”

“Well no but I-”

“So why should it be any different for us?”

“Well because… because uh… SO WHO WANTS A DRINK!?”

Me. Definitely me.

Just fill it to the top mate.

I excused myself and went to the bathroom in order to cry into a scrunched up handful of toilet paper. I spent my birthday crying into toilet paper. These days my family have gotten a lot better around him but I still haven’t forgotten that day, it still burns my memories.

At this point the unknowing reader might be wondering why my family had such a bizarre reaction to introducing my partner to my family. If this is isn’t your first article you’re reading from me you might be wondering if I have hit my head. I will come clean. You see, this article is littered with typos. Replace every reference to my partner as a male with her actual gender, and re-read it again.

Our government is looking to hold a useless tax-payer funded and wasted plebiscite later in the year where you get to decide whether or not I get to hold some form of equal footing with you in societal standing. You actually get to dictate how I live my life regardless of you having absolutely no real input or impact in it! Isn’t that exciting?

No. No it isn’t. This license for hate speech is going to tell you that my partner and I are depraved. That what we do in the bedroom is a “lifestyle choice”. Kite-boarding on the weekends or going Paleo are lifestyle choices. A committed relationship between two people should not be whittled down to a “lifestyle”. I don’t point at heterosexual couples and say “ew look at their weird lifestyle choice!” because it’s not. a fucking. lifestyle. It is a LIFE between TWO PEOPLE.

“I don’t think you should be standing up and protesting what happens in your bedroom.” This was an AMAZING rebuttal I heard today. Those who are against marriage equality think about gay sex more than us gays do. I think my partner and I are both in agreeance that if we had as much sex as they think we do, we would be a lot more exhausted. YES. SEX IS INVOLVED SOMEWHERE IN THE RELATIONSHIP BUT IT IS A SMALL PIECE OF A VERY MUCH LARGER LIFE.

Let’s be real: This is what you do in bed, and it’s no different for us except we’re catching zubats outside the house on Pokemon Go.

We are coming up on five years in September. We have had our share of ups and downs, arguments over paint colours for the house, love and loss, burnt meals and laughter over farts that sound like ducks quacking. She gets on my case about the housework, I get on hers because she puts the cutlery in the drawer away weird. She hates when I eat peanut butter and won’t come near me at all until I’ve brushed my teeth several times and gargled a heap of mouth wash. I make it up to her by making the most amazing noodles or “breakfast dinners” where I pan up a plate of hash browns, bacon and surprise her with tiny cheese kranskies.

Our favourite time of year is Halloween, we deck the whole house out like a novelty store exploded. She isn’t into xmas but tolerates my need to be festive and I make it up to her by covering the tree in skull decorations and rename the season Skullmass.

There are even festive glittery skull decorations for a table piece!

She loves when I provide foot rubs because her circulation is shit and gets worse in the winter. I love when she scratches the back of my head. I have stayed by her bedside when she was admitted to hospital for a poisoned kidney, she stayed by mine when I had my appendix out. I supported her when she was going through hell in her job and helped her get out. She convinced me to save a dog who has become the most important little heart stealer in our lives. We often get manoeuvred out of the bed because the cats take up more space than a goddamn child.

We leave notes for each other all over the blackboard at home that usually consist of a capital lettered “YOU HAVE THE BEST FACE.” I gave up the giant whiteboard in the office so she could have somewhere to scribble while she figured out calculations for her science degree. We buy each other ridiculous little presents when we can but they are treated like we just went shopping for each other at Tiffany and Co. No matter how bad things get when I see her face first thing in the morning I know I am going to be ok.

It’s my grandmother’s 80th birthday in a few weeks and I couldn’t afford the tickets. She surprised me with them at work on Friday because she knows how important it is I spend time with my family, especially as my grandmother is getting older. I am now going down there to surprise her because of my partner.

We are not just a sex act.

Eat a Snickers. And By Snickers I mean Go Fuck Yourself With a Freight Train.

“You’re a slut and I hope you kill yourself.*click*”

Halfway through my day today this was legitimately a call I had received. Someone had literally taken time out of their day, to wait on hold listening to all the advertising and hold music, for the purpose of making an anonymous phone call to advise the poor fuck that answered the phone about their sexual promiscuity and how that may be solved via a swift exit from life.

Like really? Is your blood sugar low? Are you irritable and need a snack? Are you deprived of joy and need a hug? Are you coming to the sad realisation that your mother wishes you were the one she should have swallowed? Do you need to go outside and get some sun to absorb some of that glorious vitamin D THAT I HOPE YOU CHOKE ON YOU COMPLETE WASTE OF OXYGEN?

bcxak

This isn’t about that unfortunate individual who needs some more productive hobbies however, he just made me annoyed enough to write about the more pressing issue that’s been on my mind over the last while.

Did I miss the fucking memo somewhere that told the world to go nuts with acting like complete pricks?

This isn’t some revelatory statement mind you, I am well aware of the long standing toxicity that has been floating about for oh, the last several hundred years. HOWEVER. There seems to be this trend on the upswing at the moment where a handful of people in the media that have come out making some really fucking stupid statements about other communities, minorities and other perceived scary  things (I’m looking at you, Sonia Kruger et all) and now it appears to have served as some sort of xenophobic green light to have everyone throw their moral outrage at anyone not white as the driven snow and as christian as the wood they used for the cross.

I watched the Brexit insanity with a profound sense of gratuity that my ancestor decided to steal a handkerchief that landed him on the boat out here. Now Britain’s more colourful racists have come out of the cracker box like it’s white christmas; attacks on the Polish community are becoming common place, kids are going home crying because they’re being told they have to get out of the country, and people are being abused or attacked in the streets for not looking “British enough” despite having their family there for several generations.

Locally you’ve got Pauline Hanson, resident 90’s punchline politician who has made a disturbing comeback because of the absolute horse shit state of affairs with the recent election and the political landscape in general. Her election results have given her the platform to sprout her absolute divisive vitriol and the media won’t. fucking. stop. giving. her. airtime.

She will rail on television about how she wants to ban Muslims because of the “extremist problem” we have in this country. I’m sorry, I didn’t realise I was living in the midst of daesh contested territory where I can’t go down the street for a bottle of milk without dealing with a suicide bomber or IED. Oh wait, that’s because I’m NOT. Hanson wants to claim that people are scared? They’re only scared because they lack proper critical thinking skills and people like her insist on using the language of fear to divide the community. How about those in the Muslim community who no longer feel safe because of this shit?

It was the Asian community in the 90’s the last time she was on the political circuit, this time it’s the Muslims because they’re a persistent hot topic for conservatives to play to idiot bogans who don’t know how to differentiate between someone who is a terrorist and someone who is a person who happens to follow Islam.
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Stop with the freedom of speech defence. You are racist. In Australia, we don’t have a bill of fucking rights, it isn’t protected in our constitution, it is merely implied as per the high court. Just because we have an implied policy that the government does not get to interfere with political discourse, it does NOT mean that you get open slather to incite fear and hatred of a community to further your own political agendas.
You know what pushes people to “extremism”? Bullshit statements like the ones that have been coming out of the mouths of xenophobic assholes like Pauline Hanson. I’m going to use one of the weirdest references to parallel the scenario: the original 90’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live action movie.
Picture it. You’ve got these teenagers all over New York, young and impressionable, that are constantly spoken down to, patronised, generalised, victimised.
They get the charismatic individual in head coverings and dramatic music who comes out and says I see you. I acknowledge you. I know you. In fact, this is legitimately the line from the movie he uses when addressing the hoards of teenagers while ritualistically promoting someone into his fold in front of them:
“Money cannot buy the honour which you have earned tonight. You make us all proud. Only effort, discipline, loyalty, earn the right to wear the Dragon Doji. You are here because the outside world rejects you. This is your family. I AM YOUR FATHER. I want you all to become full members of the foot. There is a new enemy. Freaks of nature who interfere with our business. You are my eyes and ears, find them! Together we will punish these creatures. These… Turtles.”
This place welcomes them with open arms and lets them be who they want to be. They can skate, they can play games, drink, smoke, play cards, whatever. This gets them into the fold. Then they are given opportunities to run about and do a few petty crimes, help with a few wallet thefts, pinch TV’s off the back of trucks, stuff like that. Then they get the speeches. Then they get the invite to the inner circle- The Foot Clan. Before you know it you’re now in the thick of it committing serious crimes, murder, and terrorism.
 Shredder
Now see that same scenario in our society right here, right now except without ninja turtles (though that would be beyond amazing) and you’ve got yourself a easy 1,2,3 into a suicide bomb vest. The divisive and marginalising statements being thrown about in the media at present are they are inciting racist dickheads to get a perceived free pass to enact violence against another community. Violence breeds more violence. It will breed hatred and resentment on both sides, which then goes on to create extremists regardless of whether they are Islamic or christian or just fucking racist.
If you want to ban everything that came from Islam, then put down your toothbrush and enjoy gingivitis. Throw out your coffee, stop playing smoke on the water on your guitar, stop receiving free medical care in hospitals. These are a handful of some pretty important things to have originated in the Islamic world, but by all means go ahead and talk about extremists as the most important contribution from the Muslim community.

Don’t blame the Muslim community to justify your inbred racism; the terrorist groups aren’t a “Muslim problem”, they are what happens when a group cherry pick the good bits out of their religious text in order to push their agenda and rally against minorities.

 
Politicians do it every time they use their bible to rail against marriage equality, while eating at lobster shack. The catholic church threw their magical lord words into the mix with their heavy lobbying against birth control all the while the priests of their flock fiddled with young boys behind closed curtains.
 
I don’t equate every christian with the Westboro Baptist Church or the Ku Klux Klan. Nor do I  equate them with the cannibalistic Anti-Balaka christian militia who massacred Muslims including children. Nor do I consider every christian I meet to be a member of The Army of God who systematically murder doctors and bomb family planning clinics on a regular basis.
It’s these assholes that marginalise, demonise and antagonise minorities that drive the itchy trigger finger radicals to do some seriously dumb shit. There are millions of refugees scattered across the globe with no home because of these fundamentalist racist bigoted cunts on both sides of the fence.
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That a bunch of backwater pricks in the middle east cherry pick their Qu’ran for the sake of oppressing minorities; that the taliban and the daesh and all these other spoons are literally the middle eastern version of a redneck… does not mean every member of the religion should be tarred with the same brush.

Not every catholic is a kiddy-fiddling paedophile, not every christian is a homophobic abortion clinic bomber, not every Muslim is a fucking terrorist.

The Limit Does Not Exist

So regardless of whether you’re a fan or not, the Pokémon fever has been completely inescapable since last week. Love it or hate it, you have to marvel at the game-changing hype machine that has gripped the planet. But I’m not here to talk about the game itself or the subsequent flu it gave me from being dragged around the neighbourhood by my superfan wife at 11.30 at night in the middle of winter the day of release. I’m actually going to talk about this:

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Because apparently the things you like have to have an age limit.

Somewhere along the line being an adult crossing into mortgages, Tupperware parties, soul crushing jobs and not liking anything you grew up with? The same people decrying 30yr olds playing Pokémon Go are probably the same people that wouldn’t hesitate to chuck a $20 into a slots machine or bet on the races, or continuously send Farmville invites over Facebook until they are blocked into oblivion.

Maybe it’s just me and I’m meant to be tagging around with the lost boys or whatever, but I didn’t realise that growing up meant that you had to immediately cease liking all the things you like, and be “serious”. I have a Nerf gun collection downstairs, I collect action figures from terrible 90’s TV shows and will sit up with my partner binge watching Adventure Time because we’re adults and being an adult means you can do whatever the fuck you want with your free time and your money.

Maybe it’s a case of us Gen Y’ers yearning for nostalgia fests of Pokémon Go because for a few brief moments we can get out into the sun, and be reminded of a time when life was simpler and we weren’t facing insurmountable government debt, a housing market that is priced out of affordability for us, a shut window on our ability to tackle climate change and basically for five minutes try to forget that we are fucked on a global scale while we go and catch yet another fucking Zubat.

We have the “baby boomers” telling us constantly how “entitled we are” and how we want everything yesterday, as decreed by the generation that got free education and could by a house for $30,000. This from the generation who have fucked the housing market by buying up everything and negatively gearing their assets, pushing the average price of a house in Sydney to a bee’s dick below a million dollars, while incomes have not increased to the same inflation rate to cope, THUS ensuring that the “great Australian dream” was killed off by our predecessors. This from the generation who systematically fucked the environment with industry and continuously rail against climate change despite overwhelming fucking evidence to the contrary leaving the rest of us to deal with the catastrophic fallout. Can you honestly blame us for deciding to put on a hat and saying “fuck this shit, I’m headed out to catch Eevees”?

Dialling back on the nihilism for a moment, maybe it’s a case of other people feeling the need to validate their own choices by putting down others for perceived “childish things”. My partner once had some complete stranger tsk at her choice of ice cream in the supermarket freezer section, labelling it “childish”. What the fuck makes a Neapolitan style ice cream of Banana, Bubble Gum and Fairy Floss childish? You said “Fucking delicious” wrong you bitter cantankerous Luddite.

While the hype train is in overdrive for Pokémon Go, what many fail to realise is that it’s more than just a game. It’s exercise in disguise. It’s adventure via a phone app. This is modern technology aiding as a catalyst for people to get outside, get moving, explore the world around them and not be afraid to talk to people. I have talked to more complete strangers in the last four days than I think I ever have in my life. The game provides a social link across diverse boundaries and gives us common ground from the instant we spy the map on each other’s respective screens.

Yes it can be daunting to see a sea of people in the city staring intensely at their phones (moreso than the usual number of people staring at their phones anyway) or moving in huddled packs or racing down the street at 3 in the morning screaming “THERE’S A CHARMANDER DOWN AT THE PARK GUYS” – yes, I heard you there’s no need to wake the neighbourhood – but it’s ok, it’s just people having fun in the 21st century.

 

Why does anything that brings a person joy have to have an age limit? I don’t give a shit if you’re 20 and into knitting, or 50 and into My Little Pony. You should not be shamed about the things that make you happy just because some other asswipe feels that they need to fanoogle you into making the same choices they did to justify their own existence.

Do what you love when you want, because if that isn’t what being an adult is all about, then what’s the point of being up writing this article in my marvel pj’s eating froot loops with baileys instead of milk?