Bed and Breakfast Banality

While I sit in this "five-star" bonanza of craziness, the days have begun to pass as though time doesn't exist. When you begin something, you look at the time you have stretching in front of you and to some extent, it seems endless.  Moving in here for three months seemed almost an eternity at the outset.  Now having been here for almost half of our time, it begins to look a different way.  While in some ways it seems like we have been here for too long already, it also seems like we've been here no time at all.  Time has a funny way of making you feel that way.  I feel like I have wasted so much time here already, and I don't know how to turn it around.  My chief goal in being in Perth (and Australia in general) was to write as much and often as possible, work on music, be creative.  I often have nothing but time on my hands here, yet I find myself not doing the things I came here and set my mind to do.  I have no one to blame for this but myself, and I know I make excuses for this lack of motivation.

Let me start at the beginning.  We came to Perth with stars in our eyes.  This place seemed so perfect, a place to live for free, some part time work in exchange for our cost of living.  The absolutely imagined endless possibilities of finding extra work for some income, the ideal location, and the limitless supply of inspiration that was of course right there for the taking.  We came here to the B&B for an interview the morning after we arrived in Perth, and amazingly landed the job.  It seemed like we were set.  We quickly found out that this place has it's own set of challenges.

I have certainly never lived anywhere that I also worked, and I don't think I have ever had a living situation quite as ridiculous as this either.  Let me give you a few examples of some insanity that has happened to us thus far in our little "paradise" we have here.  We have been told by one of the owners that we can cause them to have both cancer and heart problems by forgetting to run the "Kreepy Krawly" pool cleaner every day.  We were also told that certain actions of ours, (the specifics of which I hesitate to post here, as I was directly told I should tell no one about the details of the business, and I don't want any trouble as a result of a blog post) could potentially lead to the raping of their teenage daughters.  I could not make this shit up.  At one point four of us were indirectly accused of eating (or stealing?) 15 dozen eggs in four days, as if that would even be possible for four people to do (and especially hilarious given my hatred of any and all types of eggs).  I say indirectly because of course nothing is ever addressed to those it pertains to, all things must be told through the grapevine so as to achieve maximum effectiveness of communication.  One evening, one co-worker, completely unapologetically decided to shut off the dryer with our bedding in it, without informing us.  This was because it was past 8 pm, and for no reason at all this is the time laundry must cease.  Even though laundry never stops by this time, and anyone who could have possibly been effected by our devil-may-care late night washing, was still awake and unscathed.  And these were the sheets we were sleeping on that night.  This same co-worker, the very next night (and right in front of us may I add) BEGAN her laundry at (gasp!) 8:15!!  The irony of this completely lost on her due to her self-centered oblivion.  We were tempted to be spiteful and repay the same favor she had bestowed upon us the evening prior, but restrained ourselves, our dignity intact.  There are endless examples, I could really go on for days.


I'm going to roughly estimate I had about 9,234 reasons for coming on this journey.  One incredibly important one was to get away from humdrum bullshit and really experience life and this world.  To stop dwelling on meaningless things and just be open to what is.  Here, at times it seems like there is almost nothing else to dwell on, but the unimportant things.  Constant squabbles over the scheduling, who's working more or not enough, who's not done their job well enough, or taken too long, on and fucking on it goes.  I came here to escape all of this monotonous crap, and yet here I am being sucked into the same ridiculous drama, and for a job that I'm only doing for three months!  I am trying my level best to not let myself get caught up in it, or add to it.  But it's hard to not let it infect you.  There are times where I still fall hard into my old habits and can't help but bitch and moan.  But other times I surprise myself and just let it all go.

So to get back to where I started, this place has affected me creatively.  I find it hard to do some of the things I came here with my mind set on doing.  In order to be creative, I need to feel like I have some little bit of space to call my own, where I feel comfortable, and feel comfortable being me.  I just feel stifled here most of the time.  I find it hard to be comfortable and have clear headspace to effectively write and do the things I want to do.  As I said, I know that I can't blame this lack of productivity on anything but myself, and I'm hoping maybe writing this and putting it out there, will make me less vulnerable to what's around me.  If anything I can update this blog and have that as an outlet.  Time will tell.  I just need to get over my ennui, or at the very least put it into words, and turn it into something useful.

I am confident, however, as I write this piece that I am in the place I am supposed to be.  As hard as it is sometimes, I still know that I am meant to be here.  I need to be here learning about myself, and about other people.  I can see myself changing, day by day, little by little.  It's like a wall being built (or being torn down, depending on what imagery you'd like to go with), I can see this new person emerging brick by brick.  Things roll off my back in ways they didn't even a few months ago.  I would never have been forced to see some things differently, if not for being thrust into this crazy place.  Being put in a place to not only work, but also live, with complete strangers, who I would never have picked to do so with.  It is a fascinating process, and one which I know will result in me being a better person at the end of it all.  I cannot even begin to describe my experiences here to anyone yet, I think it will take some time and distance before I'll really be able to process it, and see things with some perspective.    Every day is an exercise in patience, personal space, interpersonal contact, and communication.  Even as I see the changes, and know it is all worth the giant headache that living here can sometimes be, I still struggle some days.  Then again, what's life without some struggle?