Memorable Moments

Well I shall surely remember turning 65. First with so many greetings including by face book from; Chris and Sue, Ann Prestipino and Anthony Beadle, our border from Leichhardt. By text message from Kelly and Mart Tidman, Kati Head (Alice's dear and oldest school mate) and Enmore Video Hire whose business I have not indulged for more than three years. By email from; Dorothy Heggen, Kay Hanrahan, Ed Margetts (a long lost relative you will hear more of) and his wife Pam (ne. Boland). By phone from; Hugh, John and Walter and by mail from Central Sydney Osteopathy. When creating this list it was never my intention to embarrass those whose names do not appear so please believe me when I say I bear no grudge. You will just have to deal with it and your own conscience, if you have one.

Working on the actual day I took an banked hour off for earlier than usual Saturday evening tradition of dinner at The View with the Herald and had a relatively early night. Sunday was for the celebration with my only true love Alice at the Theatre Royal for the Jersey Boys matinee. Decked out in my brand new blue serge 'Mad Men' suit which some fool had had tailored in Bangkok to my exact proportions and immediately grown out of, along with the never worn Van Heusen white cotton shirt, both of which I had picked up at St Luke's exclusive men's wear and op-shop the previous week for the outrageous cost of $23A, just a whisker less than $23US, I along with Alice squeezed into The Theater Royal. Jersey Boys was a hoot played to a full house almost exclusively my peers. Queues outside the ladies at interval became rowdy with lasses who affronted once more by delays they foolishly expected to be resolved not exacerbated at this late stage of life thought they should share the male facilities. I wonder if the city planners have taken the bladder control of this demographic bulge into consideration when certifying new Westfield Towers. Could prove profitable to you 'Kenny' if your listening. Oh no, of course, 'Jim's Dunnies' I can see them now in jungle green with that craggy digger hatted face stenciled on the side.

Music and theatre is all well and good but man does not live by this alone. He requires food and by a quarter to four when the show ended he was ready. A short walk away we found the Rooftop Restaurant of the Glenmore hotel in the Rocks and lucked into a table. A bottle of celebratory champagne was ordered along with food and we settled to contemplate our harbor with the Opera House in the foreground. Weather provided the theatre in this backdrop as it changed from bright lit sunshine to storm grey with water effects that saw a good number of our fairy floss companions abandoning their rigorously reserved tables but not we hardies. We were rewarded by clearing skies a magnificent sunset and our pick of position. We rewarded ourselves with another bottle.

Reluctant to break this spell of camaraderie as night fell, we made our way to another hostelry and then another and another till they simply became pubs and we were metaphorically crawling. Eventually we saw what all good things must come to and parted, Alice to a cab and I to a train. After a wait similar to that for ladies toilets at the Theatre Royal you may understand the vehemence of my curses for Christina Keneally as the train to Stanmore terminated at Central. Waiting on one of the platform seats that seemed more plentiful than before I asked a passing station attendant when the next train to Stanmore would come. "where" he asked, "Stanmore" I said. "Oh you'll have to get the flyer to Central, about forty five minutes" he said, gesturing at the same time to the name on the seat I was sitting on. Bankstown it said. Slowly it became apparent to me that time had passed mysteriously as it does when you sleep. The flyer - whatever - would get me back to Central in an hour or more but there would be no more trains to Stanmore. No what I needed was a cab and in a surprisingly lucid moment I remembered I would also need money. I found a bank machine and along with it a young friend equally despairing at the distance to Guildford. Something about him reminded me of a younger self and I resolved that if I could find a cab I would take him home utilizing this captive time to lecture him not to become like my older self. Luckily for me and him I suppose I had lost him by the time I found a cabbie on the other side of the station who was more than happy with his forty dollar fare to Gordon Street Stanmore which remarkably he knew.