The Grey Nomad Surprises The Poet

Where is Coolum? splutters Gaius.

Sunshine Coast, says Flossy. Have you been there? Me and Greg went in the caravan last winter.....

Calm down, Gaius, says Unni. If Flossy looked at the ABC website, that means we've got coverage. We can check out the new purple jellyfish.

She taps at her phone rapidly, with her thumb.

Awesome, says Unni, look at this picture. It's like, fluoro purple, with really long tentacles. Lisa Gershwin thinks it might be a Thysanostoma. Oh no, wait! No she doesn't. There's an update....   Oh no, the jellyfish passed away after Lisa and this guy Puk Skivyer examined it last night.

Passed away? says Schopenhauer. That is unscientific language.

Nicer than died, don't you think, says Flossy. Much nicer.

Nonsense! says Gaius. But never mind about that. Where is Lisa Gershwin?

It doesn't say, says Unni. But Puk Skivyer is a Mooloolaba jellyfish expert.

It doesn't take long to put two and two together.

She's not in Hobart.

Have another? says Greg, waving the bottle of whiskey. Drown your sorrows?

Thank you says Gaius. I will.

.......

Next morning everyone wakes up in the caravan, feeling stiff and surprised.

Did we sleep here? says Unni.

Looks like it, says Arthur.

Morning, says Flossy. You still here?

Dear me, says Gaius. We have overstayed our welcome.

Not at all, says Greg. We were happy to have you. How did you sleep?

Like a happy little poodle, says Schopenhauer.

Did he say poodle? No one takes this up.

Are you in a hurry? asks Flossy. Would you like to look around Wayatinah? Greg's going fishing on the Lagoon. I'm off to look at the Clock.

.........

Later in the morning....

Schopenhauer, Gaius and Greg are trout fishing on the Lagoon.

Unni is doing the first leg of the Tall Tree Walk.

Arthur has gone with Flossy to look at the Floral Clock.

It's just lovely in the spring, says Flossy. Full of gorgeous yellow daffodils.

But it isn't spring. And the flower beds are filled in with gravel.

The clock has green hands that don't seem to be moving. That, or time has stood still.

I'm disappointed, says Flossy.

I like it, says Arthur. I might write a poem about it.

Are you a poet? says Flossy. I always liked poetry at school. That was a long time ago, though, in the sixties. I used to like..... Jack Kerouac. Everything/Is ignorant of its own emptiness/Anger/Doesn't like to be reminded...... how did it go? Anyway I used to like it.

Arthur is surprised for the second time this morning. (First time was when he woke up).

A grey nomad like Flossy, quoting Kerouac. Not Wordsworth.

He likes Flossy. He wonders when she will remember the lunch box she's packed full of cakes.

.........

On Wayatinah Lagoon , Gaius and Schopenhauer are fishing, from a canoe.

They haven't caught anything. But the lagoon is lovely. The banks are grassy on one side and treed on the other. There are steep hills and glimpses of pipelines.

Gaius thinks he may have seen a platypus.

Schopenhauer thinks he see may have seen a trout.

Neither of them have seen, behind them, a blue Seahorse World bag drifting slowly across the lagoon.