This is a blank canvas. Please feel free to post holiday greetings, thoughts about Joan and friends of Joan, and questions.

If you have any questions, ‘Ask Joan’ and I will return and answer it. Questions may include psychoanalysis, relationship theories, environmental philosophising, quandries, and plain silliness (mr joel…).

This morning, I rang the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra‘s group booking service. I wanted to make some changes. The customer service representative was very professional. He listened carefully to my changes and made the alterations with minimum fuss.

That unexpected compliment made my day. Or at least, it was the highlight of my day until Damjan arrived half an hour later with presents for me

I’m catching a 10 AM flight to San Francisco tomorrow. We’re visiting my brother Jason, who is working there for three months. We will spend two weeks travelling around California and Nevada, then a week in Taiwan. I will be back on January 12th with heavier suitcases, no doubt.

Happy holidays to you all!

I have many hours of flying to look forward to. I want to spend those hours revisiting a hobby that I used to enjoy — recreational reading!

Currently, I have two books in my reading buffer — Economia by Geoff Davies and Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Economia is an environmental critique of economic theory. Catch-22 is, of course, the defining satire of human war. I wanted to bring both onto the aeroplane with me but Damjan suggested that maybe in my travel-induced haze I might appreciate some some ‘lighter’ reading material — lighter in every sense of the word.

So today I went to the library. I was there to photocopy Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody for my brother, who has found that he simply cannot do without his manuscript for the three months that he is overseas. Ha! I told you so, Jason!

While I was there, I browsed through the fiction shelves for the first time in at least a year. It was so hard to choose books! My criteria for travelling reading are:

• Interesting (of course);
  
• Of decent length;
  
• Easy to read so that I can manage even when there are blood clots building up in my limbs; and
  
• Paperback because I want to make a pretense of travelling light.

It was surprisingly difficult to find worthy books. There were many mildly interesting books that I would normally borrow but I didn’t want to risk taking a boring one. The books with riveting blurbs all turned out to be hardcovers. There were a few very slim books (it seems fashionable to publish in A5 and B6 nowadays) that I could have finished as I walked from the airport check-in to customs. Other books had 3 point typeface — or 15 point typeface.

As an interesting aside, I must have spent too long away from recreational reading because it was a bit of shock to open a novel and see paragraphs delimited by indents rather separated by empty lines!

Anyway, here are the books I ended up borrowing.

• Ladylord by S. Miller — In a Japan-like country, uproar is generated when a female (gasp!) is appointed ruler.
  
• Bad Boy by O. Goldsmith — Nice guy gets help from best friend (female, of course) to become more a Bad Boy. All women begin to flock towards him.
  
• The Crazed by H. Jin — An “incisive portrait of modern Chinese society” through the eyes of a literature professor.
  
• Timegods’ World by L. Modesitt Jr — Timedivers and Immortals manipulate cultures and civilisations all around the galaxy. Yeah, you know the drill

Yesterday, I went to a party and met a girl who was like me but magnified by about twenty times. She had the same interests and passions. She knew at least as much as I did about sustainability. She was confident, friendly and chatty — REALLY chatty. She hopped from topic to topic at whim. Her default responses were: “Nice!”, “It was soooo awesome!”, “She’s the most brilliant friend!”

I sat there listening to her waxing eloquent about everything she was involved in, every person she had met, every country she had been to, all the wonderful random things that had happened to her. Every time the conversation slowed down, all I had to do was prod her slightly and off she went.

“Do you like savoury foods or sweets better?” I’d say.

“Oh! Everytime I cook meat, I have to put at least three spoonfuls of honey on it! You have to try it. It’s the most delicious thing! The honey just caramalises over the red meat and…”

(Baiting her yet again) “Have you ever found a country or a people that you really connected to?”

“Yes and no. Sometimes, I thought I did. I’d be really comfortable in a place but I find that your needs change as you go through life…”

I was quite content to let her contribute most of the substance of the conversation. As I listened to her, I also realised this: The perceived value of your judgement requires variability of opinion. If you’re enthusiastic about everything, and everything is ‘awesome’ then you your opinions are less credible. Surely not everything can be brilliant and fantastic. People will start thinking that you’re either exaggerating or on happy chemicals.

You may have noticed that I’ve upped the posting frequency recently. The reason is that I’m giving you material before I go away. I’m going on a three week holiday to California, USA and Taipei, Taiwan.

We’re going to California to visit my brother in San Francisco, then taking two weeks to travel around the state. Two weeks is not enough. California seems packed enough to be a country in itself!

All my life, my parents have been raving about Taiwan, which is where they went to university, where they met, got married and where we were born. I imagine that if I raised my children in another country, I’d also rave about Australia. In fact, I am amazed my parents have stayed away from Taiwan for this long. We haven’t been back since we arrived in Australia 19 years ago.

We’re leaving on Wednesday so from then on, you get to skip the ‘Reading Joan’s blog’ step of your internet initiation ritual for a few weeks.

I have almost finished packing. I have a large suitcase. I’ve taken Damjan’s advice on loading up on t-shirts. I made the mistake of not taking any t-shirts to skiing.

“Joan, that’s silly,” Damo said in that wise voice of his. “T-shirts are the staple of any wardrobe.”

One day, I will be a world-weary traveller, able to travel with nothing but a knapsack but until then, I will trundle on behind me my bright blue luggage.

We were at Thara’s housewarming and he laid down the challenge. “A prize to the first person to find the one happy face on my property!”

Damjan pointed to my perpetual grin. “I found it!”

“No,” Thara scolded. “A real smiley face.”

“I found it!” said Michael. He gestured to a sticker of John Howard stuck on one of the milk crates that supported Thara’s coffee table. The milk crate coffee table features in every impoverished university student’s household.

Thara just rolled his eyes.

Our hunt was distracted as the cheese platter and dips came out. Mmm, Tia Maria Tim Tams…

A few hours later, Thara reminded us that the prize was still up for grabs.

“Come on, Joanna,” I announced. “Let’s find that smiley face!” Joanna and I are the Dynamic Duo. We are an experienced ransacking-of-boy’s-house partnership. We had practiced in Daniel‘s apartment, after all.

Julian, the International Man of Mystery, joined us to form the Intrepid Trio.

We searched each room systematically, pulling out drawers, peeking in toasters, checking under toilet lids. We even opened up the margerine container on the hunch that Thara had carved a face into the soft yellowness. In the parts of the house without working lightbulbs, we appropriated a torch to continue the search. Thara became alarmed at our thoroughness.

“Hey Thara!” Joanna called. “Can we ransack your room?” We were being very thoughtful.

“Yeah…” came the cautious reply. “Waaait. Don’t look in the wardrobe. Or the laundry basket. Or that pile. Aargh, never mind! It’s not in my room! Just go away!”

We couldn’t find it anywhere in the house.

“Looks like we’ll have to go outside,” I reasoned. Joanna sighed and climbed into her white platform shoes. I put on my more sensible black leather sandals.

We flashed the torch around the newly-tamed backyard. As we yanked open the shed, Julian said pleasantly, “Be careful of spiders.” Shriek.

At some point, the bottom of my right foot was bitten by an insect and swelled up so that it felt like I was walking on a mini yoga ball.

We stomped through the house and exploded out into the front yard. Flash, flash, flash. Where was that face?

“There it is!!” I pointed at the lawn. A giant classic smiley face had been trampled into the grass. It was the cutest crop circle ever to be seen. The Intrepid Trio had done it!

Thara emerged from the house like a Grand Master of Ceremonies.

“Congratulations,” he intoned. “You have found the Happy Face. You can now choose any prize and it shall be yours.”

“Group conference!” The three of us huddled and whispered for thirty seconds. Then we turned around.

“Your laptop!”

“Oh, come on guys! No!”

“One of your housemate’s paintings. The one worth $2000.”

“Something I can actually give you, puh-leeze!”

….[thinking]…[thinking]…

“A packet of Tim Tams that never runs out!”

Thara finally revealed his own Happy Face. He marched into the house, opened the fridge, pulled out the last packet of Tim Tams and flung it towards us.

Mmm, Tia Maria…

I am lonely in anticipation of feeling lonely next year.

The world changes a bit next year. I start full time work and will make new friends. I’m not worried about making friends; it’s losing old ones that makes me sad in anticipation of being sad.

Next year, two of my closest friends are going overseas for a long time. Kate will be working elsewhere. My other close friends are still at university, living in the uni world while I’m acclimatising to the working adult world. I find this much scarier than going from high school to university.

Another Suitcase in Another Hall from Evita, Andrew Lloyd Webber

So what happens now?

(Another suitcase in another hall)

So what happens now?

(Take your picture off another wall)

Where am I going to?

(You’ll get by, you always have before)

Where am I going to?

I will be very busy next year — working, hip hop, tutoring… Maybe I’ll be too busy to feel any lack.

Well, that’s enough moroseness for now.

The Annual Work Filing Festival is complete. I’m really excited about the idea of getting an inbox for my room. You know, those document trays that you can stack on top of each other. I’ll label one ‘Urgent’, another ‘Less Urgent’, then maybe ‘Ancient History’. I love storage solutions! (This explains why I can wander around for hours in Ikea and Officworks.)

Recently, I’ve spent time examining other people’s bedrooms. You can learn a lot about people’s interests, activities and personalities from their bedrooms. In fact, I wrote about this for a Year 10 English folio piece. It was ‘The Great Bedroom Theory’.

Maybe I will create a bedroom meme.

I spent the day yesterday helping out on the final day of maths camp. It is a ten day camp for 25 of the brightest Year 10s and 11s in the country. The training helps them with competitions like the International Maths Olympiad.

Damjan takes lectures and runs many maths competitions. I often get ‘volunteered’ to help with marking and gofering. Hanging out with hyper, talented, geeky young people is fun, although I spend all my time feeling intellectually inadequate. For example, during one problem session, the teams of juniors solved up to 22 problems. I managed three, and that’s with the help of one of the lecturers.

That’s okay, though. I am quite proud of the small works that I am able to do. I like to think that with (much more) training, I might be good at maths problem solving too. Not necessarily, though. I’ve had many years of music training and I still wouldn’t call myself a musician. I believe my brother, who was far more slack about his music, is more musically gifted than I am.

I have now gathered around myself a group of friends who have had special training in maths, sports and music. They’ve been to camps, international competitions, particpated in musical productions… and they rave about how fantastic it all was. I look back on my high school days and can’t find any equivalent achievement. I didn’t devote myself to a particular goal. Instead, I flitted between public speaking, debating, music and dancing. I didn’t “own” any of these. My achievements and enjoyment of these feel small compared to the highs people experienced from science camps and music concerts. I often think I missed out on life-changing experiences.

Oh, I didn’t fail at being a teenager. I loved high school and I know there are people out there who did far less than I did. Even if I did ‘miss out’, I’m making up for it with the fun I’m having now.

I will content myself with being a Joan of all trades, master of none.

Addendum at 17 December 2004 12:24 AM: Helping out at maths camp was nothing but fun because I got to use a phat camera and gave out junk food and people loved me.

We tried to go swing dancing yesterday. We showed up to a the venue and it was dark. Hmm, they must have closed for the summer.

Instead of wasting time looking sheepish, we shrugged, thought of the $18 we had just saved and went for a walk at the beach. It was nice. Windy. Good sunset.

Today, I get to play at maths camp!