Tell your story

There are so many reasons to talk about mental health and wellbeing.

Our world is facing anything and everything at once. Big universal issues of poverty, malnutrition, economic crises, disease, unemployment, climate change and outbreaks of war. And communities are suffering overflows of waste, insufficient maternal and child healthcare, inflated petrol prices and supermarket wastage.

I find it incredible that every single person – or dog, cat, ant or any other living, breathing species – is unique. Everyone has their own history, experiences and story to tell. Each person is their own mixture of their parents, friends, extended family, education, culture and religion. It really takes my breath away knowing that each person I speak to, interact or make eye contact with, as well as every person I just pass someone on the street, is one of a kind. And anyone you have heard of, referenced, imagined or backstabbed is, too.

I’m no saint. Sure, I’ve spoken a bad word about someone behind their back, joked about a person’s shoes being too big, their hair unkempt (although let’s face it, I’m the number one perpetrator of that ‘crime’), and criticised someone’s decisions based on my personal principles. But that’s just it. My judgements, assumptions and assertions are my own, stemming from my personal, social, familial and cultural background. I’m trying to to judge less, and accept and appreciate more. Because if someone is acting safely, in a manner that could be widely considered as socially, ethically and morally just, then really, who are we to judge?

The times are tough and tedious and I think you’d be searching far and wide to find someone who wasn’t in need of a helping hand in one way or another. Maybe your grandmother needs someone to take her grocery shopping because she can’t carry all the bags back to the car/bus/tram. A friend might want a wingman for a first date on Valentine’s Day. Or maybe your loving, caring mother or father might appreciate a phone call from their long, lost daughter or son who they haven’t seen in weeks, despite you living just a couple of suburbs away, across the river.

I say this because everyone deserves a life – a life where they feel appreciated and loved for who they are, no matter their race, religion, sexual identity, gender, socio-economic status, whether they live in a house, a yurt or they choose a nomadic lifestyle. If someone has committed a crime, they deserve a chance to redeem themselves if they are willing to work towards a better and more sustainable life in which they will contribute positively to society.

And so often, it’s about the words we choose. Naming and shaming does nobody any good. Not one of us is perfect; no one has everything. Social media perpetuates this constant feeling of inferiority, FOMO, hints to us that we’re insignificant in a burgeoning network and sea of faces. But as I said, in each (legitimate) profile picture, is a whole person. A person with unique feelings, thoughts and experiences from which we can learn, and influence in the best ways we know how.

Alongside all the heavy weights pulling on the world, everyone also has their own troubles and challenges. While I’d love to be able to resolve global conflicts, find a cure for dementia or cancer, or provide a home for all those seeking asylum across the globe, I’m aware of trying to ground myself in reality. That’s not to say one person cannot make an impact, instigate change or contribute to solving any one of an array of international issues. But if that’s a bit overwhelming, maybe we can start closer to home.

Everyone can find themselves in a sticky situation where they’re left feeling vulnerable and alone. For some, this is rare, and these people are lucky. For others, helplessness and struggle seem to be daily battles occurring within the depths of their stomach, their heart, their mind. These people do have a bright future ahead of them. They might just need a leg up over the bushes to see it.

A huge percentage of the world’s population are facing or coming to terms with mental ill health. Mental health is a precursor for a life where one is appropriately stretched and tested, and is gratified and celebrated in return.

We need to let these people know that while despair can be debilitating, it too, shall pass.

Thankfully, there are thousands and thousands of people across the world who are striving everyday to communicate this message to those who need it. And if you don’t need it now, chances are you or someone you love will need a little shot of hope somewhere down the track.

So many industries and sectors are working their butts off to create an environment where everyone feels welcome and appreciated. Every month, awareness is growing, as are available support groups, networks and healthcare professionals. You might not need that kind of support, and that’s okay too. Sometimes your greatest support can be your puppy, your partner, or even a note pad and pen.

I second the responses of Thu-Huong Ha, who in December, asked the question, How should we talk about mental health?. Drawing on wisdom from TED speakers, she highlighted the importance of sensitivity, being considerate, and respect when talking about the health of our minds. I suggest this is the same respect and thought we give others who’ve broken a bone and cannot participate in a shopping spree, or those who’ve been diagnosed with a condition that’ll put them out of work for weeks or months at a time.

We do not give up on these physically scarred individuals. Because everyone who is scarred, is also healing. They are one and the same. Healing is a process which only time can propel. But with the right treatment, ointment, love and care, we can all heal, whatever our wound, and in turn, help others to do the same.

Nobody else can tell your story. And it’s okay to ask for help to relocate your voice, your legs and your lungs, so that you can.

Support Services Australia:

headspace

beyondblue

Black Dog Institute

Butterfly Foundation

twenty10

Lifeline

Kids Helpline

Relationships Australia

International:

Mental Health America

Mind (UK)

Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand

Canadian Mental Health Association

Or please use Google to find the most direct and appropriate service for you.

Facebook morale

Facebook is celebrating its 10th birthday today amidst speculation of an impending decline. But the behemoth of social networks is showing no signs of flailing just yet.

Facebook is one of the first things we check in the mornings and the last, before we go to sleep.

Whether its FOMO, addition or just habit, Facebook has become a stalwart pal for about one sixth of the world’s population, a staggering ‘citizenship’ which could surpass the number of people living in China, the world’s most populous nation, within the next year.

It seems the way people use Facebook is dependent on whether (or not) they grew up with the network. As Seth Fiegerman writes, ‘Facebook’s users seem to be divided into two groups: younger users who are forever connected to people from the past, and older users who are given a powerful tool to reconnect with those they’ve long since lost touch with’.

Having signed up to Facebook at the beginning of 2008, I wasn’t one of the first to jump on the bandwagon. But I did have an account before many of my friends, albeit one I saw as the inferior little sister to my, at the time, beloved Myspace. I actually got a Facebook account to keep in touch with new friends from interstate. Either myself or members of the Sydney clan had to make a move to the dark side (Facebook and Myspace, respectively), and I ended up caving to what I thought was the short straw. About a year later, Myspace became effectively defunct and I found myself pretty proud of my already established Facebook backlog and network.

Nevertheless, I still latched onto Facebook as a way of remaining connected, rather than reigniting long lost friendships from my single digit days. Simultaneously, my peers began to use Facebook as their primary social network, to the point where I’m now connected to hundreds and hundreds of ‘friends’ some of which I’ve either met only once, or haven’t spoken to directly in years. However, every now and then someone I might classify as ‘random’ (a word my mum thinks is ‘soooo Gen Y’) pops up on my newsfeed and I’m kindly reminded of their existence in the world, if not in my life as such.

At the moment, I’m still pretty dependent on Facebook to do what it does best and give me updates and a realtime tracker of what my friends and ‘friends’ are doing with their lives. Ironically, Facebook really shows just how much we’re not doing because we’re too busy updating our online presence through status’, photos and ‘checking in’ to places where we want to be (virtually) seen.

I am not out to diss Facebook. As I said, I’m still thoroughly engaged with, and through, the network to people I’d otherwise have lost contact with. Despite only being a few years out of school, there are so many people I’d have called close friends that I now, rarely see or even speak to. Facebook provides me with that virtual and emotional link to classmates with whom I spent weeks and years, side by side. Someone’s got a new boyfriend, someone else is on exchange, one girl is living abroad and another just qualified as a professional nurse and has already landed the job of her dreams.

When people announce exciting (or even terribly tragic) events on Facebook, there is an almost resurgence and instantaneous spill of camaraderie for those involved. It’s pretty amazing how quickly people come together for someone in need, or to celebrate and congratulate a new couple, job or marriage.

But Facebook also perpetuates a continuous disease of comparison between both strangers and friends. If the aforementioned friend got ‘the’ job while you lucked out, you might feel down. You see a group of old friends catching up without you and checking in somewhere for drinks, and now not only you know you’ve been sidelined, but everybody else in their network does, too.

And social networking is, ironically, incredibly self-centred. While each network proclaims to be about connecting people, they’re all centred around individual users creating a ‘profile’ through which they will portray themselves to the world. Yet whether by intuition, self-protection or devious scheming, what and how we choose to display ourselves online is overwhelmingly self-selected – and if it’s not, you can untag yourself or remove yourself from the group with the click of a button.

So people are choosing profile pictures where they’re pleased with their appearance. They’re checking in only at the places/with people with whom they want to be seen. They’re selectively creating a virtual profile of themselves filled with all the good bits, and only minimal (if any at all) aspects of their vulnerabilities. And as Brené Brown teaches us, there is so much power in vulnerability.

But with over 1.23 billion users worldwide, Facebook is clearly doing something right. The network also hosts thousands of support groups, allows for easy sharing of digital content, and makes inviting friends to your birthday soiree so much easier. Of course, sometimes you’re drowning in events from promoters or can’t see anything on your newsfeed other than bloody memes or videos of friends nek nominating each other, but being so privy at least means you’re kept in the loop… at all times… whether you like it or not.

I suppose what it all comes down to is the power of social networking in creating, building and maintaining relationships between individuals and groups across the globe. In the words of TheFacebook’s multibillionaire founder, Mark Zuckerberg, ‘It’s been amazing to see how people have used Facebook to build a real community and help each other in so many ways’.

Only time will tell if the network survives its terrible teens. Always reinventing itself, Facebook continues to keep up with if not, lead, the Joneses so if it continues to dominate global connectivity into the 2020s, here’s hoping we’re all still interested in those self-appointed popular girls from high school because, who knows? Maybe we’ll even see them settle down some day.

Like This

Last night I uploaded a new profile picture to Facebook.

The Likes I received were incredible/ridiculous/many. Every time I checked my phone, the Likes had increased. I went out to yoga, put my phone on silent, and by the time I came home an hour and a half later, the number had skyrocketed further, still. As I write, I’m on 209 Likes and 23 extremely generous and complimentary comments. That’s a Like Record for me, the most I’ve had on anything I’ve posted over my five plus years on the social media platform.

So, I’m thinking, ‘Wow, this is great! People think I’m attractive, people like what I’m wearing, my smile, the composition of the photo, or a combination of all of the above’. It made me feel good, I felt (no pun intended), Liked. I felt more worthy than I had a few hours before, I felt more accepted and somehow, more legitimate, as a valuable, equal member of my peer group, of society, if I can to take it to that extent.

Here’s the problem: I recently had a professional photo shoot at a professional photography studio. I had my hair and make-up done by an ‘artist’, was shot by a professional photographer, and the team used ‘props’ like a fan to blow my hair around, made lighting and furniture adjustments, and positioned me in ways they thought complementary to my figure/features/whatever. Essentially, they directed me into looking ‘good’. The photographer said she had all the knowledge and experience needed to produce the most flattering shots and I was (and still am) grateful for her keeping to her promise.

But, how do I know she succeeded?

Because one of those photographs is the one I made my profile picture less than 24 hours ago. That same one with the most Likes, kind comments and good feelings that have come as a result of the finished product.

Oh, there’s another Like. 210, now.

So, here’s the thing. What does it say about me that this course of events and tiny clicks, minute actions by others, granted, by you, that have led me to feel a significantly increased my self-esteem over a short period of time? How else could I have achieved this sense of okay-ness on my own? Am I so dependent on others that I am unable to pick myself up?

And, perhaps, what does it say about you? Is this a situation you’ve too, been in?

What lesson does it teach me, or us, about our society? About praise, about dependence, about the relationship between looking good and feeling good?

Instant gratification. Social media provides me – and I suspect most of my generation if not everyone active across the various platforms – with comments, Likes, Followers, that give me a sense of achievement. For that second that I’ve got someone else’s attention, I’ve been thought of, considered, mentioned.

Truth is, my presence in your mind probably is only momentary, fleeting if anything was. You’ve no doubt now scrolled down your newsfeed and Liked three other Friends photos, status’ or Shares. But in our fast-moving world, that moment I was present with you is as significant as I can ask for.

But, here’s the thing. Is that person in that picture you Liked actually me? I mean sure, it’s me – the image captures my hair, my face, my favourite clothes, my ring, my posture. But, I’ve been manipulated. Edited. Touched up.

Granted, it wasn’t actually touched up a whole lot. If I had a copy of the original, organic, un-Photoshoped photo, I’d post it here for you to make that judgement yourself. I saw it before editing though, and I’d say they only smoothed out a few blemishes or whatever they deemed to be imperfections on my face or something.

But, what about all these pre-production adjustments? I spent a good 20 minutes getting my hair and make-up perfected before they even considered taking me into the proper studio (for lack of a better word) part of the ‘studio’. Yes, they opted for a fairly natural look (upon request), and they let me bring my own clothes. So, I suppose the final photograph could be considered a fairly realistic representation of who I am. But, what is troubling is knowing that had I uploaded this picture (see below) instead, I’d probably be sitting on a solid, oh, five Likes, if I’m lucky. And they’d most likely be from my nearest and dearest who fit the ‘take me as I am’ brief.

We’re constantly being bombarded by Photoshopped images of celebrities, by messages of the ‘ideal’ body type, skin colour, hairstyle. We’re told, heck, dictated to, what’s ‘hot’, what’s ‘in’, asked ‘who wore it better’, shown so-and-so’s ‘biggest blunder’.

To be honest, it’s all fucked.

And I can only say this because I play into this culture of externally-identified ideals of perfection and sources of assurance. I’m a victim and an offender but it’s perpetual, it’s enthralling, it’s insane.

We, as a society, have an addiction to judgement. We draw conclusions from un-evidenced or unsubstantiated data. We take thing at face value and buy into advertising, media reporting and gossip without stopping to consider our deeper values or attitudes.

Even when just taking that photo above on my computer’s Photo Booth, I took a couple. I wanted to look my best ‘in a bad situation’ (read; day at home, no make-up, dirty hair). Side note: omfg the temptation to edit that picture was enormous.

But, why is this? I’m not saying we don’t have the right to want to feel beautiful, to feel accepted and to want to be happy. Naturally, that’s an inherent aspect of building one’s self-esteem, something no one should be denied. It’s something principally deeper than that.

It’s more about how we source that emotion, and questioning why we value certain ‘sources’ over others.

And, it’s also about how much we rely on social media for quantified assurance and positive reinforcement.

211 Likes.

I don’t want to play the blame game anymore than I have, nor do I believe this culture has come about as a consequence of a single event/person/aspiration. It’s a process, it’s constantly evolving. And no one is immune (J-Law, case in point).

212 Likes.

I’m not anti-make-up, anti-media, or even anti-Photoshop.

But, if I – or you – can’t upload any picture of ourselves in equal self-confidence, and are dependent on external input to confirm or trash our mood and opinion of ourselves, I think there’s at least something to think about.

Birthday

 

 

The response I received on my previous post has been overwhelming. All your words of wisdom have been gratefully appreciated. This is only the beginning of a long, complex journey towards recovery, but my word stands: it will be worth it.

I had an amazing birthday yesterday. I was incredibly spoilt by my parents, family and friends. A week ago, nobody would have believed I’d have been home to celebrate but with the support of those around me, home I was. Thank you to everyone who made contact and gave me their well wishes. It means an enormous amount to have you all by my side. Here’s to an exciting year of growth ahead.

A mere portion of the gifts I received. I now live in a florist!

Today’s Appreciations

Today I Appreciate:

1. Being with 16 other young women who are making a move on the tough ride over Humpday
2. Getting back to sleep after an early wakeup
3. Art Therapy
4. Getting a headway with sorting things out for university
5. Feeling heard
6. Being cared for
7. Having a warm bed to snuggle up in
8. Messages and calls of hope from loved ones

Things I Could Do Without:

1. Guilt
2. Physical illness
3. Slipping over in the shower and hurting my bum (TMI?)
4. Self-pressure
5. A poor and unreliable internet connection
6. No Wifi
7. My laptop battery’s ridiculously short life-span
8. Ensure

75 Things I Miss

Pleasures of the past have been on my mind recently. Some are once-offs, a lot are series’ or phases or crazes that fled through my time as a child. Some memories are bittersweet, some are vivid while others pale against the background of their time. But here are just some ‘things’ – for lack of a better collective noun – I miss.

1. Baby-sitters Club books, Karen Brewer and Stoneybrook Academy
2. So Fresh and Barbie CDs
3. Lizzie McGuire
4. Mary-Kate and Ashley books
5. HMV gift vouchers in metallic colours
6. Arthur
7. Barney & Friends
8. The Ketchup Song (Aserejé) by Las Ketchup
9. Beanie Kids
10. Gel pens
11. S Club 7… “ain’t no party like an S Club party”
12. The original version of Snake for old Nokias
13. Pinball on my mum’s old PC laptop
14. Sunny Boys from the milk-bar after school and snow cones at the Australian Open tennis
15. The Game of LIFE and Guess Who?
16. Follow Me by Uncle Kracker – the first pop song I ever knew all the words to
17. Canned-spaghetti sandwich jaffles
18. Cheese toasties my Nanna used to cut into boats with sails
19. Before- and after-school care with Milo milks
20. Four square
21. Splice ice-creams
22. Ice Magic
23. Monkey bars
24. Performing shows with friends/cousins for family and friends
25. Family outings/day-trips
26. Incursions
27. Parental permission slips
28. Baby chinos
29. Going into mum’s work and being spoilt rotten
30. Hairbrush microphones
31. Lime spiders
32. Ribena
33. Getting a packet of salt and vinegar chips from the vending machine after swimming in the local pool, with wet hair and a towel swung around my waist
34. Spider solitaire
35. MSN
36. Not knowing your own city well enough such that every trip in made it feel like there was a whole new world you were about to explore
37. Calling up a friend and getting your parents to speak to arrange a play date
38. Slumber parties
39. Feeding the ducks on an extended-family picnic
40. Looking forward to a trip to Luna Park/a theme park for days in advance
41. The Drive-In
42. Baking tiramisu on Italian Day in primary school
43. Book Week dress up parades
44. Roll-Ups
45. Those sucky yoghurt things where you tear off the top and slurp up the dairy
46. Lip Smackers
47. Monkey bar blisters
48. Family road trips
49. Staying up late enough to hear the number one song on the Hot30 Countdown, just as the clock ticks over to 10pm
50. Endless energy
51. Waking up early and actually being ready to start a new day
52. Lunch orders
53. Ovalteenies – “nutritious & delicious”, from the tuck shop lunch mothers at morning tea time
54. Choosing which Teletubbie/Powerpuff Girl/Sex and the City character you wanted to be
55. Getting a new CD and playing it over and over and over again (e.g. anecdotally, Anthony Callea’s Rain)
56. Sandpit treasure hunts
57. School fetes
58. Junior School discos
59. The Black Seat outside the principal’s office
60. Kopiko and White Rabbit Cream Candy
61. Hall – a subject we had at my first school that was just literally semi-structured play time in a huge hall where there was gymnastics equipment, a stage, art materials, things to play ‘shop’, and an old typewriter that I seem to remember was pretty popular
62. Plaster fun houses
63. Relative fearlessness
64. Seeing someone with their/getting your hair braided and beaded, and knowing they’d just come back from a tropical, exotic island holiday (and then seeing how long you could leave it in before your mum told you it was getting too knotty beyond presentable standards)
65. Running through the sprinkler during a hot Aussie summer in the backyard
66. Choosing (in advance) what I wanted for dinner on the night I arrived home from camp after a week of dehydrated, mass-produced meals
67. Moving the TV into the living room for the 2000 Sydney Olympics
68. Solitary tea parties with my dollies
69. Loosing track of time and not worrying about how much/little time there was to do something/anything/everything
70. Lining up in pairs to enter the classroom
71. Sitting on a bag of rice in the back seat of my dad’s car so I could see the world – like a booster seat, just made of uncooked, edible grains
72. Kneeling on a stool to reach the stove top and cooking and stirring the Béchamel sauce with my dad
73. Judy Blume books
74. Voting for class captains/library monitors/SRC representatives
75. Guess How Much I Love You

 

 

 

Additionally, here are two pieces I wrote for artsHub this week:

Name Your Price for Leading Literary Journals <— this is super good value for all you bookworms

Grants Support INternational Opportunities for Victorian Artists

An Interview with Angeline Armstrong from Melbourne Band Haiku

This new group straight out of Melbourne’s roots are absolutely unbelievable. If you do anything today, check out this interview for insight into their how, what, where, when and why. And be sure to come along to their EP launch: 9^th of May at the Evelyn Hotel in Fitzroy, Melbourne.

Here’s a sneak peak of their first single Love, For The Day Is Near

We Are Powerful

It’s scary how powerful we are.

We have the power to make someone’s day or change someone’s life.

We have the power to create and destroy.

We have the power to learn and love.

We have the power to move, and sit passively looking on.

Every day, tragedy strikes where it’s least expected. Heartbreak hits after longterm illness, as people pass, and come and go. Some events get more public attention. Others fade away, while some never get reported on at all. But every little action you choose to make effects someone. That someone might be your father, your mother, your best friend, you sister, your brother. Maybe it’s your daughter, your son, your uncle, your grandmother. Or maybe, that person is you. Maybe pressing snooze this morning left you running to the station, only to see your train pass you by. Or maybe it was the best thing you could have done for yourself; those extra seven minutes leaving you just that little bit more rested and up to facing the challenges of the day.

Attention is amazing. We pay attention to something or someone depending on our personal interests, our context, our mood. We are shaped by those around us, our social status, our biological or psychological dispositions. We might have a crazy obsessed over a celebrity, a boy, a girl, that interesting looking creature you noticed in your front garden this afternoon. Some characteristic, a look, a style, an inkling, has captured you, in part or in full.

Right now is right now. Next week is next week. And yesterday is gone for good. So maybe it’s time to make a decision to pay attention to something else. Or maybe you find yourself all-too-consumed by chaos, drama, loss. No one can be the judge, but you.

We have some power over what consumes us. But sometimes we feel helpless, unable to change. Some situations are too big to handle alone. Others are within your own capacity. Crises demand attention on a broader scale. When horror, terror, or war takes place, people hurt. People yearn. People love and lose. People die.

Power is scary because it can be imposed upon us. Dictation, compulsory activities, enlistment, war.

And I don’t have a fucking clue how to manage all that.

You have to know that it’s okay if you can’t cope on your own. There is no shame in reaching out, asking for help, needing a shoulder to cry on.

Because life can be hard. Life is hard. And we each have our own, individual thresholds, limits, boundaries we can’t quite yet cross.

But there is always something you can do to help, to change, to move towards the light.

That is powerful.

Power can be beautiful. Power is enabling. Power is motivating. Power is special. Channel your power towards a better place for you, right now. That’s something you can do. You have the power to rid yourself of guilt. Of shame. If you want it enough.

I know we have more power together, than we do alone. So let’s use our power, or our agency, to bring good, peace and calm, in a time so full of mistrust. Be generous and kind. Give and receive.

And, that will be powerful.

The Evolution of The Mobile Phone: A Personal Relationship Retrospective

I remember the night I was gifted my first mobile phone. Mum, Dad and I were sitting at a local restaurant – fine dinning, with while table cloths and polished silver to boot – and I had just been announced as (Co-) Captain of my school. I was super excited, but also bummed because I’d really wanted House Captain of my house, Oswald, so I could spend my time making up chants and buying green pom-poms and get kudos for it. But there I was, co-captain of the Junior School. And all that responsibility and achievement in my parents’ eyes had merited my very first cellular telephone. I. Was. Stoked. Not a lot of my 11-year-old friends had a mobile phone, but I distinctly remember one friend who had the prized Nokia 3200, one of those ones where you could change the cover and even collage your own on paper and stick it under that wonderful plastic backing. And the game of the moment was Bounce. Fuck, I loved Bounce. Getting that little red ball over jumps and passing levels. I remember when I finally finished the game (ie. completed all the levels), I felt like I’d won the lottery. Bounce was kind of a progression from the Old School Snake (an example of a game that has disintegrated and disappointed thousands of kids across the globe through it’s reincarnations). I played snake on my mum’s Nokia 3410, which she got as part of her work plan. Now I’m more of a Sudoku kinda gal. Gotta love a bit of Sudoku when you can’t sleep at night.

Nokia 3200

Nokia 3410

But my obsession with all things mobile started prior to my school captain election, in Year Five. We were given the task of our own personal project. We could research, write up and present to the class on any topic we wanted. So while most sensible girls chose to study volcanoes and make cool explosions with bicarbonate soda happen on classroom tables, I set out to ‘prove’ to my parents I needed a mobile phone. The truth be told, I did very little actual research for that project and I don’t know how I got a good mark for it because the teacher must have known I was full of crap. I remember sitting in front of our old, big, blue-backed Mac in my dad’s studio, typing up lines that were founded and composed completely from my imagination. Obviously a bibliography was not important in Year Five, or if it was on the criteria, it certainly wasn’t checked prior to marking. I probably just bullshitted and wrote http://www.nokia.com, http://www.sonyericsson.com and http://www.telstra.com without even clicking a button. So from memory, I ‘analysed’ the best plans to go on, the benefits of Telstra vs. Nokia (clearly not comparable ‘items’ one being a provider and one being a phone manufacturer), and printed and cut out pictures of phones I thought were pretty cool and would look good in my hot little hands. Pretty hilarious nearly a decade on. Since then Sony Ericsson has dropped the Ericsson and Nokia’s have been largely superseded by the infamous iPhone and it’s competitors. But the aim of my project was to get a phone. And I guess it worked.

My first phone was the Nokia 2600. I remember taking it home, opening up the manual and letting it ‘fully charge’ over a no doubt sleepless night. It lit up for the first time and I went to school a very happy chap. Not long after, I got a Roxy lanyard and a purple Von Dutch cover for my buddy, and I was right up there with the cool kids. Who could resist a girl with a cellular in her pocket?

Nokia 2600

In the summer between Years Five and Six, my family took a trip all the way up the east coast of Australia. We stopped off in Canberra, and then drove for two full days before reaching the Sunshine Coast. I think that entire summer I spent only $10. I reached the end of my credit period (my phone was prepaid) with over $80 left. I was economical and responsible, and I was proud. I also was highly antisocial and rude to anybody that texted me as I’d only reply to the most important of messages, things that deserved a reply. I don’t think I ever made a phone call. It was all about the texting. I remember my aunt and grandmother commenting on how good I was with my phone use, and my younger cousins being jealous of my new acquisition. My mum was so happy with my (bare minimum) usage, and I managed to keep it up for quite a long time. I think I mainly used it to tell the time and played around with all the settings and the screen savers. Oh, and the games.

At the time, personalising your ringtone was just about the coolest thing you could ever dream of. I remember being excited when I got my 2600 because the manual said it had polyphonic ringtones. My mum’s stock standard 3410 was only capable of blasting monophonic brutalities of Bach and Mozart, whereas I could have Rhumba and Calypso. Life was a dream. Television ads selling ringtones and tacky screensavers were common, and watching late at night gave one options some might consider verging on pornographic, suitable for Adult Viewers only. I remember visiting the Vodafone store on my phone and laboriously considering ringtone after ringtone, wondering whether it would be worth all of those $3, and if it would unknowingly find me in a situation of monthly deductions from my $10 allowance. I don’t remember ever making the purchase. It was probably for the best. Mobile phone providers and fellows seem to have a knack when it comes to scheming and reeling in customers unawares.

But things got complicated when other friends got the Nokia 6101, and similar phones that had more impressive features than my 2600. Infrared was never really used amongst my cohort, but Bluetooth became all the rage. Flip phones were ‘in’ and my lanyard was pulling me back. So my jealously and I grew simultaneously. On another note, for some reason, Year Six saw a rebirth of the Tamagotchi. And I refused to get one, because I wanted to be the first one to be ‘over’ it. You see I was ahead of the pack in other ways. I’m still kind of like that, refusing to get involved in things because I want to be the first one who’s passed it. I tried this with Instagram and succeeded for a while. I thought it was pretentious. But whom am I kidding? Photos of food, feet and (duck) faces are sadly addictive (and eat up my data allowance every month).

Nokia 6101

With Year Seven came new friends, a new experience despite being at the same school, and new mobile phone trends. Around this time, Orange was phased out and 3 because the hottest provider. Friends held their mobiles together tight when transferring songs via Bluetooth, much like one did with a Tamagotchi. The strength of the Bluetooth signal wasn’t revealed until later, when we realized immediate proximity wasn’t as necessary as we’d previously thought. I remember pressing play for Anthony Callea’s Rain on my portable CD player and holding my phone next to the speakers to try and record an enviable ringtone. Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful, one, because it sounded like crackly shit, and two, because apparently, Anthony Callea was in fact not cool. At the same time, I unfortunately made my email address about him, and created a Piczo site with the URL of ‘mscallea’. Obviously my priorities were in tact, and my preference in guys, spot on. When I found out he was gay I was pretty devastated.

My Year Three teacher’s fiancé had proposed to her while he was swimming in the shark tank at the Melbourne Aquarium. And he worked for Sony Ericsson. So basically, I thought the company must have been pretty sweet to get a guy like him. I got my Sony Ericsson z550 as a present from my grandmother around Year Eight. Super happy to get a phone with Bluetooth (and a camera!), I was all over that shit. Until the first one had a technical malfunction. And the second one, I dropped straight into a glass of water at a restaurant, in front of the grandmother who’d purchased the product for me. And the third one, which was stolen. Boo.

Sony Ericsson z550

I called my number from my mum’s phone after realizing it’d been stolen and the guy who’d stolen it answered it with “Fuck off, Mum”. Obviously it’d said ‘Mum calling’. I cried. I also remember losing one yellow and one metallic green Haviana thong that night. Should have thought about being trendy and indie, wearing one of each before realizing that I’d be stuck with a permanently mismatching pair of thongs as a result. You live and you learn.

Throughout the rest of Year Eight and Year Nine, I made my way through a number of friends and family member’s old phones. None of them were memorable, and many were largely unworkable, too. I chose to go the summer between these two years, mobile free. I was again, pretty ahead of the game, but maybe by 200 years or something (will they ever be entirely superseded?) and it kind of sucked when I couldn’t wish a friend happy birthday because I was stuck in northern New South Wales without access to another phone. I thought she’d hate me after that. To my surprise, we happened to be mature enough to move our friendship beyond it.

My next new (read: store bought) phone was the oh-so-common silver Nokia 3110, probably still living an infrequent existence today. It came with a Casino Royale theme and got me through the long days, late nights and drunken calls of Year Ten. Its camera was sharp and enabled me to have crappy techno music as my ringtone, so I was sufficiently happy. With this as my staple, I seemed to pass over the various editions of the fad, pink Motorola Razr’s which greeted you with “Hello, Moto” each time someone turned them on. Additionally, I missed the craze of slide phones and the Nokia E Series. That was definitely due to my insistence that I would not get something that everyone else had. Instead, in 2010, I got the Blackberry Curve 8520, which I never turned off silent or vibrate, so much so that when I passed it onto my mum the next year and heard it ring, it’s sound was foreign and unrecognizable.

Nokia 3110

Motorola Razr

Nokia E(72) Series

Blackberry Curve 8520

My Blackberry saw me through hard times and some months my $29 cap was barely dented. I have always had a thing about saving messages, and it has been very rare that I ever delete one. I’m sentimental and a hoarder. Not the greatest trait to have but technology comes with a lot of memory these days, so why delete if it isn’t necessary? I loved its trace/sense mouse and enjoyed the having the full QWERTY keyboard to twiddle my thumbs over. I got into apps with my Blackberry, most notably Facebook, which I had unlimited access to. I also checked my email and did a few web-based things on it but it was pretty clear that it was a man’s phone, a business phone. Is that sexist? Probably.

Just after finishing school, I got a car and finally rose to meet the iPhone trend. I decided holding back from this one for the sake of individuality would actually be stupid rather than self-proving. And I’m so glad I did. I do use folders under the titles of Utilities, Reference, Games, News, Uni & Work, Photography, Melbourne, Sound and Health, but some of the apps don’t really fit into the folder they’re found in. Facebook and Twitter are out there on their own, showing their significance, and the frequency of which I use them. After placing such a focus on transferring music via Bluetooth in the past and making sure you had enough memory to do to, the iPod is now an inherent feature of the iPhone. Alongside its touchscreen, it’s almost strange to imagine being without it. And from monophonic tones through to techno trash, I now settle for the factory default ringtone and message tone. I’ve never even bothered to look twice. I love the Do Not Disturb setting, and the way everything syncs with my beloved MacBook Pro, including iMessage working across Apple platforms. My iPhone 4s completes me. We are engaged and in love. And it’s the greatest, most superficial and one-sided relationship I’ve ever had.

iPhone 4s

I don’t know if I’m part of Generation Y, or Generation Z, or the Techno Generation. But I know that my generation’s use of mobile phones, living in a developed country, has evolved as I have. My friends and I have gone from playing games on each other’s phones, to asking to look at another’s phone and pretend to be playing games while really reading messages to find out what they’re hiding, and have now reached a stage where our mobile phone ownership and use is fairly independent from one another, if not incredibly dependent on the device itself. But it’s the way of the world. And nothing’s going to stop its constant evolution. But as a consequence, the next time someone fails to reply to your message within a few hours, you’d be pretty right to think they‘re hating on you. But in the same respect, don’t be one of those people who sends messages consisting only of question marks. Because no one likes a hassle-r. So save yourself. Because that’s one reputation you’ll struggle to lose.

Perks and Hitchcock

 

These past few years I’ve not seen many films in the cinema. I’ve seen plenty of movies and watched seasons of many series’ at home, but I’d say that generally I would have been able to count the number of times I’d set foot in a cinema on one hand. I think 2013 is going to be the year in which I venture to the big screen more and more, if these first two weeks are anything to go by.

This weekend alone, I’ve been to the movies twice. Last night, I saw Hitchcock and this evening, The Perks of Being A Wallflower. So I thought I’d gather a few thoughts and pen them to page – or type them or whatever you’re supposed to say when press keys down and magically your thoughts appear on the screen in front of you.

***Potential spoiler alert***

Sadly/shamefully/oddly, I knew almost nothing about Alfred Hitchcock before last night. I knew he’d directed Psycho, and that was about it. I knew the screeching Psycho music but would not have necessarily associated the sound with the silver screen. Hitchcock is directed by Sacha Gervasi, a journalist-writer and a relative newcomer to the directorial scene. The story is thought to be a biographical story of the lives of Alfred Hitchcock and his wife, Alma Reville, yet is based on Stephen Rebello’s book, Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho.

Anthony Hopkins is a portly Hitchcock, with intriguing lips and a waddle to be applauded for what must have been the result of in-depth character development. Hitchcock, or ‘Hitch’ as he is more commonly known, is an avid eater, a charmer and a risk taker, who believes in himself and his work so much that he will mortgage his house to make a film will very little backing from producers or distributors. Yet he has undoubted support from his wife, Alma, a stubborn, hearty and dedicated Helen Mirren, who portrays her character with great integrity. I can only imagine the real Alma, had she lived to see this production, would have been proud and satisfied with Mirren’s performance. Ultimately, it is a story of relationships (aren’t they all), but more specifically of the strength of a woman who dares to live her own life while standing by her husband and all of his endeavours. 

The film also features Scarlett Johansson, James D’Arcy, Toni Collette, Jessica Biel and Danny Huston, who to my eye, looks like he’s just jumped out of a Walt Disney picture. His face is so huge and animated, it consumed me almost as much as it filled up space on screen.

All in all, it’s not a must see, but definitely is well-directed, well-cast, and acted thoughtfully and thoroughly (if that’s even a ‘thing’). I kind of wish it were nominated for an Oscar or two, best supporting actress being the stand out pick, if any.

On a completely different note, Perks was something I’d been wanting to see since hearing it was coming out as a film, many months ago. While Hitchcock was seen on a whim, this had been in the pipeline for a long time. I feel slightly unauthorised to speak about this film considering I haven’t read the book, which I feel indebted to read even more as a result of seeing the film. I always think it’s best to read the book first, but for some reason, I didn’t get around to it. Let’s say it’s now etched into my ever-growing To Read list.

The story is directed by and the screenplay, adapted by Stephen Chbosky, author of the original novel. With a young yet all-star cast, he has done a wonderful job of portraying youth through relationships, sadness, conflict and self-doubt. Coined as a coming-of-age novel, it has a cult-like following and this group will no doubt have grown since stars Ezra Miller and Emma Watson have jumped on board.

A narrative spoken by Charlie (Logan Lerman) tracks his growth from a shy freshman with many secrets and no friends, to his time as a young man with knowledge of love, experiences of beauty, fun and an ability to speak the truth and be heard, without shame and free from judgement. Charlie is introduced to drugs, sex, pain and honesty through his friendship with Patrick, (Miller) and his step-sister Sam, (Watson). The film deals with issues that could have been brutalised and vulgarised if not handled with appropriate care, including gay relationships, mental illness, sexual disturbance and violence. But it is a testament to the story, the acting and the greater direction and production of the film, that each of these occurrences are told with authenticity and respect. The depiction Charlie’s inner torment and his time in hospital is delicate, as are the subtle yet powerful references to various characters’ sexual abuse.

A stand out performance award must go to Ezra Miller, previously best known for playing the title role in We Need to Talk About Kevin, one of my favourite films. In Perks he is Patrick, a queer/queeny, enthusiastic spark with a confidence sure to be envied by teenagers and adults alike. Apart from his distinctive physical features, his acting is impeccable. The first Rocky Horror scene is possibly the one of the best moments in theatre ever. You have GOT to see it, words cannot describe… Other casting is also superb, including Paul Rudd as Mr Anderson and Mae Whitman (whom I love from Parenthood) as Mary Elizabeth. Additional familiar faces include Joan Cusack, Kate Walsh and Dylan McDermott.

I would highly recommend Perks to people of any age. It is an eclectic mix of romance, drama, teen-fiction and simple, raw emotion. It will make you feel something. And whatever that feeling may be, is special in itself.

Maybe these are summaries more than reviews, or thoughts rather than star ratings, but I felt compelled to write something about my hours in front of the big screen this weekend. If nothing else, I hope you too, might now venture out to see either of these films, and do let me know what you think of them. I’d love to hear your thoughts.