Seedy Sales

Sales is not exactly my forte, I have tried, really tried, why I thought it would be a good idea to buy a retail business is almost beyond me.

I liked the idea of helping Georges parents to be able to retire, and also the idea of not having a boss or co-workers apart from George, however I don't think that I fully thought through the whole process entirely.

I failed to imagine the calibre and demographic of our customers and their lack of education and etiquette, now I know that it takes all types and such things as education don't always account for the level of interpersonal skills that people possess. That no matter where you live, it is almost a certainty that you encounter unpleasantness from other people, but in our case things are not diluted because the population is so small so it seems unproportionally insane.

I lose a lot of customers/sales sometimes because I can mis read the situation or completely stuff it up in how I handle it.

All those little tricks that salesmen use, I just can't seem to get a handle on them, I am no smooth talker and I hate to rip anyone off, when we first started I had to remind myself that people actually went home with something they wanted, we weren't just taking their money, I know how hard I have had to work to get what money I have, yet some people just don't seem to have any concern for it and have no problem buying disgusting looking trinkets that don't actually do anything.

Which is interesting because when we buy things to sell in the shop, we don't buy what we would like, if we think it is revolting and tacky then it will sell.

Today a man came into the shop and wanted to borrow a pen, I told him he could buy one for 80 cents, he didn't like that at all, but I stuck to my guns and told him to go and borrow one from somewhere else because I sell pens, I don't lend them.

Had he approached the situation in a different way I would have been happy to lend him a pen, but his manner and tone when he asked me without even saying please, I wasn't prepared to be a good samaritan in turn for his rudeness, turned out I am the worst person in the world and now have a black mark against my name, because even though this guy was from away, he used to live here and knows everyone, in fact George even used to work for him, all over a pen.

So he was out in the street slandering me to everyone that would listen.

And I cried like a girl when no one could see me.

It's a tough game.

Getting High

Cannabis, marijuana, weed, pot, hashish, yarni, dope, gear, wacky tabaky; these are some of the more conservative names for this drug, let alone the colloquial versions, of which in my naivety, I have no idea what they are.

I do however, now know what this drug smells like.

I had a vague idea from when I was living and working in Sydney, but I was never really sure, until I moved to Dellaren, it is really quite distinctive.

The cops seem to turn a bit of a blind eye to the drug trafficking in Dellaren, I believe there have been a few 'busts,' but if you want to smoke a joint in the street, in the middle of the day, around children, go right ahead.

I am seen as a bit of a prude, so the drug scene is very much out of my view, but I hear snippits that it is certainly alive and well.

I definately see it's effects and on occasion have been privy to the abuse that comes from using this as well as other hard stuff.

Last month while working at the doctors surgery, I received quite a ear bashing from one man who wanted a doctors appointment, even though we have no doctor, he needed some paperwork signed so that he could continue getting payments from his insurance company, which the previous doctor had refused to sign anyway.

This man, lets call him Rod, had a car accident while working on a property and broke his neck, which he received compensation for, his neck has now healed completely, nothing wrong with him, fully capable of working, apart from maybe his personality and motivation, physically though, nothing hindering him.

Rod, it seems has a little problem with substance abuse, when he decided to come and give me a serve, without taking a breath for long enough for me to explain how we could help him, everyone who was working in the hospital that day came running to see what was happening, because he was loud enough to stir even the deaf residents living a block away.

After raising my voice to him, to try to get him to stop for long enough to say something, which didn't work, he left the hospital yelling all the way down the street, my boss came to see if I was alright, the nurse came out to see what was happening, as she thought he was after some drugs, I was alright, it actually felt pretty good to stand up for myself, which is difficult in the shop, even though there was not a resolution it felt good, might have been a bad move on my half but at the time I didn't care, my boss was alright with it and Rod hasn't stepped foot near the shop since, which is ok by us, and there haven't been any other ramifications that we are aware of.

Rod, I found out later has also managed to shoot himself in the head without actually killing himself, shame really.

He also decided it would be a good idea to lure his next door neighbour into his yard while having an altercation about a dog, only to be hiding behind the gate, waiting with a steal baseball bat ready to bash his neighbour over the head.

Only little does he realise that his neighbour, who is no better than Rod himself, carries machetes and other similar knives concealed on his person at all times, bad luck for any poor unsuspecting person who may aggravate the bastard.

I have no idea who ended up worse off, nor do I really care, I do however find it pretty amusing, I must be a little unhinged.

So when Rod called my boss to see if he could get in to see the doctor when we had a locum visiting, she told him that he needed to apologise before he would get in to see anyone, he said that we owed him an apology because I was the one that attacked him!

This is all deemed normal behaviour in Dellaren, which to me seems a little outlandish and this is only a taste of what I am discovering every day about the lives of the people of this little town isolated in the scrub of 'North South Wales' as it was referred to by a telemarketer the other day.

Scrambled

This has been a pretty full on month... thinking that we were still in August! My head is scrambled so much that I find it difficult to even string a sentence together. My mind is filled with fog and grey matter, everything is whirling around in a dizzying spin, that I literally lose my balance when I try to stand up too quickly, luckily though no one has noticed.

So many things have been happening that anger me into a state of confusion and forgetfulness.

I never knew how difficult it was for some people to complete a task that for others is so mind numbingly simple.

This was last week, I was so scattered that I couldn't even finish writing what I had started, and now, even thinking of it, I can't remember entirely what it was that got me so fired up.

I know I have been having trouble changing my name with a number of different companies, who manage to change my surname but not my title, so that even though I am married I have remained a Miss!

I never knew that owning a business would open up so many avenues of frustration; dark dank ally ways crowed with rats and people sticking their legs out, trying to trip you in the confusion of the crowd of things that swarm around you everyday, begging to be done, mixed in with the personal chores that need attention on top of all of that.

There are moments of light when someone opens a doorway to help, or when the sun creeps out from behind the clouds and sneaks in between the cracks in the buildings, on days like this things are easy, they flow smoothly and you wonder what all the fuss is about.

We can go for days, weeks even, when things seem settled, the customers are pleasant enough, when it has been put into perspective, sometimes we deal with a person and think, 'crazy!' but then we think about it if it had been in another situation, in another place, at another time, and compare them to some of our other customers and you realise, 'Ok they weren't too bad.'

Then there are times when one, after the other, after the other, are just insane and you go a little mental, sometimes I imagine we can be a little rude or abrupt to an undeserving customer whilst trying to comprehend the insanity of some situations or people that we have just encountered.

It almost seems sometimes that people tend to be absent minded or completely self absorbed to the point that they are unaware of any human interaction that they might have encountered while in the shop. I must admit I know there are times when I have been like that, I will have to remember to be more aware of my surroundings in the future!

Pushing on.

Yesterday, being a saturday meant that we got to close early and have the whole afternoon to ourselves, it is pure luxury indulging in our two afternoons off on the weekends.

Most of the time, we either do house or yard work and catch up on the washing that mounts up, slowly during the week in the wicker basket in the bathroom.

Yesterday, however George was away, I tidied the house room by room with the intention of vacuuming but in the end only managed on cleaning the bathroom, so while the rooms were tidy the carpet is still thick with dust, I cleaned it last week, but it doesn't take long to amass an amazing amount of powdery dust from who knows where.

After watching a bit of TV on my computer, I packed my backpack with a jumper and a drink and made my way down the rickety wooden stairs, pumped up the tyres and strapped on my helmet.

George and I bought ourselves new bikes, George put them together the other day and I have been waiting to get the opportunity to spin my new wheels.

I was so excited and a little bit nervous as well, as I could hear the local kids fooling around in the main street, and as stupid as it is I am a little scared of them, little louts that they are, when I was a kid I was a little timid around grown ups, certainly I would not dare to speak to them unless they spoke to me, let alone ridicule them. This is definitely not the case any more, kids have no shame and no fear, the kids around here anyway.

So I sucked it up, I thought, so what if they see me riding, I pushed my bike out of the gate and called to Boogie, who cowered in the bushes beside the pool, weird dog that he is, he's a little scared of the big bad world, or maybe he is just confined to his duty of guard dog and the guilt of leaving his post is too much to bear.

So I left him there, shut the gate and jumped on my bike. Its been a number of years since I rode a bike, but I haven't lost it, its just like 'riding a bike.'

Pushing down on the peddles and being propelled forward was an exhilarating feeling, I rode down the back lane, a little bit wobbly on the uneven surface of the dirt, dodging the puddles festering from last weeks rain, unable to drain away, bumping over the mounds created by the cars and trucks driving through the mud which has long since dried up and crusted over, getting lost in the pot holes and divots in the lane, until I pushed out from between the pub and the derelict house on the corner, onto the road.

I waited at the main street for a car to pass, I could feel their eyes watching me as they passed, I glanced to the left to look down the main street, to my relief the kids had gone, off to cause some mischief in someone else's yard, they wouldn't be game to try to get into ours, not with Boogie there at least.

I stood up on the peddles and rode up onto the bridge to head out of town, the sun on my back and the wind stroking my cheeks, the fresh dusty air filling my lungs as my muscles stretched out in luxury, unencumbered by the confines of everyday life, out in the open space, with room to move.

As I rode along the narrow rode, praying that I wouldn't have to compete for the bitumen with a roadtrain, I concentrated on the white line beneath my tyres , watching it disappear where the soft edges of the road had crumbled away, I played with the gears amazed at how easy they were to change, one lever to up a gear and another to go down, one flick and the chain ground its way from one cog to the other, it took me about a kilometre before I had it completely figured out.

As I glided along, I lifted my head and noticed the ugly beauty that surrounded me.

Everything was so peacefully quite, when I looked to my left off in the distance, I saw a lonely camper taking a cup of water back to their site to make a cuppa, to my right lay the fresh carcass of a Kangaroo.

The breeze tickled the leaves in the trees and the bird chirped blissfully, playing, ducking and diving, chasing each other through the branches.

I was starting to tire but knew that I didn't have far to go and not only that, I was enjoying it so much that I didn't want it to end.

I reached the two kilometre mark and turned to my left, onto the dirt and through the gate, Smidge started barking even though I was still hundreds of metres away, I whistled out to her, letting her know that it was only me, she heard me but didn't listen.

As I came around the bend I sped up and yelled out to her, the tail tucked up between her legs wagging, she did a little dance as I parked my bike in the shed, excited to see me, waiting in anticipation for a little pat.

Her tiny frame danced along side me as I made my way onto the porch where I was met by Jock, the Jack Russell, complete with ball in mouth, ready to play.

I made my way inside to find Mama up on a stool, putting away a years supply of rice which she had divvied up into smaller containers.

We chatted and soon the dogs were off barking again as the boys made their way down the drive.

Back it up

I am lucky enough to be amused everyday by the goings on in the street, I certainly don't get to see everything that happens, as the doorway to our shop isn't that big and the front windows are full of displays and covered with a curtain.

One thing that fails to amaze me, is peoples lack of ability to drive, I suppose that's why they live out here and hate the city so much, because they are scared of the traffic, I would be too if I thought that everyone drove the way these people do.

Most of them go flat out like the clappers or they are simply not moving, however I'd say about 90% of them cannot reverse park, I watch them as they back up, slowly, until WHAM the back back tyres hit the curb and they know they have parked the car.

Now I do not profess to be an expert at driving by any stretch of the imagination, but I can reverse park a car.

I have no idea how these people have no concept of the space around them to be able to tell when to pull up. As far as I am aware, I am sure that there is some crazy law that has probably never been enforced, where it is actually illegal to have your tyres pushed into the curb.

We don't always have a lot of cars parked in the street but I'd say, 9 times out of 10 the wheels are jammed up into the gutter, bulging under the weight of the car/truck/ute.

Whats even better is when they reverse straight into a power pole with an almighty CRACK, once it was the cars taillights, the other time was the actual pole, I had to laugh out loud when I saw that one, while making sure I wasn't in the way if it decided to come down, which it didn't, but I half expected a blackout. Luckily for everyone involved it stood strong.

Just not Mickey Mouse

Rodents.

Dellaren is full of them, not just the human kind either.

The other day I was walking down the street to go and collect the mail when I stopped dead in my tracks, held my breath and lifted up on to my tippy toes, then I realised it was dead, laying motionless on the footpath, a little mouse.

On another day I was changing the Lotto posters on the wall, when I jumped back, caught my breath and then noticed it was dead, another mouse, just inside the entrance to the shop, laying next to the ice cream freezer.

Sitting at the back of the shop on the computer last year, I kept hearing a noise above me, this little mouse was eating the bait on the shelf above me, then climbed down a wire onto the bookshelf beside me all the way down to the ground, no fear, I was right next to it, yuck.

A few days ago, as I was going out the back of the shop a little brown creature ran straight past my foot to hide in the shadows, and last night when I went to lock the safe one ran from under the desk to the tiniest space between the wall and the safe.

Not to mention all the dead ones we have caught in the traps we have set next to the fridge and the stove, I always turn the light on if I have to come out to get a drink in the middle of the night in case one got its head caught and struggled to try and get free only to cark it in the middle of the kitchen floor for an unwary person to step on while they aren't paying attention or can't see where they are going.

It may be cruel, and I may be callous but I can't stand mice, they stink and they are creepy, did you know a mouse can fit through a hole the size of a pencil!

I have seen a mouse scale a brick wall from the floor right up to the roof while sitting having lunch with one of George's friends on a building site in Gullet, quite amazing really.

The rodents are definitely not something that I will miss when we leave here, the only thing I can think of that I would possibly miss is the sky but that goes everywhere with me and no matter where you live it is never to long a drive to escape the city lights to bathe under the starry sky.

Early on a Sunday morning

This morning we woke up at 6am, which is a little earlier than usual, as we had to drive to Gullet to collect the papers, as our usual Sunday driver is sick. This doesn't really bother us, as it is a bit of pocket money, its a bit of a gamble though, driving through the twilight, on watch for roos, foxes and hares.

It's hard to get up when it is so cold, 0.2degrees according to my phone, layer by layer we got dressed to the point where I can barely lift my arms and out into the darkness.

We drove down the lane and had contrail vapours following us from the condensation of the exhaust meeting the icy chill in the air.

As we drew nearer to Gullet the sun had tipped up over the horizon, spilling colours out onto the sky, the birds picked at the carcasses squashed into the road, as the colours changed from inky blue to purple, pink and peach, rising up across the sky in front of us, slowly fading into a dusky blue to cover the scrub for the rest of the day, with the wind whipping up across the dusty plains.

Back in the shop, it was a quite day, but exciting as we have a new project, I decided to 'buy' myself a video camera from the shop, I figured George had probably smoked the equivalent value, so this is what I got.

We have set it up, complete with a velcro dot so that it doesn't move when we turn it on and off, to record the coming and goings of the inhabitants of Dellaren! Spectacular!

We have already recorded some beauties! George has decided to start his own blog with the highlights from everyday!

We figured we really needed to have visual proof, as sometimes, words are just not enough. So we will make the most of the rest of our time here by recording what can only be seen to be believed.