xmas day is always strange, last year i spent it with a water drenched duckling watching mr. bean this year i spent it at work with a client whose family only wanted to spend a few hours with him, it was really sad. 
all year he spends wondering when he will see or hear from his family and on his birthday nothing, not even a phone call and once a year at xmas he gets a few hours with them after xmas dinner, the poor guy hadn't eaten much all day in the way of xmas feasting and all that jazz. 
when i got into the unit this morning he was sitting there waiting to do something so i took him out looking for a coffee shop. we ended up at my friends house in the city, she made us coffee and offered us some home made cake, i mean that's xmas, isn't it, and my client seemed really happy. 
later we drove through glebe and stopped off at bad manors in glebe. we sat in a crowed coffee shop and had chatted to some people about some stuff. a guy came over and shook my hand, wished me merry xmas, i think it was my aboriginal t-shirt, it attracts a lot of attention for some reason.
when i got back to the unit i put on the star wars dvd and watched it with him. 
star wars was fun, i enjoyed it but when it ended and i started to get my client ready for his family his mood changed.
he was dealing with abandonment, it was sad to listen to as he tried to articulate how he felt but the message was clear and he hugged me and said he didn't want to go see his family. i mean this is a guy who can hit you one moment and hug you the next, but i think it was a genuine expression of his rejection. he's torn up and conflicted, all his housemates went to their families, they get to stay at least until new years and it would be fair to say their families have regular contact with them, but poor old missions xmas client gets a couple of resentful hours with a family that have quite literally abandoned him.
i use the word resentful because i dropped him off 20 minites early and his brother says, 'you're early.'
i dunno, it's sad really, he's a handful, yeah he's demanding and difficult but he's cool, just a bundle of fear really.
as i'm leaving the brother says, 'what's with the t- shirt, are you making a statement?'

fucking 'north shore' people really piss me off sometimes, yeah, i'm making a statement, i like this t shirt because of the symbology, its beyond political, just look at it. 

the land is red, the sun bright yellow and the night sky is black, there's nothing political about it unless it exists in your mind mr. then it's your mind that is making the political statement not me or my shirt.
ho freaking ho! 
i drive home, it's been a long day, heavy rain hits me as i hit the freeway, i seem to be drifting through a haze of grey bleak atmosphere into the endless night. 
home hits like a soft pillow, in slow motion, after a shower i feel better and play 'kilbey kennedy' i smoke my spliff and start to feel the pull of gravity.