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What Snow Is, and Will’s New Passion

July 26th, 2010 by the_lifer
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To Ulrika’s Swiss expatriate irritation, after five people have come all the way to Turoa with her, nobody else is particularly motivated to ski. They want to snowboard, drink, and send photos to their friends. Snow here is a toy, not a way of life. The only person willing to ski is, unexpectedly, Winona. “We skied for a week or so every winter, Mummy would meet her sister here.”

The intermediate slope is Ulrika’s compromise, but a challenge for Winona. Ulrika, zipping about in flattering space-age fabrics, sapphire hair escaping from her white hood and space-age goggles, is capably sexy. Winona, trembling like a lamb, looking petite in ski gear two sizes too big for her, is equally appealing. By the time they make it down the slope, a couple of Cantabrian guys have attached themselves to the pair.

“You did all right! You’re a goer!” says one of them, patting Winona on her shoulder. Winona presses her lips tight, amused.

“That’s right, it is good to try. But you must point your feet in more,” says Ulrika.

“Where are you from? Are you German?” one of their admirers asks, hopefully.

Winona isn’t paying attention. “Where’s Will?” she asks, as one of their mutual friends appears.

“Oh, he came up with an excuse to take the car out again.” Everyone rolls their eyes. They are all car-free Wellingtonians, but being car-free is not a natural state for most Kiwi males. The moment they picked up their car rental, and Will sat behind the wheel, he was a changed man. On the four-hour drive, he had talked affectionately – to the 4×4’s engine: he had ranted at length – at the other drivers. Once or twice, someone had asked if he wanted a break while they drove. “No! No, I’m good!” he had barked, gripping the wheel tighter, as if they might take his toy away.

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A Flower for Vicky

July 21st, 2010 by the_lifer
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Winona trails home from work, lingering all the way. The winter evening feels like spring. She browses through a few stores, the sale racks full of rejected clothes for 22nd-century space nuns, and leaves empty-handed. Her walk home takes her through Courtenay Place – not packed with munted rowdies, as it will be on Saturday night, but flowing with cultivated crowds, eager for the film festival’s rarefied offerings. Restaurants and cafes are buzzing. Nobody has chundered on the sidewalk recently. It’s the city that, when she was growing up in Kelburn, everyone grumbled that it could be. The Wellington of her dreams is all around her. Or is it?

She is in the city she longed to return to, well employed. Still, as her nan would say, “The gilt is off the gingerbread.” She returned to Wellington to be closer to her family, but in the meantime, her family seems to have gotten along quite well without her. Hm.

At least she’s found a circle of friends who fit with the rhythm of her child-free, mid-thirties life. Willow has recovered from her recent temptation by her vile ex-boyfriend, and settled into the townhouse she has bought. Wazzer, her bogan bartender flatmate, has been rather too quiet lately. Winona wonders what she’s up to.

Her partner Will, always quiescent, seems happy enough, and has let his London brittleness slough away. He’s seen a bit of his best mate Wayne these past few weeks – Wayne’s baby isn’t keeping him away. Winona wonders if it’s horribly selfish of her to bring up children again. Thirty-three doesn’t last forever. She decides that she’ll see how well they get through the ski weekend, put together by Will’s jewel-like workmate, Ulrika.

Her walk has brought her by the blowsy statue of Queen Victoria on Kent Terrace. Winona looks up at her with Commonwealth affection. For all her empire, and not believing in lesbians, old Vicky did have family and partners cracked, Winona thinks. On the spur of the moment, she crosses the street. Unpinning the felt flower brooch from her coat, she hops a low balustrade and places it at the bottom of the statue’s plinth.

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The Sighting

July 19th, 2010 by the_lifer
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Willow has borrowed her flatmate’s car for a grocery run. On her way home, she pulls over to put some petrol back in the tank. At the pump, she notices that the ordinary car on the other side of the petrol pump has a back seat stuffed with quilts and pillows and duffel bags.

Who moves house on a Sunday night? More likely, the driver is living out of their car.

Willow is disturbed.  Is he that poor? Has he fled flatmates? Been thrown out by his wife? Whether he’s good, bad, or just unlucky, it’s a cold night to be dossing down on the back seat.

It’s one of the few moments when she can see someone’s poverty in Wellington. It’s there, but it’s hard to see in a city where walking, not driving, and dressing in jeans and polarfleece don’t stand out, where the cheaper stores have all moved out to the suburbs.  Most of the time it’s tucked away in the council flats here or there, hidden behind brave faces.

The driver catches her peeking and flinches. She wants to say something innocuous to him, like “Laundry day, eh?” But she knows she can’t with enough conviction. She’d smile, but he’s not going to look at her again.

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Leave Town During The Film Festival? Are You Mad?

July 16th, 2010 by the_lifer
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Winona is vexed. Her partner Will says that  his work friend Ulrika, a Swiss expatriate inspired by the crisp, cold weather, wants them to join her and a few other people on a ski weekend.  Winona can’t ski, but that doesn’t bother her. The real problem is that she doesn’t want to leave Wellington during the International Film Festival.

She’s not even a serious film buff, but the film festival heralds the end of winter doldrums. Is the weather still terrible? It doesn’t matter, as long as you can make it to the theater. Friends and acquaintances reconnect, using films as an excuse. Parties at peoples’ homes fall off, replaced by pre-film meet-ups in restaurants and bars. And even if you go crazy and buy tickets to ten films, this seems sane compared to the truly obsessed, those who take time off of work to gorge on three or four movies a day.  Frankie, one of Winona’s workmates, is doing just that. “It’s the best staycation ever. You go away in your mind. One of my contractor friends is taking me along. She did a job for Weta Digital once, so she’s deducting all her film festival costs from her taxes as research!”

It’s the principle of the thing, Winona thinks. If Ulrika was a real Wellingtonian, she’d at least be apologetic about the timing. As it is, she can tell that Will wants to go, and she’s not about to send him off by himself with the minxy Ulrika. Resigned, she takes out her phone to text message a friend and ask about borrowing some snow clothes.

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Rusticated III: Seen At The Market

July 9th, 2010 by the_lifer
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It is Saturday morning, time to entertain guests. Wilhelmina has taken Leona, her friend from Levin to Frank Kitts Market. A chatty stall holder switched off and lost interest when she mentioned being from Levin and remembering the stall holder from a market up there.  Wilhelmina has her back up about it.

Wilhelmina huffs, “I just think it’s absurd. Why shouldn’t your money spend the same as anyone else’s? I certainly shan’t spend my money with her after she was so rude. You said yourself half these stallholders are from up the coast  – oh, look, there’s my daughter. Win! WIIIIIN!”

Looking slightly embarrassed, Winona comes over, trailing Will and Owen. “Hullo, Mummy. We were just about to get Mexican food, the stall over there is famous for it.”

The older ladies goggle at Owen, with his waxed mustache, bowler hat, and utility kilt, while Winona dutifully says, “This is my mum and her friend, er…”

“Leona runs an orchard up in Levin,” Wilhelmina states. “And she brought us the most beautiful tea cake.”

Winona sighs in misty admiration. “Do you have a blog? I’d love to read your blog. ”

“We could get your recipes,” says Will.

Owen, being Owen, has to take it further. “I’d love to get your number! D’you like the South Island? Fancy being a farmer’s wife?”

Leona, pink and giggling, protests that she’s already married.

“Nonsense! Polyandry is the way of the future. Especially for accomplished ladies like yourself.”

Later on, mother and daughter will say of each other, “She was a bit stuffy, as usual, but she’d brought along the loveliest friend…”

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Rusticated II, or, Bacon Futures

July 7th, 2010 by the_lifer
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The season of guests visiting Wellington has only just begun. Across town, Winona and Will are similarly gobsmacked by their own out-of-town visitor.

Owen was at university with Will. He is currently in Winona and Will’s living room, in a striped shirt and braces, his bowler hat placed carefully on a table. Twelve years after graduation, he too is one of those software programmers whose brilliance enables them to work from whatever location they choose. Owen’s spot of choice is a start-up free-range pig farm twenty minutes outside of Oamaru. In his bizarre blend of technology and Victorian back-to-the-land, he has plenty of company there.

Owen, and his many country cousins, from steampunk sophisticates to “sharp fullas” are the product of a unique equation. Subtract whatever sartorial trappings they do or don’t have. Add up the Kiwi Male’s Desire to Hide in the Shed + Disturbing and Genuine Science = Survivalists. The more civic-minded ones join local disaster recovery crews. When it comes to their sheds and collections, good luck getting them to even think about clearing away some of their mad junk – it will be irreplaceable after Peak Oil causes The Infrastructure to crash.

As they chat over their cups of tea, some of Owen’s prognostications do seem extreme, sitting in a flat with electricity in urbane Wellington. Still, neither Winona nor Will are out to offend. Because what if he’s right? Generously, Owen has offered to let them come work on his farm after the Peak Oil Infrastructure Crash Disaster. “Bacon is going to be the currency of the future,” he assures them, “and I intend to be prepared. I can already source all the ingredients for a BLT on my land or within ten kilometers.”

Will can’t resist. “Even the mayo?”

“Walnut oil and we’ve already got plenty of eggs. Add some garlic from the raised garden beds and you’ve got aioli.”

“What about avocados? For BLATs? Too cold for them where you are, isn’t it?”

Owen’s smile curls his mustache. “We will trade with Maori tribes on the North Island.”

“Oh. I’m glad that’s sorted, then.”

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Rusticated

July 5th, 2010 by the_lifer
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Having a large house near downtown Wellington, silver-haired Wilhelmina and Wilson, in their golden years, are eager hosts.  Unfortunately, their current guests are testing their hospitable good nature.

Once upon a time, when they lived in the same city, they had been close friends with these guests. Eventually, the friends said adieu to their kids, inherited some money, and decided to live the Kiwi dream and move to the country. That was ten years ago, before this had any fashionable artisanal aspects. Their chosen piece of paradise is an orchard forty-five minutes from Levin.

A decade later, this voluntary rustication has taken its toll.

Wilhelmina is worried about her friend. Said friend, it seems, has foregone lipstick, mascara, and taking the initiative in conversation. Upon being drawn out by Wilhelmina’s probing questions, the friend admits that she’s rather tired. “I thought you’d just, you know, plant, but we’re always swapping out for new varieties. And my back…” After dissecting every vertebra, she then asks if her hostess’s daughter Winona is married yet.

Her husband has a Kiwi male’s relish for the hard yards and seems to be flourishing. Wilson is privately dismayed at the prospect of entertaining this bloke all weekend. Where is the tolerable fellow whose ties he once admired? His laugh has become a bray. He ends nearly every sentence with “eh?” Not only does he tell an exceptionally raw version of the “Aristocrats” joke, it takes five minutes. Wilson hopes that there won’t be a repeat at the Cake Tin, where they’ll inevitably run into people they both know.

Later, the guests huddle in their bed in the icy spare room. (Winona nicked all the quilts when she moved to her own flat a few months ago.) “What on earth is Willie thinking, wearing tangerine lipstick at her age? We were teenagers in the sixties, you don’t do it twice. I’d say something but you know that’s not how I was brought up, dear.”

Her husband nestles into her cosy form gratefully and kisses her. “You don’t need that slap to be a beauty, pet. Don’t think Wilson fancies it much either, man talks like he’s got a broomstick up his bottom. Oh well, I’ll see if I can’t put a bit of the devil back in him, eh?”

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Auckland Mysteries

July 2nd, 2010 by the_lifer
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Willow is in Auckland for work, just for a few days. Why are men in Auckland fawning all over her? Her Auckland friends complain just as much as she does about no good men, dismal dating, etc. Maybe it’s the recent influx of South American immigrants that she’s heard about?

Not having a mirror in front of her when she walks, she is unaware that Auckland is kinder to her. Her hair, instead of being scraped back into a bun or braid against the weather, falls over her shoulders in feathery dark gold waves. Not bending over double against the wind feels refreshing, and her fit, light-footed saunter, developed trekking around Wellington’s hills, makes guys look twice. Most of all, the softer weather has her smiling.

As mystified as she is, she wishes her Wellington friends were there to witness it. Or that she wasn’t so busy, between meetings and “working lunches” and colleague dinners. Work does send her up to Auckland fairly regularly, and every time she plans to relax and do a little exploring. But it never seems to happen.

She could spend Saturday there, but Wellington weekends are always so packed.  She could go shopping, but the clothes downtown are mostly the same as the Wellington stores,  and chic Newmarket overwhelms her. Besides, she thinks, Wellington is so lively that even a nerd girl like herself has two party invitations this weekend. Next time she’s up in Auckland she’ll stay a bit longer and do…something. Oh, no, wait, it’ll be the middle of the Film Festival and she’ll want to be back. The time after, then. Maybe.

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If a budget falls in the forest and nobody spends it…

June 30th, 2010 by the_lifer
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News flash – government spending is up. Way, way up. All the government departments are trying to spend their annual budgets before the financial end-of-year deadline of June 30th. Freelancers and contractors stick around town, despite the ghastly June weather. Between projects wrapping up “for the 30th” and shell games involving fungible advance invoicing, this is when they make their money.

Winona has spent the morning trying to shed the budget for her area of The Department of Stodge, managerially neglected for five months earlier this year.

“D’you need a Creative Suite software update, Frankie? Ergonomic keyboard? Jen, how about you?”

“If we’re trying to spend all our money, can you take us out to lunch?” asks Jen.

“Ooooh, yes. I need my perspectives broadened to be able to communicate well with our changing  society. Butter chicken is a powerful multi-cultural experience,” says Frankie.

Winona checks a spreadsheet. “Only if the butter chicken’s in Mumbai. The entertainment budget’s gone, but the travel money’s nearly untouched. And it just goes away as if it didn’t exist after tomorrow.”

Scouring the Web to find ways to spend this odd surplus, Winona feels twinges of guilt. This is so ridiculous. I wish there was a way we could send this money to a food bank or something. Oooh, look, there’s a WordPress camp in Auckland! She quickly tots up a “continuing education” request for herself.

Meanwhile,  Jen is moaning hungrily, “Did you have to mention butter chicken?”

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