Great Sentence of the Week #7

Your worst enemy, he reflected, was your own nervous system. At any moment the tension inside you was liable to translate itself into some visible symptom. Nineteen eighty-four (Orwell).

What Price a Moment?

For Mark Tredinnick...

I find myself in a moment; sitting and staring up through a v-shaped vista – between the grey, lichen marked trunks of Bangalow Palms – and I notice how the sun plays a different tune on each species of plant: delicate silver and copper piping on the Casuarina needles, or thick citric screaming on the Coachwood leaves. A Noisy Miner twists and flutters on glowing white feathers, then perches sideways on the crumbling bark of a Sydney Peppermint to swallow his catch. There’s an Angophora in the far distance; just a piece of a tree; a warty salmon branch twisting in an S-shape, before moiling towards the sky. A Currawong calls. The Sweet Pittosporum is thick with cream blossoms. Tree Fern fronds wave in a gentle northerly breeze.

 

I’ve been fortunate this week. In less than three days I’ve generated more income in my own business than I would have in two weeks as an employee. If my calculations are right, there’s a lot more to come. It feels like a blessing. Except now the Internet is down. Again. And for a moment, I can’t earn any of that promised income. A frustrating moment. I leave my little office and go outside for some air. Let my computer re-boot – and myself. Breathe. And I sit out in the shade and I listen to the colours of the world. It’s only for a moment, but it feels a lot more valuable.