All I want for Christmas is a new Face

Christmas is coming, and by the look of Auckland's inexplicably-retained leering Santa, beckoning children with his creepy mechanical finger, its going to be a weird one. He's making a list and he's checking it twice. Pray your kids are not on it.

Pervy Saint Nicks aside, now is the time to convey present wishes and gift expectations. Now, more than ever, “nothing” is a dangerous answer to, “What would you like for Christmas?” Men in particular do not understand that 'nothing' actually means 'something utterly fabulous, directly representative of your love for me.' Be careful what you wish for – you just might get it and then there goes your Ho Ho Ho and it won't be the halls that get decked.

All I want for Christmas is a new face, which might be a tad beyond Santa's abilities. A million elves couldn't undo the ravages of social smoking, red wine and not taking your make up off before bed. Renee Zellweger has a new face, and good on her. While she may never work again, having gone the way of Dirty Dancing's Jennifer Gray by messing with her brand, she's happy and that's all that matters. Of course, Renee needn't have resorted to the scalpel, she could have just stopped wearing her glasses. Nothing is nicer or more soothing to the aging than a lovely pink blur, although it does have a rather negative effect upon one's driving.

However, back to Christmas, a very stressful time of year. For many the holiday is a mass of complex social interactions with family or relatives, some of whom you'd rather not see. Some people rate Christmas worse than divorce or being burgled. Having experienced both I can say with confidence, it is.

The first half of December is when the yuletide season is at its most enjoyable. Different rules apply. “Five a day” becomes your mince pie limit and wine imbibed in this period cannot be counted towards weekly alcohol intake because it is 'festive'. For these two weeks, nothing is jollier than watching the middle classes cramming bikes and rice cookers into their cry-for-help tidy SUVs while simultaneously tying a tree to the roof rack. 24 hours later, they've got the decorations up, presents wrapped and are nervously staring at the pine, clutching a Dyson handheld in case it drops a needle. Well, who's laughing now? Probably not them, they seem pretty humorless.

The member of the family at whose house the meal will take place invariably sets the tone. I have been banned from hosting Christmas ever since the infamous 'vanishing tinsel' incident of 2006. Evidencing a desperate need for things to be over, as soon as the presents were unwrapped, while everyone was out on the deck having a wee post-prandial (feeling it had served its purpose), I took down the Christmas tree; stuffing it, wrapping paper, ribbons and all associated joy into a rubbish bag and chucking the lot out by the kerb.

But fear not. Tidings of gladness do I bring the chronically disorganised. The dash to the finish you must now undertake may seem to be like doing the hurdles wearing flippers, but just like Chris Addison of The Guardian, I am an old hand at this kind of seasonal arsewittery. “Eco-consciousness is highly fashionable and a brilliant excuse for not worrying when there are no more trees to be had” says Chris. A broom, some coat hangers and a length of garden hose will do just as well. “Get the kids to make toilet paper decorations (try to avoid them weeping with disappointment directly onto the paper, as soggy garlands will spoil the overall look).” And when it comes to food, anyone who whinges about the absence of edibles can legitimately be accused of lacking Christmas cheer. Actually, try to get someone to complain. Your counter-attack will create a nice smokescreen for your monumental uselessness. Incidentally, this is how government works.

As your world crumbles like those disastrous reindeer biscuits you tried to make last year, that familiar, esophagus-tightening fear will descend: the inevitable, immutable annual sensation that Christmas is upon you and you haven't done a bloody thing. Only one thing for it, a poem. Of me own.

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house,

Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

Stockings were hung by the chimney with care,

And the economist had ingested enough alcohol to shopping bear.

Heading for the Warehouse at 5 minutes to closing,

He bought gifts for everyone,

Happiness supposing.

Cruel to be Kind

Can it be a co-incidence that the week bleeding-from-every-orifice disease, Ebola, jumps from Africa to Europe is the SAME week AMC's Walking Dead resumes on TV3? I think not. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this zombie-apocalypse-themed television series is actually a cleverly disguised public service announcement.

“If this is true, what do we learn?” asked the economist.

“That everyone's going to die,” I said. “And then they're going to come back and start eating the living.”

“No, sweetie. We learn guns are useful and its important to get on with people.”

Well that's me stuffed. My relationships are constantly going pear-shaped and needing to be repaired. That's why I wrote a book about relationships. It wasn't because I was an expert. Sadly, the neighbours probably have guns they now won't lend me.

“If Ebola goes airborne...” continued the economist.

“What are the chances of that?”

“Non-zero.”

“And 'non-zero' isn't good, right?”

“Right. Stop interrupting. If Ebola goes airborne you can lean over and kiss your ass goodbye.”

I haven't seen the economist this ramped up since 2009's swine flu epidemic. Approaching all viruses within the parameters of zombie movies, the economist tends to blur the lines a tad, failing to distinguish between actual dead people rising from their graves and the just plain sick. “Zombieland instructs us in the vitals,” he says. “Cardio. Double tap. Never go to the toilet alone, and always check the backseat.” You should really do this anyway – who hasn't seen that scary movie where the murderer is hiding in the couples' backseat, popping up with a chainsaw and a maniac grin just as they drive away?

As in Shaun of the Dead, it might initially be difficult to tell that large scale corpse reanimation has broken out (particularly if, as we do, you live close to South Dunedin). So, before you start shooting, check the shambling masses are real zombies and not just devastated post-election Labour party members or recently evicted Housing NZ tenants.

Ebola rules are simple and, you'd think, easy not to mess up: don't embrace the dead and, if you feel sick, stay away from others. Isolation is the first step of any virus control and New Zealand is a long way away from anywhere. Although, as Liberian health authorities have learnt, containment is futile, so once the virus takes hold, its best to board up the windows, booby trap the lawn and hunker down for the long haul.

With this in mind, we stocked up for the End Times. Again. “Shop as if we weren't paying for it,” said the economist. “We'll need enough supplies to hold out should we get quarantined. Put down that Woman's Day. Plenty of canned goods. Not chocolate. Oh, alright, it will cheer us up when we get despondent. Do we need a stash of money? Currency will soon become worthless. Just how accurate are you with a can of chickpeas? Remember, head shots only.”

I retreated into my favourite fantasy: Hot Widow. All the possessions and none of the mess.

So convinced is he of impending doom, the economist tried to track down his fathers' 308. Because having an unlicensed WW2 relic around the house is always a good idea. He also attempted to assemble a crack team with the necessary skills for a post-apocalyptic world. That ruled out everyone in the School of Business. “We'll need a doctor (not of economics) a mechanic, a survivalist and a paramilitary. Get your paramilitary sorted and the rest falls into line.” 

“What about me?”

“We don't need women, and nobody needs writers. Later on we may wish to breed with you to re-establish society. And if someone gets bitten ... listen, this is important, kill them immediately – don't let sentiment get in the way. You've got to be cruel to be kind.”

I could see it all: as Ebola mutated and hungry bands of shuffling zombies roamed the countryside pulling the boards off buildings to get at the inhabitants, like sugar fiends peeling the shell off a Mallowpuff to scrap out the fluffy stuff; the economist, armed only with a shovel, would pick off ravenous, grudge-holding neighbours as they climbed over our defenses – the Camry parked on a diagonal – intent on our store of Watties.

“Atishooo!” said the economist. His eyes were a bit red. I didn't hesitate. Cruel to be kind.

Hot Women, Cool Party

I hear there are no men around. Quite frankly, I find this a little hard to believe. In the midst of a book launch offensive, everywhere I look there's a man (usually another woman's husband, out on loan), nodding acquiesce to mad plans, placating freakouts – walk around the Historic Precinct at the moment, you fair trip over them. What I think people mean is that, if you're my age and single, there aren't many of a certain kind of man to be had. Unmarried. Not mental. Baggage-less, somehow having escaped being horribly twisted by a previous relationship. These are few and far between, apparently.

Last weekend a friend of mine, Tall Gorgeous Blonde, had the most fabulous birthday party. It was SO good, noise control turned up. Sure, the volume at which Prince was being played was the result of the aging participants' collective deafness, but it was a win for coolness.

TGB is a marvelous hostess, her house striking envy and fleeting feelings of hatred and despair into the hearts of all who enter it, but you wouldn't want to mess with her. Think Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2, Judgment Day. There's a pull bar fixed to the hallway lintel (for chin-ups) and her thighs are so strong, she could kick you through a wall. If TGB met the person responsible for cutting down the trees at Logan Park, she would punch him in the face. Me, I just whinge about it.

On this particular evening, TGB's kitchen was filled with hot single women, I mean seriously hot. “Extremely hot, extremely flexible women,” said the economist. True. All the single ladies were Bikram yoga aficionados, most taking part in a challenge that would see them do 30 classes in 30 days. “Yoga, yoga, yoga,” they said as I danced around the economist, like a Sioux warrior marking her territory.

I don't do yoga, having no time for a sport with so many zealots. Plus, I hear there's a lot of puking in the Bikram version. Big fan of the pants, though.

Not only were they bendy, the hot yoga ladies knew how to paint the perfect eyeliner flick and make red velvet cheesecake. They could quote Walt Whitman and do the splits. But where were all the men? Ladies this accomplished deserved to be waited on by buff, shirtless dimwits with foolish smiles. “They're either gay, married or insane,” said the economist, of the absent men. Also true. Census 2013 figures show the number of men is at an all-time low, and its especially grim for those of prime marrying age. For every 100 women looking to snag a New Zealand chap between 25 and 49, on average 9 will miss out. Chances are even lower on the Kapati coast, with only 82 men for every 100 women. None of the census figures take sexual preference into account, so there's every chance Mr Right is looking for a Mr Right of his own.

I don't know about insane.

“Yoga,” said the hot ladies and “Kale.”

Its different story among those under 24, where males heavily outnumber females. With young women – despite the fact that you could bounce a $2 coin off their buttocks – about as interesting as an air mattress with a Selfie addiction, the solution seems obvious. Unfortunately, the only 24-year-old male at TGB's party was busy filming the assembled women on his cellphone with a view to posting on the internet.

“Pervert!” yelled the hot ladies followed by “This coconut water is amazing!”

Mr 24 scuttled away from a potential cougar mauling, probably wondering, as was I, whether this yoga/kale/coconut water obsession was responsible for the man drought. “Problem is,” said the Tamster, who doesn't do yoga and therefore has a boyfriend, “these women have evolved to such a high level of physical and mental supremacy, men simply can't keep up.”

“Its demand AND supply,” said the economist, in what would be his last rational thought of the evening. “They're skeptical. And right to be (indicating himself). What man's going to yoga, that's collectable? Who wants to get into weird positions? Luckily, I don't have to.”

I felt momentarily affronted, and resolved to get the economist into an extremely weird position post-haste. To hell with his sore back. The hot ladies left early and clear-eyed (they had a class in the morning). The rest of us danced like the electrocuted for hours before staggering off into the night, late and loud. Waking to hangovers, a feeling of over-indulgence, and someone warm on the other side of the bed.

Are you Being Served?

If you believe the reigning mythology, we ladies loves us some shopping. Never are our hearts gladder, apparently, than when we're off on a spending spree, riffling through the sales racks and maxing out the credit cards. Shopping, according to social convention, is the panacea for all feminine complaints. Bung marriage? Depression? Gangrene? Hit the mall (maybe not the shoe stores) and everything will be tickety boo. It is a wonder we have any time left over for life's more vital chores: child rearing, hair removal, gainful employment.

But do we love shopping, or have deteriorating levels of customer service made this once-noble pastime a joyless task? Is buying things actually NO FUN AT ALL? Yes, I really said that. Deep breaths, the dizziness will pass.

Such was the shocking epiphany I recently experienced, when, for the first time in forever, I found myself with too much money. Filthy lucre was fair burning a hole in my pocket, so, in an effort to avoid death by spontaneous cash combustion, I went into a Bed and Bath emporium with the intention of commerce. I'll admit, I was dressed tragically. My hair had not seen a brush, nor my lips a chapstick. Nowhere about my person was there a hint of the contents of my wallet. The two sales assistants (young, bored and monosyllabic, with no concept of 'please' and 'thank you') naturally ignored me completely – continuing to gossip about someone called Tia, who was, from what everybody could overhear, a bit of a skank.

I found what I was looking for, at 70% off, and gleefully took it took the counter. The more orange of the two sighed and swore under her breath. Come on, I thought. This is how retail works. Goods are exchanged for money, if not pleasantries. It was a Pretty Woman moment (without the prostitution). Big mistake. Huge. I should have stalked off, returning later with bags full of goodies bought elsewhere, but this was the only store with 70% off.

So instead, I seethed.

If the customer is king, why was I made to feel scruffy, stupid and poor? Are we simply an annoyance; unfolding jerseys, asking for our money back and not being the standard size? Customer service, like bikini lines and the right to free and fair elections, varies wildly from country to country. In Israel, there is no such thing as customer service: pack your own damn groceries. In India, it translates to a form of fawning supplication, shopkeepers clinging to your ankles, beseeching. In Thailand it is a constant cloying chorus of, 'Welcome Madaaaam.'

“In New Zealand you'd love it if they'd just deign to take the money from your hand and pour you a beer,” observed the economist. “How hard can it be?” Sure, there's a difference between service and servitude, and maybe we Kiwis are too proud and egalitarian a nation to grovel or be overly obsequious. But rudeness is another thing all together.

I've met my share of rude people, I am a rude person, but if you work in a shop, maybe don't get snooty when a member of the public asks you a question.

Key offenders: record store employees, reveling in the fact that they have a superior knowledge and conveying this with eye-rolling snideness. I'm sorry I didn't know that record wasn't released on vinyl, but HOW WOULD I KNOW THAT?!?! You only know because you blimmin' work here! It's your job to know stuff like that, you hipster dickhead. While back in the day everyone who worked at Dunedin's EMI was in a band, this is no longer the case, unless its an alternative no-instrument ensemble called Look Straight Through You.

However, the absolute worst, the hyena of the customer service savannah, would be the barista. With hole-punched ears you could toss a caber through, baristas, like boys who aren't ashamed to be DJs, have an overinflated sense of importance – obnoxiously correcting your drink order into inane special terminology, thus suggesting you're a not-cool thicko: 'Oh, I think you mean a Venti Quad Caramel Macchiato, not a Quad Venti Caramel Macchiato.' Honestly. Drop the attitude, dude. You make coffee for a living. Coffee, not antibiotics.

As with cafes, shops have become complacent, when they can little afford to. If retail therapists don't shape up soon, snap to attention when I enter, or at the very least throw a smile my way, I'm going to shack up with the competition, the Internet. Actually, I've been having it away on the side with online shopping for ages, quietly cheating on the high street (I feel no shame), and I have to say the courier who delivered my Kathryn Wilson shoes couldn't have been nicer.

Let's get ready to rumble! Or rumba. Up to you, really..

The Kindness & Lies book launch is fixed for the 16th of October and brought to you by the lovely people at the University Book Shop. So what are early readers saying about the book?

Kate Coughlan, editor, NZ Life & Leisure said, "to say Lisa Scott's got her finger on the pulse of New Zealand life is rather an understatement - she's got her stiletto on its jugular. She makes me laugh like a drain."

Virginia Larson, editor, North&South said Kindness and Lies was, "packed with laugh-aloud yet reassuring revelations on the world of women. Lisa Scott's writing sparkles with wit, warmth and divine self-depreciation."

Needless to say, feeling just a little bit fabulous right now.

A letter to my daughter on her 22nd birthday

Dear Sophia,

Everyone always gets excited about 21sts, believing they are an occasion for conferring the mantle of adulthood, hence the gifting of oversized keys and ceremonial consumption of yard glasses (because opening doors and puking a lot are what being a grown up is all about). But the real business actually starts at 22, when nobody's watching, you've lost the cards, spent the money and the balloons have long since popped.

Independence can be tough and you are a very sensitive sausage. I was sensitive too, at your age, my edges have been worn off from bumping into bad decisions, loss and disappointment. Initially mourning the dents, these knocks were invariably a good thing, the reason I am now so well-rounded. Life is a bit like your mother's driving: a series of accidents and wrong turnings where the destination doesn't matter so much as staying on the road. I know sometimes it can feel like you're not doing it right – and if its any consolation everyone feels this way from time to time: that its all too much and people suck, but I can tell you, Sophia, you ARE doing it right. You are doing it way better than I ever did at 22.

Motherhood, or as it’s known by those of us who’ve experienced it: LMBAHS, for Left My Brains Around Here Somewhere is a journey to weirdness. Being a mother is intimate and intense, profound and painful – almost too much to bear, and I’m not just talking about the labour. Although, once you have experienced that level of pain, the rest of your life is a cakewalk. You’ll never fret about excel tables, burnt scones or how short your legs are, ever again. Once you’ve had a baby, any day you’re not pushing something the size of a frozen turkey out of one of your more sensitive orifices is a good day indeed (I'm not suggesting you do this any time soon. In fact, you know what? Forget I said anything about babies).

The point is, having you changed my life. One day I was Lisa Scott, the next I was (cue menacing tiddly pom music) Sophia's Mother. You were a huge responsibility I felt I never properly lived up to. We didn't have any money when you were growing up, not a bean, but you never made me feel bad about it, even though you must have wanted stuff the other kids had: a nice house, a car that worked all the time, a proper dad. I should have made sure you had those things. I'm sorry.

We haven't always got on. There has been yelling and meanness, things said and regretted, moments when you cried and I cried and a stranger would have been hard-pressed to figure out which of us were having the worse time. I'm glad we made up our minds to just be kind to each other, and I love the way you come over and tell me everything about your life, please don't stop doing that.

Giving your children advice is hypocritical in the extreme, as nothing in your entire experience of parenthood ever turned out as you expected, so all I've really got is:

• Don't sweat the small stuff. Nothing is ever as terrible as it seems and the sting can be taken out of things considerably by not putting them on the Internet.

• Smoking is bad. You'll get zipper face (awful lines around your mouth that make you look like the Corpse Bride). Plus, you'll die.

• You don't have to be everyone's friend and some people just aren't worth it.

• Like your mother, you love a fixer-upper. However, the truth is you can't fix people, its exhausting and unrewarding and inevitably to your emotional detriment. If you must love the male equivalent of a starter home; settle for new curtains and a lick of paint, there's no point gutting the kitchen.

Sophia, if you were a book, you'd be a bestseller. If you were a painting, you'd be a masterpiece and if you were a song, you'd be the best song ever written. Did I mention I was proud of you? I hope so. Honestly, it seems a miracle that someone so slipshod and prone to panic, so selfish and awkward and bad-tempered ever managed to have such a great kid. How on earth did it happen? Perhaps its best not to ponder the imponderable and instead think of you as a lottery I have clearly won. Whatever the cosmic circumstances causing the stars under which you were born to align, I am enormously glad they did.

Oh and by the way, happy birthday.

Australian Pests

Musing on perverts and possums

Tell you what I wouldn't want to be right now: an old man with white hair. Because you don't look like Santa, you look like a pervert. No more the avuncular gent; man of a thousand jokes and ditties, smiling at the antics of youngsters, dispensing sweeties and cheek pinches – do that now and you'd get a kick in the shins and a subpoena.

Not like the 70s, is it? The 70s were a man's world. A decade when television entertainers were given keys to mental asylums and 'a woman has the right' was the beginning of a joke that ended with 'to be barefoot and pregnant in my kitchen.' When, as Dunedinite Stu Fleming says, “UK children's Saturday TV consisted of Rolf's Cartoon Club, (hosted by Rolf Harris, Order of Australia/ CBE), Jim'll Fix It (hosted by Jimmy Savile, OBE/Knight Commander with Star), and Its a Knockout (hosted by Stuart Hall, OBE, one of the first to be charged with multiple historical sex offenses) and we were scared of Daleks.” You'd be right in wondering if there exists a single TV host/celebrity from this era who isn't a pedophile, and if the Queen might not be a bit of a bad judge of character.

Maybe the answer lies in the tenor of the times. People thought differently then, sleazy old men were just a thing, like a dog in the corner that might bite you without warning. You'd keep an eye out for it, but wouldn't take it seriously. Its just a dog.

The problem is though, if that scabby mutt bites and bites over years and years (licking its chops with glee every time shock turns to forgetting); a little harm here, a few tears there, the cumulative effect is a great deal of sorrow and collective pain, innumerable victims. 'Why wasn't it put down years ago?' people ask. And, 'Why didn't you say something when it bit YOU?' Only now that it is mostly toothless and grey about the muzzle does the world feel brave enough to shout, “Down, Sir! Bad dog!”

Oh, what a barney we had at a family dinner last week, when conversation turned to Harris. Funny, all the women present (ranging in age from 37 to 76) could recall at least one childhood creep who'd copped a feel, 'accidentally' brushed their new breasts or squashed up against them in a hallway, and yet not one of us, man or woman, could agree on the seriousness of Rolf's crimes.

“Its a witch hunt, hysteria whipped up by operation Yewtree,” said one. “Everyone's just so eager to be outraged.”

“I was felt up by a friend of the family who gave me 2/6 afterward, and it didn't ruin my life,” said another.

“I bet you wouldn't be so ambivalent if he'd gone on to do the same to your daughter,” said the family stirrer.

“I'm going to kill him,” said the family defender, disappointed to hear the perpetrator was already dead.

Despite differing opinions, the consensus was we just wouldn't stand for this kind of molesty carry-on today. Those of us who know how it feels to be young, confused and ashamed (the behaviour of others somehow your fault) will be damned if we'll let the same thing happen to our daughters, nieces, neighbours. Unfortunately, the sheer number of serious weirdos previously hidden in plain sight has made us all a little nuts. Scared of what we have already let happen, we've gone too far the other way, via the law of unintended consequences.

Which is why 2014 is not a man's world, rather a world where television advertisements feature good-looking morons who stick sanitary pads all over themselves and pretend to be spacemen or short, bald doofuses just lucky there is a woman around to remind them to breathe. Men are the butt of every joke, 'Men are crap' the constant message. But hang on. (Most) men are lovely. We like them. Remember?

To get away from the yuckiness, the economist and I escaped to Purakanui and stayed the night, during the middle of which, a loud thud sounded from the backyard. I woke to sunrise and the sight of the economist holding a very large, very dead possum by the tail. Rigor mortis had frozen its limbs in a regrettable splay. It looked like a fur-coated Grandpa asking for a hug.

“This is what you do with Australian pests,” said the economist, heaving the body over the bank, where it landed in a tree, upside down, sort of crucified. No, I wouldn't want to be an old man right now, or a possum.

Friendship Fights the Winter Goblins

June is the cruelest month. Short days, frosty mornings. Winter's slap is always a nasty surprise, lulled, as we are, into a false sense of security by Autumn's beautiful shambles. Its easy to get the blues, feel seasonally unloved. For some, the weather and weight of worries is just too much and the week before last a lovely man I knew took his own life. He had a smile as big as Africa, but behind it unhappiness had hurt his heart one too many times and the cold got into his bones.

I felt shock hearing of his death. Followed closely by guilt, as I realised it had been at least a year since I'd seen him somewhere that wasn't Facebook. I didn't know him well, but I really liked him. He was one of those people who make the world better by living in it. Now he doesn't and I didn't get a chance to tell him.

Reading the many tributes to this sunny free spirit, this same thought was repeated over and over by other Facebook friends: 'Hadn't seen him for ages...', 'wish we'd caught up...' The time had slipped by and we just hadn't noticed. And noticing each other is what friendship is all about. Friendship, and the act of displaying it: touching base, meeting up for drinks, talking utter bullshit, is a way of saying, 'I see you', 'you matter' – and you simply cannot do this over the internet. Friendship needs hugs, pokes in the belly and hair ruffling. Friendship is hands-on sort of stuff. Because you don't know if someone is really alright until you ask them, to their face, and see the answer in their eyes.

Your friends are the wall you wail to. Friends put up with personality traits a mother doesn’t love. They advise against skinny jeans and dating men who own small dogs. They never chide you for drinking that last tequila and take you to the Farmer’s Market the morning after for a bacon buttie to feed your hangover. Friends know your secrets (and keep them), your deepest fears and were there at your most embarrassing moments (taking photos). Without your friends, you would be that woman talking to herself in the pasta aisle. Yes, friendship is messy. Red things get spilled on white carpet. Glasses and ornaments are broken, people laugh and accidentally spit on you. Maintaining friendship is an effort, a constant fleshy broil of loud noise and bad jokes and I can see why sometimes, a quick text is the extent of our bothering.

But no no no my dears, the fact is we will forever be too far out all our lives, and not waving but drowning, without our friends. Friendship is an expression of shared humanity, acknowledging we are just pitiful squeaking creatures parked on the face of the planet and that the best thing to do would be huddle together. Because its a marvel anyone will put up with our stupid tics and grumbles, a miracle anyone wants to be our friend, cares if we live or die.

As Chris Barton writes in this month's North&South, New Zealand has one of the most restrictive regimes on suicide reporting as well as a persistently high suicide rate, hinting our silence about it isn't working. Suicide loves a secret, is, as Chris says, “devious and cagey; morose and brutal. It infects with misery, creeping anguish ... hides in plain sight cloaked in shame, dishonour and mortal sin.” We don't like to talk about it, but those affected by a sudden, violent gap in their lives actually want and need to talk about it. And anyone contemplating their own untimely end must be able to feel they can tell someone, ask for help. That dialogue is possible, and welcome.

So make sure the people in your life know how much you love them, how blessed you feel to call them 'friend'. When you ask, “How are you?,” really listen to the answer. Even those satellite friends, glimmering on the edges of your solar system yet adding to its illumination – don't let your affection for them be a mystery. It is only by banding together that we can keep out the darkness, turn our backs on the fat-fingered goblins of gloom. Keep in touch and keep eyeballing each other.

Helplines: Suicide Crisis Helpline 0508 828-865; Lifeline 0800 543-354; Depression Helpline 0800 111-757. More information at www.spinz.org.nz and depression.org.nz

Tank Man was just a guy coming back from buying groceries

Last Wednesday was the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, when, in 1989, Chinese troops retook a square in Beijing where protesters had set up camp for a week. 'Retook' is a bit misleading, isn't it? It sounds like the reluctant handover of a stolen budgie, when the reality was blood on the tarmac and people mowed down like weeds, corpses of students lying where they fell, atop their bicycles, as soldiers fired indiscriminately into the crowd.

Some estimates put the deaths in the thousands, but one thing's for sure; the ultra-violence put out the lights of a burgeoning democratic movement. After a quarter-century – and a thorough attempt by the Chinese government to conceal the events that unfolded that June (happily, foiled by the Internet) – our collective memory is limited to the comparatively benign image of a man standing in front of a column of 17 T59 tanks. That CNN footage has become iconic, coming to represent the power of ordinary people against oppressive regimes, and ironic, given they generally don't have any.

The Tank Man was named as 19-year-old Wang Wei Lin, but there's no evidence this is his real name. “Almost certainly he was seen in his moment of self-transcendence by more people than ever laid eyes on Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein and James Joyce combined,” wrote the essayist Pico Iyer. There are conflicting reports of his survival, imprisonment and death. Some believe Tank Man was hustled to safety by fellow protesters and lost in the crowd. Rumors of his identity and existence persist, and when Jiang Zermin, who would later become President of China, was grilled by Barbara Walters about whether he knew what had happened to the young man, he responded: “I think never killed.” However many claim Jiang, then general secretary of the communist party, gave a secret order for him to be tracked down and executed.

Tank Man was not one of the student leaders, he was no intellectual, nobody had ever heard of him. He was just a guy, coming back from buying groceries, who couldn't believe what a government was doing to its own people. Incredulity made him fearless. So it is sad that China, the world's oldest continuous civilisation, an Olympic host and a member of the UN Security Council, wants to expunge him and the events of that week from its history, instead of celebrating his heroism. But they're scared of the Dali Lama too, and he's just a little old man in an orange sheet. As unlikely as it is, I hope Tank Man lives still (in Hong Kong), a family man in his forties who sometimes remembers how crazy he was, thinking he could stop that steel tide with the power of his own personal outrage.

All anniversaries are cause for thought and 25 years on I wonder: Could I ever be that brave? Would I stand my ground, waving my shopping bags in defiance, or run away and hide? Yes, I've protested – taken back the night – but it was a rather wet effort, as I wasn't entirely convinced the night had ever been denied me. As a New Zealand woman, I've always had a voice. New Zealanders practically invented feminism, for cripes sake. My girlfriends and I are so used to freedom of speech, you'd need Mainfreight's daily allowance of masking tape to shut us up. I'm free. We're all free. That's why they call it a democracy.

This article would see me jailed in China. In Cambodia I'd be tortured just for being a journalist. In Nigeria, kidnapped and worse, for being an educated female. When protestors occupied the Octagon in 2011, the only beef most Dunedinites had was that they were vegetarians, and the only thing that got killed was the grass. Here, in our ignorant bliss, do we ever stop to think how fortunate we are, unquestioningly entitled to an opinion. “I disapprove of what you say, but I'd defend to the death your right to say it,” wrote Evelyn Beatrice Hall in her biography of Voltaire – and as I looked online at images of Tiananmen's pro-democracy protestors, just kids really, who died doing exactly that, I wept, and thanked my lucky stars I lived in a country where, if you don't like what the government's doing, it comes down to a tick, not a tank.

 

Finalist Canon Media Awards!

Lisa Scott was recently a finalist in the 2014 Canon Media Awards for Best Columnist, Humour Satire. Hooray!