Dispatches from the Fury Road: Daily Hourly

Someone needs to remind 2022 that it’s time to go home.

The photo attached represents the last moment of clarity I have experienced in the last few weeks. Clear blue skies with the Adelaide summer heat filter applied. My childhood flush in my memories, staying up later than usual, jumping through the swirling strings of water created by my grandfather’s sprinkler. When the day gently transitioned into dusk and the Redeye cicadas would stretch their wings and sing their songs in the hopes of attracting a partner.

In my teenage years those summer nights were an invitation to revel in mischief and privacy. Walking suburban streets with friends, talking about important topics like:

“Who do you think is funnier: Robin Williams or Eddie Murphy? Yeah, I agree, Robin Williams.”

“Who are you barracking for in the cricket? The West Indies of course.”

“Who do you love? I’m not telling either but I will if you do.”

When the night was too warm to sleep and you roamed the streets with the friends you swore you’d keep forever but can now barely remember; the night clear and full of stars after the day had evaporated the clouds, and the moon glowed with a sharp outline like it had been drawn with the finest of fine tip markers, that is when your dreams flourished in technicolour and hinted at what you might experience as an adult. No rules. No parents wondering where you are. No one wondering when you’ll return home. All the secret places would be known and inviting. The possibilities stretched beyond your view, humming within the primordial soup of imagination.

These feelings returned as I viewed the sky and took that photo, looking like an alternate cover of You Am I’s “Hourly Daily”, a symbol of suburban roots and the contradicting desire that inspires me to run further away but also attempts to draw me towards so I can marinate in the comfort of its ingrained promises. I exhaled deeply and felt 2022 recede in that breath, invisible on the night, the only proof that it ever existed evident in my relaxed shoulders and curled posture.

That genuine peace would only last for a short amount of time.

It turns out that New Year’s Eve means nothing to the universe and is in fact just a random selection of numbers we’ve all agreed means something. The changing of the year has no bearing on the constellation of Ursa Major, and I am inclined to follow the Great Bear’s lead. This doesn’t feel like the start of a new set of months but instead feels like the previous year has decided to hang around just a little longer, the unwanted guest at the party who hasn’t noticed that everyone else has left and you really wish they’d leave so you can at least start to clean up the dirty plates, the broken glasses and the food that was mashed into the carpet.

In the first few weeks of 2023 I have discovered I am out of sorts, dancing to different rhythms that leave my dance partners confused and bemused. Even when I try to align with their movements it feels clumsy and forced. I am hearing a completely different song to the one they’re swaying along to. Most nights I have sat alone bathed in the Xanthic hue of the street lights and pondered where I need to be.

If only in my youth I hadn’t dreamed of a promising tomorrow, I might be quite content with today.

Everyone I know is burned out. We’ve all gone varying degrees of bonkers. For better or worse, none of us are the people we were only a few years ago. People react to words while ignoring meaning and intent. Arguments abound from aggressive reactions to sentences that weren’t spoken, bulls charging at imagined red flags. Compliments are discarded, as it appears face value holds little currency in the current climate. Instead they’re an excuse to mistrust the messenger, and return to the faux modesty we would prefer to express.

I worked diligently on embracing a positive outlook last year. I looked down the barrel of turning 50 and did my best to remove cynicism from my list of traits. Don’t let this fool you. This isn’t code for saying I chose to plunge my head into the sand to protect myself from the world. For starters I’d probably get dermatitis and the last thing I want to deal with is flaking skin coating my glasses like a scabby snow. I just made a choice to avoid cynicism so I could bypass the byproduct which for me is most notably anger. And like Bruce Banner, you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m hangry either, but that’s just more because I’ll eat like a Golden Retriever that has broken into the pantry while their parents are away. It is gross, uncomfortable and once seen, cannot be forgotten.

I also find people who still act jaded like they’re twenty-five-years-old are some of the most insufferable people to be around. Their tedious approach to life has outgrown their black jackets and childish adherence to what is important, to what is cool, and leaves them shouting slogans of self defeat that are hidden in their empty rhetoric like a parent hiding the broccoli under the mashed potato. To catch the endless waves of progress is to always be on your toes, and while that can be exhausting, when you do catch the latest bombora, it can be thrilling to discover the new and unfamiliar territories you find yourself in.

Even though it is ostensibly the start of the year, I’d love to slip away under the cover of night, free from the world I know and embrace whoever else I could be. What shape would my personality make when it is free of the constrictions of me and the friends I’m surrounded by? As I grow older I find I am reverting to my younger years, when as an only child I could while the night away with dreams of an interesting future. I feel comfortable being alone more than any time in my life and I wonder if that could be my bonkers way of evaluating recent history. I feel claustrophobic with expectations and explanations and know there must be a sweet spot out there, beyond the present and potentially within grasp, if only I could face in the right direction.

Who knows how many summers I have left? How many more times will I be able to look at that sky and feel the warmth of past hopes fuel the dreams of future achievements? For now I will reside in the comfort of my company and the goals I hope to achieve. Hopefully someone will finally tell 2022 to go home, you’re making an arsehole of yourself. Only then can we collectively exhale, find some grace in reconnection and share gossip about yesterday while revealing our hopes for tomorrow.

Justin Hamilton

Surry Hills

January 2023 (technically at least)