The pain was not like before: not like the shame and revenge that had fuelled my adventure to London, and not like the pain of being cheated on or lied to.
This was just the ache of pure grief, and what I discovered by not running from that ache was that grief can change us for the better, can bring out an honesty in us that will connect us to the whole of the human race, but only if we allow it to.
It’s been almost twenty years since I last saw him.
It’s incredible we’ve never bumped into each other, but we haven’t.
As far as I know, he’s not on Facebook. And he changed all his numbers, his address, all that.
I tried calling his mum once to say hi, to check if he was okay—she didn’t call back.
I guess that was the only way it was ever going to end for good: to treat it as a death and mourn it, which was what I did.
I mapped my way through my heartbreak as simply as I could: by sticking to the basics, just making sure the dog and cat were fed, I was fed, slept, watered, and that my journal and my guitar were close at hand.
This was also when I finally accepted that, although I was terrible at meditating, I was going to do it anyway. I suppose this marks the moment I first began my highly imperfect meditation practice.
That summer, I wrote my heart out; just me and my guitar, night after night, sitting on a leather couch by a bookcase, writing songs about all the things I didn’t want to be feeling, but was.
Through tears and more tears I recorded and recorded and rerecorded those songs onto cassette tapes, listened back, changed lyrics, went in again.
What was different this time was that I was telling my story, from my perspective, my lens, to myself, for myself, without hiding or apology.
If you have ever wanted to write a song and been paralysed by your own self-doubt, begin here: your story, to yourself, for yourself. No one ever has to hear them. That is what I told myself anyway, and it sure did help.
My dream, my songwriter dream, began to trickle back in. As I wrote I noticed something interesting. Although Frank would often show up before and after I’d written a song, he would rarely appear while I was writing a song, nor when I was singing it, or playing my guitar or piano. For some reason, when doing the work, my anxiety seemed to dry up.
Perhaps that’s why I played so much that summer; because when I was playing, I felt at my best. I sometimes just played the same three notes for an hour at a time, because, when I did, it made me happy, or gave me a place to be sad. Music did for me what it does for all of us: it took a pain so great I did not think I would survive and made it into something else. I must have written thirty songs that summer, starting with songs about the pain of goodbye (‘Sweet Pain’), and, later, the guilt of moving on (‘Another Love’), but this time, I kept going—I did not allow myself to get stuck in the drama—and I wrote songs about other things, like Defah’s dog Mozzie (‘Doggie Song’), and the ocean (‘Tide’), and sailing boats (‘Sailor’s Song’).
But the one I liked the most was the one about empty pockets. That’s the one that gave me the best feeling—truth and beauty, sadness and resolution.
And I suppose that this was the summer I finally worked it out … Well, look at that, I’m a songwriter. It didn’t matter to me that maybe no one else would ever hear my songs; what mattered was that I’d done my part. I’d written them. They existed. I had done my part.
This was also the summer I finally remembered what it felt like to get a good night’s sleep.
10
The story of music
Let it all out.
Go on say too much
Let someone know you.
Go go go.
‘ONE LITTLE RIVER’
(The Winter I Chose Happiness, 2012)
I can’t remember exactly when it was that I first began to sing; all I know is I have been singing for as long as I remember. It was just a thing I always did, and always loved and, for some reason, I just kept doing it, and kept loving it, and I still do to this very day.
That I got to grow up, and make my living doing this thing I love? Still, to this day, that fact absolutely blows my mind. And the way that all rolled out? That is a story so fortuitous that I’m not even sure you’ll believe me when I tell it.
But I swear—every word is true.
Without music, I’m not sure I’d be here. No really—my very origin story, the story of how my mum met my dad, is entirely thanks to music. Legend has it that one day my father was walking through the suburban streets of Melbourne when he heard rather exciting Hawaiian music coming from within one of the houses on the street. Curious as ever, he walked over to where the music was coming from, peered inside the window, and found himself face to face with a small band of young Dutch beatniks playing ukuleles. Naturally, as happens in all stories of this nature, my rather handsome young father was invited inside. This is how he made friends with my mother’s sister, Clascina, who later became his secretary, and it was because of this connection that, when my mother came to visit Australia for the first time, my dad met my mum.
I hope this comes out the right way, but there is nothing unique about the fact that I sang, and wrote songs, from an early age. So do all kids. That’s how we teach ourselves to
