Given my wicked nature, I have woven an element of truth into all my falsehoods to more easily ensnare my victims.
So which are the lies? What is the truth?
1. I have a very rigid routine. I have so much happening in my life the only way I can keep it all flowing is if I diarise absolutely everything.
This is my first LIE. I have a terrible tendency to fly by the seat of my pants. However, I do use a diary fairly consistently at work. Otherwise, my natural tendencies to random behaviour would be fatal to my credibility as a manager.
2. During my surfie period in my youth I was waiting to catch a wave when suddenly a huge shark burst out of the wave next to me. I have never been so frightened.
This is true – almost (but not quite). I was once sitting on my board out behind the breakers waiting for a larger wave. As a wave began to build, I saw in the water a massive shadow racing directly at me.
Naturally I thought “shark” and was expecting to end my short life in a patch of blood soaked foam. Then out of the building wave popped a bottle-nosed dolphin, I swear it laughed at me, before disappearing back into the wave. So the fear was real, but technically the shark is a LIE.
3. When I was a toddler I lived in a house that had no less than 20 of the deadliest snakes in the world in residence. They didn’t frighten me because I was simply too young to understand the danger.
This is actually the TRUE yarn. Although taking a little poetic licence I have made it sound much worse than it was.
My dad was a herpetologist, probably one of the leading experts on Oz reptiles in the field.
His passion – snakes. My Dad had literally dozens of Eastern Browns, Copperheads, Red-Bellied Blacks, Tiger Snakes, Bandi-Bandis and Death Adders all living in the house. Fortunately for little me they were all enclosed in cages.
4. Again on the subject of houses, I have lived in a large number of places over the years. In fact the total number of houses I have now lived in is nearly 20.
This is also a LIE, although only technically. You notice I said “…nearly 20.”
My eldest daughter E has already lived in “..nearly 20” houses (18 to be precise). I have in fact lived in 58 houses I can remember. If my Mum is to believed (and I always listen to my Mum), there were at least a dozen in the first three years of my life.
Why so many? It’s a long story probably best reserved for a post of its own. My throw away line is “I have a gypsy for a mother and I married a gypsy too.”
5. Deb and I first met when I sat next to her in a lecture hall on our first day at university.
This is also a LIE. In fact I sat next to a guy who was at that stage Deb’s boyfriend. So I met a certain charming young woman through him, again it’s a long story.
6. I was on a ship in the Suez Canal when the 1967 Arab-Israeli war broke out.
Fortunately this is also a LIE. However, I was actually on a ship crossing the Indian Ocean bound for Suez and London when the 1967 war broke out. Can you believe people actually travelled the world by ship back then? My Mum’s Dad had just died so she took us to England to visit our Grandma. Because of the war we were diverted around the Cape of Good Hope and went to England the long way.
7. When I was 18 I wrote off (totalled) my first car by crashing it into a tree.
Again this is a LIE. I did write off a car when I was 18, but it was my Mum’s. Also, I didn’t hit a tree. It was much more dramatic. It was wet, the tires weren’t great and I was young and silly. Very silly.
I was driving much too fast on the Pacific Highway when I skidded across in front of oncoming traffic. I hit the table-drain on the other side of the road and cart-wheeled the little FIAT 850 I was driving end over end. I didn’t touch the roof.
I have a vivid memory of looking down through the windscreen as the car was flipping over. I was absolutely convinced that I was about to die. I felt no fear, just a profound regret that it was all over so soon.
To my total surprise, when the car came to a halt (right-way up), I was still alive. The driver’s seat had collapsed so I was lying on my back. The engine (in the back of an 850) had pushed partway through the firewall and was sitting by my head. I thought “It could catch fire, I’d better get out.” Amazingly, I got out of the wreck under my own steam. I had severe bruising (one on my leg as big as a dinner plate) and whiplash, but other than that I was uninjured.
So there you go, Al is revealed as a terrible liar! Only Anne the Piedmont Writer guessed correctly that Number 3 was in fact true.
Or is it? Do you believe me?
A random photo: Harbour 2008
