Caldyanup, the Dublin, the Guardian and the Tower

Some days the country is like one of the colonial specimen tables. Irwins Inlet is so still it lies across the land like smoke on a low. My scope lands upon a cave to the north that my mind has somehow slipped past every day for months. The art of seeing. Three upright clouds in a row. The eagles are around again and I let the spotter know, he's heading this way. Two other towers are calling in permit burns and prescribed burns alike. It's the end of the season for me now; once open burning begins there are too many to call in and wildfire risk is minimal. So it's 'Office, this is tower. Tower's closing for the day. Have a good evening. Tower out.'

Unfortunately I didn't make it to the Dublin's shortlist. That's okay, that it was listed at all is really bloody exciting. Yes, really, bigly. And I didn't really want 100,000 dumb Euros anyway, like, the tender wouldn't even be legal in Australia, would it? This weekend I was involved in a feature in the UK Weekend Guardian. It's an article called 'How to be Alone' about people's solitary work. It's here. It's accompanied by the painterly work of my favourite photographer Nic Duncan. The image above is me at the base of the mountain in the karri forest, with that earthy smell of recently burned eucalypts. These closed forest spaces are a different experience entirely to the vastness of the peak, which I reckon would be an agoraphobic's bad dream. I'm a bit the opposite, one with an eye for an horizon. Maybe that's why I was so in love with the job.

                                                       A burn out Rocky Gully way.

                         And this one behind Granite Peak is fifty kilometres away from the tower.

                                                                           Office

                                                                                Perks

And now with the autumn comes the stunning calm days, sudden deluges that clear the air of dust and smoke, and freaky fruity fungi. Whee!