odyssey

Lovers and dreamers, forgive my absence. I have been in Sydney with the man I love for the past five days. Can you blame me if blogging was not at the forefront of my priorities? No, I didn't think so. At any rate, I had the most wonderful time away. Shall I tell you about it? Okay... I will begin at the beginning, go on until I reach the end, and then stop.

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Geelong Freeway is as flat as a pancake, as straight as an arrow, and as featureless as Marcia Cross's forehead after twelve rounds with a botox needle. This must be officially the most soporific roadway on the planet. In other news from Melbourne's astoundingly uninteresting West, Avalon "Airport" is A FUCKING SHED. Do not be fooled. JetStar is not an airline. You roll up to A FUCKING SHED, they barely look at your ticket, you wait around, you are crammed onto the vehicle wherever you fit. It is not an airline: it is a flying-bus company. And did I mention it operates out of A FUCKING SHED?

I landed in Sydney. The JetStar terminal at Sydney Airport is a rabbit warren. I got lost. Security guards with knowing smirks directed me through what looked like the cleaner's cupboard in Guantanemo Bay, before I finally found myself at the baggage-collection. Mr Byron and I eventually tracked each other down and made our way to his place of abode. It is a beautiful area - almost rural in feel, with clean air and abounding in trees, where large houses cling to hillsides among the eucalypts.

It had been over a month since we saw each other in person. Needless to say it was a wonderful feeling to fall asleep beside each other again. After our long-awaited reunion, Byron headed off to work in the early morning, leaving me to sleep in and laze about at his place. Later, I successfully negotiated Sydney's absurdly complex public transport system and met him after work. We walked and walked for almost three hours. We wandered through seemingly-endless interconected underground shopping-malls until Munkey got disturbed by travelling so far without seeing the sky. We peered through some glass windows and saw Chris Bath looking VERY TIRED while preparing to present the news. We saw lots of tall glossy-looking buildings in the Financial District. We walked all around a pretty white pointy building (pictured) and a lovely big curvy bridge (also pictured).

We saw theatres with posters of Lisa McCune with "Urine" written on top of her head. We saw town halls and apartments and motorways and monorails (which I do not trust one bit - they look way too precarious to me). After our in-depth walking-tour of Sydney (during which I realised my feet were wailing in pain because my boots are shit, before I physically ripped the soles out of them from the inside, which - believe it or not - was an improvement) we met a bunch of Byron's friends for dinner. The earliest of his friends - Mr Dion (pictured) - was about half an hour late. The latest - including Ms AMW (also pictured) - arrived a good hour after that. This is somewhat remarkable to me. I am used to punctual/neurotic/OCD people.

Oxford Street is strange. It is nice, I suppose that the gay community has a place where they feel comfortable. But there is something ghetto-like about it. This ultra-gay-friendly strip seems to exist at the expense of queers being accepted anywhere else. For amusement value, we all wandered into a sex shop named "Tool Shed". I am not sure what was most disturbing: the blueberry-scented latex vaginas? the improbably vast array of different dildos (surely there is no need for that many different kinds)? the pile of flyers for Dusty - The Musical casually strewn amongst the hardcore publications?

More wandering the city on foot on Saturday. We visited the Museum of Contemporary Art although we got there only about 45 minutes before closing, so didn't have time to check out the Sam Taylor-Wood exhibition... a shame because I quite like the idea of Hayden Christensen weeping tragically. Most of the art there - predictably - was reminiscent of the wanky pseudo-meaningful tripe that adorned the foyers at my Uni, but there were some interesting pieces. Later we went to see a Sydney Film Festival session at the beautiful State Theatre. The film was Little Miss Sunshine - a fantastic comedy with just the right balance of absurdity, pathos and darkness. I was especially pleasantly surprised by Steve Carell (who I thought was dogshit-on-a-stick in the Amercian version of The Office) in a wonderfully subdued performance as a suicidally depressed Proust-scholar.

We met up with the Spectacular Ms Sami on Sunday to have lunch, visit the creepy mannequins at David Jones, peruse JB-HiFi, and generally amble about Sydney's Northern Suburbs. That night we attended an X-Men movie marathon. This event began at 11.40pm and concluded at 6am, but I managed to stay awake through all three. Go me! I was rather impressed by the first two. However the third is a bit shit. Apologies for getting all SPOILERy, but I must put this out there... The woman you love has turned into some kind of angry hyper-mutant who just might destroy the world with her awesome power and fury. You are in possesion of a small boy who renders all powers useless when he is in the proximity of a mutant. You say some cheesy lines and KILL the woman you love. WHY?!?! Bring that kid over here and HANDCUFF the little shit to her!!! FOREVER, if necessary! God, Wolverine! Did you undergo a fucking lobotomy somewhere between film 2 and film 3?!

Due to their all-night movie shenanigans, the Turtle and the Munkey slept late on their final day together, but eventually managed to drag themselves from the boudoir, and traipse into the city again. This time we explored the shiny touristy prettiness of Darling Harbour, and the kitschy grubby liveliness of Chinatown. After being thouroughly perturbed by the Asian supermarket - where green soy milk and terrifying snackfood (see photo) abound - we wandered into Coles on a whim with the intention of buying something for dessert. We left about an hour later, during which I think I had lost five kilos just from laughing. Byron plus a Supermarket equals Much Hilarity. We got home, ate waffles (our eventual dessert-of-choice) and then were sent to an early bed by a sudden black-out.

Byron left early for work again on Tuesday. I made my way to the airport, and back to the Shed. Oli, my car, was waiting for me in the carpark. He still needed a wash. I drove home and the hour back along that Freeway was still amazingly dull. My apartment was messy, just as I had left it. Home still looked, smelled and sounded like home. Everything was the same as when I left. Everything except me. I re-entered my ordinary life on a glorious high. Then, slowly, I descended back to reality. I was back, by myself, in my quiet flat. I had to go back to my utterly uninspiring job tomorrow. I would be going to sleep alone, in a big cold bed.

I am glad to be home. I missed the people I love. I missed the zany left-of-centre bundle of contradictions that is my city. But at the same time, I don't want to be home. Now I miss Byron more than I thought was possible. It's totally pathetic, but I feel fucking empty and completely alone. I should stop whinging. I am unbelievably lucky. But I just want one more little piece of good fortune. I want us to be together - really together. I don't want every period of joy and love to be followed swiftly by an intense feeling of solitude and longing. Having found joy and love, I want to be able to wrap myself in it all the time, whenever I want. Is that so much to ask?