inferno before dawn, i'm up very early laying awake under my ceiling fan covered in sweat and residual erotic dreams. i text my friend, a man i met by accident in a central coast coffee shop. he introduced himself and latched on to me. i liked him a little, he was a londoner, jewish guy who seemed to want to take me under his wing and guide me into his flock. 
he was bewildered by my being. my hair, tee shirts, surfing lifestyle, attitude to the world, knowledge and yet like all those i come across a little intimidated. therefore during the course of the friendship he always inflated his sense of self, called himself a spiritual leader and told me all the things he could do for me, people he knew and i bit my lip and listened quietly. i listened and we had a few laughs, i incorporated him into my morning routine, he very kindly drove me to the beach each morning and sometimes let me have a surf, but as his need to control increased would sabotage my time in the ocean. i paid it no heed. he said he was a great spiritual leader, not that i ever figured him to be spiritual at all, but he kept introducing himself as one, couldn't he see the irony?
i could but i weighed up his company, his offering to buy me the occasional breakfast and his willingness to help me enter his fold, the community with his abrasive manner and ego. 
one day after he harassed me for not being a great part of the community  i said to him, 'fuck the community, i don't want to be in a community of anything. i hate the whole idea of communities especially this one. those eastern suburbs fuckwits, all gold and bmws, all glam and materialism. i never met a more selfish fucking judgemental community in my life, they covert everything from thy neighbours wife to thy neighbours job.'
so i got the cold shoulder from the spiritual leader who said i was not very traditional. it's true, i am not interested in any tradition other than perhaps a magickal one. i believe and know god and she loves me, i have faith in her... the rest is bullshit. i take my truth from elements of all spiritual truths and my critical thinking, my experience and knowledge and my ability to take off my head every now and then and write a new program for the time.
anyway the friendship continued but was rocky, everyday he had to get his digs in, repeating his conquests, the famous people he knew, the business deals he sealed, yet all i saw was desperation and futility, a tragic old man who was loosing his way. i kept my mouth quiet and offered some support, i baked him some healthy cakes, gave him some relationship advice, just tried to understand we were different animals and he was unlikely to change into an octopi. but the more time i spent with him the more he pushed me, wanting to enter that horrific competitive bollocks that guys get into, he wanted to show off his skills at being involved in various community groups, choirs, committees and social groups. occasionally he would boast about his electrical skills, how he was inundated with work and contracts and how he fixed various establishments lights circuit boards and cables and then demanded a free breakfast, and often got it. i'd seen this part of him and it was ugly, it was this expectation he relieve 'something' rather than just change the bulb to do a good deed. he justified everything with weakness. he told me of the people who disappointed him, friendships he ended, loves lost and i began to see he was indeed the problem not the other parties who were probably as frustrated as i. 
this morning he exploded as i made him wait up the street for a few mins, he screamed down the phone and said he was 'hot' in his air conditioned van, he implied he had texted me to say he was waiting, a text i never received and then he left me after raging his fury and anger. 
so after my surf when i had my coffee in my terrigal coffee shop he was there hiding away in the corner stuffing his face with bacon fat in secret (so his community wouldn't see him) the spluttering drivel emitted was something like, 'don't expect an apology from me' and then i told him i didn't because he was a selfish arrogant bully of a man who should be ashamed of his behaviour.' 
the waitress came over and asked me, 'your friend is behind you, don't you want to sit with him?'
'he's not my friend,' i said, 'he's a fucking disgrace.'
so the heat burns up friendships here in australia, it consumes everything and i realised i don't have many friends at all anymore. i have the birds in the garden, the fish in my pond, the  dragons and the handful of people i seem to have managed to keep in my circle. agent stone, val and olga and a girl in the shadows, so and i do some work in the garden, sweating away like some sort of slimy amphibious beast channeling my energies. later i fall asleep under a fan and i get a text from friend who invites me to a gig where he's playing 4 songs and i can't go due to work. i'm really saddened about it but i'm heart filled as i do have good friend's i may not see or hear from a lot of the time but they are there in that consistent way and for that i am ever grateful.