Piece Of Morning Sun.

Dead Bryan stares up at me from my pouch of Australian rolling tobacco as I wait for Kate to pour my second coffee of the day. Its a testament to my addiction that I am willing to spend the equivalent of thirty quid for a bag of leaves wrapped in an unbranded nightmare of death portents and statistics. Not to mention Bryan's dead eyes staring up at me woefully as I roll. Poor 34 year old Bryan. What do you want to be when you grow up Bryan? Well Miss, I'd like my adult corpse to adorn every packet of cigarettes in Australia with a nice little pic of me healthy and mustachioed in the corner to serve as a reminder to smokers that they too will come to an untimely end if they follow my path. Not that anyone will see it, I mean 40 dollars a pack? You're having a fucking laugh aren't you?! That or I'd like to be a train driver.
Everyone here thinks the coffee is much better than in the UK. And they're right. I don't know how that's possible but, inexplicably, the coffee is just a great deal better. I'm up to six cups a day so its only a matter of time before Heart Attack Dave is staring up at me from my paper cup.
There's a lyric in one of Kate and Keir's new songs called Bliss: 'A piece of morning sun, swallowed with a grin'. I feel like that every day at the moment. Happiness is such a simple thing when you have it, so easily forgotten when you don't.  I found a book on K&K's shelf called 'Happiness'. I thought 'Whoa there! That is SO weird. I'm feeling happy and here I find a book all about that very subject. It must mean something. Evidently the universe wants me to read this book. I'm going to read it. I could learn a lot from this. And probably grow spiritually, like, as a person. I'll start it just as soon as I've stopped looking out of the window and marvelling at how beautiful the sky is at this time of day.
Serendipity. A happy co-incidence. But if I don't attach some deeper meaning to it and create some sort of cause and effect then I might have to consider the possibility that the universe is just glorious chaos and if that's true then anything could happen. That used to be a fearful thing for me. Now it seems quite exciting. A really recent example of this would be flying. I've been afraid of flying since I was about twenty. And I'd like to say that I underwent CBT or read a self help book or got hypnotised and consequently mastered my fear. But the truth is I just decided I wasn't going to be frightened of that anymore, and then I wasn't. To believe that the plane you are on, that specific plane, is going to fall out of the sky, implies that you think you're special in some way. They almost never fall out of the sky.  It's taken me a long time to realise that I'm insignificant, just like everyone else. Its very freeing. It makes you feel kind of special.
It still amazes me every time I hear Kate sing that a voice so vast could come out of a package so tiny. Seriously, I could fit her in my pocket, right next to Dead Bryan. She should by all rights just be a bobble head on an enormous pair of lungs.  The first time I heard her go at it full pelt in the UK I thought what a wonderful gift to have. How lucky. But living with her has been quite an education. That girl earns every penny she makes. The mornings start silently as she potters about eating more than should be humanly possible for one so small. There's a smell of vinegar sometimes. Some apple cider concoction that I assume aids the throat. No jump starting that engine. I always feel that I should be silent too, my voice sounds like rocks falling in the stillness. At some point she'll start speaking quietly and then its just a matter of time before the noises begin. Scales usually with the odd grunt interspersed. I'm sure its all very technical but to me its just hilarious. Like a small woodland creature waking up and making its presence known.
Its a nice household to be invited in to. I like musicians, their houses are always filled with instruments and songs are always playing, either on the stereo or live. Keir sits doodling on one of his seemingly endless guitars as I watch enviously. He sings sometimes and I'm stupidly surprised at how lovely his voice is. Kate and I sat drinking red wine yesterday, writing lyrics on the floor by the piano. We'd fuss and fiddle over a word and then she'd sing it to test the sound. I think this should be in my life every day for at least an hour. There's a little whiteboard in the corner of daily goals they set themselves and a box to tick the ones they achieve. The list includes: Listening to music, writing music, not smoking and doing exercise. But my favourite one is: Be a good friend.
We're flying to Perth today for the second leg of the tour. I still can't get my head around the fact that we'll be in the same country but it will take nearly six hours to fly there and we'll be in a different time zone. I'm taking Bryan with me. I don't know if he ever went to Perth. Either way he'll be seeing a lot of this country over the next three weeks or so. I should pack. And wash. And have another coffee. And count my blessings.