17 January 2011

Commissioner O’Callaghan

Western Australia Police Headquarters
2 Adelaide Terrace, East Perth
Western Australia 6004

Dear Commissioner,

I am writing in support of your sentiments today as published in The West Australian (Monday 17 January 2011).

Not only would I like to congratulate you on the great work you are doing, but also point out that while the liquor industry might not hold you in high esteem, the rest of the law-abiding community in WA certainly does.

I’m sure I don’t fit the standard profile of someone who might send you a supportive letter – I am a 33 year old, single, professional female with a university education, living in the vibrant inner city suburb of Leederville. I enjoy going out to clubs and pubs as much as anyone and I have done so since I moved to Perth from Albany at age 18. Unlike everyone else though, for the past two years I have abstained completely from alcohol – not because I had an issue with it – though I do now recognise that like most of Australia’s young people, I was in fact a social binge-drinker from age 18 to 24. Thanks to a series of fortunate coincidences, I started on this course and have managed to resist both the automatic urge and the peer pressure to go back to drinking.

A group that I stumbled upon called Hello Sunday Morning (http://hellosundaymorning.com.au/) was instrumental in helping me explore the reasons why I found it (to my surprise) so challenging to quit drinking altogether. By writing a regular blog about my experiences, I joined with other young people (now more than 200 across Australia) in unravelling the reasons why alcohol has become a teenage right of passage in this country. Why we would rather risk our lives, our freedom, our friends and our dignity than be seen to be ‘soft’.

I’m not against alcohol and I don’t want this to be any kind of anti-alcohol rant, but I am against the rampant abuse of this substance which is tearing our society apart. It’s a powerfully addictive social crutch for 95% of people in all age brackets and all walks of life.

Remember that not that long ago, the cigarette industry was up-in-arms when it was banned from advertising in magazines, billboards and in sport. And now the unthinkable – countries such as Ireland and Scotland have even banned smoking in pubs. Australia is leading the way with teenage smoking rates down to an all-time low This was a concerted effort to push against the scourge of irresponsible commercial interests and fight for people’s rights (even against their own collective will).

The same can be done with alcohol and the liquor industry. As I’m sure you know, in Norway, their drink-drive limit is 0.02% and they have a substantial range of commercial non-alcoholic beers on tap in every pub, so that being a non-drinker has no stigma attached – you can still enjoy a round with your mates and not appear any different.

I would like to advocate for a zero alcohol drink-drive limit in WA and across Australia. This would help to shift that dangerous grey area, when people make the indiscriminate decision to flip a metaphorical coin and drive home after ‘a few’, not knowing if they really should or not and thinking “she’ll be right mate”.

Thank you for leading the way – keep up the great work and don’t ever give up.

Kind regards,

Ebony Frost

Most of us take our amazing lives for granted. That’s not a criticism, just an observation. Sometimes we are gently reminded that we mustn’t. Sometimes, the reminder is so violent, we never forget.

I find, thinking big often puts the small things into perspective.

I have a tenuous grip on my imagination at the best of times, so fairly regularly, if I’m looking the other way, I will turn around and find it has run off down the street, waving dramatically as it goes.

I just wanted to jot down a few of the gems my imagination has come back with in the past few days… you never know, it might get you thinking.

how do I work this thing again?

You wake up tomorrow and …

… the internet is gone, never to return. For those of you who were born into the digital age, this might be a tough one to fathom, but think about what your life would be like if, for some cosmic reason beyond our control, the web was gone forever.

… the world’s oil supplies are destroyed and petrol prices hit $150/L. The situation is expected to stay that way for the foreseeable future. What would you do with your car? How would you get around?

… a massive solar flare knocks out the major mobile phone networks. Estimated time to get back on the air is 6 months. How would you cope without a lifeline in your pocket? Is it liberating or infuriating?

… a new international convention outlaws alcohol in every form. Within 3 months production, sale, consumption and trafficking of alcohol will be as illegal as heroin.

I’d love to know what you guys think

Thank you Audreys (lyrics from You and Steve McQueen) for reminding me of this all-important fact.

So, what I’d like to know is… how should we define waste exactly? Where is the line between:

“oh he/she could’ve been so successful at <insert profession here> … so much talent but gee, what a shame”

and

“oh yeah, he/she is amazing at  <insert profession here> … they’re really ahead of the game, so talented”

Who decides that exactly? A straw poll? A national magazine?

Or does the person themselves not necessarily know that they rock? Do these conversations only go on behind their back?

Wouldn’t it be reflected in their career progression I hear you say, their salary, the car they drive. Well sometimes, sure. But not always, no.

If you like stories with a moral, then read on. If you fancy happy endings, well you may be disappointed…

Those non-West Aussies might not know the story so well, but back in early days of our great state, there was a very talented and intelligent man by the name of CY O’Connor.

O’Connor was an engineer from Ireland, who’d spent time working in New Zealand before Sir John Forrest, premier of WA, offered O’Connor the position of engineer-in-chief . In reply to his inquiry as to whether his responsibilities would cover railways or harbours or roads, Forrest cabled ‘Everything’.

Both Forrest and O’Connor had known the toughening experience of surveyors working in unexplored places. O’Connor was the more sensitive, with wide and cultivated tastes and a passionate sense of justice for men of all degree. For the next ten years they worked closely together.

Forrest’s first demand was a harbour at Fremantle to accommodate the royal mail contractors, the Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co. and the Orient Steam Navigation Co., whose vessels were the largest steamers coming to Australia.

The resulting Fremantle Harbour is still one of the finest in the world, having served as a base through two world wars and as a port for countless fishing vessels, ferries and leisure boats over more than a hundred years.

(the following is taken from http://adbonline.anu.edu.au/biogs/A110059b.htm)

…

During his time, O’Connor effected striking improvements in building and operating the government railways.

With the rush following the discovery of rich gold at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie , the lack of water became extremely serious.

In November 1893 responsibility for water-supplies on the goldfields passed permanently to the Department of Public Works: O’Connor established the goldfields water-supply branch.

Just when O’Connor began work on a plan to provide an abundant, permanent supply of fresh water for the Coolgardie goldfields is not known, but by mid-1895 his plans were under way.

With limited resources but with the enthusiasm of his staff, O’Connor made plans. By the end of October 1895, designs and estimates—showing alternative materials, pipes of varying dimensions, three different quantities of water—were ready for Forrest. The scheme was imaginative and dramatic; simple but bold. The scheme could be completed in three years and was estimated to cost £2½ million. Forrest accepted it but he had to convince parliament, and persuade it to support the raising of a London loan.

O’Connor suggested that the scheme be submitted in 1897 to a commission of experts: he visited London where three British engineers commended the plan as entirely practical, the greatest undertaking of its kind yet constructed. But nothing stilled the local opposition, criticism and attack.

Two years passed, from his own initial approval of the plans, before Forrest obtained the parliamentary support for the Coolgardie Water Supply Scheme that he sought. Even then, delays occurred.

Forrest and his friend Sir John Winthrop Hackett, editor of the West Australian, commended the plan. Both Forrest and O’Connor saw it in a wider context, as part of a related plan to enhance the colony’s development: a harbour at Fremantle; railways and communications; water for railways, potential settlements, goldminers; and, later, the western link of an Australian transcontinental railway.

In February 1901 when Forrest withdrew from the State government to enter the first Federal parliament, his dominance was not repeated. Short-lived, unstable governments left the Coolgardie water scheme and O’Connor vulnerable. Work was well advanced, but at a crucial stage. His decision to use on the water main a novel, electric caulking machine provoked a storm.

In 1902 while he was in South Australia advising its government on an outer harbour for Adelaide, harassment intensified. In parliament much criticism was uninformed, malicious and unbridled. Eventually O’Connor submitted a detailed memorandum, rebutting a long list of criticisms aired in both Houses.

The Sunday Times was vicious and defamatory (so nothing’s changed then – ed). These attacks, and the silence of the minister and the government, wounded him. Depressed, affected by neuralgia and insomnia intensified by overwork and nervous exhaustion, O’Connor needed a respite not controversy.

O’Connor’s confidence in his scheme was vindicated on 8 March 1902 by a successful preliminary pumping test of six miles (9.6 km) of the water main over the most difficult part of the route. That evening one small leak was discovered near Chidlow’s Well. He arranged to accompany the engineer in charge of construction to the site on Monday. That morning, 10 March 1902, he prepared for his customary early ride but his usual companion, his youngest daughter, was unwell. He rode alone along the Fremantle beach past the new harbour, then south to Robb Jetty, where he rode his horse into the sea. His deft revolver shot ended his life.

He had left a note: ‘The Coolgardie Scheme is alright and I could finish it if I got a chance and protection from misrepresentation but there is no hope of that now and it is better that it should be given to some entirely new man to do who will be untrammelled by prior responsibility’.

O’Connor had been a man of strong personality, initiative and imagination. He was compassionate, forward looking and seemed to many contemporaries a genius. With his varied interests and quick wit he was a delightful host, and a man of strong family feeling.

A bronze statue of O’Connor by Pietro Porcelli was later erected at Fremantle.

By the end of 1902, as planned, the work was completed for the estimated cost: the great reservoir was ready, the pumps installed, the main laid to Coolgardie and extended another twenty-five miles (40 km) to Kalgoorlie. The water had completed its carefully regulated flow begun eight months before in the Helena River valley at Mundaring. On 24 January 1903, amid great rejoicing, Forrest turned on the water at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie. He praised O’Connor, ‘the great builder of this work … to bring happiness and comfort to the people of the goldfields for all time’.

…

Whenever I think about giving up, I always think of CY O’Connor. If only he had backed himself for a few more months, he would have been alive to see one of the greatest modern engineering feats of our time – a feat that he conceived and planned against a tidal wave of scrutiny.

So, is this the ultimate story of the tall poppy? Was O’Connor so far ahead of his time that only a few other men could see what he saw?

I also often think of history’s great artists and musicians who lived and died in poverty, never knowing their own genius and that their work would go on to be adored worldwide.

We all have a talent that we should be cultivating and we all ‘waste’ opportunities. And assuming we have the luxury of ‘wasting’ any time at all in achieving our goals, how much is acceptable?

Between you and me, I’m worried I’ve wasted too much of it already… and time is certainly one thing we can’t get back.

So, my advice would be, if you know someone who has a talent, make sure they know about it… help them to see they mustn’t waste what they’ve been given.

Do you see what I see?

So much of how we see this world is a result of imperceptible factors. We look, but we don’t necessarily see. We see, but we don’t always understand.

It’s the tiny grains of sand that make 80 Mile Beach, the thousands of metres of altitude that make our sky blue, the Aero ‘bubbles of nothing that make it really something’.

There are few things more satisfying than seeing a knowing smile and an emphatic nod as you describe your own observation – your own view of the world – and it’s immediately reinforced. That’s what we’re all searching for. We all want confirmation of our own reality.

But reality, as we all know, is completely subjective. Much like the truth… your own version all depends on where you were standing at the time.

Have you ever been halfway through discussing someone you’ve just met with a friend, when you realise that your friend – who met them at the same time – has seen the polar opposite of what you’ve seen?

How can this be? Surely our interpretations of reality can’t be that different… we were standing right next to each other!

And then, you realise… you’ve fallen for the oldest trick in the book – you forgot to look past the smokescreen, to check for hidden wires, to question how the magician could possibly have cut off her legs.

So many times I have bought into other people’s inflated view of themselves – the delusion lasting for months or even years – before I realised how far off the mark I really was.

From thinking people were better looking than they actually were, to thinking they had better intentions than they actually did, I was wrong more often than I was right.

Far from being black and white, or from categorising people into ‘good’ and ‘bad’, I have now discovered how to read others’ intentions and agendas with greater speed and accuracy than ever before. I’m sure you could argue that this comes naturally with age and maturity. I would also argue it comes with sobriety.

Since I quit alcohol I have honed my ability to shatter smokescreens. I can now pick people at a mile. I know their game, I can read their M.O. and I gauge their own rating of their physical qualities against my own objective measures.

Not only is this helpful in avoiding timewasters and assholes, but geez, is it satisfying when someone steps right into the spot you prepared for them! Gold.

Even though we joke about ‘beer goggles’ (helping people get laid since 1789) it is also true that by drinking, we create a giant smudge over our ability to remain insightful. Without even knowing it, we misjudge and misread people’s intentions. Sadly, it also means we can miss good intentions even when they are right under our nose.

I think a huge part of my newfound ‘people reading’ mechanism comes from my own understanding of myself, which has gone from 50% to 95% over the past 18 months.

I would argue that you can’t really know anyone else until you know yourself and that you can’t accurately question the basis for others’ self-projection until you have your own rock solid island of confidence on which to stand.

So, I can say happily, from my own humble little rock that I have built for myself, that I can finally see reality with clarity, and I can see further now than I ever have before.

Thought-provoking, hilarious and downright genius at times, the modern beer ad seems to be in a class of it’s own.

From the Woman Whisperer to The Big Ad and the original I could do with an Emu, how ’bout you?, beer ads have captured the imaginations (and wallets) of ‘blokes and sheilas’ across the country.

So how has this happened?

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Down with love? Really?

It’s true. We love love. If love were running for PM, there’d be no need for a televised debate.

Love can cook? Move over Adam and Callum.

And if love had a competitive streak, then hello Australian Idol, we have a winner.

Love is perhaps the single most unifying force on the planet. It transcends all languages, crosses all religions*, can be gone in a week or wait a lifetime to arrive.

It sees no skin colour, has no age barrier and can survive unimaginable odds.

So we agree. Love is the unbeatable hand, the hole in one, the checkmate (no condom pun intended… okay maybe just a little bit).

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When the captain takes a hit, the whole boat shudders.

I’m finally reading Nelson Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom. He talks about the great leaders who influenced him as a child and how they described leadership:
“A leader, he said, is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go on ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realising that all along they are being directed from behind.”

As a child, the first time you see one of your parents sick or hurt, it comes as a real shock. It makes you stop and wonder, exactly who the hell is in charge around here then?

They’re fallible? They’re mortal? Surely not.

Surely the strength and warmth and endless energy and patience they’ve displayed throughout my life is as solid as the earth itself. And then you learn that even the earth can move (not usually in an ’89 Martika kind of way, either).

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Life is full of blind corners and one of them hit me out of the blue last week.

I was parked in a marked bay on the side of the road, waiting to pick up my Mum after her French class.

It was 9.30pm, I had Triple J on the radio and was just thinking how quiet Northbridge is on a Tuesday night… as distinct from the weekend, when its heaving with girls and guys out to party (and depending on the time of night, out to vomit on the footpath, or punch each other in the head)…

Then, in my rearview mirror…. LIGHTS. SIRENS. SQUEAL. SMAAAASH.

The police had been pursuing a guy with a suspended license, who decided that braking was not in his repertoire and instead he would try and jump from the driver’s seat to prove that he was not the driver (!)

My car was his brake. Oh and the huge 4WD parked in front of me – that was my brake.

I knew I was injured straight away – I felt the pain shoot through my back as my body was thrown forward like a rag doll. And because I was parked, I wasn’t wearing my seatbelt.

I could see in the rearview mirror still and got a glimpse of the police jumping out to arrest the guy. I thought I would just stay put in case they were chasing him because he was on a shooting rampage (you never know!).

The Police did an amazing job – they were so attentive and caring. Then the ambulance arrived to assess me, put on my neck brace and take me to emergency.

Then, hilariously, due to a communication error about what kind of accident it was, a giant wailing fire truck full of beefy firemen arrived to cut me from the vehicle (which I clearly didn’t need!).

I would have been in heaven if I could have actually turned my head to look at any of them. Mum tells me they were suitably hot. DAMN.

Anyway, aside from my car being a write-off (I patted myself on the back for being smart enough to have comprehensive insurance, since the other guy didn’t even have a license!) my injuries should heal in a month or so and I will be back to normal. Well, a more enlightened version of normal.

It’s all the things we take for granted that get thrust into the spotlight when accidents happen, isn’t it?

If he had been going 10kms faster, I could have gone head first through the windscreen. I could be a paraplegic or have brain damage. It might take four people to roll me on my side so I could wee into a pan that a nurse holds under me. But thankfully, I am one of the lucky ones. I still have my dignity, my body and brain in one (albeit shaken and sore) piece.

It’s  all these basic elements we forget are held so tenuously in the hands of fate – the things we cling to as fellow human beings: dignity, compassion, loyalty…. These are the things that get us through. We are all in this together, as Ben Lee so wisely says.

So, how many of those things do we throw away when we binge drink? Dignity – check. Compassion – frequently. Loyalty – sad, but often true.

Hello Sunday Morning is about redefining our relationship with alcohol, yes. But also, it gives us the chance to redefine our perspective on life.

Since the accident I have had two dreams (nightmares) in which I had downed an entire bottle of passion pop (poor taste, subconscious, poor taste). I felt like I had committed the worst of betrayals. Yet it was only to myself. But why is betraying yourself any more acceptable than betraying a friend? If you don’t like yourself a great deal, then it makes sense that you would have no regard for how you end up.

To take Sunday morning (and any other morning for that matter) for granted by wasting it on a hangover is a slap in the face to the healthy, full-bodied life we’ve been given.

If this sounds melodramatic or over the top, feel free to scoff. But come back to me when you’ve been at the scene of a serious accident and tell me it hasn’t changed your mind.

A friend of mine is about six weeks away from having a precious baby girl. Yesterday, some of her friends organised a ‘baby blessing’, something I had never been to. It was a real salute to the mother, something we don’t really have in our culture (don’t even mention hallmark mother’s day) and amongst other things, we all lit a candle and spent a minute thinking about everything our own mum’s went through to bring us into the world.

I know it sounds wanky, but it was really awesome.

And splashed across the news this week, of course, were the tragic stories of the young men we have lost to war. Good men who loved their families. I’m sure those wives and children would do anything to have one more Sunday morning, one more chance to hug him tight and say I love you.

I will never forget a beautiful phrase my Mum wrote to me in a letter when I was in London… “we are all human, fragile, unable to see round corners”.

So from now on I’m going to spend some time every Sunday being grateful for everything we have, aware that the next corner will bring unexpected challenges and adventures. Maybe this is the religion of a new generation.

Say hello, and thank you, Sunday Morning.

Something interesting happens when you begin to take control of your own life.

Heads turn. People ask questions. ‘Noise’ appears. Some people pat you on the back. Others don’t like it one little bit.

Options materialise. Something shifts.

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I used to think that as individuals, we all grow up and slowly become who we are – we start with a wheel base, slowly add in parts of the chassis, tune the engine, adjust the mirrors, shine the hub caps, fuel it up and away we go.

But now, after watching my friend’s little boy grow over the past year (he is just 2) I have come to realise we are born all kitted up, done, perfect, whole and robust. As we grow up, other people, knowingly or not, with good intentions or bad, mess with our traction, tip dirt in the fuel tank, smash the windows, crunch the gears and skew the steering, until we are no longer road-worthy. Sometimes we even do these things to ourselves, under the misguided belief that it will make the ride smoother, or the engine more powerful.

When all we have left looks like something from the end of a Dukes of Hazzard episode (circa 1979), what we really need is a patient mechanic and a little time off the road.

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