Everything that is born, eventually comes to a natural end. Like your favourite television show and the realization that there’s only three minutes of air time left before the obviously planned cliffhanger, or like Batman dying in Dark Knight Rises (whoops) – what lives must eventually die, making way for something new and exciting. If you people are anything like me, I fucking hate moving and moving on.

From moving my right arm to pick up beer while on the couch through to literally moving houses or quitting jobs, I hate all forms of moving.

Does that make me profoundly lazy? Probably. Gym down the road for that ‘craving’ to exercise? Forget about it, too far away. Supermarket trolley return on the wrong side of the carpark? Forget about it. Grabbing a knife, even though you already have a perfectly good fork available to cut with? Forget about that. Taking pegs off the clothes line every wash? Fucking forget it. Rotating in the sun long enough to get a real tan? Oh. You best be forgetting about it.

Crushed, like the coffee in this commemorative Hey Hey It’s Saturday mug, Daryl Somers hated moving on too. I’ll be surprised if he ever hosts anything on Australian television again. Even after I was so hopeful. Shameful Mr. Somers.

While some people look to the future with glistening eyes and the excitement of a child that doesn’t know any better, I don’t – I know better. I know certainty. Well, I think I do. But how much is certain in life?

What you don’t know, is that I’m actually an eighty-year-old masquerading in a twenty-five-year-old’s body. I don’t like things when they change. I like certain… certainties in life – and as my friends will tell you, this is for better or worse. The same haircut, milk before boiling water in coffee, a stable living situation, and not being ripped off in the Deli at my local supermarket – these are but a few of the many simple and complicated things I like remaining steadfast.

Moving just means there’s an end coming to something, and endings often suck. Just look at the X-Files and ask Chris Carter (that said, I really enjoyed Season 6 when they moved production to LA from Vancouver because David Duchovny willed it. Just imagine the look on Chris Carter’s face when he turned around and quit one season later… but I digress).

Endings: Simple to get to, easy to fumble. Sometimes they’re forced on you – sometimes you get to do the ending all by yourself. In hit show “24”, the clock just counted backwards towards zero at the end. Imagine if everything did that. Time limits everywhere. I’d be that guy living in fear of the impending flashing zeros.

With that font even. Think about it. Floating above everything. Forever counting down from somewhere to zero. Mmmhmmm.

Come to think of it, I already am…

“Sorry darling, but the LED clock above your head is flashing zeros. We’re through.” If only ending every social engagement was that easy. That awkward dinner with a potential girl that ended up being really boring, not to mention having a boyfriend? Fucking zero’d. Outta there. That birthday where you got ditched while you went to the toilet at a nightclub, just before lockout? Fucking zero’d, she got outta there! Or that time where you drove some friends to a music festival and they were terrible the whole way? You better believe they got zero’d. ZEROS EVERYWHERE! What if there was a button to immediately force zero’s on the countdown clock? That’d be great!… Once again I digress;

Ending something can lead to disappointment, so why not anchor the fuck down and hang on. That’s my terrible theory. Extensive references to average television writing aside, not all moves to end are as awful as I’m illustrating. Life isn’t usually as dramatic as something scripted. Then again, there are always going to be some moments that read like a sitcom. Like a disappointing coffee with low fat milk, or stumbling across a pickle in a burger you’ve been hanging for all day – changes are inevitable and often thrown onto the road in front of you.

Nothing made this more clear to me than the excruciating number of hours I spent packing up my house recently. That is to say I physically moved on something. Yes, you read that correctly. That eighty-something-year-old that hates lifting even a god damn limb, moved house. And as I spent maybe thirty agonising hours sorting through years of hoarded belongings, some seldom used, I didn’t really know how to feel.

I wasn’t really happy to be packing everything, but at the same time it provided a certain finality and avenue through which I could throw out a tonne of useless shit I’d collected over the years.

I think this picture sums up the disdain I felt about moving house.

Then I had to box up what remained and actually move it. What a fucking nightmare. Honestly, who would want to live in multiple places in their lifetime if it involved packing up all your shit in-between? No one that’s who. “Sure, you can move internationally for free every year! Just make sure all your stuff is packed into a shipping contain…” *hangs up phone*

Actually, one thing I did learn from it all, is that you should never move house around work. Just don’t. Really. You can afford it. Just take the time off you idiot. Primarily however, I learnt that while I like standing like a buried bridge post in a flood of water most of the time, I should also occasionally let the water push me in the right direction once in a while.

And that leads me to where I am right now. Three years of hate… so much irrational hatred… yet some, not that irrational. Some of ‘Life’s Important Questions’ got answered. Some ‘Awful Ideas’ were explained to the world. Some drug and alcohol induced musings from an old friend got published. Not to mention, plenty of talk about shitty people (bogans, Gerry Harvey, Pink, Delta Goodrem, all country music ‘stars’, George Lucas, Ben Lee, the Royal Family, Justin Bieber, Sarah Jessica Parker – the list goes on) and shitty industries (hospitality, IT). I’ve had some successes with ideas and some failures that no one read. This whole thing was about life. As real (sometimes) and as shitty (a lot of the time) it can be.

I hope you’ve had a laugh. I know I have.

But where do I let the water carry me from here? Maybe I should just take up letter writing? God knows I enjoy doing that.

Coulda-woulda-shoulda 😉