BILAMBIL CALLING : THOUGHTS FROM DAVE ' THE BLOKE' OVENDEN

THE GIRL I MET IN THE CAR PARK

The girl I met in the car park…

Ok…so, I just got back from up north, I was staying a few weeks with Daz ‘n’ Carm, at Airlie beach, just hanging out, tooting round the islands, Daydream, Hamilton and Hayman…Anyhow it was about 2pm, when I arrived home, the arvo sun was shining, the sky was blue, I keyed my way in, chucked my travel bag on the floor, opened up the fridge…Ahh, nothing doin, so I trecked up the zig zag track, kicked the great white hope into gear, and with a 50 buck note in my pocket, I took a zoom along the winding road, down along the Kennedy drive flats, Greenmount here I come…Ahh the lovely white sand beneath my feet, then into the deep blue, for a cool confronting dip, and a lollop in the waves that always wash upon the shore…Then up the wooden stairs to the office, where it’s always bright and breezy, the salt water is dripping from my beard as I sit soaking the last of the afternoon sun, and my thoughts are doing cartwheels and summer sorts…Hey everybody has there now time thing…If that sounds ambiguous, I spose it very well could be …

Yea, me speedos is nearly dry, I wander back along the footpath track, key open the great white hope, pull me shorts on and step into me sandals, arm into me smelly old t-shirt, ignition up and I’m off, headed for the Mall, to hit the supermarket and stock up…Look, I’ve done this rave before, so I’ll cut to the quick…Personally I think the supermarket is a great air conditioned place to be…

Ok, so if you remember I had a 50 buck note in my pocket, the check out chick gave me a little over 25 bucks change, then I wandered of through the car park carrying two plastic bags full of goodies, me hair is a bit birds nesty, I’m salty all over, and my damp speedo’s is beginning to chafe.

Anyhow, I’m standing at the drivers side car door, and as I look up I happen to notice a real sweet young thing with a distressed look on her face, she looked like she needed a chat…So I says… ‘Hey what’s bumming you out’…

She then blurts out… ‘My boyfriend, he’s a real prick, he’s got my card an I need an extra 40 bucks to pay the rent’…

She kind of gave me a look that says a thousand words, blinks them bright young eyes, and says… ‘I’ve never done this before, I’ll make it worth your while if you’ve got 40 bucks’… ‘Ah…Gee Wiz’ I replies, as I pulled out my pockets… ‘I’ve only got a 20, and some change’…

She mathematically weighed it up in her mind, then to my surprise, that cute little thing says… ‘ Please don’t take this the wrong way, but if you give me your 20, I’ll hand it for ya’…My mind was racing as I tried to hang on tight and grab my cool…I said, ‘Ok then’, without thinking of the ramifications…But then again there’s only now…

She jumps in, and off we toot up to Razorback, where I used to fool around some time ago, with a very frisky ex lady friend…

But that’s another story…Anyhow when we got there the place was full of daytime sight see’ers, to many people for some monkey business to go down…So we sat and talked for awhile, then she noticed my drums on the back seat… ‘Hey, are you a muso’… I says, ‘ yup, player of some, master of none’…She looks up and blinks them lovely long eyelashes, giggles then smiles an says… ‘I always wanted to play a musical instrument’, I says, ‘Well you’ve got the rest of your life to do it’…She glances around, then says, ‘There’s to many people, we can’t do it here’, ‘Yea, your right’ I says, ‘lets go someplace else’…So we then cruise on down to the Greenbank parkland where the Mangroves reach into the tidal waters of the estuary…I’d already given this sweet young babe me last 20, me pension check comes in tomorrow, otherwise I’d have gladly given the 40 that she needed, to pay the rent, or by an eccy trip…

‘So’, I says, ‘What instrument would you be wanting to occupy yourself with?’, ‘Well, I’d like to play the tuba’. That took me by surprise, coming from this little waif like thing. ‘ I’d like to put the mouth piece to my lips, and blow sweet music from that big round horn’, ‘Ah yes’ I says as I look around, my mind in a whirl, it’s still daylight and too many people around, young kids on their skate boards coming home from school, oldies out walking their yappy little dogs, fitness freak joggers strutting by, all glancing through the windows of the great white hope, hoping to catch a glimpse of something going on, or something coming off…

We sat there laughin ‘n’ talkin till the sun went down…

She had the 20, and I had lost the urge…

In hindsight I would, and should have approached the situation somewhat differently, but that was then and this is now…And when I think about it, I hope that that cute piece is blowing far out riffs, in some funky little Jazz band…