Well, not about who I am, that will unfold over time and you will only come to know me if you have the will or the desire to know me. No, I will just tell you about what I do. Of course, what I do is not what I am. Of course I'm still trying to figure out who I am, no, don't laugh, I  mean, can you put your hand on your heart and tell me with all honesty that you know your self all too well? 

I mean what would be the point of that? The very thought of waking up in the day or morning (whatever) and knowing that I had lost the ability to surprise myself... well, what would be the point of getting out of bed? That wouldn't be life, that would be existance. A pretty stagnant existance at that. 

Oh, I have digressed, I was going to tell you about what I do wasn't I? I suppose you could say that I work on the internet. I provide technical support. I make sure that people can connect. I talk them around their machines uninstalling and reinstalling stuff on their machines. Some people think that this job is juat about *troubleshooting* and fixing things, but I don't like to think of it like that. I hate that word. That is a nonsense. I don't shoot trouble... I ask questions and if I ask the right questions I can get to the bottom of the problem. I ask questions dilegently, I find that asking questions  has always come easy to me. I have never been happy taking things at face value. Have you? 

It's been quiet tonight in work. Quite restful really. Gave me plenty of time to ponder my navel, think my thoughts, and dream my dreams.  I am your classic 30 something slacker. Overqualified and under motivated. I am incapable of seeing this job as a career. In fact if I am being honest, the idea of a 'career' makes my flesh crawl. I can hear my father urging me to join the civil service, 'A job for life Ton, a job for life...' Fancy scaring a 12 year old with a prospect like that, no wonder I turned out the way I did. At all costs I had to avoid making a career out of a life sentance. 

One of my earliest memories (of language) was of delight in a word. I couldn't have been more than 4 or 5. I was not in school that day and I watched an Open University programme, it was about water, I learnt two things from it. Firstly, I learnt that water had a kind of skin, and second, water was made up of things called molecules which were smaller than we could see. I remember being full of these two new found truths when it came to bathtime that evening, babbling about them to my mother and trying to get really close to the water to see if I could see it's skin and if I could make out the shape of these molecules. They said on the programme that everything was made of molecules. From then on in, I tried to view the world more closely. Nothing ever seemed quite the same after that revelation. 

Anyway, now you know what I do. You may, or may not come to know who I am, that is up to you, you have a mind of your own, don't you? What I haven't yet told you is what I am. 

I am an artist. 

Are you going to ask me what an artist is? 

I hope not, because I am still trying to figure out what that means. I'm not so sure that I want to find a definitive answer to the question either. I mean at the end of the day it's the process that is the interesting thing, that is the bit where you learn new things about it. The product is relly just a relic of where you went. 

I suppose it's like my search for the perfect pebble. Everytime I go to a beach I scour the sand for the 'perfect' pebble. The 'perfect' pebble is small (not more than an inch and a half) and symetrically rounded. It's white, and opaque and flawless. I am always pleased that I never find it because what would be the point of owning such a pebble? I know that there is a danger that I might one day find that pebble, I know what I would do, I would hurl it into the sea and carry on looking for the next 'perfect' pebble. It's not the pebble that I  want, it's the experience of the variety that I find under my feet that brings me the joy. The point is though, if  I was not looking for a particular pebble I would not pay attention to all the other small stones that litter the beaches and my life would be just that little bit poorer because of it. 
 

My dad brought them home for me one day and procceeded to build a 'bogey' for me. Now our house was built on a hill, it was in a small close which led to a slightly more main road at the bottom, and although it wasn't a majorly busy road, even then it was a close favoured by driving instructors for the practice of reversing around  corners. The bogey was a simple construction, a pair of the wheels fixed to a large board and the other pair of wheels,  mounted onto a thicker piece of wood with a hole drilled into the centre and this was bolted onto the plank. Steering was achived by the addition of a bit of rope tied to either end of the front wheels. Being ever mindful of safety issues (he had worked as a safety officer in the pits), Dad concluded that a brake would be a good idea, so he screwed on a smaller pivoting piece of wood that we could jam against the front wheel thus bringing the bogey to a halt before the rider disappeared under the wheels of a passing car. 

The brake was always the first thing to go. In all the incarnations of bogey we (myself and the lad across the road, Nigel) never did get much further on brake design. We were such speed freaks too, which of course compounded the problem. We would get the cart off at a good fast start and leave it till the last availible moment before we would slam hard on the brake. This made the brake, breaking off just when you needed it most, an all too common experience. I think we spent that one summer chasing that awsome moment where we would find ourself hurtling down the hill and the brake would come away in our hand and we had no option but to slam our feet to the floor, bail out, or try to roll the cart to a stop before  disappering under a car. 

This experience did not prepare me very well for using brakes on the bike. When I had gotten the hang of cycling on the flat with just the one stableizer I felt confident enough to attempt the downhill run. Dead easy, just balance and brake at the bottom... 

No one had explained to me that brakes on bikes were not like brakes on bogeys.  I guess I was too young to have cottoned onto the idea that the two brakes on the bike would not have the same effect, so when I slammed hard on the brakes (and mainly with the front one) I went sailing arse over tit over the handle bars, nothing broken, but I learnt the hard way. Although it smarted like hell at the time, I can remember the real desire to experience the thrill of sailing down a hill fast again, and as soon as possible...

And when all my friends got silly over horses, well, I didn't. I discovered what fear was then, and kept my distance from the muscled monsters whose stamping, snorting, head-tossing energy struck me as barely-contained violence. 

None of this tells you who I am, but you can probably figure out that I always seemed to be out of step with my peers. Not much has changed since then, since the time that I was the little Pommie migrant kid who 'talked funny.' I'm probably the only Australian on the planet that can't swim! In a country renowned for brash, bronzed, sporting hero types, I am the archetypal indoorsy shrinking violet. 

If I thought about my ideal existence, it would be this: 

I would be a recluse, alone with my books and my cats, only venturing out for supplies, and to observe the world around me without actually taking part. It's a bit of a joke really that I spend my days centre-stage, performing for unreceptive adolescent boys who don't give a shit about Shakespeare, who think poetry is for poofs, and whose aim in life appears to be getting through high school without learning anything. Driving me insane along the way is an added challenge for them. 

It's not like I thought it would be. From the first time I set foot in a classroom, a wide-eyed little cherub, my goal was to be the teacher. Now I'm there I find the playing field has changed, and so have many of the rules. I don't want to play anymore. I want a new game.