Minerva's Owl

At school, there were always groups of girls standing about talking, laughing and leaning on each other. Marta would stand back, trying to work out how to break in and be part of it all. Sometimes, she would walk past theses small companies multiple times, hoping that someone would call out for her to join in. Sometimes, they did and then her mind would empty; like the tide had suddenly gone out, leaving the fish flapping about, trying to breathe.

  When Marta pictured it in her own mind, it was if everybody else, was part of a busy coral reef and Marta was a lone octopus. Like an octopus, she could learn quickly, solve problems and remember things, but she was also somewhat solitary. This wasn’t entirely a matter of choice.

  “Oi luv” bellowed Marta’s next door neighbour, Bob Slugsby, even though he was standing only a few steps away, next to his broken down mail box.

  “Fancy a cup of tea then…..or something else, eh?” Mr Slugsby, or “Gawp”, as she privately called him, generally made clumsy, naively suggestive invitations whenever he saw Marta, which wasn’t as often as he would have liked, as Marta had as strong an inclination to avoid him, as you would a steaming stream of effluent coming toward you. She had even found herself dropping down to hide behind pot plants in her own backyard, when his bald, cabbagy head made an appearance over the timber fence.

  Marta both despised and felt intensely sorry for Gawp, who she regarded as a rather unattractive, bloodless mammal. She was always torn between trying to avoid his artless cunning, which she found repulsive and not wanting to hurt his feelings. He made her feel like one of those insects skewered to a board.

  “Thankyou but no……I have a lot to do this morning…..” replied Marta, clumsily.

  “Well tonight then? Under the stars so to speak.” As he said this, his mud coloured eyes roved her person, alternately squinting at and ogling Marta from head to toe, with long pauses at certain parts of her anatomy. Marta inwardly shuddered.

  Luckily, one of Gawp’s oily looking cronies suddenly pulled up in a ramshackle car, which had seen better days. The colour of baby poo, this car was one of those jalopy’s which are often featured in a list of “lemons”; cars which bring trouble and are best avoided. In this case, much like the occupant of the car himself. Marta muttered something unintelligible and made her escape.

  Chores needed to be done. So for the next few hours, Marta washed and scrubbed and pondered the hole in the roof where the water had stealthily entered yesterday. How much would such a thing cost to fix? Could she afford to fix it? Could she afford not to? And then, as though the spirit of Scarlett O’Hara had entered her, she decided to think about it tomorrow. Now, it was time to get back to the computer and Facebook.

  Since yesterday, Joy Aristo had posted various “new agey” aphorisms, about how you should “Avoid the negative” and “Count your blessings.” She had also added a new photo of herself in a microscopic pink leopard- skin bikini. Who has ever seen a pink leopard? Marta shook her head. Such “new age” ideas were usually spouted by privileged, neurotic people in her view; self-absorbed types with little concern for others. But then, she thought, being consumed by all the horrors of the world was definitely not good for you either, as before you realise it, if you are not careful, the “abyss also gazes into you”. She sighed heavily. Everything, life, relationships, how to think, how to be, how to act, were so complicated. Not to be too naïve, not to be too cynical and how to judge where critique ends and prejudice begins.

  Life, sometimes, seems absurd. And yet, this life is the only one we have. So it is comfort in a way, that we can generate meaning and purpose for ourselves, in the midst of the joy and despair that this life brings.

  Musing on such thoughts, brought to mind a book that Marta had read recently about Albert Camus, who when working as a journalist had reported on the desperate situation of the peasants of Kabylie, Algeria, who were forced to feed their families on grasses and various roots. Reporting on this had lost Camus his job.

  In the years since leaving school, the memory of two particular Aboriginal students also from her school days, would sometimes drift into Marta’s thoughts. Kia and Danny, they had been good students and even better athletes. Marta remembered how she had gained Kia’s approval at the sports carnival one year, owing to the fact that she was a swift, long- legged runner in those days. She was not of course in Kia or Danny’s league, as they made running look almost easy, almost lazy; panther like and beautiful. They had both left school though at fourteen. Just left. Marta always wondered about them.

  Other memories infiltrated her mind as she gazed out the window at the sun falling through the trees. She watched absently, as a lone kookaburra swept downwards, then soared triumphantly skyward with a mouse in its beak. She thought of Spiro, beautiful, talented Spiro. She had watched him in awe from a far. He was too handsome, too talented and too gay. She had heard that he had been snapped up by a big fashion firm after finishing college. He had become a “rising star.” Then, he had gassed himself in his car one night. This was not long after his father had refused to acknowledge or ever see him again. Marta wondered, when you thought about, really thought about it, how being gay hurt anyone. The strange thing was that, even though Spiro probably wasn’t even aware of Marta’s existence, she felt somehow responsible, like she could have saved him, if she had only tried.

  Marta retuned to Angela’s Facebook page, but there was not much to see other than her friend’s list. There was a picture of her cat though: cats were safe. Angela had been Marta’s friend during the last year of high school, when Angela had transferred from another school. Unexpectantly, the pair had bonded and journeyed together through the realms of ancient and modern history classes. They had played Dungeons & Dragons in lunch hours and sometimes, sat under the monumental eucalypt tree in the lower playground reading The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings out loud. It was a wonderful feeling having a friend, someone to share things with. When and how was it that they had fallen out of touch? But sadly, troublingly, since then, Marta had become aware, that we often invent others and build them in our own image. As Marta had done with Jack.