At the time, my father and I didn't see eye-to-eye, which isn't too surprising considering my reluctance to return to school. Things are better now, of course, but at the time almost every encounter turned into a mushroom cloud.
Obtaining a University degree was always important to my father. In the end, the straw that broke the camel's back was a misunderstanding over a bill from Big Pond. As it turns out, they had incorrectly over-charged us.
Tension was very high, and I left home after one amazing argument, where I must have looked like a bad Basil Fawlty impersonator, and initially I started staying with friends. This caused a lot of tension with their families, so I ultimately wound up living in a squat in Melbourne's CBD.
There I met some really talented people who earned their money through street performing of some kind, including musicians, tricksters (like fire twirlers, jugglers, and magicians), pavement artists, and so on. These were really smart kids, about the same age as I was, but stuck in much worse circumstances than I was in. I still wonder to this day what they're doing.
Despite all the misconceptions of what goes on within a squat full of late-teens, these kids were gentle, good natured, and had a mature and realistic grasp of what life was about. They weren't party animals that did drugs every night and trashed the place; in fact drugs never came into the picture.
During this time, I had my 18th birthday, for which I spent a very brief and tumultuous period with my family. A good friend of mine at the time organised a birthday surprise for me with her mother, which included a Roos versus the (bloody) Magpies footy match at the G in supporters seats behind the goals (we won, by the way), dinner at Taco Bill, followed by a few drinks at a nearby pub.
It was a perfect ocker-style night, and it really meant a great deal to me.
The night was topped off by going to the ever-trashy Heat nightclub in the casino, and (unfortunately) meeting Molly Meldrum for the third-time running, as he once pretended to DJ there on Sunday nights. This basically means he had someone else do the work, while he drank at the bar and now and then did a bit of MC-ing.
That night I slept pretty soundly, as you can imagine, despite the concrete floor. As luck would have it, the nights were very warm, and the squat was in fairly good condition, so it wasn't overly uncomfortable.
The whole experience changed my perspective on what's important in life with regards to friends, money, and social attitudes. For example, it taught me that money isn't as important as western society implies, so long as you have enough to get by and you're smart with the little you have.
Socially, it proved to me that real friends and family are possibly the most important things in life. At that age, it's so easy to be clouded by how important other things are, such as careers, qualifications or even relationships. Of course, there are rare exceptions to those, but having a good support network of family and friends is an amazing thing most people take for granted. To this end, I really appreciated the support of my friends, my mother and my sister during this time, even though I kept most of them ignorant of the full extent of my situation because of my own self-pride.
Finally, I learnt that strangers aren't all evil monsters. I do believe that trust is something that must be earned, but despite my pessimistic outlook on life it needs to be said that 99% of people walking down the street are lovely people — they just don't know you.
Continue reading: parts four and five.
