I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 4 June 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“Well, now that the baps are done, and just as soon as the rolling stones are hanging around my neck, I’ll be thinking about the what the next groove will be in my art and heart. It’s exciting! I have a little bit of an idea of possible themes and series which have been brewing up top for a while and I’m hoping my ideas will translate into paintings and drawings. I also have some unfinished painting biz to return to. But I think I’m ready to push myself to try and convert potential into reality. You have to believe in the dangling carrot, don’t you? And I see a sea of faces ahead.

Not much of a housebomb to address this weekend, seeing as it’s take two at this game. I’ve chucked some trashy mags and a few of my favourite things in a bag and generally I’m feeling pretty “breezy” about the op on Tuesday. I haven’t even received the admission details yet! Surgery eve for those technicalities it is then. I can do casual, yeah man, yeah man, yeah man. Chill. I can’t flipping wait to be on the other side now though. Again. How many other sides are there? This is it this time, right? I’m asking too many questions to sound confident here. So here my homegirl in no doubt of it at all. It’s Gwen Stefani. She wind it up and make the sweet escape.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 3 June 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“It is really, really nice to have someone you trust take photos of your new breasts which have taken 10 months to make. Yes, can you believe it? (Yes, you can.) I have been talking about how to get new ones that don’t kill you since 10 August 2016! I must be insane in the membrane to still be chit-chatting. There is the smallest amount of bruising on the right one but essentially today I can conclude: JOB DONE! JUMP AROUND! Or maybe JOB DONE! SLEEP ON YOUR TUMMY EVERY NIGHT!

I was scrolling through the photos just before dinner out with my homegirls and the penny dropped in that moment of looking as I realised just how far I’d come. And I realised that no matter how much I’ve talked out loud, there would still always be very few people who would fully understand what lies beneath those images of those baps. This was no ‘boob job’ fo’ shizzle and I was straight back to ways of seeing.

There are always going to be different perceptions of the same thing no matter how well you tell or show the thing. My photographer lady was looking at the light play and the interesting shadows, shapes and negative space it was creating. I was obsessing. Do I look normal? Do I look normal? Do I look normal? All I was looking for was qualification: yes you look normal, love. Calm the hell down! I think I do. There is a 5cm (I measured) needle scar which runs out horizontally to the side of each nip. I am quite glad to have these scars because when I look in the mirror every day they will gently remind me of what it took to get to this point in the here and now, long after my obsession has calmed the hell down.

Needless to say I drank too much wine and did too much effing and blinding over dinner (tummy behaved) but I think that’s a given. Pressure cooker was letting off steam. So here my homegirl. It’s Raye. She say we could throw shapes together but it doesn’t mean you’re in my circle.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 29 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“You were always on the run, never still.” Something else Mum wrote to me. I think that’s about right. I used to run everywhere as a kid, right up until running cross country in my early teens (early 1990s). There is cinefilm that exists somewhere of my childhood where I am mostly a speeding blur that cuts across the frame. Hard to believe now but s’true.

Competing at cross country in a British winter was not the most fun thing ever for a sun loving lizard with poor blood circulation: cold, wet mud, bloody scratches on legs from the brambles, a red raw face and wobbly thighs from the freezing wind, hands blue and dysfunctional. Right up there with playing Goal Defence in netball in fact, brambles aside! P.E. people stick you in that position if you have tall girl syndrome. You soon come to realise: hate, hate, hate! So then I stopped.

After stopping I would say that I started running in my head. Yep it’s a jungle in there. Why do I think so much? Too much. Way too much. It can be exciting but it’s tiring, too. A mental workout every day and around the clock. The upshot is I’m driving myself crazy from overthinking in the house of pain. I’m sick of being sick. I’m sick of being stuck. I’m sick of being me!
But it is nearly over and there are just two more sleeps until tummy fix. Baps are doing great, really great. Still tight but great. On Saturday night I thought to myself, “What are you waiting for? You should be up and running! The bruising won’t change anything. Get on your tummy and sleep on those things before you really can’t again for a while.” So I did! First time in 10 months!!! Hip hop hooray! Oh my god. It was totes amazeboobs and my mind ran away straight to my wildest dreams. How’s that for Monday motivation? So here my all saintly, artfully dodging homegirl. It’s Melanie Blatt. She twenty four seven.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 25 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“It’s the end of the week and I’ve got so many questions that need answering. I’ve hounded all my go to gurus for enlightenment and I’m looking and feeling like a mean machine. Tomorrow is the day of reckoning, the big one: a rendezvous with Dr. Gallstones to get the lowdown on the course of action for the rolling stones. I need them gone but at what cost and in what timeframe? So… different surgeon, different hospital. Yay! Keeps it interesting dunnit? I’ve lined up all my questions like bullets and harnessed my inner fighting frog. I’m going in there with balls coz I is needing answers, man!!! And I’m not leaving ’til I get them. That’s it in short-n-sweet. So here my homegirl. It’s Neneh Cherry. She hang in a buffalo stance.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 24 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“One of my favourite things in life at the moment is walking the rugrats to school and childcare. I haven’t done much of it lately for reasons such as: too unwell, foul weather or medical appointments first up. I love walking somewhere over driving. I always have. Exeter hills, Eltham hills, same same. You see so much more on foot than from behind the wheel. You get that great big rush of energy and clarity. You get to be present. And that’s especially true this week where autumn is at its most magic – in the air, in the colour, in the light – and guess what? It all comes for free.

Everyone bangs on about being in the here and now. Whateva… It’s virtually impossible to do all of the time. We all know that. Even keeping a diary has its limitations. You reminisce about the past, you imagine the future, you can’t live exclusively in today. I mean a diary does help to ground you but you will always travel. The only thing you can do is just appreciate those precious things you love NOW, NOW, NOW, and not save them all for later.

After staying up to watch yesterday’s news of innocent children, many of them young girls not much older than mine, being so horribly injured and taken too soon from this world when they were out having fun, I know that I will hold my big girl’s hand a bit tighter this morning on our walk-skip to school together. I will listen closely as she shares her secrets with me. I will be in the now with her. So here my cosmic homegirl. It’s Kučka. She walk with me.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 21 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“Yesterday was a pretty good day for my body. A fixed eye, tonsa energy from the steak and wine and hardly any trouble from tummy. Tummy was pretty happy. The sun was shining (more of my medicine) and was warm enough to make a Brit hit the streets bare chested (erm, no, not me). For being two weeks off winter Melbourne could certainly not be sniffed at.

Winter is a funny business here. It’s short but long all at the same time, and the temperature of a British autumn. Australians start wearing woolie hats at around 15 degrees (ho, ho, ho – so naive!). The nights draw in, the days get colder and I wait for Christmas to come. Without fail it doesn’t come and then every year without fail I wonder why I didn’t book a toasty beach holiday to break up the long haul. Déjà vu this year for sure. Sick and broke.

I’ve talked about “beachfix” many times before – it really is my go-to when I need a reboot. Yes! I only moved 12,000 miles away from home to get more of the stuff! It’s my happy place and I don’t get there nearly enough. Admittedly an Australian beach is intimidating with its lurking hidden dangers under a cancerous sun, and so swimming in the sea is nothing like taking a dip in the warm dirty Med or the dagger cold waters of the British Channel Islands (I can still remember everyone else gaily splashing in to just a few degrees in the water off Herm in the middle of summer. Erm, no, not me…). No-one can deny the beauty of an Aussie beach though. It’s a national treasure taken completely for granted by the home grown.

Now that I can swim again I know I want to see even more of la plage. Bring me my mermaid tail at once! (I’ll have to get fitted for new grabby starfish.) So here my homegirl, the Patron All Saint of Bikini Midriff. It’s Shaznay Lewis. She take me to my beach.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 19 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“Today marks 6 weeks since exchange surgery. Hip hop hooray! The 6 week mark always seems to be the medical start of normality. You are allowed to do anything and everything at this milestone. (I lay on my tummy for a good few minutes last night. Didn’t hurt. But I’m waiting for all the bruising to go before I try to sleep like that.) Most of the green lights refer to housework in my view (apart from swimming if you are lucky enough to have a house with a pool): VAC/MOP/LIFT.

Boring!!! It’s all down there. Down there on the floor. Which coincidentally is exactly where I’ll be later today – on the art gallery floor putting my words out into the air, hoping they’ll fly, not die. I’ve got a general idea of what I’ll be talking about. (CHANGE THE RECORD, LOVE!!!) But I wrote myself some notes just in case I get lost on a tangent as is so often the case. Be nice to me because I go red easily! So here my well practised homegirl. It’s Jennifer Lopez. She on the floor.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 12 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“The day started with a small crime scene. Big rugrat had another nosebleed in the night so there was her bed and the loo to deal with and before I knew it I was cleaning and washing everything in sight like some sorta desperate housewife. Tummy was still totes yuck but improved and little rugrat skipped into daycare with her meds. Phew. By the end of the day I could feel the baps again: bap-tummy pain equilibrium had been restored in some kinda small triumph! I called for the scan results but they were not back.

Soooo… turns out I’m not doing an artist talk today after all. Don’t go to Montsalvat! I GOT THE WRONG DAY. Please come next Friday at 1pm. Just imagine talking yourself silly about the mental trip from boobs to rocks to baps into a great big empty void. Who would do something like that???!!! I duly updated all posts to 19 May and deleted my talk eve reminder. Apologies! S’ok – I’ll post the same reminder next week. You’ll be seeing double.

So what an idiot! I’m very confused at the moment and it means I’m not reading things properly, and I do have an alarming track record of doing this under stress. The example that first springs to mind is the time I FAILED TO TURN OVER MY DEGREE FINAL EXAM PAPER for the remaining third of a French/English translation on Roland Garros. When everyone started discussing Martina Hingis afterwards I felt seriously sick with stupidity as the penny dropped. I subsequently loathed tennis for 5 years until I moved to Melbourne and the Australian Open wiped the slate clean with its 30 degree nights and bouncy blue courts. So don’t be stoopid this weekend kids! Stay woke. Here my homegirl. It’s Ashanti. She foolish.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 11 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“Some days you just wish had never happened. The sun was big and warm. The sky was blue. Perfecto! The rest was total cack. Oooooh tummy was so unimpressed at drinking the litre of piss. I actually don’t know what piss tastes like but if I was going to imagine the taste then that pale yellow drink I sipped over the course of an hour would be it for sure. The scan was all right, far less awful than an MRI. You’ve still got to get your kit off though and I’m getting tired of that. It’s just not sexy. There are definitely no heart shaped cut outs in a medical gown.

Little rugrat was suddenly sick with the croup in the morning so we both nursed our ailments at home all afternoon. Thank you so much for the sick kid, God. So helpful! Tummy has been horribly foul and nasty to me. And Eat Fit Food has come to an end!!! Please. No. Can’t be. I “cooked” for the first time in weeks (fishfingers) and put the rugrats in front of a movie. I think that’s called cheating but I had nothing left to give. The radio announced that Robert Miles had died; a small part of first year looniversity in me died in that moment. So then when I tried to open the (medicinal) bottle of lemonade from the fridge and couldn’t coz of my stoopid boobs, I cracked and cried. It’s been a while since some blubs but the main thing is I’m over the hump in the week and today can’t be any worse, can it?! Here my homegirl. It’s Kelela. She can’t rewind.”

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I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 10 May 2017

HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)

“The mummy on the bus say tummy ain’t right, tummy ain’t right, tummy ain’t right. The mummy on the bus say tummy ain’t right, all day long. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s really getting to me now and I just want the pain show to be over. I don’t think I remember normal and I’m sure my tummy is acting as a TENS machine for the discomfort in my baps because I hardly even notice those new things! Tummy is giving me a horrible headache. Involuntary stress twitch is back in left eye. Right arm still dodgy. Pourquoi moi??? It’s all very galling (a very bad jeu des mots for anyone speaking Franglais). I’m seeing Dr. Gallstones in two weeks. This morning I won’t get breakfast (it’s the second fasting Wednesday running) but a dollop of radiation via a CT scan instead. Yum yum bubble gum. Then I’m guessing Lady Doc will call me with all the test results later this week. Please let it only be gallstones! What AM I going to talk about when I start feeling well again?! It’s a complete mystery. So here my grumpy homegirl. She looks a lot like me at the moment. It’s Syd Tha Kyd. She walking the tightrope in your circus.”

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