Is that thing diesel?

by Paul Carter

  I stood there for a moment trying to gather my wits. As I took the stairs, time slowed down again; I rounded the corner and there they were, the writers, looking over their glasses at me the way parents observe other people’s kids. To my right sat many hundreds of paying members of the general public. I looked like shit on a stick. I sat down in the free seat, sweat making its horribly dank and smelly way down my back.

  Suddenly I was being introduced. Shit, I was the first cab off the writers rank today—perfect. I’d thought I’d get the chance to sit down for a few minutes and try to remember what the fuck I had planned to say to these people, but now there was polite applause. Finding my feet, I confidently strode over to the podium, smiling out at the bright lights. I cleared my throat, thanked the festival for inviting me, thanked the members of the audience for coming, and then I went com- pletely blank.

  I decided to explain why I looked like shit, and of course I ended up telling the story of my day so far. I had fifteen minutes to speak and it took fifteen minutes to tell the story. I didn’t talk about books, or writing, or anything to do with literature. But I did explain that I am indeed the guy who manages to get himself in all kinds of shit just by getting up in the morning. They loved it, thank God.

  After the session we all went to the green room where speakers were supposed to wait before going on, and had a drink. On the way I discovered that there was an area outside the green room where we each had a desk set up with our names on a little card, so audience members and festival-goers could buy a book from the bookstore and take it over to the author to sign or write obscenities in, etc. At the end of the row of desks was my name, and a queue of people all holding books. I wandered up as the staff ripped open boxes, pulling out copies of a book by Professor Paul Carter. ‘Um, that’s not me,’ I said, pointing at the pile on the table.

  ‘What?’ said the young guy unpacking the books.

  ‘This isn’t my work,’ I said. I confess, for a moment I thought about just sitting down and signing them.

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, we’ll get it sorted out.’ He grabbed the books and disappeared, leaving me in front of an ever-lengthening line of people.

  To my right I could see all the other authors making polite small talk and doing their best signatures on huge piles of books around them. More and more people filtered into the courtyard. It was the entire cast and crew of the Melbourne literary scene; there were pearls and lots of air-kissing. The word ‘darling’ skipped across lips and reverberated as frequently as ‘fuck’ used to on the drill floor.

  I saw a familiar face in the crowd: not someone I knew, someone I recognised. He got a bit closer. It was Geoffrey Rush, the actor, and he was working his way around the courtyard. Wow, I thought, I’m going to get to meet him. My books had turned up—perfect. I started chatting and signing, all the while closely monitoring Mr Rush’s progress towards my table.

  It was all going very well: the people waiting for me to sign their books were all very nice, the wine was very nice, the gentle tones of civilised conversation broken by the occasional laugh were all just very nice. The sun was shining and birds sang from trees nearby.

  That’s when I heard it, a rough voice that could have come straight from the oilfield, shattering the peace and my sensation of wellbeing. ‘Oi, are you Paul Carter?’

  Turning to my right I saw a six-foot, 300-pound, slightly drunk man with full-sleeve tats and wearing a VB t-shirt with sauce stains down the front, eyeballing me through more facial hair than I thought it was humanly possible to grow.

  ‘Yup.’ I smiled. I think he smiled back.

  ‘I fuckin loved your book, hey.’

  ‘Thanks, mate.’ Just past his left shoulder I saw another familiar face approaching through the crowd; this time it was someone I knew.

  ‘M’name’s Dwayne hey.’ My new fan stuck out a massive hairy hand. I dived my hand into his, making full contact with his upright thumb, enabling me to get a firm grip and shake. I looked him in the eye; he was pissed. I darted a look at Mr Rush—his entourage was getting awfully close—at my friend, now waving and bounding through the crowd towards me, and then back to Dwayne, who was still talking at me.

  ‘Lemme shout you a beer, mate,’ he said, raising his other hand. Only then did I notice the stubbie neck just visible through the furry knuckles.

  ‘Cheers, Dwayne,’ I said. ‘I’ll just finish up here, mate, and meet you at the bar in half an hour.’

  At that moment, my friend appeared next to Dwayne.

  ‘Hi, Bruce.’ I hugged him and we shook hands. Bruce is a truly gifted man, he’s a very talented writer and filmmaker, a gentleman in every way.

  ‘Why does this stuff always happen to you?’ Bruce was laughing—clearly he’d heard about my day so far. Mr Rush was now ten feet away.

  I introduced Dwayne to Bruce and they regarded one another carefully—it was like worlds colliding. Bruce, ever the gentleman, politely smiled and got his manicured hand crushed by Dwayne, who defaulted back to beer.

  ‘I’ll shout yas both a beer.’

  Mr Rush was now just a few feet away and getting closer. Bruce was enjoying himself. ‘Have you read Paul’s books?’ he asked Dwayne.

  Dwayne looked at Bruce’s perfect attire, his neat, clean, personable aura, and spoke loud enough for half the courtyard to hear him. ‘Mate, I’m just like him. I know what it’s like to work for a living hey, not like all these cunts.’

  The second Dwayne dropped the C bomb, Mr Rush turned on his heel and melted back into the crowd. Bruce was loving it. ‘Go on, Pauli, have a beer with him.’ He nudged me with his elbow and gestured towards Dwayne’s hand. ‘Look, he’s got a traveller.’

  Dwayne looked at Bruce. I looked at Bruce. ‘He’s got a what?’ I started to worry.

  ‘You know, a traveller.’

  At this point Dwayne stepped forward, and with his beard almost touching Bruce’s face said, ‘Mate, a beer you walk around with is generally referred to as a roadie; a traveller is when you crack a fat on public transport.’

  ‘Oh.’ Bruce nodded. ‘I’ll try to remember that.’

  Dwayne stepped back, took a long swig of his beer and regarded the two of us. You could almost hear the penny drop: it was like a thought bubble appeared above Dwayne’s head that read, ‘Oh, they’re a gay couple. Paul Carter’s a poofter.’

  This could not have panned out any better for me. Bruce registered all this and kindly helped me to embrace the horror by placing a hand on my shoulder. That cemented the picture for Dwayne, who got out of there so fast you would have thought his hair was on fire.

  Not long after the writers’ festival, I started a new job in Perth with an oilfield supply firm, working in a small office not too far from home. The job was perfect; the boss was just like me, he’d worked in the field for years, and everyone we did business with was pretty much from the old school. Most of our business dealings were conducted over a single malt at lunch, very civilised.

  By this time, I’d settled down a bit. My wife was amazing; my child was amazing, they made me dizzy with contentment. I actually enjoyed my job and we had purchased a house that ticked every box. I would stand in the power tool section at the hardware store, envisaging potential backyard projects. On weekends I pruned hedges and mowed the lawn. I made polite conversation with my neighbours wearing a silly hat to keep the sun off my bald head. I even got to know the postman—I never ever thought I’d know the postman.

  After kicking and screaming all the way from the rig for the last twelve months, I had crossed over into the next stage of my life. Well, you can’t stay in a bad mood forever. I’d turned into the grey man living the middle-class dream—there was even a white picket fence around my house. I bolstered my pension plan and life insurance, I stopped smoking, and before the rebellious voice in my head could say, ‘Hey, what the fuck?’, i
t was my fortieth birthday and I was in bed by ten.

  Christ, I was middle-aged and happy about it.

  For my birthday I got the regulation socks and jocks, a gift voucher for the hardware store, and a copy of Long Way Round, the documentary series on Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s epic motorcycle ride. When I did finally get the chance to sit down and watch it I discovered instead Lola’s Finding Nemo disc inside, my sixteen-month-old daughter having put my DVD into one of the many cases piled up on the floor.

  Whereas in my old life I used to play beat the clock on every job, I had even stopped marking time. Despite this, the year had blown by faster than I’d ever experienced before. There were reminders of what I now looked back on as my old life; for example, my friend Erwin, who still lived at a pace I couldn’t comprehend from the ’burbs and was still working offshore. He’d come home to Perth on a crew change, and within 24 hours of arriving he’d ride his motorcycle over to our house and demand a long ride into the hills.

  Erwin was my mentor: we had spent many years rig-hopping all over the world together. He’s a larger than life character, he has the light around him—you know, anything could happen and he would walk away without so much as a scratch. Our friendship had literally kept me in one piece for the better part of fifteen years; I would have been eaten alive by the oilfield without his guidance. If Mother Nature wasn’t trying to kill us there always seemed to be something else that was. The first time I went up in the derrick—that’s the big steel mini-Eiffel Tower on the rig—it was Erwin who taught me how not to fall, get crushed, or cut any limbs or fingers off. Believe me, over the years a great many men have hurt themselves up there. If it were not for his patience and skill I probably wouldn’t have the digits to sit here and type this.

  These brief two-wheel interludes with my old friend became very important to me. Time spent on my bike put me in a mindset that I just couldn’t replicate any other way. When Erwin and I got tired, we’d stop and rest and I caught up on all his latest adventures.

  Even though I was getting used to life at home, something was not quite right. Maybe it was turning 40; maybe it was a lingering sense of loss, knowing that I had departed a life I had loved for twenty years and could never go back. I still missed being on the rigs. It was always fun working and hanging out with my crew; I had never laughed so hard or been so scared in my life. Or maybe what I missed was the sense in those days that adventure was a thing that just happened, without any planning or preparation, just random spontaneous life getting in the way.

  In the weeks after my birthday I started to realise that I couldn’t go on in the same way that I’d been living for the last year or so; I just wanted more from my life. And when I say more, I’m not talking about material goods. The arrival of Lola and the profound and all-encompassing impact of being a father had helped drown out all that chatter and white noise and worries that can make us slaves to our possessions. It’s funny how your kids change your priorities overnight. So long as Clare and Lola were alright, you could set fire to all our shit (I had a bit of experience at that now) and I wouldn’t bat an eyelid. I used to worry about my stuff, my special things, but not anymore. Doesn’t matter if it’s something really nice or valuable, in the end you’re just the custodian of it for a while, then someone else gets it anyway. No, this restlessness was just about adventure.

  The highway sat there out the window, waving a dusty invitation at me through the heat haze. Back in Sydney I had been able to indulge myself on my days off. If the urge got to me, all I had to do was wander into my garage and get on a bike. Not just a bike, an escape into a mindset of corners, faster each time; a heightened sense of awareness that blanks your troubled mind and focuses it on one thing only: the ride. No responsibilities, no life insurance, no five-year plan. It’s not just a bike, it’s a get-into-jail card, it’s an unlicensed weapon and a fat bank guard, it’s whatever you want it to be, as fast as you like.

  I would leave the city and head south, to Araluen; sometimes I would just keep going, stopping when I got hungry or tired, buying clean jocks and socks in some small town, throwing the old ones in a motel bin, getting drunk with strangers and ending up in Melbourne. I missed those days, before I was a grown-up.

  At the halfway mark during one of our rides to nowhere in particular, I looked over a roadhouse table at Erwin and announced, ‘I’m going to ride my bike around Australia.’

  He finished his mouthful of steak sandwich and beamed. ‘When are we leaving?’

  ‘How about now?’ Obviously I was joking, but there was a time when that was exactly what we’d have done.

  Erwin looked at me thoughtfully. ‘You watched that Long Way Round DVD I gave you for your birthday?’ he asked.

  ‘No, not yet.’ I was looking at the bikes in the car park.

  During the ride home the idea solidified in my head. I thought, I’m not done, I’m nowhere near done. Somehow, I was going to get the time off work, talk Clare into giving me a leave pass, and get to have my cake and eat the bastard too. The thought sat there in my head, bobbing about like a crouton in my brain soup for weeks—and it was soup, strained through months of paperwork, tender documents, pre-qualification questions. The detritus of business was weighing down my itchy feet, a paperweight of increasing responsibilities, increasing business lunches and my increasing waistline—all of which pushed me to broach the idea with Clare.

  My wife, flat out dealing with motherhood, which is in itself much harder and more draining than anything I’m ever tasked with during the day, listened patiently while I blurted out my idea. I was nervous: I knew it was a big ask.

  She surprised me. Apparently, Clare had been waiting for me to do this for a while. She said she knew it was only a matter of time before sitting behind a desk and living in Lego Land would turn my life into a cage with golden bars.

  ‘You’re going to write about this, right?’ she asked me. What can I say, she knows me well.

  ‘Well yeah, why not?’ I replied, wondering where she was going with this.

  ‘Honey, anyone can get on a conventional motorcycle and ride it around Australia. You should find a machine that’s different.’

  The more I thought about it, the more it made sense. After all, Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman had punched out two books and two TV series about riding around the world. (Which reminded me, I still hadn’t found my copy of their DVD yet.) Motorcycle travel/adventure has been done to death.

  So, how would I jump on a bike and have an adventure without replicating what’s been done before? I knew I couldn’t get anywhere near what those guys did. Ewan McGregor is a movie star, they had limitless funding, an army of people in support, and the ability to make shit happen on their custom-designed, top-flight BMWs. And that’s the point: I’m about as far removed from their end of the spectrum as humanly possible. Whatever I did, it had to be different.

  And then a light bulb went on over my head. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of this earlier. Enter Mr Greg Quail, aka Quaily—an old mate, a prince among men. Greg runs a successful television production company based in Sydney; he’s animated and insightful, but above all, when he’s armed with an idea he likes, he won’t let go. He’s like a greyhound chasing after a stuffed rabbit. Earlier in the year, one of Greg’s staff, Warwick Burton, had called me to discuss the idea of Quail Television making a show about a ride on a bio-diesel motorcycle. I had thought it was brilliant, and perfect for me: I’m the oil guy—what else should I ride but a bike that runs on bio-diesel, environmentally friendly fuel? It had sounded redeeming, and at the time, was a nice alternative to going back offshore. But the idea never made it past conception, and I’d put it out of my mind.

  Now, when I reminded her, Clare said I should call and find out how far Warwick got with his research. I practically knocked her over in my rush to get to the phone.

  But Greg and Warwic
k didn’t have good news for me; apparently the TV networks in Australia, while interested and enthusiastic about the concept, thought the idea was too expensive to make. The networks are generally more interested in something ‘reality’-based, something that’s cheaper to put on the telly. You know, ‘Find My Bogan’ or ‘World’s Silliest Bogan’, or a group of people trying to lose weight, or dance or sing or cook or renovate another fucking house, or a bunch of celebrities between gigs dissecting the news on a panel. That kind of stuff is cheap and very simple to produce. But above all, it’s what we want to watch at prime time, isn’t it? Not a bloke riding a motorcycle around, especially if he’s not overweight and not trying to dance, sing, cook, renovate a house or find a long-lost degenerate alcoholic sibling.

  I just don’t understand the way the TV game works. Greg is a good mate, and whenever I’m in Sydney or he’s in Perth we get together and, as mates do, we discuss work. But I have neither the patience nor the ability to try to comprehend how Greg gets an idea for a show, makes a pilot or reel and then sells it to a network. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Well, as far as I can make out, quantum physics is simpler. Essentially, the ‘bio-diesel bike ride around Australia’ idea was too much of a hard sell, and Greg had to shelve it.

  However, I was only concerned with the ride, and Greg was only too happy to pass on the info they’d compiled on the bio-diesel motorcycles currently available. Armed with Greg and Warwick’s research, I started my own hunt for information. There are several bio-diesel motorcycles commercially available in the world, but none of them are for sale in Australia. I found a great bike made in America, another in Holland, one in Japan, and a really good one in Germany fabricated by a former uber-lieutenant from Porsche who had packed in his job and started building bio-fuel bikes. (Germany, I learned, has over 1600 bio-diesel fuel stations.) His bike was perfect and completely capable of doing the ride. But no matter where in the world I found a bike I liked, I couldn’t get a compliance plate on it or get it legally registered and insured so I could ride the bastard round Australia.