a quiet satisfaction

Saturday night. Scene: shite cocktails at the local RSL that has recently decided to vamp it up to entice the young crowd. Cast: four ladies who survived high school together.

Ms. Brains: Smart, articulate, and the first one of us to get married. Other memorable traits include the infamous incident on the first day of high school when she stood up in front of the whole maths class to tell the rest of us buffoons to shut up and "show some respect".

Ms. Simpatico: Lovely, quiet, and rational. She is the best of us - the first person I think of when I feel a rage attack to calm me down.

Ms. Boobs: Hot, cleavage, and it wasn't a surprise when she became the first one of us to get a boyfriend.

And me.

There was always this quiet rivalry between Ms. Boobs and I, as was usually the case between girls who were best friends. The only thing was, she always seemed to beat me in the things that mattered - boys, boys and boys. And it irked me.

The first boy I ever liked, for example. Ms. Brains cornered him in Grade 8 one day.

"You know, Polly likes you, " she said with the subtlety that could only be found in an eighth grader.

"Yeh. But I like Ms. Boobs."

Friggin moron. Although some satisfaction came in Grade 11 when the friggin moron asked me to be his girlfriend. Pretend girlfriend, so that he could throw off the scent on this girl who was stalking him. High school was tough.

So. Saturday night. Ten years later. Cheap cocktails. Four young ladies who survived high school together.

"How's the new guy?" I asked Ms. Boobs.

"I don't know. I think we're not going to last. I plan on breaking it off next week," Ms. Boobs replied. I shook my head; it was like back in high school again, I thought. Ms. Boobs - too many boys chasing after her, and her not realising how good she has with her ridiculously small and unfair waist to boobs ratio.

"So what happened with the old one?" Ms. Brains asked.

"It just didn't work. He wouldn't touch me."

"What? You were doing it right?" I was amazed.

"I could lie there naked next to him and he wouldn't touch me," said Ms. Boobs.

"What?" We exclaimed in disbelief. I mean, she has a ridiculously small and unfair waist to boobs ratio.

"Yeah. He was great at everything. But in the four years we went out, I can count the number of times we did it and the number of times he stuck his tongue down my throat." Ms Boobs recalled, "Ten and ten."

"Are you serious?" we asked.

"Yeah." Ms. Boobs confirmed.

"Oh. That's just fucked. If I was that motherfucker, I'd totally tap that. I mean, you. Like, more than ten times in fucking four years. Bang!" I said, under the influence of alcohol and total disbelief at any hot blooded male's inability to tap that.

I also spent a whole day earlier fueled up on two whole seasons of "Entourage". I thought I was Ari Gold and maybe I could talk sense into the situation if this frigid boy of Ms. Boob's was in front of me.

When I got home tonight, with some quiet satisfaction, I realised that it isn't all about the waist to boob ratio. And I couldn't wait to tell the Boy about how good we have it, despite the tyranny of distance.

Not that it is something to be smug about.

on flb, and how to annoy those like her

FLB, the rotten egg smell that we just can't get rid of in my otherwise semi-harmonious team, has been with us for close to a year now. She is the bane of everyone's existence; the itch that we want to scratch till it bleeds, the psycho dog that we want to put down, the cancerous tumour on which we want to double the dosage of chemo...

I can keep the metaphor going all day. She is a bitch. A very lazy one. Hence the acronym she is now known as amongst the team. No prizes for guessing what the F stands for. Lets just say that the F helps with the venting of anger.

Her understanding of the word "assistant" in "personal assistant" is very limited. Not a day goes by without our requests being bounced back from her with a terse "can you sort this out for yourselves." We forward those emails around the team; we lament and console each other over our shared misfortune of having to work with her.

Very Tall New Guy: "I got locked out in the fire escape last night. She somehow got rid of the after hours access on my security pass. Instead of putting it back on today, she emailed me the security operations number and walked out of the door to go shopping."

Chubby Pom [screams over email]: "Fire escape? At least you managed to get out. I'm stuck 800km away because she fucked up my flight."

Very Tall New Guy [not ready to be outdone]: "No wait. I think I can top that. I just got 1000 business cards printed. Very nice of her to get that done. Very useful. If only she had put the address on.

As she annoys us all day with her lack of "assistance" as part of her role as a "personal assistant", sometimes, I like to hit the ball back into her court.

For example, right after Chinese New Year.

Me: "How was your Chinese New Year?"
FLB [rather chirpily for an FLB]: "Yeah, it was fantastic! I got a few of red packets."
Me: "You? Red packets? Aren't you a bit old at 37??!"
FLB [with less enthusiasm]: "Well, yes, maybe..."
Me: "I guess there's ALWAYS an upside to still being a spinster eh?"

Me 1 - FLB 0.

the best mix tape ever!

"So Polly, when is it your turn?" the Delightful Young Man asked while we were out at dinner. He had just flown into Melbourne for work and we caught up on the woes gone by in the past year.

Which, namely, for me was my disastrous debut as a bridesmaid in April. My friendship with Bridezilla still hangs by a thread.

"I think after that episode, I am off weddings in general." I said bluntly.

"How long has it been now? Two years? Surely you think about it?" DYM fired off a series of questions, "Even daydream about a diamond here and there?"

"Yes, but only in terms of how much I can haggle with that Israeli jeweller on Swanston Street. " I said, referring to the jeweller who Miss Unsubtle had gotten her bling from. This guy can get you any cut of diamond you want, at any size. Sometimes, he even flies to Antwerp himself to pick it up. Visiting him is like a scene out of a Guy Ritchie film.

"See. You do think about it."

"But not in some pink vomit way," I hastily defended myself.

We ate our entrees in silence as I thought about "it" a bit more.

"You know what I do think about a lot?" I started to confess. "The music. Bridezilla paid something like five grand for the three piece jazz band at her wedding. I could save that and do it myself!"

"What? You're going to sing at your own wedding?"

"No. Don't be stupid. That would leave no time to drink," I scoffed and started again at the subject I had been thinking a lot about. "I know music. And I know good music. And what's more, le Garçon knows even more than me about music. I will have the best music at my wedding. It won't cost me anything because it's all in my CD collection and iTunes. It'll be Polly's wedding collection full of the most romantic yet not so cheesy tunes. It'll be the best mixed tape ever! My definitive version of the best mix tape!"

"So it will be like being trapped in car with you and being made to listen to all your CDs during a very long road trip," DYM wasn't convinced.

"No! Not all CDs! Just a mix tape! And what better time to show case it than at my wedding because people will be made to listen to it! We'll start off with Al Green's 'Let's Stay Together' and then throw in a bit of Ella, Billie and Frank - the originals - none of this Michael Bublé bullshit. A bit of Rufus and Queen for laughs. You know, songs that ticks in peoples' head with 'wow, that really captures the two of them.' Oh and there's this one I heard recently..."

Like a mix tape, I think DYM stopped listening by track four. But come my wedding, he'll oblige.

bridezilla

The wedding is drawing close. Less than a week, in fact. A monstrous project fifteen months in the making. Bridezilla is full steam ahead, leaving a path of destruction behind her - two disenchanted bridesmaids; one quit and the other has been close to going over the edge on many occasions.

Miss Unsubtle quit with five weeks to go. A drawn out process following over a year of "It's my wedding! It's my life!"

I remain. Reluctantly.

December 2006. "I'm engaged! Look at the ring! Groom-to-be-of-Bridezilla got it from Charles Rose! Will you be my bridesmaid? My chief bridesmaid?" Screams and hugs followed.

February 2007. At a bridal expo, "This is my chief bridesmaid, Polly."

May 2007. Through tears in a busy cafe, "I'm trying to make everyone happy! I'm trying to please everyone! It's going to be a pink dress!"

July 2007. "Oh Polly! Thank you for finding my wedding dress with me!"

August 2007. "I don't care about the starving kids in Africa! The photographer is $6000 and he's GOOD!"

December 2007. To Miss Unsubtle, "Sometimes, I think Polly only wanted to be my bridesmaid because she's in competition with Tuck Shop Lady Arms (TSLA)."

January 2008. "If I was the bridesmaid, I would have all weekends in the two months leading up to the wedding free for the bride. Polly should have told me that she has a wedding to attend on the day I want to have my Hens."

February 2008. "Miss Unsubtle, I am not unreasonable, I am selfless. It's not like I have been a bridezilla. Just get along with my lovely friend who called you and Polly manipulative. It's my wedding. Just be happy for me. It should be about me."

February 2008. "I can't believe Miss Unsubtle just quit."

February 2008. "I never wanted Polly to be my chief bridesmaid. If I had a choice, it would have been Arse Crawler."

February 2008. "Polly, TSLA is going to be Miss Unsubtle's replacement. I always wanted her to be the bridesmaid but you were uncomfortable about it because she used to go out with The Boy. I'm just selfless like that."

March 2008. "Polly, I've paired Arse Crawler with the Best Man because she is the only one who is married. All my bridesmaids are the same to me. There's no chief bridesmaid. What? Oh that ceremony program just says Arse Crawler is the Matron of Honour, but all my bridesmaids are the same to me."

A rather good summary of events. So come Sunday next week, as the Wedding March plays and TSLA waddles down the aisle...

The Boy thinks to himself, "I tapped that."

And as I gracefully glide toward the alter...

The Boy thinks smugly to himself, "I'm tapping that."

It is like rain on your wedding day. A black fly in your chardonnay.

one-eighth...

"So what are you?"

I have always envied those who can answer this in a long-winded way to include every continent on earth and throw in various mix of spices in quarters or eighths, or even sixteenths. My friend, Ms Pants Advocate, can list over half of the UN Security Council in her blood stream.

Being just full-blooded anything seems so...dull.

On a recent trip to China with my parents, a revelation came one night out at dinner in Chengdu.

"Dad! Let's do the family tree when we get home!" I excitedly said. Earlier, we had visited an elderly relative who revealed all the glory of the old family. Oxford scholars, renowned surgeons and crazed artists abound in the thick volume of my paternal grandmother's family tree.

"Pfft!" My fat cousin scoffed at the idea.

"We're not doing YOUR family tree. We're doing OURS!" I scoffed back. He's on my mother's side of the family and thus we don't share the same surname.

"Sometimes, you find things things you don't want to know, " he retorted quietly.

Given my limited mastery of the Chinese language, all I could come up with was very loudly, "I DON'T CARE!" and a pout.

My outburst was met by silence around the dinner table. Momma and Pappa looked embarrassed. We don't know what drugs she's been taking while on her own in Melbourne, we might need to have a quiet chat with her later, the look on their faces revealed.

And then the silence was broken by my cousin.

"You want to find out about how your grandfather's mother was not even his mother? The old man was illegitimate! The woman was a sing-song girl who became a concubine!"

"What?!" This was obviously news to my mother as well. At that point I couldn't tell if she was upset or confused.

"See, you don't want to play with history," fat cousin emphasised again.

Silence ensued while plates of Szechuan delicacies were brought to our table. I picked at the green peppercorns and stole looks at my mother in between. I wondered, what was the psyche of a woman who just found out her much admired father was a bastard?

"Well. That could explain why he was an outrageously good-looking man." She finally said, with a hint of smugness.

"The old man was still a bastard." Fat cousin insisted.

"Shut it!" I said defensively of the man who caught a tortoise for me the first time we met. "He was still your grandfather."

The uncomfortable silence continued.

* * *

"How was your day today?" The Boy asked over the phone that night.

"I found out that I'm one-eighth prostitute from mama's side."

is that the scent of change i smell?

"Guess who I saw at the polling booth today??!" Pixie excitedly asked.

"No? Who?" I was not going to venture to guess. Pixie lives on the edge of the illustrious seat of Wentworth, where the rich and famous frolic.

"Delta Goodrem!"

"Wonder if she voted for K-Rudd."

Election day 2007.

I woke this morning hopefully sensing a change in the air. I considered carefully in the attire that I was to wear on such a momentous day.

Eleven years! I was not yet fifteen when J W Howard took office! Red! It has to be red; the colour of K-Rudd and the working class, the rouge in that strip bar he visited in New York, the shade of Julia Gillard's hair, and the colour of those bar graphs on every channel tonight dissecting the results of the election.

So it came to this long sleeved jumper that I picked up on a recent trip to Shanghai:
It was enough to deflect the Liberal pamphlets as I made my way to my celebrity-less polling booth.

I have been amusingly engrossed in the election this year. Mildly entertained by the pamphlet-overboard incident this past week and the little bit of bitch-slapping that went down this afternoon. Not forgetting the coersion, flirtation and intimidation by the same bitch-slapper that provided the prologue to today's showdown.

Notwithstanding my own amusement and hyper bias for the red team, the politics has divided the Boy and I.

"I can't believe you think they're better economic managers!" We both cried at various times of the last few weeks.

How do you turn someone long decided to be a blue (bleh!) to bat for the red team? After some screaming, some mild coaxing ("If you love me, you'd vote for K-Rudd!"), and threats ("That's it! NO CUPCAKES FOR YOU!"), I have come to reluctant acceptance and will just be smug while the so very obviously better team wins the day.

tale of a mechanical pencil

Two weeks ago, I turned 26. The momentous occasion this year was all the more special when I received a Graf von Faber-Castell mechanical pencil from Le Garçon.Though it is not jewellery or handbag, it is more than enough bling to last me for a very very long time.

* * *

[1989. Shanghai, China.]

I saw my first mechanical pencil at a stationery store on Huaihai Road with my Mama. It was shiny silver with a handsome black grip. I thought it was the classiest thing I had ever seen in my life and bound to make me have the best handwriting in the whole school. Unfortunately, this was back in the old country - fine things were rare and expensive.

"You can have that pencil if you get full marks in your test next week," my Mama bribed. It took a bold statement like that to move me away from the glass cabinet that the mechanical pencil was encased in.

I studied my times table and Chinese poetry like crazy that week. But as fate would have it, I didn't get full marks. I got 89% in Chinese and 97% in Maths. I stared at the numbers in the report card with bitterness as I thought about how the mechanical pencil was going to be encased in that glass cabinet forever. I was seven-years-old and had already started to develop a tendency for the melodramatic.

Slowly, I began to change the numbers on the report card. I was seven-years-old and had not yet learned that there was no possible way of making either "89" or "97" look like "100".

On the way home, the guilt of it all started to weigh down on me. I was also aware that the two 100's did not really look that legitimate. It all got too much that when I handed my passive Papa the report card, I burst out crying and fessed up.

Like how they were for the rest of my childhood, they didn't lose their temper or yell. They simply said they were disappointed and it was enough for the water works to overflow the dam again.

A few days later, while shopping with my Mama, I saw the mechanical pencil again in the same store. I stared at it again and quickly walked away. But this time, Mama pulled me back to the glass cabinet.

"You changed your marks so you could have this, didn't you?" she asked.

I sheepishly agreed.

"I was going to buy it for you anyway. But if I buy it for you today, you will have to never lie again."

I nodded but I felt awful. It was a prize I shouldn't have won. It was also 3RMB and I knew that Mama only took home 20RMB a week. When I finally held the pencil in my hand, I got no satfisfaction in knowing that it was mine. It was tainted goods. I put it in my desk drawer when I got home and never used it.

* * *

"So that's the worst thing you've ever done in your whole life?" Le Garçon asked when we were trading childhood stories about a year ago. "You fibbed your way into getting some pencil and that's the worst you've got?"

"It was a mechanical pencil! And I lied to get it and mum still bought it for me even though it cost 15% of her weekly wage! I was a horrible child!"

"That's still the worst thing you've ever done?" He asked in disbelief.

* * *

On my birthday, I tore through the wrapping and shook the box slightly to hear if it sounded like the pair of earrings I had been hinting for all week. When I finally opened the white oblong box, I was seven-years-old again, staring at the classiest thing ever.

"So you can have one legitimately now," he said.

But what was I supposed to tell my parents? I have not spoken about my downfall of 1989 since the event.

A day later, my passive Papa called.

"What did the Boy get you for your birthday?" he asked.

"He got me a mechanical pencil."

"A what?"

"Remember that time in second grade when I changed my mark so I could get a mechanical pencil?" It was inevitable to relive the shame all over again.

"No? When did that happen?" Passive Papa was clueless.

"In second grade! Mum said I could only have it if I aced my tests that term." I was starting to get exasperated that he couldn't remember the worst thing I have ever done in my life.

"So you changed marks?" Passive Papa started to laugh.

"Yes. I felt awful."

"Why your mother not buy it for you? It couldn't be that much!" He said sympathetically.

"But she did! And it was 3RMB when you guys only made 20RMB a week!"

"How you still remember that?" he asked.

"How do you not remember that??" I asked, "You mean I've been carrying the guilt of this horrible thing I did for almost twenty years and you guys don't even remember?"

"No. Can't remember."