Scarf on, scarf off.

I've just had an earth-shattering epiphany. Ok, it's summer. (It most certainly is not, but bear with me here.) I check the next day's weather compulsively, plan what to wear (rather, what not to wear if I don't want to die of heatstroke), put together an outfit and check the forecast again the next morning before I get dressed just to make sure nothing has changed in the intervening seven hours (this is Melbourne, anyhing could happen).

Winter: wake up, get dressed. There will be jeans. There will be layers. There will be a hell of a lot of black. And herein lies the answer to Melbourne's famously monochromatic fashion. Over the course of a typical 'chilly' day there may be any and indeed all of the following: blue skies, sleet, cutting wind, patches of sunshine, hail, rain and overheated shops/stuffy trams/congested pavements.

All of which require layering up, shedding down, reassembling and stashing and hastily wrapping in futile attempts to stay temperate. I'm not sure I'm qualified to stay dressed. The answer? My car. Never tidy at the best of times, it's a wardrobe on wheels. I counted five cardis on the passenger seat: dark grey hooded, loose black, tight black, grey cropped and black cape-y thing. Explains why I can never find any inside, but resembling homeless person starting to get a little ridiculous.
Save me.

I wasn't a zombie the last time I looked...

... so why am I suddenly falling apart?
"Pop."
It was a quiet, innocuous kind of sound, except for it's location.

My left hip. Yeah, INSIDE my body. Bones still in their original shape (i.e. not broken) and still inside a meat case are not meant to make those disturbing kinds of sounds. Nor, am I sure, are they meant to feel like that. Argh.

It just slipped casually out of joint, as you might expect if doing something particularly strenuous, like walking down the street. Grind, grind, grind... and twenty-four hours later I'm realising just how damn inconvenient this is. Ballet? Yeah, oodles of fun. Touching my toes is painful, walking no bucket of joy, so let's not discuss attempting a developpe, or casually throwing one leg back into arabesque.

I suppose I'm a lot luckier than the parent currently on crutches for six weeks. She tore hip cartilage - sitting down. Yep. Ordinary is when we hurt ourselves. Ordinary is when we realise just how much we take for granted.

Ordinary is this damn chunk of my body throbbing (in a nasty way) as I sit on the couch bemoaning the stupid of my hip joints to the vast internets.

And if you tell me that this is the universe actioning my slow-down then I'll hunt you down and smack you. Hard. I may even club you round the head with

Whoosh

Another term, another concert... Another magic release and tournament among friends. Another mothers' day and handing back a friend's dog (we babysat while they honeymooned).

Wait. Their honeymoon's over already? We just went to their wedding... Three weeks ago.
What do you mean it's nearly (ballet) exam time?

That means I have to start thinking about (ballet) concert music. And the next violin concert? A paltry five weeks away, and then it's caberet night, and another (violin) concert...

I'm not sure I can continue at this pace. Don't get me wrong, I make time to sit down and drink coffee. I even read. But between all the little markers of my year, the months are blurring past at a frightening velocity.

I find myself talking about the end of the year, even entertaining the idea of my hypothetical existence in 2011. How do I return to my blissfully ignorant state of week-by-week? Hell, month-by-month would be quite fine.

I am sickeningly certain those days of elysian unawareness may be correlated with a state of no financial obligations. And that since I like having a car and a place to live far more than any reasonable person should, I shall have to stay in the driver's seat.

No smartass remarks about being a passenger, thanks, it doesn't marry well with my control issues.