In the coastal rural district of Gladstone is a little service station with driveway service. I haven't seen driveway service since my father sold his little service station way, way long ago. And Mort doesn't even call it a service station, he calls it an "auto-port". I took photos because service with a smile is so rare - let alone driveway service!
We stopped to fill up on the journey home from Pearl Beach after Christmas.
The old highway runs all the way along the river - it's cattle country nestled in National Parks which are adjacent to surfing spots like Crescent Head.
This road runs straight through green grazing land. Open the car door and the smell of cow dung wafts in as well as annoying tiny flies.
Dr Smith opens the door for the alien girl and she drinks all their fuel - "Woe is me!".
The flies are definitely a downside of this Garden of Eden. But you'd never know from a pretty photo. I've been thinking about packaging lately.
I've been thinking about what people look like and how "life" packages us - as opposed to how we try to package ourselves.
No money. No teeth. Do you ever see young people with toothless grins?
No money, no dentist, no teeth, no teeth, no job - no money, no health.
Once upon a time I'd think something along the lines of: "Disgusting! They don't take care of themselves properly."
That's what teachers, employers, strangers think ... so how do they make friends?
We're always comparing our packaging. I open my eyes Christmas Eve morning and my eight-year-old niece hops up and peers into my eyes and tells me: "Your eyes are like slits and your nose looks like a mushroom."
"Really?" I reply annoyed and half asleep and feeling like I was back in Grade Eight when girls are so-o bitchy (believe me, most of them never grow out of it either!)
I don't have a perfect button nose like the dear one who was addressing me - I'm old and therefore when I laugh my eyes are like slits.
She tells the truth. But she's judging my worth by my packaging.
I'm strong enough to endure this but I worry about how or if she'll learn not to do this. Every time I do my shopping I have so much packaging to throw away it's annoying.
Strange contradiction this. We throw away the packaging of everything else but LIFE depends on our own packaging.
Packaging is everything - EVERYTHING! Our appearance, our body, our work, our careers, our families, our car... everything except the soul.
The soul is the content of the packaging and some people don't even believe in it.
I don't have the answers I seek but these questions I ask myself as I dress up stories I want people to read; as I think about websites I want to make; as I listen to people go on about "content being king".
I put the coffee into an air-tight jar and throw away the packaging.
I drive into the auto-port and Mort comes out smiling and asks: "How much do you want?" Throw away the packaging. It's about service. It's about the content. It's about being the real deal.
Be that so that children have something else to measure themselves by.