Door of perception

The carved wooden entryway was open. I followed my childhood into it. Memories leaped out. Tropical trees, the rustling of the breeze passing through, heavy rains in stone gutters and the turtle, our pet, that lived there. I saw my mother, and my dad passed through. My brother and I racing around the garden. There were mangoes and rice and crispy fish. Smells wafting, drifting, familiar.

Dusk

Dusk. It's my favourite time of day. It doesn't mean the end of the day; for me it means the beginning, the start. I can relax and leave behind the day's work. Relax and switch to the night's coming. A beer, a book. Bali. Wherever I am, dusk is the same. I become awake with its coolness. I get hungry and restless. I stir. I wake. I want.

Ocean sanctuary

It was one of those gorgeous sun-warm afternoons, with a constant but gentle breeze, that March day at the Bay of Fires, Tasmania. We wrapped our jackets around our waists and climbed over the rocks. We didn't talk much, even the child. We felt the roughness and solidity of rocks beneath our hands and feet and explored and felt and watched. The tide made a pattern through the chlorophyll greenness of the seaweed. The peaked hard hats of barnacles clung for dear life at odd angles on sun-exposed sections of ice-age rock. The pipe-smoked clouds above the tree line lingered for our amusement. We picked up sea-smoothed pebbles and unbroken shells and put them in our pockets. And reluctantly walked back to civilization.