From Jester To King XLIII

I couldn’t believe I was going to Australia but I didn’t know what to pack. I had this bundle of clean clothes ready from laundry, but then I thought I’d give my closet one further look and I found all these other items I’d long since forgotten like my Ted Baker/All Saints zip jumper, like the one I already have but newer and with more sheen, and then a pair of jeans which were also so new and clean and fresh and whose fit was just perfect around my calves and ankles. They were gleaming too. Always forgetting about clothes in my closet. Did it matter that it was going to be hot? Not one bit. You never know and especially at night it can get cold anywhere you go. I had the name Kingsford Smith ringing in my mind but I wasn’t absolutely certain I was flying to Sydney. Australia, Australia so far and so… Well so familiar almost. Then I realised that if I didn’t know which town I was going to, I didn’t know the time of the flight either and I got in a tizzy because it was already nine in the morning and I might have missed it already. What a klutz! Then all these thoughts were going round my head to do with the benefits/drawbacks of staying or going away on one’s own. Going away was always exciting, especially Australia, but then there was always the thorny issue of loneliness and what I’d do when I got there and if I started to feel down and on my own, well there was always my cousin and the people from BASP and then I could always go to Japan if I got really stuck, I thought I could even do some work there if the money got tight. And then I started thinking well money is made for spending, that’s what my father would have wanted, who would care if I spent a little when life was short and we can go at any time. It wasn’t going to be too expensive was it and that made it more bearable. So I had all these nice clothes with me but also to wear on the plane, and the thought crossed my mind as I looked down at myself that I was going to be one of those people in the airport and on the flight that other people look at and think well isn’t he dressed nicely, or maybe they wouldn’t have had that exact cogent thought, but it would have panned out as something along those lines in their minds, in any case, it seemed like fate that I was going, part of my unique individual Magnolia journey and I resigned myself to that stomach-gulp feeling I always get in the pit of my stomach just before going away and rode to the airport.