Circles: A story about connecting

By Matt Small

Frustrated by increasing inequality, environmental degradation and climate change, Jay concludes that a new movement is required to lift society from spiritual poverty and reconnect people with nature and community.

Collaborating with old friends and new acquaintances, Jay discovers unexpected joys, loves and challenges while developing a

• Language: English
• Publisher: Matthew Small
• Release date: Jun 29, 2018
• ISBN: 9780648341710

Matt Small

At the age of fifteen, Matt fell in love with humanity and the world during a month-long school exchange to India. Over the following years, he chased new experiences, travelling extensively in over fifty countries before settling in Melbourne, Australia, where he lives with his wife and two children. Through effective storytelling, he has helped to raise millions of dollars for environmental, humanitarian, and animal welfare advocacy organisations. He is deeply committed to ensuring that future generations can fall in love with the world in the same way that he has. 'Circles - A story about connecting' is his first novel.

Book preview

ISBN (ebook): 978-0-6483417-1-0

Copyright Matt Small 2018

First published 2018.

All rights reserved. Except s permitted under the Ausrtalian Copyright Act 1968 (for example, a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review), no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system. communicated in any form or by any means without prior written permission.

All enquiries should be made to the author.

This is a work of fiction.

The author’s imagination has been greatly influenced by many real places, people and events. Honour and respect is intended in every catchphrase or mannerism that has been included.

Cover design by Matt Small

Cover photography by Martin Stringer

Book design by Matt Small

Editing by Beau Hillier

Labyrinth images by Well-fed spirit

50% of author profits will be donated to organisations

that are advocating a kinder and more sustainable future.

For details please visit: circlesthestory.com

About the author

At the age of fifteen, Matt fell in love with humanity and the world during a month-long school exchange to India.

Over the following years, he chased new experiences, travelling extensively in over fifty countries before settling in Melbourne, Australia, where he lives with his wife and two children.

Through effective storytelling, he has helped to raise millions of dollars for environmental, humanitarian, and animal welfare advocacy organisations.

He is deeply committed to ensuring that future generations inherit a kinder and more sustainable world.

‘Circles - A story about connecting’

is his first novel.

Part One

Transpiration

One

The warmth of the fire was ebbing just as the sky showed the first signs of dawn. Slouched on camp chairs, eskies or cushions, none of the circle of partygoers could find the energy to keep the flame alive. Their minds had slowed to a gradual halt while the drugs kept their scattered neurons firing.

‘If you don’t think it’s worth saving the planet, what’s the point of doing anything?’ Jay demanded of his closest friend, Nicko.

The conversation stuttered on about the wisdom of acting to prevent further damage to the climate. Nicko insisted that there was already too much harm – that humanity was doomed, but that life would go on. Jay asserted that Nicko was a fuckwit, and that it would only be too late when there wasn’t any life left to preserve.

‘Will you please stop complaining, for fuck’s sake?’ Carla interjected. Jay’s lover was reaching that part of the night when she had nothing productive to add to the conversation. She longed for sleep, yet knew that it would continue to elude her as she metabolised the chemicals in her blood.

Jay took another long draw on the spliff, breathing out a thick cloud that merged with the smoke from the fire. ‘Sorry if it seems like complaining to you, darling, but whether we like it or not, the reality is that the richest one percent of people in the world own as much as the poorest ninety-nine. We’re warming the climate like there’s no tomorrow. And Trump is President of the United States!’

A pause, then a snigger gave way to laughter among the circle of friends around the fire. ‘Fuck, we are living in interesting times. That sentence will never sound right!’ coughed Nicko, as he accepted the spliff.

‘Okay, but can’t you just stop fucking whinging and be in the moment?’ Carla spat. ‘I’m trying to escape all the shit of the world and have fun here! What the fuck are you going to do about it, apart from complaining?’

Jay took a few moments to respond. His mind was cloudy from the combined effects of the marijuana, MDMA and the ‘doof cocktail’ – containing rum, white wine, tequila and fruit juice – that had kept him dancing for the previous few hours. Perhaps he should just keep his muddled thoughts to himself?

No, that would be dull.

Jay’s thoughts suddenly sharpened. ‘I’ll start a new religion!’ he proclaimed. ‘We’re living at a time of spiritual poverty, like nothing matters except our own comfort. There is so much to fight against, but what are we fighting for? Our connection to nature and each other. Our sense of purpose. What it means to be alive. We need a spiritual revolution!’

Carla sniggered. ‘Great idea! It would be hard to do worse than most of the other religions,’ she said cynically.

‘Can I be a priest in your new religion?’ Nicko offered. ‘We can model it on the craziest parts of all the other religions and see if we can out-crazy them!’

‘Yeah, out-crazy the Scientologists, that would be a great challenge!’ Jay agreed.

Although he downplayed the idea, Jay wondered what would happen if the spiritual beliefs of a significant minority of people required that they use civil disobedience to protect the commons: our air, water, and land.

Jay felt that Carla was distant, despite her proximity. He wanted to cuddle up to her in the cool of the dawn, feeling the warmth of her body. However, he knew that contact with Carla right now wouldn’t give him the comfort that he desired.

Their relationship had been challenging for the past few weeks. They were seemingly unable to agree with one another on any subject – what to do, what to eat, when to make love or what to watch on TV. There were now more negative than positive feelings between them.

‘I’m going for a bimble,’ he told the assembled crew as he stood unsteadily.

It was still dark away from the embers of the fire. Jay’s vision was clouded with small dots that made progress slow. He focused as hard as he could, stepping anxiously through the guy ropes of the tents towards the main walkway that led to the stages. His foot caught a guy rope, causing him to nearly fall onto a tent. ‘Fuck,’ he muttered. He had no idea where he was going or how long his energy would last.

It seemed like an eternity until he reached the path. He hoped that the people around the fire hadn’t noticed just how challenged he’d been by the effort to put one foot in front of the other. Under the lights of the path, he felt more secure. He shivered, hugged himself, and wished that he’d taken his jacket. Sunrise couldn’t be too far away, he reminded himself.

A giggling couple staggered past, clinging to each other. Obscured by the semi-darkness, Jay pushed on, his aching limbs enjoying the warmth of exercise. He felt an intense desire to be alone. The light was beginning to spread across the horizon on the other side of the hill. He took a left at the next turn to head towards it.

The festival stages of the temporary party village had now stopped for the night. The sound of chatting from the camps blended with a distant drum circle to make a pleasant background hum that receded as he headed further away from camp, toward the pale blue glow on the horizon. Jay shivered again and kept walking, swinging his arms to keep blood flowing. He passed the gate out of the festival site, nodding in a way that he hoped was nonchalant towards the door people, who were chatting in low tones at the side of the gate. Their faces appeared to Jay as mostly red, black and white dots, like static.

Jay’s mind whirred with half-finished thoughts: Had he been wrong to walk away from Carla? Would she even care? Would she be sleeping now? Was she right to be pissed off with him talking about the problems of the world?

Jay thought they’d had a good night up to that point, dancing together freely while hanging out with friends on the dance floor. There had been plenty of hugging, kissing, and laughter. Carla had seemed happy. A couple of hours ago he couldn’t wait to get back to the tent to help her out of her party dress. So what had changed? Where had the night gone wrong?

The melancholy and the cold wrapped him up. Had it been such a foolish comment, to say that he would start a religion?

Jay’s mind had become increasingly cluttered with thoughts about the unfairness and inequality of power, wealth, gender, race and nationality. The degradation of nature affected the people feeding on scraps at the bottom the most. There was an apathetic disregard from most in society.

It annoyed him that Carla didn’t seem to notice or care. It seemed evident to Jay that too much power lay in the hands of too few greedy people. Democracy was in their thrall. Advocacy groups, charities and progressive politicians were doing their best to effect change but didn’t have the resources to take on the destructive powers that were doing the bulk of the damage.

The religions of the world had much to answer for. Organised religion did little service for the people who donated their devotion, money, and faith. Western religions understood the power of belief, yet did nothing to address the global destruction that threatened them all.

What if people rose up and threw off the shackles of those limiting superstitions to live in the present, instead of worrying about what the next world might bring? Humans had developed spirituality over tens of millennia. He felt that there was something bigger and more spiritual that had helped his ancestors through troubled times. That without organised religion, the world would probably be a more compassionate place.

Tired and cold, Jay arrived at the brow of the hill. He wondered how long he’d been walking, hoping that he hadn’t been speaking his thoughts aloud. The first kookaburra call of the morning began a chorus of birdsong that calmed him. He looked down at the dew drops on the grass, shivering once more, wishing again that he’d brought a jacket or a blanket to sit on. A soggy bum was undesirable.

‘Come on, sun!’ he whispered, pondering just how many humans had shared this feeling throughout the ages.

The first bead of the sun’s light brought a shudder of gratitude, relief, and pleasure. Jay’s vision was still bleary, like a poorly tuned television. His hands felt painfully cold now that he was no longer moving, so he put them in the front of his shorts. His scrotum tightened in response, but the warmth of his groin spread to his fingers. The first rays of the sun fought against the cold, while blood flowed to his swelling penis, and his muscles began to relax. ‘Thank you, grandfather sun!’ he breathed.

A tidal wave of exhaustion broke over Jay. He fell forward as his legs failed him. He landed hard on his knees and slumped face down on the damp grass, his consciousness fading to black.

Confused awareness returned with a sense of panic. Had he blacked out? Jay opened his eyes with difficulty, his face pressed against the damp grass. Realising that his hand was still in his pants, he looked around guiltily. The sun was now climbing fast above the horizon, the veil of darkness lifting from the valley. Although his vision was still blurry, he could see the campsite and the lights of the market and stages below him. It all seemed very distant.

A white hot pain seared within Jay’s temple, his stomach churned and he tasted gastric acid. He wished that he could just lay down with Carla under their warm doona right there, right now. The thought of walking back to the tent filled him with exhaustion. A deep breath steadied him.

Jay’s mouth felt furry, as though he had exhausted his reserves of saliva. Lacking a bottle of water, he settled for wiping his hands on the dew-sodden grass to lick the water from his fingers. It tasted salty but brought some relief.

The peeled trunks of large gum trees glowed warmly in the early morning light. Further away was the dark green of eucalypt forest. To Jay’s right was a beautiful, pale, dead tree; the remains of an old giant that now stood alone like an inspired sculpture to the beauty of death. He felt drawn towards it. A large fallen limb made an inviting seat.

Jay’s brain was a tangled mess of thoughts and feelings, so he tried to meditate, even though he hadn’t done so for several months. Sitting upright, he lengthened his spine, breathing in deeply, feeling the gratitude of his back and shoulder muscles for the change in posture. He released the breath slowly before taking another deep breath through his nose.

Intense waves of energy shot through his body, from his head to his legs and back up through his spine. It was a struggle to focus. Jay allowed his mind to drift as he concentrated on his breath, his posture, and the pleasant sensation.

After a short time, Jay was conscious of his heart racing. He opened his eyes, feeling mild terror; he needed to get back to the tent urgently.

Picking himself off the log, Jay looked around. His vision was clouded with tiny spots of light, like static. The grass and the trees around him vibrated with energy, yet the dead tree was still. He looked closer at a living tree. It pulsed at a cellular level, glowing unnaturally bright. When he looked at his hand, he found the same. It was as though he could see a spectrum of colour outside his usual visual range. He could sense the life energy pulsing through his skin, yet his shirt and his jeans remained dull. The visual disturbance was accompanied by a feeling of deep connection with the natural world around him that was akin to love. He wondered if this might be a flashback to a previous psychedelic trip.

Jay’s mind seemed clear, but his vision was not. What was happening? He turned to walk back towards the camp. To his right, there was a small lake that also glowed with energy. Jay headed towards it, sitting on another log near the water. Looking again at his hand, Jay saw himself as ephemeral, just as the grass, trees and the insects – made up of the same pulsing energy, always changing and rejuvenating.

Looking into the water, he could see the tiny insects and algae, all glowing with the same energy. He felt at one with the life around him. Everything was a stream of living energy. Time didn’t exist. Was this what Buddhists would call enlightenment? Could he stay in this state of nirvana?

Jay’s mind turned to Carla lying asleep in the tent, of the ambitions he had to travel, the work that he felt he had to do. There was too much to give up. To stay in this state of detachment, he would need to decry everything else. He couldn’t. He felt the need to wrench himself away from the stream of life, back to reality.

Jay’s vision went white, his head throbbing more intensely than he’d ever known. The feeling began to subside after a couple of minutes, so he raised himself and lifted his fatigued legs back toward the camp. What had it all meant?

The journey back seemed to grind on, but Jay was driven on by the desire to lay down with the warmth of Carla’s body. He put one foot in front of the other, avoiding eye contact with the few people that he passed.

The sun was now quite high in the sky, and the warmth was returning by the time he arrived, gratefully, back to the tent. The camp was quiet. Nicko was slumped unconscious in a camp chair near the remains of the fire, saliva dribbling down his chin. It seemed that everyone else had made it back to their tents. Jay took a long guzzle from his water bottle, marvelling at how delicious water could be.

Unzipping the tent as quietly as possible, he looked at Carla, sleeping peacefully. She was the most beautiful sight that he’d ever seen; he felt pure love for her. Jay clumsily removed all of his clothes, desperate to lay beside her, to touch her skin. He tried not to wake her as he lay beneath the blankets, the warmth of her body helping him to relax. He warmed his hands between his legs, then turned around to cuddle up to her, working his hand under her T-shirt to cup her soft breast in his palm. Her skin felt comforting.

‘Fuck off,’ she murmured, shuffling away from him while pushing his hand away.

Jay couldn’t decide if he had ever felt fuller or emptier. Possibly both.

Two

Jay’s headache raged throughout the following day, which made the pack-up, return journey and homecoming mildly traumatic. It felt as though his brain had stretched too far then snapped back abruptly. He just wanted to lay quietly with his eyes closed, but that was impossible as Carla was eager to get home.

Carla packed up noisily around him until he was forced to move. Jay tried to help with dismantling the camp but was defeated by the hot pain in his temple. He retreated to the shade of a tree, covered his head with a jacket and played no further part in the pack-up.

Jay brooded in his discomfort through the return journey. He was grateful to Carla for agreeing to drive, but she was unsympathetic, assuming that his headache was due to the cocktail of drugs from the previous night. She showed her annoyance that he had been close to useless for the pack-up by pretending that he wasn’t there.

‘It’s like having a fucking kid,’ she muttered to Nicko, gesturing at Jay, who lay supine on the backseat with a blanket covering his head. In the car, Jay kept the blanket over his head for as long as it was bearable, speaking as little as he could. Thinking was painful, but thoughts rose, lingered, and swirled. There was no escaping them, and several thoughts returned to gain more solid form.

- His relationship with Carla was based more on desire than love. It was heading downhill, probably beyond rescue.

- The world was on a collision course between capitalism and nature. A spiritual revolution was necessary for all of their benefits.

- Reawakening a spiritual connection with nature was probably the easiest way to achieve the changes that he felt were needed.

- He and his friends could have some fun with this idea.

Throughout the afternoon, variations of these thoughts revolved in Jay’s head without respite. Nicko gave Jay a rescue package containing a serotonin replacement tablet, multivitamins, and paracetamol. Jay hoped it would at least allow him to distract himself with reading, listening to music or watching television, but he was incapable of any of these things. He wondered what had been in the MDMA that would have this effect. He’d felt messy but fine until the sunrise experience.

The night brought little relief. Sleep came in fits and starts, bringing strangely realistic yet banal dreams that confused him further. Concerned that he would disturb Carla by speaking his thoughts aloud, Jay made his way to the sofa in the lounge but found it occupied by a softly snoring shape. With his vision still affected by the multi-coloured static, he couldn’t confirm his theory that the body was Sam, one of Nicko’s friends.

Exhaustion magnified the effect of gravity. Jay felt that he couldn’t return to the bed even though he longed to cuddle up with Carla. It didn’t feel right. Jay opened the bedroom door, feeling for his clothes. He picked his jeans up as quietly as possible, but change fell from his pocket onto the carpet with a noisy jangle. It was not enough to wake Carla, her breathing continuing rhythmically. Jay found his jacket and a blanket then quietly retreated to the back garden. The fresh air and space brought relief. Jay looked at the crescent moon in the clear sky, taking a deep breath. The night was chilly, so he pulled on his clothes and drew the blanket around his shoulders tightly, wishing that he’d grabbed socks.

Jay sat on a chair, enjoying the silence. He gazed lovingly at the gnarly bonsai on the table, noticing visual snow moving through the Lilliputian branches and leaves. The prospect of sleep gnawed at him, and after a few more minutes of staring at the shrub, he worked to rearrange the chairs in a line so that he could lay on them. It proved impossible to get comfortable for even a moment, so Jay rearranged the table to make space to lay down, relocating the ashtray and glasses to the floor. He curled around the bonsai on the hard table, using his arm as a pillow. He felt himself descending towards sleep.

Nicko’s jovial voice pierced Jay’s consciousness. ‘I’ve heard of tree-hugging, but that might just be taking things a bit far.’

Shutting his eyes tight against the morning light, Jay heard laughter and indecipherable words. The headache persisted. He had no desire to be awake or to talk with anyone.

‘Another one for the wall of shame.’ Jay heard a camera shutter, then Nicko’s retreating footsteps back into the house. Fighting to keep his eyes screwed shut and his head from throbbing, Jay strained to hear the muffled conversation from the kitchen. ‘We should probably wake him; he’s meant to be working today, I think,’ Carla said.

‘I guess,’ Nicko agreed.

‘Shit! Work,’ Jay thought as he roused himself. He rubbed his eyes, raised himself from the table and stretched out the aches from his limbs as best he could. Entering the house through the back door, he found Carla, Nicko, and Sam eating toast.

‘Morning blossom!’ sang Nicko, far too enthusiastically. The follow-up, ‘Want some coffee?’ was more welcome.

Jay looked at the clock: 8.06. He should’ve left for work by now. His voice echoed strangely in his head as he muttered, ‘Ah, shit. Yeah, please … there’s no way I can work today.’

‘Leigh isn’t going to like that,’ Carla commented. She had gone to school with his manager. Jay felt that their friendship hadn’t helped him at work.

‘It’s not in anyone’s interest that I do anything today except get my head straight. I think it’s broken.’

Carla snorted.

Jay felt that Leigh would understand, but he looked at his phone, hesitating before calling. He loved his job as a frontline fundraiser for Greenpeace despite all of its frustrations and challenges. He knew that he wouldn’t be making himself popular by leaving it so late to cancel his shift. But to go out today and confront the apathy of the public would have been too much for his aching brain.

He pressed the call button and put the phone to his ear, then quickly hung up. A message might be easier. He gratefully accepted some paracetamol along with the black filter coffee, which burned his tongue and hit his stomach unpleasantly.

Jay focused on the phone screen, typing; ‘Hi Leigh. I’m sorry but I woke up with a terrible headache & I can’t work today. Will call later when my head hurts less. Sorry.’ Out of habit, he added his usual smiley face but quickly realised that it would be inappropriate. He put a sad face, then deleted that, too. Emojis didn’t go down well with Leigh. He hit send and immediately felt guilty for failing to call.

A shower helped to snap him back to the present. As the water poured over his skin, he returned to his idea of starting a religion to challenge the orthodox. He needed to write his thoughts. Reluctantly he stepped out of the warm shower, feeling the cool of the morning on his skin and realising that he had forgotten to take a towel in with him. He used a face cloth to dry as much of the water from his body as he could and pulled on the boxer shorts that he’d already been wearing for two days. He no longer felt clean.

Now that the bed was vacant, Jay took off his dirty underwear and fell into it, snuggling beneath the blanket. It felt great to lay on a mattress, but he could feel grit on the sheets, and it bothered him. He wished that he’d closed the door properly so that he didn’t have to hear Nicko and Carla’s banter from the kitchen. Nicko said something in a low tone and Carla laughed loudly. Why did he feel like they were laughing at him?

Carla came into the bedroom. ‘So that’s another day’s pay gone begging. Are we really going to have enough to go to Bali?’

‘I’ll make it up,’ Jay replied. Carla neglected to respond. ‘You on a late today?’ he prompted.

‘Well yeah, otherwise I’d be at work already. Beth’s coming over later, so it’d be helpful if you could clean up all your shit.’

Jay felt anger rising. Why couldn’t she just let him be? ‘Okay,’ he said bitterly, swinging himself irritably out of bed. He felt unsteady on his feet but started stripping the bed sheets aggressively.

‘That’s probably not the priority,’ Carla said.

‘I disagree,’ he countered, casting the sheets into the laundry basket. Wordlessly he collected all the washing and took it into the laundry, finding that Nicko had already put a load in the machine without bothering to put it on. Jay started the cycle, left the basket and went to tackle the kitchen area. It was a mess, with full ashtrays and dirty dishes stacked on each other. ‘Am I helping or doing it all?’ he muttered.

Feeling that he didn’t want to be around people at the moment, Jay left the house without saying goodbye to anyone. He walked towards the river, his head still aching and now also swimming with anger. As he approached the trees, he felt calmer. He usually ignored the river as it was full of weeds and litter, which included shopping trolleys as well as plastic bags and discarded fast food wrappings. The river was murky brown, presumably from runoff further upstream. Today, however, it was a place of beauty and respite. Despite the rubbish, he felt grateful to have somewhere close to home that was calm and peaceful.

He walked along the trail until he found a patch of grass that was close to the water. The bank was steep and overgrown with weeds. Jay almost slipped but made it down and looked at the murky water for a minute or two, soothed by the gentle flow. Looking at the trees he felt that he could still see the tiny circles of life energy glowing within them, but it was far less vivid than it had been the previous morning.

Further along the river, an exposed rock in the middle of the river created a small island. Removing his shoes and socks, he waded to it apprehensively out of fear of broken glass, finding the flattest area of the rock that he could. Sitting down, he gazed at the water and reflected. Jay’s parents had raised him and his older sister, Amy, as Christians, forcing them to attend Catholic church each Sunday. The services left them cold, so as teenagers they had finally dissuaded their parents by attending services obviously hungover and dressed entirely in black.

Organised religion had served itself well but was now so irrelevant that people were leaving in droves. Jay had found Taoism to be the philosophy that most closely resembled his values, feeling that there was plenty of ancient wisdom in the Tao Te Ching that was useful in the modern day. Jay pulled out his notebook and started to write his thoughts, which became clearer as the words appeared.

- Fuck Carla. I’m doing this whether or not she approves.

- Society is fucked. We need massive global social change if we are to avoid killing the planet.

- We’ve lost connection with nature, and each other. Things are only getting worse.

- Organised religion is self-serving at best. If people are to reconnect with ancient traditions and values, we could create sharing, active communities that would be beacons for a progressive society.

- By bringing people together in natural spaces to celebrate nature, community and action, we could reach people who are currently part of the problem and allow them to understand what it means to be alive and spiritually active in a time when we are all spiritually dead. Reclaim spirituality from dogmatic beliefs in ancient gods, star signs, etc.

- Design a religion around what is most relevant about other beliefs. Church of nature.

- We’ll meet in natural spaces. No overheads. Volunteer-run short meetings that are hopeful, fun and based around community and the commons; the things in life that have the most value.

- Talk about current socially progressive issues and allow time for reflection.

- The church of nature will be anti-capitalist/consumerist/supernatural. It will be pro-community/science/nature/inclusion.

Jay realised that he would need to find an appropriate space to meet for the ceremonies. He wanted to meet close to the river and recalled a labyrinth where he had previously met some friends for a picnic that might fit the bill.

Birdsong accompanied Jay along the five-minute walk, and he smiled, wondering why he rarely walked along the river. He greeted the dog walkers he passed and as soon as he arrived, Jay knew that this would be the meeting place.

The area was a former bluestone quarry, with a large flat area that was relatively clear of vegetation. It was set back a few metres from the river with cliffs as a backdrop. There was a beautiful old tree to the left, and the labyrinth had been created in the clearing by locals, who had arranged hundreds of bluestone blocks in a large spiral. A deep layer of mulch around the stone suppressed weeds. Jay ambled around the labyrinth, taking about ten minutes to reach the centre, where he sat and smiled at his surroundings. It felt like a location from the Lord of the Rings. It was perfect!

The gum tree to the left of the clearing had a hand-painted sign attached to the trunk: ‘The Wishing Tree’. Its branches were crowded with slips of paper or cloth, on which people had written their desires and left them to flap in the breeze. A sign explained that the labyrinth had been created by the local community fourteen years ago and was maintained by volunteers. Jay made a mental note to contact them and seek permission if they were to use the site.

The area seemed to hold a powerful energy, perhaps thanks to the love of the community that maintained the site. Although he was just twenty-five minutes’ cycle ride from the central business district, Jay felt like he was in the country.

Now that he had a space to meet, Jay wrote a message to ten of his closest friends asking them to meet him at the labyrinth later in the day.

Three

Jay arrived at the river twenty minutes early, feeling apprehensive as he waited for his friends. His words would need to inspire support. Without others to help, his idea would remain an idea.

He’d brought a picnic backpack containing munchies: Lebanese bread, avocado, cheese, tomato, hummus and baba ganoush, along with a box of red wine and a bottle of water. It was a pleasant autumn evening, so he felt hopeful that people would come.

He checked the clock on his phone compulsively. He looked down at the water, doubting himself; was this crazy? As the murky water flowed by, he reflected on the beauty of the gum trees, stretching their limbs to allow their dark green solar panels to receive the warm late afternoon glow.

A couple of gang-gang parrots squawked from a tree on the side of the river, so Jay moved to take a closer look. They were not disturbed by his presence just a few metres away, and as he observed them, he became aware of other gang-gangs a little further into the tree. They seemed content with their simple needs.

Returning his gaze to the river, Jay noticed movement and saw an eel slaloming through the water near the bank. Musing at how much pure pleasure he felt at this, even though he was surprised that there could be so much life this far into suburbia in such a degraded landscape, Jay felt that nature was on his side. ‘Nature surrounds us at all times – how rarely we stop to appreciate it, with our lives as full as they are of the obsessions of everyday living,’ he considered.

Jay’s thoughts were disturbed by a hearty, ‘Evening Blossom!’ that announced Nicko’s arrival. Jay had never been more grateful to see his friend, and the hug was long and heartfelt. ‘You okay man?’ Nicko asked.

‘I’ve possibly never felt more alive!’ Jay responded. Despite the headache, he felt more present than he had in a long time.

‘That’s great to hear, man! You looked half dead this morning. So what’s this all about?’

‘Well, I’ve had lots going on in my head that I need to share with you all. It might be better if we wait until everyone’s here, so I don’t have to say it all more than once. How’s your day been?’

‘Oh okay, did some jamming with Ben. We wrote a new song.’ Nicko sang the two-word chorus, ‘Fu-uck everything!’ three times in a gravelly voice while miming guitar. ‘Did you