Saved By Seinfeld

The near break-in that happened in my area at 4:00am nearly two weeks ago changed my life. I was absolutely petrified of being in the house at night, especially during the early hours. Mum stayed up with me for a few nights and we watched television together, but then I realised it wasn't good for her health, so she went back to sleeping normal hours.

As for me, I've settled into a routine of watching television in Mum's lounge room at the front of the house, near her bedroom. I actually started binge-watching Seinfeld, and I have it turned up really loud. I checked the volume with Mum and she said she couldn't even hear it. 

I never realised how funny Seinfeld is. I literally laugh out loud, and there aren't many shows that make me do that. Over the course of my life, a couple of people have told me that Seinfeld reminds them of me because the characters focus on the little everyday things in life and somehow find amusement in them.

Seinfeld makes me feel better and safer. Because I have it up so loud, I also feel like it would deter anyone from breaking in because it definitely sounds like someone is awake inside the house. So, in many ways, I was saved by Seinfeld.

My fear remained at an extremely high intensity for about a week. I had this sickly feeling in the pit of my stomach, and my chest was unbelievably tight. In my head, everything seemed to swirl, and I felt like I could faint at any unexplained sound. The best way I can describe it is that I felt completely vulnerable to anyone who might have been lurking around the neighbourhood at night. I felt like the locks were weak, that anyone could get in if they wanted to, and that it was my job to fend them off—to protect Mum and myself.

At the height of that fear, I discovered footprints near the driver's side of my car. You can see two views of the larger footprints below:

If you look closely at the photo below, you'll notice a number of different types of shoe prints.

Seeing these footprints made everything feel very real to me. I tried to think of what other explanation there could be for whose footprints they were, but I kept coming back to the same conclusion: they were most likely left by people looking to steal my car. Mum and I don't wear shoes like that, and no one else wanders around our front yard. Even if they weren't planning to steal my Beetle, they were well into our driveway, somewhere they had no reason to be. That really stirred me up.

I was already dealing with what felt like an unmanageable level of fear, but seeing physical evidence that people had been on our property was extremely unsettling. They didn't steal either Mum's car or mine, and as far as I know they didn't try to break into the back door. None of those facts brought me any comfort at the time.

But now, a little while later, I don't care. I really don't care if someone breaks in, scares me, or causes me physical harm, but I will do anything to protect my mother. I still have the sickly feeling in the pit of my stomach, and my chest is tight. I feel like I could faint, and those feelings have intensified a thousandfold since those intruders were on our street. But this time, they're due to a completely unrelated incident.

To give you a bit of background on what's been going on, my brother and I have had a fight over Mum's finances. I have been looking after them for the past year or so, and my brother thinks I haven't managed her finances as well as I should have, so he's going to take over. He's made me feel like I've really let her down. The truth is, money is not my strong point.

I want to be absolutely clear about one thing. I have never, ever taken money from my mother, and I never would. If anything, I have often transferred my own money to Mum when she needed it. It's just that everything has become a little messy, and my brother is right. Her finances are looking pretty bleak in general.

I'm not a crier, but for the past few days I have cried like a baby. How do I look my mother in the eye if I've let her down? That's the part that keeps breaking me. I started imagining the worst. What if someone thought I had stolen from her? What if I ended up in legal trouble because the accounts looked so disorganised?

I know I haven't done anything wrong, but I feel like I have. I feel like I've let down my mother's parents, whom I never met but who loved her so much. And here I am, not taking better care of her finances.

Do you want to know what else this has made me realise? I am completely alone. Completely. Most people might say something like that, but they usually have at least one friend they can call and talk to. I literally have no one. No family and no friends. I have Mum, but I can't talk to her about this because I feel so awful that I want to cry every time I bring it up.

But perhaps being alone isn't entirely a bad thing. I'm not going to kill myself, not now and not ever, although I did seriously think about death while all of this was happening. I like the idea of wandering through life completely alone. I don't want friends or family around me. I genuinely just want to be alone, and I think I'm going to build my life around that.

But for now, my focus is on Mum. The heartbreaking part is that I don't even want to be around her because I feel so gut wrenchingly terrible about what has happened with her finances. I never acted with bad intentions, but it has become clear that I haven't been capable of managing her money the way I should have.

I remember that well before my father was diagnosed with dementia, I was giving my opinion on something. I think it was a political issue, perhaps marriage equality. I remember Dad looked me in the eye and said, "You don't know anything. You literally don't know a thing about anything." That has always stuck with me.

This incident with Mum's money is something I will never get over because it feels like all the mistakes I made growing up, where Dad would usually have to step in and fix things. I think about the time I didn't wake up one morning while I was living in my unit at Frewville. My work had called Mum and Dad's house, so Dad contacted the real estate agent and came to unlock the door just to make sure I was okay.

These two incidents, the potential intruders and everything that has happened with Mum's finances, have been life changing. I don't feel like the same person I was before them. Everything seems so much clearer now.

My brother has shown some kindness because he has seen how much this has upset me, but he has also not made himself particularly available over the past few days. He was probably the only person I had in this world.

So here's what I am going to do. From now on, I am not going to engage with anyone beyond a superficial level. That is, apart from Mum, of course, but she is slowly slipping away. I don't want anyone else in my life, and I also don't think I can have anyone in my life because I don't feel equal to them anymore.

I am going to apply for a casual job at the Centre, which is somewhere I desperately wanted to work before but missed out on an interview. They are recruiting again later in the year, and I have spoken to the contact person, who said I am welcome to apply again.

I am also starting a qualification on Monday through TAFE NSW. It is a Certificate IV in Arts and Cultural Administration. The course runs for six months, with online classes on Mondays and Tuesdays. It is expensive, but I paid for it using only my own money, not Mum's.

I am doing this course for one reason: to help me get a casual job at the Centre, where I would genuinely love to work. I think that if I could get even two shifts a week there, it would bring me a little bit of joy. I don't feel like I deserve that joy, but I still want it.

I may not be capable of managing Mum's money, but I am more than capable of spending every day with her, taking her to appointments, driving her around in my Beetle, and doing everything I can to make her days comfortable and full of laughter.

It's funny, as I write this I'm sitting in my lounge room at the back of the house. The doors open out onto the driveway where our cars are parked. A week ago I couldn't even walk into this room at night, but now I really don't care. I don't care about my physical safety. I really hope this feeling goes away, but the fear I have at the moment is so much bigger than intruders breaking in. It's about being seen as someone who tried to screw over their own mother. 

I haven't started my volunteer role calling people on home detention yet. I have to drop some forms into the office next week and then, hopefully, I'll be inducted into the computer system and be good to go. After the potential intruders, I was hesitant about continuing with the volunteer role simply because I thought that, if there are people who wish to bring harm to us, I don't want to be talking to them. But the thing is, life is complicated, and I still want to sit with people, even in their wickedness, and check that they are okay.

Something that makes Mum and me really happy is that on Thursday nights we go to the hairdresser at the shopping centre just up the road from us. We both see the same hairdresser, Stella. She's really funny, and she's really into true crime, so we spend a lot of time talking about that. Last Thursday, Mum and I both had our hair coloured, which felt good because my roots definitely needed doing.

Below you can see a photo of the basins in the salon, along with some of the chairs in front of the mirrors.

The salon isn't as glamorous or modern as my old hairdresser's, but it's much more reasonably priced, and I like our hairdresser a lot more. She only works on Thursday nights and Saturday mornings, but so far, we haven't missed out on an appointment.

So, the age-old question I've wrestled with for years is: should I be an artist or should I be a writer? The question always comes up whenever I feel like studying one of the two disciplines.

I suppose you could say that a writer is an artist, but it doesn't quite feel the same to me. Writing is more about word smithing and storytelling, whereas art communicates in a completely different way.

I've got my Certificate IV starting on Monday, and I think it's a really good idea to finish that qualification even if I don't end up getting a job at the Centre. But in the background I've also got my Bachelor of Journalism. The Bachelor of Journalism is online through Adelaide University and is run over four terms each year, so you only study two subjects per term. That's manageable alongside the Certificate IV, and I don't even have to leave the house to do it.

I chose journalism because my long-term goal is to lock myself away in a room in my Housing Trust house and just write. Write books, write blog posts, write letters... just write. I'm actually waiting on some money so I can get removalist's to move my computer setup into the spare room and turn it into a dedicated writing room. Once that's done, I'm going to start writing my book about the judges. I tend to write a lot in a single night, so I should be able to make substantial progress by the end of the year.

If I were ever lucky enough to have a book published, I would do so under a pen name. My goal is to move through this life completely undetected, under the radar, and when I'm gone it will be as though I was never here.

But then there is conceptual art. I genuinely think I was born for it. I love writing letters and collecting oaths, and I have a number of projects on the go at the moment. I've already sent off my letters requesting police officer oaths, so now I have another project out there in the world.

I wanted to create something for the State Attorney-General. I've never met him, but in the space of a few months I've seen him out in public twice. The first time was at the Art Gallery, where I saw him wandering around with his entourage. The second time I saw him walking down Franklin Street near the GPO.

Apart from those two chance sightings, I've always liked him, so my first idea was to collect oaths from attorneys-general around the world. Then I read his Wikipedia page and discovered that he has a fondness for sausage rolls.

That sent me down a rabbit hole. I researched the history of the sausage roll and discovered that it originated in the United Kingdom. So I wrote to bakeries across the former British Empire, asking about sausage rolls in their country and in their bakery. I also wrote to 75 bakeries in the UK. I've got another 75 letters to send to bakeries around Australia, but I'm going to wait a little while so that the dates on all the responses are a bit closer together. Below, you can see some of my sausage roll letters being sent off into the magical postal network at the post office.

I'm really not doing too well at the moment. The letters distract me for a while, but these two life-changing events have changed my life forever. And it's all happened just before I turn 45.

I had arranged for Mum and me to go out to dinner with my friend Rebecca and her mother for my birthday next month, but I think I'm going to cancel it. I don't want to interact with anyone. I can put on a smile at work, but I don't want any interactions outside of that, and I'm going to be true to that.

I can still send my conceptual artworks to the people they are intended for, but I won't engage with them. I won't engage with anyone except Mum, and I'll also have to engage with my brother but it doesn't really count seeing as he lives a million miles away. 

If Only For Nostalgic Purposes

I'm sitting here on the black leather sofa in my mother's living room at the front of the house. It's freezing cold. I've got the air conditioner on cool again because the heater switches itself off once the room reaches a certain temperature, and for some reason it won't stay on all night. The air conditioner is on because I need the noise it makes, and I need it now more than ever. But I'll go into that in more detail later.

Mum's sitting on the sofa beside me, watching Emily in Paris from the very beginning. I like having it on in the background while I write because we've watched it so many times that it feels very familiar to me.

I'm wearing a knee length black nightie with love hearts on it, and I've got a beige shawl around my shoulders and arms to keep warm. It feels like forever since I last wrote, so I'll fill you in on what's been going on with me.

Two weeks ago today, on Wednesday 24 June, Mum and I made a trip to Service SA to pick up a Fitness to Drive form for her. She had been given one after being diagnosed with mild dementia. Her geriatrician told us she could continue driving, provided a doctor completed the form and she passed a driving assessment.

We had the original form filled in by a doctor, who then told us we also needed an optometrist to complete part of it before Mum could sit the driving test. Somewhere amongst all the red tape, we managed to lose the form altogether, which is what led us back to Service SA.

It's almost impossible to get a park at Service SA Tranmere during the day, so I hatched a plan to arrive at 8:30am, grab a park, and wait until it opened at 9:00am. We managed to get a spot right out the front and settled in to wait.

As 9:00am drew closer, we noticed people walking up to the front door, reading the sign, and then turning around and leaving. I couldn't work out why, so I got out of the car to have a look for myself.

If you look closely, you'll see that on Wednesdays it doesn't open until 9:30am. I suspect they have a staff meeting beforehand because I noticed groups of staff walking together in the same direction. With another half an hour to wait, Mum and I made ourselves comfortable in the car, and before long a queue began to form outside, as you can see below.

It felt like such a government morning. People were waiting in line for their motor rego needs and other government business. Many stood there clutching forms in their hands, and just like us, they were hoping to be among the first through the doors so they could get on with their day. Eventually, I jumped out of the car and joined the back of the queue.

When they finally opened the doors, I didn't have to wait long. I was greeted by a lovely woman who asked how she could help. I explained that I needed another Fitness to Drive form for Mum. She went and grabbed one for me, and before long Mum and I were on our way.

As for my own car issues, I still hadn't heard anything about the red Beetle. I'd pretty much given up. The following day, on Thursday night, I went to the hairdresser, and they asked me about the car and whether I'd managed to get it. I said no, but just talking about it inspired me to write to Peter one last time and ask whether the car was still available. I sent the following message:

"I just want to ask if there is still any possibility of purchasing this car. It's been a week now, and if it is possible, can you let me know? If it's not possible, could you also let me know so I can look at something else? Thanks, Me."

I received a message back almost straight away asking where I was located. I responded and asked whether if he'd received my previous messages because I'd been trying to contact him for a week.

A woman replied and said she had taken over selling the car for her father, who had fallen ill. Then I went in for the kill. I asked if I could buy the car and said I'd come and pick it up the following day.

She responded that there was another potential buyer, but if that sale fell through, I was next on the list. I was so angry. I assumed she'd read my previous messages so I responded with this message:

"Listen, I know it probably wasn't your intention to be rude, but you can take me off the list.

Just so you know, I think the way I was treated over this car was unbelievably unfair, and the whole experience has taught me not to trust these sorts of websites.

I wish your father good health, and I wish you all the best with the sale."

She then wrote back and apologised. From what she said, I realised she probably hadn't seen the messages I'd sent her father, and I could see how things might have got lost along the way. So I just left it.

On Friday morning, she sent me another message saying the prospective buyer was unable to view the car until the following week. She didn't want to hold onto it for that long, and said I was welcome to come and see it that afternoon if I was still interested.

It didn't take much convincing. I jumped right on it and arranged for Mum and me to catch an Uber to the lady's house. I was so determined to buy the car that I was prepared to do it without even inspecting it.

The lady asked for cash, which meant I had to go to the bank and withdraw the money. Before I knew it, Mum and I were sitting in an Uber on our way to Springfield to pick up my bright red Beetle.

We arrived at the house and it was an absolute mansion. The first thing that struck me was how secure it looked. Whilst I'm sure a house like that would attract criminal attention, it had a high fence and an intercom system. Through the fence, I caught my first glimpse of the little red Beetle, and I instantly loved it. But, if I'm being honest, I already knew I loved it. It was like that Savage Garden song: I Knew I Loved You. I knew I loved it before I met it.

The lady and her husband came out to greet Mum and me, and we naturally gravitated towards the Beetle. She opened the driver's door for me and I climbed in while Mum settled into the passenger seat. I simply handed over the cash without asking a single question.

Sitting there, I knew the only thing I wanted that day was to drive away in that little car. I didn't really care about any imperfections. It appeared to be in good condition, although it didn't have a log book, but by that stage it simply didn't matter to me.

As the lady and her husband counted the money, I asked how her father was. She told me he had liver cancer and was on borrowed time. Suddenly, all of my previous communication with him made a lot more sense. We spoke about him for a little while before saying our goodbyes, and then Mum and I simply drove away.

It's an older car and it makes a few noises that I still can't quite pinpoint, but I absolutely love it, and I couldn't have been happier with my purchase.

When we got home, I parked the Beetle on the road and we went inside. A little while later, I went back outside to drive the bug into the driveway. When I put the key in the ignition, it wouldn't start, and the battery light came on.

I couldn't believe it. But, strangely enough, I didn't care as much as I probably should have. It crossed my mind that the previous owners might have known the battery was on its last legs, but even if they had, it didn't really matter to me.

I called the RAA and ended up buying a new battery. The RAA man was a little bit creepy, but he was also nice, so I suppose the two qualities cancelled each other out. Below you can see two photos of the RAA man replacing the battery.

Below you can see my beautiful little red Beetle parked on the side of the road behind the glowing rear lights of the RAA van as the sun went down.

I took the following two photos of the Beetle in daylight after parking it in the driveway, so you can get a better look at it.

At the same time I took the above photos, I swung the camera around and took a few pictures of the work site across the road.

Below you can see some of the heavy machinery.

As you can see, the site has been fenced off quite extensively.

After the excitement of getting my new car and photographing my neighbour's work site, I had been waiting for 1 July to purchase the international stamps for my police oath project. I waited until then because that was when the price of international postage increased, and I wanted to make sure my letters had the correct postage before they made their way around the world.

The 1st was last Wednesday, and I jumped in the Beetle and took Mum along for the drive. We pointed the car towards the city and headed to what is now the most underwhelming GPO. I knew the historic General Post Office had been turned into a hotel, but I thought they would have kept some sort of iconic post office there, if only for nostalgic purposes. I was wrong. The new GPO is a small, simple post shop on Franklin Street. The sentimental side of me was extremely disappointed.

I had made a list of all the stamps I needed, separating them into Zones 1 to 5. It was my expectation that, being Adelaide's central post office, they would have the new stamps in stock. Once again, I was wrong.

I asked the first woman who served me for the stamps. There were 197 in total, but I honestly don't think that's too much to ask of this post office. If any post office in Adelaide was going to have the new stamps, surely it would be the GPO.

She didn't know anything about the zones, so she went out the back and brought out a young man to help me. He told me they didn't have the new stamps, so he had to make them up using the stamps they already had in stock. That was annoying because these weren't self adhesive stamps. They had to be moistened before being stuck onto the envelopes, and when you're making up the postage with multiple stamps, it can be quite time consuming. Still, it wasn't the end of the world.

It took him quite a while to put the order together. While I was waiting, I called Mum, who was sitting in the Beetle in a carpark close by, and apologised for taking so long.

When he finally finished and I paid more than $1,300 for the stamps, he asked me which business I was purchasing them on behalf of. I told him they were just for personal use. And get this. He then asked me my name.

I couldn't believe it. I felt like I had to justify my stamp usage to Australia Post. Why did they want my name? Can't a private citizen spend more than a thousand dollars on stamps without being questioned?

I gave him my name, then asked why he needed it. He smiled, shook his head slightly, and I said, "That sort of violates privacy in a way, don't you think?" He replied, "Yes, I agree with you."

But just like the Beetle, I was far too excited about these stamps to dwell on it. I took them home and immediately started sticking them onto my pre prepared envelopes. Below you can see some of the beautiful stamps I purchased for my police letters.

The letters requesting the oaths were already folded and sealed inside their envelopes. I had dated them 3 July to give myself a little extra time to prepare everything before sending them out, and I was so excited to finally release them into the big, wide, global postal network.

On Friday morning, I got up early and took the letters to the post office. I used to drop large mail outs like this into post boxes, but they're now few and far between. It had also been raining, and I didn't want the envelopes to get wet.

I used to have a very good relationship with Jimmy, the older Chinese man who owned my local post office, but he's retired now and I haven't really warmed to the new owner. He's a younger Asian man who doesn't speak the best English, which I don't judge, but more than anything he simply doesn't seem to care about my letter writing projects.

I felt a little awkward leaving the police oath letters there because I hadn't purchased the stamps from him. With Jimmy, I used to order the stamps through the post office and they would arrive about a week later. I liked doing that because Jimmy would fuss over the projects a little, whereas the new owner couldn't care less.

Still, I walked into the little post office with a grin as wide as the Cheshire Cat and placed my envelopes on the large scales on the counter. I took the following two photos.

Later on Friday, Mum and I went to Baby Bunting to buy some gifts for Mum's great nephews. The only reason I mention it is because I always call Baby Bunting "Baby John Bunting", after John Bunting from the Snowtown murders. I took the following photo out the front.

When I was in Tanzania in 2018 and 2019, I became really sick. I have never been that sick before. I wasn't vomiting or suffering from flu like symptoms. It was so much more than that. It was an overwhelming, relentless nausea, coupled with an inability to move. I would lie there for hours, feeling as though I were trapped somewhere between consciousness and unconsciousness. I honestly believed my body was simply going to shut down and die.

I was staying alone in an apartment, and I would spend hours awake during the night searching the internet, trying to work out what could possibly be wrong with me. So many of the results pointed towards cancer, and the more I read about different types of cancer, the more convinced I became that I had one of them.

Looking back now, I think that was the period when I truly realised that cancer and other terrible illnesses are a reality. They could happen to me, or to anyone I love, at any time. I'd always been aware of cancer, but it had always seemed so far removed from my own life. It was something that happened to other people.

My time in Tanzania wasn't really a realisation of my own mortality. It was more a realisation that there are forces in this world that can suddenly strike without warning, causing immense suffering or even taking your life. Until then, those forces had always felt distant. In Tanzania, they suddenly felt very close.

Thankfully, my mystery illness passed, but the stark reality of ill health, and cancer in particular, stayed with me. I had to learn to live with the fact that the risk is very real, and that I somehow have to get through the rest of my life without living in constant fear of becoming terminally ill.

I think I've managed that. I'm still pretty unhealthy. I'm fat, although I am losing weight, and at the moment I think I might have bowel cancer. The truth is, I'm too frightened to get it checked. But I get by. The fear of ill health no longer cripples me the way it did when I was in Tanzania.

But there is something else that is crippling me at the moment. Every night, I stay awake in sheer terror that someone is going to break into the house. I keep the television turned up loud, every light in the house is on, and I even have the air conditioner running on cool because I hope the noise will distract me, if only for a moment.

This fear has developed over a number of years. I watch and read a lot of news, and my heart sinks whenever I hear about a home invasion. I literally live in one of the safest documented suburbs in Adelaide, yet I feel every noise with every inch of my body. I don't just jump. I almost pass out. My heart races, I feel a kind of shattering in the pit of my stomach, and for a moment it feels as though I can't breathe.

So I sit here in the cold in sheer terror. I do hear noises, and realistically I know we have rats in the roof, but it sounds horrifying, as though there's someone up there.

This fear escalated after they knocked down the house across the road. I don't know what it is about that empty block, but it just reeks of trouble. There are always men working there during the day, and that empty space gives me the creeps. I hate seeing large groups of men like that.

As I said earlier, I'm fat, and ever since I became fat, I've developed a fear of being gang raped. There's something about a group of those toxic masculinity type men that terrifies me. I imagine them trying to humiliate a woman like me simply because of my size. It is one of the deepest fears I carry whenever I think about a home invasion.

Even though I've been living in this state of constant fear, where I literally dread the night, there has always been a small part of me that held onto the statistics. They said I was living in one of the safest areas in Adelaide. Then, on Monday afternoon, a police officer knocked on our front door and told us something else.

I heard the doorbell ring, but I let Mum answer it. She spoke to a woman for a brief moment before coming back inside and telling me I wasn't going to like what she had to say. She said it was a police officer who had told her there had been a strange man hanging around the area. According to Mum, the officer also said they'd caught him and there was nothing to worry about.

As Mum was telling me this, I could feel my eyes widening and my jaw dropping. I felt sick in the pit of my stomach. I started asking her a series of questions. Where was he? Was he near our house? Did it have anything to do with the work site across the road? Mum didn't know the answers.

I just stared into the distance. My already shattered world somehow became even more shattered, and I realised I was never going to sleep in this house at night again.

But as the day went on, the story changed a little. Mum then thought there had been men knocking on doors and that they weren't invited. By night time, I was so confused and terrified that I called the police assistance line on 131 444 and asked whether I could get some more information.

I explained that my mother was becoming confused about a conversation she'd had with a police officer who had knocked on our door. The woman I spoke to was very nice. She said it looked like a trespass and that it was probably just an offender trying to break into a house. The way she said that so casually really annoyed me.

She then told me that if I wanted more information, I would need to ring a police station and speak to an officer who could look up the incident. She gave me the numbers for the Norwood and Hindley Street police stations. I rang both of them several times until they rang out, but no one answered.

So I called 131 444 again and explained that I couldn't get through to either station. I asked whether they could give me any more information. They couldn't, but they said the police were probably just door knocking to see whether anyone had CCTV footage.

I then called the Elizabeth Police Station, where someone finally answered the phone. She was incredibly kind. I admitted that I was frightened, and she sent an email to the police officer who had knocked on our door, asking her to give me a call.

In the meantime, I asked Mum a few more questions. That's when she started crying and told me I was confusing her. It was literally the worst moment of my life. I wanted to cry myself, but right then and there I realised I couldn't. I couldn't fall apart because Mum was frightened too, and she needed me to hold it together.

Later that night, while I was in my room at the computer, I missed a call from the police officer. It was about 11:00pm. She left a voicemail explaining that there was nothing to be concerned about, but that there had been an incident in the houses around us where people had been on someone else's property without permission.

I really didn't like that wording. Why not simply say they had tried to break into someone's house? She said I could call her back the following day, which was yesterday.

Yesterday she called me again, and once again I missed the call. I rang her back straight away. She explained that, at around 4:00am the previous morning, some men had tried to get into one of the houses near ours.

That was my worst fucking nightmare.

Four o'clock in the morning is exactly the time I'm usually wide awake. They would have seen our house. They would have seen every light on. Maybe they simply moved on. I don't know. But they were there. They were moving around in the darkness.

Even though I'd already spent the past year living in sheer terror every night, this hit me like a brick. It's that cold, horrible realisation that there are people out there who genuinely want to take things from you. People who are willing to frighten you, hurt you, or violate the place where you're supposed to feel safest.

Just as I came to see cancer in the cold light of day after my experience in Tanzania, this suddenly became another frightening reality. Not simply something I read about in the news, but something that had happened only a few houses away. I am so scared. I really am.

Mum and I have talked about it. She stayed up all night with me last night, and she said she'll stay up with me for another two nights, including tonight. After that, I'm somehow going to have to find a way to live with this.

I honestly don't think I'll ever sleep at night in this house again. Now I just have to work out what a life looks like around this impediment. It's now 3:04am, and Mum and I are still watching Emily in Paris. It's kind of ironic that I was so excited about sending off all those police oath letters, only to have the police scare the crap out of me a few days later.

The police officer called me again late yesterday afternoon, and I rang her back after I realised I'd missed another call. She told me it must have been a mistake. I then asked whether they had caught the men who had tried to break into the house.

She was quite short with me. She explained that she was in the middle of another job and couldn't answer my questions, but that she would call me back. After I hung up, I realised something. It's not her job to make me feel safe. Her job was to give me the facts. My job is somehow to learn to live with them.

Watch And You'll See

The 1989 Disney film The Little Mermaid follows a young mermaid named Ariel who dreams of living among humans. After falling in love with Prince Eric, she makes a dangerous deal with the sea witch Ursula, giving up her voice for a chance to become human and win his love.

What I love about this movie is that it contains a classic Disney "I want" song. By that, I mean a song where the main character expresses what they long for — something they dream of, usually because they feel their current life is lacking in some way.

Part of Your World is about Ariel, the film's protagonist, feeling out of place in the world she was born into and longing to be part of the human world she has been observing from afar. She collects human objects, dreams of walking on land, and wonders what it would be like to live freely among people, even though everyone around her expects her to be content as a mermaid.

At a deeper level, the song is about yearning for a different life — wanting to belong somewhere else, to experience things that seem out of reach, and to become the person you feel you are meant to be. It is less about Prince Eric and more about Ariel's desire for freedom, discovery, and self-determination.

She sings, "What would I give if I could live out of these waters?" and later asks, "What's a fire and why does it — what's the word? — burn?" before pleading, "When's it my turn?"

What I love about this song, and songs like it in Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin, is that the lyrics were written by the brilliant Howard Ashman. Ashman was an American lyricist, playwright, and producer who helped revive Disney animated musicals in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Working alongside composer Alan Menken, he wrote the lyrics for many beloved songs in The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin.

Ashman believed songs should reveal a character's deepest desires and move the story forward — a philosophy that helped shape what became known as the Disney Renaissance. He died from AIDS related illness in 1991 at the age of 40, but his influence on musical theatre and Disney animation remains enormous.

You can watch Part of Your World below.

I remember watching Oprah interview Meghan Markle. She spoke about the criticism and negative press she experienced after falling in love with Prince Harry. During the interview, she recalled watching The Little Mermaid and identifying with Ariel, who falls in love with a prince and ultimately loses her voice. It was clearly a story she felt reflected some of her own experiences.

I have to admit; I didn't feel a huge amount of sympathy. Whilst I appreciate that the scrutiny they faced must have been incredibly difficult, it's obscene how much time they spend talking about their struggles when they enjoy a level of wealth and privilege most people could only dream of.

I remember watching Harry and Meghan being interviewed in South Africa and finding myself shouting at the television as they spoke about their struggles. My reaction was, "Why don't you step outside the compound you're staying in and ask the local people how hard life can really be?"

 Anyway, when I didn't hear back from Peter about the bright red VW Beetle, I started to draw a comparison between how I managed my love for the judge in Sydney fifteen years ago and my love for the Beetle.

When I first met the judge in an anteroom between two courtrooms in March 2011, I fell instantly, deeply and unequivocally in love with him. Like the car, in my opinion, he looked as though he wanted someone to pick him up.

After a few months of working with him, I was certain it was a done deal. When I spoke to some friends, they advised me that the only way to seal the deal was for me to initiate something. So, I wrote a Post it note and left it on his bench.

On the Post it note, I wrote:

"Dear Your Honour,

Your courtroom can be very thought provoking.

Kind regards,

Me"

At the time, I thought it spelled out what I wanted, but I wasn't being clear. There is almost an air of youthful arrogance about it. I seemed to think he would somehow understand exactly what I meant without me ever having to say it. Before I had the opportunity to explore it any further with him, I had been let go.

That Post it note is much like the first message I sent Peter about the car. In my mind there is no doubt that I wanted it, but in a sense, I was acting coy. Rather than saying exactly what I wanted, I hinted at it and hoped he would work out the rest.

I ask so many questions, but I never actually said, "I want your car more than I have ever wanted any car in my natural born life."

"Hello I am interested in your car. I just have a few questions. Is the vehicle currently registered? How long have you owned it? Do you have service records? Has the timing belt been replaced? If so, when? Are there any known mechanical issues? Are you happy for a mechanic to inspect it? Thanks, Me"

If I had my time over with the Judge and with Peter, I would have just cut the crap and got straight to the point. I want what you're offering, and what do I have to do to get it? I have always been a believer that the person who controls any relationship is the one who cares the least. And Peter cares the least.

With the Judge, I first sent flowers to him and his associate after I was let go, and his associate called and told me the Judge loved the flowers and invited me into the courts for a coffee with him. I said I wouldn't go. This didn't happen with Peter, but with the Judge it was a mistake not to go and meet him for coffee. I see that now, but at the time I was deeply humiliated by the way I was let go from the courts.

Then things got weird, both with the Judge and with Peter. I wrote the Judge an absolutely insane letter about Jesus, the Bali Nine and the journey sperm goes through to fertilise an egg. It was absolute madness. I asked the Judge to call me.

And with Peter, that's when I behaved in a delusional manner. Really, after he didn't respond to me, I still asked him to call me as though nothing had happened at all. Then, with both of them, I corrected myself. I sincerely apologised for my previous correspondence and then I laid it all on the line.

After not hearing from Peter, I could physically feel the same pain I felt from being separated from the Judge. I also felt exposed, desperate and, most of all, I felt like such a fool. I think the chances of finding a bright red VW Beetle with 120,947 km on it for just under $7,000 again are very unlikely.

But it got me thinking. What if I flipped VW Beetles? There is one on Carsales.com for $2,200. What if I bought it, did it up and then sold it again? What if I bought multiple VW Beetles and parked them all up the street? Incidentally, there is a bright pink VW Beetle a couple of houses down. My street could become a hub of VW Beetles.

And then I realised that my way of processing lost love is the same for animate and inanimate objects. For me, it was much like the movie Red Dog. When Red Dog's owner dies, the dog travels all around the Pilbara and Western Australia looking for his owner, refusing to believe he is gone.

It's like what I did when I wrote to all the judges of Australia and the world, searching for something. I'm still not exactly sure what that is, but it's the same principle as the VW Beetles. I'll never find another one like the beautiful red one that stole my heart. But as a result of that, I want to surround myself with VW Beetles because they remind me of the one I love.

I really think there's something in that. When I didn't hear from the Judge or from Peter, I found myself inventing excuses for them. Maybe they hadn't received my letter or message. Maybe they were busy. Maybe there was some genuine reason they hadn't responded. But eventually I would think to myself, who am I kidding? He's just not that into you.

I thought that was the case with both of them, but on Saturday I was shocked to receive a message from Peter: 

"I will not be home until Monday." 

Now, I personally think he is pretty rude. That was a rude response to my four messages, and it was also rude that he didn't respond earlier given that it was obvious I was stressed about it. Nevertheless, I responded immediately with an offer. He is asking $6,888 for the car and I offered $7,000. He saw the offer, but he didn't respond.

Today is Tuesday and I sent him the following message:

"Hi, I'm just following up on the Beetle. Is it still available? If so, I am still interested.

Kind regards,

Me"

To his credit, he responded in good time. 

"Yes, still available." 

He did not mention my offer or invite any further discussion, so I immediately sent the following two messages: 

"I've made an offer, is that okay with you?" and "If it's okay, I can come and pick the car up tomorrow. Does that suit you?" 

Peter has seen the messages, but he hasn't responded. This is quite possibly the most painful online interaction I have ever been a party to.

A picture of Peter has begun to form in my head. I was thinking maybe he is intellectually disabled. I don't mean that in a derogatory or demeaning way. I genuinely found myself wondering whether he has some sort of cognitive impairment because I have never encountered anybody who communicates quite like this. Every response arrives days later and contains only the absolute minimum amount of information required to keep the conversation alive.

Then I started thinking that maybe I was being unfair. The advertisement describes the Beetle as having been owned by a "cautious grandma driver". What if that grandmother was his wife and she has passed away? What if he is genuinely torn about selling the car? I really don't know.

What I do know is that no person in their right mind would put an advertisement online, receive an offer from an ultra-keen buyer, and then drag the process out for nearly a week unless there was some reason for it. Whether that reason is grief, poor communication skills, indecision, an intellectual disability, or something else entirely, I have no idea.

Whatever the explanation, I'm not sure how much longer I can dance this dance. It is seriously annoying me, but when I think about how much I want the car, I suspect I am just going to have to ride it out.

The difference between the Judge and my interactions with Peter over the Beetle is that Peter eventually got back to me, even if it has been in these excruciating little pellets of information. The Judge never got back to me. I think in both instances there is another similarity. Peter may have no apparent ability to conduct a normal conversation with another human being, but I am not exactly a master of mainstream communication myself.

Ariel longs to be part of the human world. Well, so do I. I long to communicate without freaking people out. I long to hold down a job. I long to study successfully. I long to have a large group of friends, a husband, and all the other things that seem to come so naturally to everyone else. I want to be part of that world.

Someone else who I feel like has lived her life as an outsider is Josie Murray. Josie is a 75-year-old transsexual woman who is the grandmother of four-year-old Gus Lamont, who went missing without a trace on 27 September 2025. He was last seen playing outside the homestead at Oak Park Station, a remote sheep station near Yunta in South Australia, about 320 kilometres north-east of Adelaide.

It's as if this poor little boy simply vanished into thin air. The police initially thought he had wandered off, but on 5 February 2026 SAPOL declared his disappearance a major crime. Josie Murray has been declared the main suspect, while Gus's parents have been ruled out. Police have said that aspects of Josie's timeline were inconsistent with those provided by others.

The Superintendent who I am making the Book of Police Oaths for has been heavily involved in the case, and I think the way he has managed the media surrounding Gus's disappearance has been impressive. On Sunday night, Spotlight aired an interview with Josie and I was very surprised they were allowed to do that.

The framing of the program was that SAPOL had discriminated against her because she is a trans woman. I was watching it thinking, couldn't this prejudice a jury if it goes to trial? Surely there are laws against this sort of thing. Mum, having worked in media, said that because the matter isn't before the courts it was allowed.

Josie seemed matter-of-fact and slightly cold, although she did become emotional at times when talking about Gus. In my opinion, the interview was a very strategic move and the way the discrimination issue was framed may work in her favour if the matter ever goes to trial.

Watching the Spotlight special, they discussed the possibility that an eagle may have picked Gus up. I remember thinking Mum was being incredibly unrealistic when she first suggested that theory shortly after he disappeared. But it appears investigators have taken the possibility seriously.

Josie seemed to think that Gus was abducted and could still be alive. I hope that is the case. Whatever happened to him, it is difficult to imagine the anguish his family must be experiencing while they continue to live without answers.

The last I wrote, I was going to attend the Media Make Up Academy next year and study special effects makeup. The plan had been to complete a Bachelor of Journalism online at the same time, but I've finally cut the crap. At the end of the day, when it really comes down to it, I want to be a conceptual artist.

I don't know whether I will ever make any money as a conceptual artist, but I have to try. I just have to. To do that properly, I need to go back to university. I need to go back to art school. So I withdrew from everything else I had enrolled in and re-enrolled in the Bachelor of Fine Arts at Adelaide University. I am not going to change my mind. I start in August, and this time I am simply going to sit down and do it.

I know that if I can master some technical skills, I can create meaningful work. But first I have to give myself the opportunity. For years I have talked about it, thought about it and planned for it. Now I am finally giving myself a chance. That's exactly what I am going to do.

The Little Mermaid gets interesting when a violent storm hits Prince Eric's ship. The ship catches fire, is wrecked, and Eric is thrown into the sea. Ariel rescues him from drowning and drags him onto the beach. As he begins to regain consciousness, she sings to him about what she would give to live near him and be where he is. When one of Eric's attendants approaches, Ariel retreats to a rock in the water and watches as he is led away.

This is the moment she makes up her mind. She no longer wants to be part of his world; she is determined to become part of it. The longing that defined the original song transforms into determination. She climbs onto a rock and sings the reprise of Part of Your World. Disney should probably be ashamed of how much they sexualised this character, but the sentiment behind the song is powerful.

She sings:

"I don't know when,
I don't know how,
But I know something's starting right now."

And then:

"Watch and you'll see."

You can see the reprise of Part of Your World below.

She goes from "I wish" to "I'm going to try". And that's exactly what I'm going to do. I'm no longer longing for some Judge or a bright red Beetle to love the unlovable. But I do want to be part of that world. The world where people respond to your Post-it notes and messages on Carsales.com. The world where a man wants to discuss how thought-provoking his courtroom can be, or sell you a car he has listed for sale.

I want to be normal. I think that's everyone's world except mine.

Cautious Grandma Driver

It's another freezing cold morning as I sit here at my computer at 3:26am. I've got my big black puffer jacket on over my clothes, and my feet are toasty and warm in thick bed socks. I'm surprised my mother said the cool air of the air conditioner doesn't bother her, but I think it may not flow into her room. As for me, I feel like I am back in Antarctica, but you can't put a price on the sound the cold generates. 

I am really looking forward to my safe time of 5:00am this morning because I have heard so many noises. I don't completely react like a child; I just tend to freeze for a moment. If I'm watching YouTube, I'll pause it to see if the noise continues, which most of the time it doesn't. But I have heard some noises which seem to be coming from inside the roof. They are so vivid that it sounds like someone running.

At first I thought it was rats, but then I saw an ad on television the other night for a news story about a woman living in a Housing Trust home who discovered that a man had been living in her roof. I wonder if someone is living in our roof?

I sold my car a little while ago because Mum and I needed a bit of extra money and also because Mum doesn't drive anymore, so I use her car to drive both of us around. But the absence of a car in the driveway has had more of an impact on me than I realised it would.

If you think about it, a random or targeted intruder assessing the viability of breaking into this house might see one car in a double driveway and view it as an opening for a successful home invasion. I don't know what sort of things people do to residents who are awake during a home invasion, but I've read enough stories to know it doesn't always end well.

I feel like having only one car makes it look as though either not everyone who lives in the house is at home, or that only one person lives here.

I got a skip bin around two months ago, not to hide the empty space, but genuinely to dispose of rubbish from the house. But having the skip there has made me feel a lot safer, so I must have extended it seven or eight times. I'm sure the skip people must wonder what is going on because it's just a normal-sized bin and there is only so much stuff you can fit into it.

I've got it being collected in the first week of July. That will then leave a very obvious empty space in our driveway, and I believe it leaves us open to vulnerabilities that would not be there if there were another car parked there.

On Monday 22 June, which is next Monday, my term deposit expires. I didn't have a life-changing amount in it, but it is a good little amount of money. I had a lot more money, but I gave most of it to Mum after my father was trading on the stock market while he had dementia and lost a huge amount of money. I also gave some money to my best friend, Maiki, to do his PhD.

On Monday, I intend to put the majority of what's left back into another term deposit, mostly so I can't touch it, and use some of the remaining money to pay a few expenses. One of those expenses is to buy a cheap car to put in the driveway so it looks like a household full of people is living here.

Initially, I found a silver Volkswagen Beetle 2003. It's done 233,640km and the seller is asking $2,200.

I have loved these Beetles ever since I wanted to open a florist called Strike A Posey and have Volkswagen Beetles painted like ladybirds as the flower delivery cars.

The idea initially was that the car parked in the driveway would be registered and insured, but it wouldn't be for everyday use. But then I fell down the Volkswagen Beetle rabbit hole on Carsales.com and, I fell madly, deeply and irrationally in love with a bright red 2007 Volkswagen Beetle Miami 9C Auto MY08.

It was, and still is, the most beautiful car I think I have ever seen. It's done 120,947km and the owner is asking $6,888. There is even a note in the description that says:

PERFECT FIRST CAR! This bug has been well looked after.by cautious grandma driver

You can see the car below.

The moment I saw it, I knew that I had to have it.

I am about to turn 45 years old, but I've never actually bought a car myself. My Dad bought all of my previous cars, and he died in 2024, so it is up to me to ensure I get a good deal.

The first thing I did was tell my dear friend ChatGPT, and I asked it what I should say to the owner when I contacted them. So, solely on the advice of ChatGPT, I sent the owner the following message:

Hello I am interested in your car. I just have a few questions. Is the vehicle currently registered? How long have you owned it? Do you have service records? Has the timing belt been replaced? Is so, when? Are there any known mechanical issues? Are you happy for a mechanic to inspect it? Thanks, Me

It must be a family member of the cautious grandma driver who is facilitating the sale because the name on the account is Peter.

Late on Wednesday night, I saw that he had read the message, but he didn't respond. So yesterday afternoon I tried to call him through the Carsales app. He didn't answer.

So, I sent him another message saying:

Hi I'm still very interested in your car - can you give me a call on 12345678910 if you get a chance. Kind regards, Me

I saw that he saw the message, and he still didn't respond. So, I sent him another message.

Hi again, sorry to bombard you with messages, it's just that I really want this car. Is there any chance I could come and see it tomorrow morning?

He still didn't answer. So I just thought, you know what, I want this car. I'm just going to lay all my cards on the table.

Hello again,

I really am so sorry to send so many messages. It's just that I can see that you have seen them, and I am wondering if there was a problem with some of the questions I asked you initially.

The truth is I don't really care. I just want the car.

The reason I asked is because my father used to buy my cars for me, and he has died, so my brother recommended I ask those questions.

If the car is still available on Monday, when I get some money, I'll give you $7,000 for it.

I'll leave it up to you.

Kind regards,

Me

It's very easy to see what has happened here. The car is obviously not in as good a nick as it sounds with the cautious grandma driver, or at least that's the conclusion I have come to. But in my heart of hearts, I don't care. I just want the car. He is not going to message me back though. How could he? If he does, he will be conceding that he was hiding something about its condition.

My heart broke a little and I had a go at ChatGPT for recommending I ask such stupid questions in the first place, but ChatGPT wasn't sorry. It thought they were reasonable questions, and I suppose they were. This is the story of my life. Mum always says I go over the top, and maybe I went over the top in my questioning about the car and its history. I scared the man away.

I think I used to do that when I was actually involved with men romantically. I would scare them away. I have been told I am a pretty intense person. The funny thing is, if I met a man now, I would be the total opposite. Not as a game tactic, just because I genuinely have no interest in engaging in any romantic activity.

And seeing as I am about to hit menopause within the next five years, I will more than likely have no interest in engaging in any sexual activity either. If I could just go back to Wednesday and send Peter a message saying, "I am hopelessly devoted to your car. I'm in love with it, and I want to make love in it. I want to write poetry about it, and I'll do anything for one test drive."

But I think the moment has passed.

Last night, in the middle of my failed attempts at purchasing my first car sans Dad, Mum and I went to the hairdresser. We went to Mum's hairdressing salon, which is just up the road and owned by this beautiful man, John, who I have a little bit of a crush on.

John usually does Mum's hair, and a hairdresser called Stella does my blow dry. Stella only works on Thursday nights and Saturday mornings, so I've been trying to book appointments well ahead of time just to get in with her. Stella is around my age, maybe a few years younger, and she's absolutely hilarious. I love her outlook on life, and she does a good blow dry, so those are the reasons that keep me coming back.

Lately she's been doing both Mum's and my hair one after the other on a Thursday night, and we sort of congregate in this little huddle and have a chat. Last night we were talking about the car and about how Peter wasn't responding to my messages when John came over and asked if I wanted him to call Peter for me. I thought that was lovely, but I said it was okay and that I would wait to hear back from him.

John is friends with my good friend Mariah's husband, Luigi. Luigi is at least six foot seven and he is a scary-looking guy. John joked, "Did you want me and Luigi to go and get the car for you? We can get it for free." Then we all laughed.

Then John said Peter would wake up with a horse's head in his bed. But after I had told him the story of my communications with Peter, he said I should have got to first base first and then asked about having a mechanic inspect it.

Stella and I always talk about local crime because she's interested in it and, I guess, I am a masochist who likes to scare the shit out of myself. It was funny because while Stella was doing Mum's hair she said to me, "What's your younger brother like?"

Mum just looked at me and I said, "He's a white supremacist."

Mum looked like she wanted to get angry at me, but then we all burst out laughing.

When we got home from the hairdressers, I jumped back online to Carsales.com. I have taken into consideration the real reason I want a car in the first place. It's not to drive; it is to create the illusion of a house full of people. So, I have decided to take it one step further.

I am going to buy a ute.

This way, not only does it look like a house full of people live here, it looks like at least one of those people is likely a man, and he could fight back if someone elected to undertake a home invasion.

I've found a ute. It's a 2004 Holden Rodeo LX RA Auto 4x2. It's done 276,000km and the seller wants $4,500.

I thought I'd play it cool with this seller and not ask about its history or mechanics. I simply said:

Hi, I'd love to take a look at this ute. Do you have any time over the weekend, preferably first thing in the morning, around 9:30amish?

Kind regards,

Me

I sent the message quite late, so I'm not worried that I haven't heard back.

When I was younger, I used to make love in cars. Not all the time, but every now and then. Once, my boyfriend and I took his car to the car park of a political enemy and we did it there. I've done it out the front of my parents' house, at Botanic Park, and out the front of other people's houses. It's uncomfortable and it's so obvious. The car fogs up and anyone driving past can see what's going on.

I can honestly say that I have never really liked or cared about a man I've had sex with in a car. There were a few nice times when I had some first kisses. It's far more intimate in a way. I wouldn't do that now. Like so many things I did when I was younger, I'm too scared. I would be scared of getting caught by the police and I'm not sure what kind of criminal conviction you would get for that, but it could be a really bad one that could potentially ruin your life a million times more than my conviction for texting while driving.

The truth is I'm a bad driver. I'm safe and responsible, but I am not a confident driver, and you should be confident when driving on the roads. Everything depends on that. I don't drive in the country at all. I used to. I remember when I worked at Centrelink and was involved with a man who lived in Port Augusta. Sometimes I would just drive up there after work and drive home in the middle of the night.

I also remember driving back to Adelaide from Sydney in my beautiful red Mazda 2 about 15 years ago. I absolutely would never do something like that now. I hate driving in the country purely because of the speed limits. It's so fast, and when you are travelling in the opposite direction to a truck you really feel it when you pass each other. I could do without that feeling.

Just after I got back from Sydney, I was driving my Mazda down Grand Junction Road and I was in a line of traffic waiting to turn right. As the cars started turning, one driver slammed on their brakes and there was a three-car rear-end accident. I was on the end of it all and my car was a write-off.

We all managed to turn right and we called the police. A patrol car with two officers came out. One of the officers was around my age and we got talking. We actually talked for ages and I asked him if he could give me a ride home. He said he couldn't take me home because it would look bad if he drove an attractive woman like me home.

He then asked for my driver's licence and went back to the patrol car. I don't know if he took a copy of it, but he arranged with the tow truck driver that he would drop me home. I jumped in the truck and we dropped my car off at a yard before starting the journey back to my house, which was quite a distance away.

Then the police officer I had been talking to called me.

He said he had just looked at my driver's licence again and realised it said I was born in 1981 and not 1991. He said he thought I was 20 or 21. I actually could not believe he rang to tell me that. But he said he just wanted to make sure I was on my way home okay.

When I told him I was fine, we sort of said goodbye, but what he was actually saying, without saying it, was: I thought you were much younger, and if you were, I would probably be ringing you for another reason.

I actually took that to heart at 30. There would be no question now at 45, but 30 is still young, isn't it?

Well, I've made it through another night. It's 5:21am and it's raining outside. It's absolutely freezing now that the air conditioner has been on cool all night, but I have a big smile on my face because it feels like this part of the world is starting to wake up.

To celebrate making it through the night, I am going to watch "Trump Finally Puts Bibi In His Place and Neocons Cry Over Peace in Iran. Tucker and Piers Morgan React" on YouTube. I can't think of a better way to start the day.