Beneath Mistletoe

Mistletoe is the common name for many hemiparasitic plants in the order Santalales found all over the world from Europe to New Zealand and Australia. The name mistletoe comes from two Anglo Saxon words 'mistel', meaning dung, and 'tan' meaning stick. These plants attach to and penetrate the branches of a host tree by a structure called the haustorium, through which they absorb the host's water and nutrients.

Mistletoes grow on a wide range of host trees commonly stunting their growth. A heavy infestation may kill the host plant. Technically they are not parasitic but hemiparasitic. This is because they all do perform at least a little photosynthesis for a brief period of their lives. Just enough to tide them over until they're properly embedded. This self-support however, becomes academic in most species and the typical contribution is very nearly zero. Once they have attached to the circulatory system of the host, their photosynthesis reduces so far that its becomes insignificant. I guess it just doesn’t know any better, or care.

I have a friend who calls his partner "Mistletoe".  I used to think it was a cute Christmas nickname.  It spoke of joy and kisses: of Yuletide mirth. I always imagine they had met with an impromptu, obligatory kiss under the mystical, druidic decoration. I thought it explained their outward appearance of mirth and uncanny good luck. But now I’m not so sure.  To scratch the surface of any relationship is to peer into a Pandora’s box. How many relationships, I wonder, have formed under the influence of a parasite: a Mistletoe. 

Mistletoes are not to be confused with their nobler cousins, the epiphytes. Epiphytes are plants that also grow on a host tree, but are supported non-parasitically. A meeting of equals, epiphytes derive their water and nutrients independently; from the air and the rain. Spanish moss, bromeliads and staghorn ferns are examples. Some, the hemiepiphytes, end up as free standing trees in their own right.

I could cope with being Staghorn. Yes, that's a nickname I think I would rather like. Hell, we all need a bit of support from time to time. It even sounds kinda butch. Sure, it requires a bit more independence, but I'd rather be Staghorn than shit-on-a-stick any day. I guess he just didn't know any better. Or care. 

Fool’s Gold

Pyrite is the most common of the sulphide minerals.  Named from the Greek pyrites “in fire” because it would often create sparks when struck against metal, it is an iron sulphide with the chemical formula FeS2. The mineral’s metallic lustre and pale brass-yellow hue give it a superficial resemblance to gold, hence the well-known nickname of fool's gold.

  

Marcasite jewellery, made from faceted pieces of pyrite, was known since ancient times. It was most popular in the Victorian era and with Art Nouveau jewellery designers. Commonly made by setting small pieces of pyrite into silver to create cheaper costume jewellery it saved on expensive, valuable things like diamonds or gold. 

What better material can there be for our time? What more suitable item could there be for our modern disposable era, our hedging of bets and abandonment of authenticity?  I propose a resurgence in marcasite – in pyrite jewellery. Allow me to introduce the Partial Commitment Ring. The “you’ll do... …for now” ring. Fashioned from fool’s gold, surely this is the new must-have item for our time. Inexpensive and shiny. Capable of creating a spark, but not actually generating any sustaining warmth or light. Nothing says I-sort-of-love-you like pyrites. 

But the uses do not stop there. Commonwealth Games medals could be more appropriately struck from pyrites, better befitting the status of these events compared to, say the world championship or Olympics.  It should be the prerequisite jewellery for gay marriage: “I do, but the best man is also quite hot”. It’s the only material for a long service 'gold' watch that truly says to retiring employees after 25 years of loyalty "we appreciated your service, dear INSERT EMPLOYEE NAME HERE". 

So versatile. So cheap. So nasty. And as a result, ironically, now so authentic.

Pyrites. You’re worth it.

Malaysian Yoga

Hello class. Lie back with your hands next to your side and facing up. For this next while let's leave any day to day tensions behind. Lightly close your eyes, swallow and release the tension in your mouth, eyes, face.

Bring your focus to this room, and our time here together. Focus on the breath. Breathe deeply into you lungs for the count of four. Hold. Out again for four.

Again bring your mind to the space around us, and focus on my voice. This time is your holiday; a short business trip; a coming home to loved ones. Focus on this your journey. Somewhere warm, tropical. This room is your flight. It is a Malaysian airline.

Again focus on your breathing, and make sure that you take your own deep breath on a count of four - one - two - three - four - before you assist others in the room. Imagine all your cares and tensions being accidentally disintegrated by a careless missile fired from a nearby naval ship or a careless military unit, accidentally blasting them into smithereens, and gently saying oops. Observe all the tiny pieces being carefully collected and placed where no-one will ever find them, while all attention is diverted a few thousand kilometres away. 

Dump all the remaining contents of your mind now into a little black box, and toss it hopefully into the Indian Ocean or the shallow South China Sea.  Anywhere really.  It might as well be the Sea of Tranquility. Allow it to touch the ocean floor lightly, silently, softly enough to be mistaken for the gentle kick from a barfridge on a naval sonar search vessel.

Now allow all trace of your existence to vanish from the face of the earth.

I have a gay Haitian friend who's taken on the new nickname MH370: His black box is often missing in action, and he dreams nightly that the navies of five countries are probing deeply to discover its secrets.

The Build-up

It is an exquisite torture. The build-up they call it. Typically it hits Darwin in October. Sandwiched between the end of The Dry and the beginning of The Wet. The humidity skyrockets. The air is clammy and dense, visible. Every action promotes a lather of sweat: no mere glow, but a torrent. As the heat increases thunderstorms build, looming over the landscape. The sky seems low and enormously tall at the same time. Lightning crackles. Impossibly, the humidity increases. You can hear the water vibrating in the air, your veins and your head. Poised to condense, to bucket down, to explode.  The very air is delirious. Thoughts stymie, fester. Actions become animalistic, driven by moisture and electricity. The madness increases. Fullness wells and the desire for the relief a downpour would bring is unbearable. The sky darkens and by late afternoon the expectation of gushing rain is palpable.  Imminent. And imminent. And imminent.

Not a drop falls. No torrent. No relieving shower. Not even a smear.

Night comes with no relief and as the tropical sun rises early the next morning it begins again. Mad. Frustrating. Unspent.

It can go on for weeks.  Suicide rates skyrocket in line with the humidity. Wardrobes fill with mould. Tensions rise, until some time in November, or in bad years December, the monsoon finally hits. The build-up breaks and the land is flooded with sweet, fresh rain.

A friend of mine once described his relationship like the build-up. The levels of desire were high, building as the day wore on, but there was no activity in the bedroom.  Or in any other room for that matter. No amount of talking about the monsoon, or the benefits of a downpour ever seemed to result in rain. Tensions were escalating.

He had been given some advice by a close friend of his: keep a sex diary. Record just the facts. Perhaps the frustration was clouding his judgement. Log what happened or didn't. Who did what to whom or didn't. No colour or embellishment. A weather station.  A wet-bulb thermometer. A rainfall gauge.

So he did.

Eleven days nothing. Two days at first base then 19 days nothing. It went on for a couple of months.

He told me that the experience had taught him important lessons, however, which I can share with you.

Communication is critically important. Be sure and check the fine print. If someone says they will be rooting like rabbits come the weekend, then perhaps they mean rabbits struck with myxomatosis. Or chocolate Easter rabbits: sweet but inert. The only messages worth listening to are embedded in actions. Marketing without sales is a bankrupt proposition.

In cases where chemical assistance is required, Viagra is a fantastic and very effective drug. But like all drugs, it has its limitations. The most critical of which is that if you don't take it, it is very unlikely to work. Leaving it in the foil does offer certain economic benefits, but these are offset by efficacy problems (even of placebo effect). I could say the same about paracetamol and headaches.

The most important piece of advice he had for me, however, was that if you ever feel you have got to the point where you need to keep a sex diary with your boyfriend, there is an important thing you must first do. Move on. Seriously! Men who live together and don't have sex are called flatmates.

For good

"I've heard it said", sings Glinda in the musical Wicked, "that people come into our lives for a reason, bringing something we must learn, and we are led to those who help us most to grow if we let them, and they help us in return." Is this true? Does it bear up to scrutiny?

I have spent a while examining my string of failed romances, aborted launches, and false starts. I’ve pondered what occurred, as forensically as a participant can. A serious reckoning. I stopped short of 360 degree feedback ala Nick Hornby (though I was tempted by the thought of actually interviewing all my former partners!) but still 'high fidelity' unlike so many of them. An alchemical accounting rather than an intellectual exercise. I put on my winged helmet and sandals, held my caduceus and stood in judgement over my failures.

What reasons have people come into my life? Have I been trained and guided by their influence? Did they help me most to grow? Perhaps, but I feel like I have been pulled up by the roots at regular intervals and pruned, twisted and stunted. In effect, bonsaied.

Although the word 'bon-sai' is Japanese, the art it describes, 'pun-sai' originated in China. The earliest containerised trees were peculiarly-shaped and twisted specimens from the wilds. They could not be used for any practical, ordinary purposes such as lumber or firewood. Their grotesque forms were reminiscent of yoga postures, bent-back on themselves, re-circulating vital fluids. 

Who can say if I've been changed for the better? But I have been changed for good.

Best Before

I was on a first date the other day. We'd chatted for ages on dating apps etc and, well, you know how it is; people are busy and calendars are hard to align and, well, if you're not really sure or feeling a bit stretched... it had been years of chatting, quiet admiration, and unspoken expectation. The date was great. A lovely, summery, January day. We had lunch. He was clever, compact, charming, considerate, cheeky. And that's only the 'c's. The other letters were just as good. We clicked. An instant connection.

Ideal really. There was one downside though. Just one. It emerged towards the end of the date. Just one downside, but it was a biggie. He was poised to leave the country. Permanently. Or for years at least. Off on an adventure. July at the earliest, but more likely October. In other words, he had a "use-by date". A "best before".

Ok. Deep. Breaths.

And then the most unexpected thing happened. The connection deepened. We could let down the firewalls, lower the drawbridges, send home the guards. There was no need for barriers. This was zero risk. Breach the walls, have the keep. Our levels of intimacy skyrocketed. We could share and be vulnerable. It wasn't an investment any longer - no need for compound interest. It was a holiday bromance, but in our own town, with our familiar settings and comforts. A feast to be consumed, not a harvest to be extended. We went to movies, the theatre, dinners, camping, and quiet nights in. No need for family introductions and getting on with friends. And it was good. Or so I thought.

Until one day, at the end of May. You're probably thinking it was the departure day. That the use by date had arrived. No, it was much worse. We were at the beach. He said that he had started to develop feelings for me. "What" I said. "But you can't be! That's not what we agreed. You're going away! You can't be doing that". It was a breach of contract! Accidentally in love.

Arguably I think we only ever really fall in love accidentally. It can be a very painfully transient thing. “But that was love and it’s an ache I still remember” says Gotye. Real love, the best love, sneaks up on you and you're gone before you can escape. Stitched up. But this? This was a Kobayashi Maru. A no-win situation. Stay here with me and abandon your dreams? Fall for him and abandon my heart as he abandons the country. It collapsed. Perhaps we'll be friends. Another one that got away. Perhaps The One, that got away.

I now think that all boyfriends should come with a best before date. It would just save such a lot of angst.

How ironic though, that the use-by date turned out not to be the use-by date.

Indian Summer Haiku

I wrote these Haiku in May 2006. It never ceases to amaze me how the angle of the sun, the smell of the air and the bittersweet fall of summer into autumn into winter always brings me back to that time. My darkest days. The breaking of the world. And beginnings.

Night swimming
sandy salty skin

nestle into warm strong arms

until breakfast kiss.

Winter apart
cold nights warm with dreams

now a chance for men to rest

together apart.

Chris
winter sun bring home

my beautiful traveler

his shoes by my bed.

Pizza night
eyes of sleepy kids

kitchen tables full of kneading

in my heart flowers.

Galacto-intolerance

In Lady Windermere's Fan, Oscar Wilde writes, “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” Are you looking at the stars? I don’t mean Beyoncé and Rihanna. I mean the heavens; celestial objects; stars. How long is it since you saw a real life star?

The word galaxy comes from the Greek for milk. Why? Galileo Galilei published his astronomical observations of the skies above Padua in 1610. One of his findings was that the Milky Way is made up of individual stars. How could people not know it was made of discrete stellar objects. Did people really think the Milky Way was some kind of aerial fluid? Galileo wrote that the light from the Milky Way was so bright that it cast a shadow on the ground. What if, back then, the light from all those stars was so bright, so solid, it really did resemble a smear of milk? 

Our night skies are now polluted with so much artificial light it has been estimated we are no longer able to see 90 percent of the stars we might once have seen. Our vision is literally clouded with light bouncing back to the ground off our smog and mists.  A particulate reflection of nothing in particular. How ironic that our post enlightenment age has brought darkness to our heavens. A luminous beauty is concealed from us. Our society has made us all galacto-intolerant. A split milk over which we should most definitely cry.

If you want to bask in the natural illumination, you've got to travel to a remote area where the darkness is deeper. Perhaps we all need to find somewhere profoundly dark and distant before we can see clearly again. To lose the reflection of our dissipated energies. And then, some of us can look up and see the stars. Got you lookin' so crazy right now. You and I. You and I, like diamonds in the sky.