Between all the tragedies being played out amongst the floods and raging rivers all over the place, I wonder what, in a panic and totally bewilderment, we would salvage after the dreaded midnight knock by police to evacuate.

On the TV, that horrible medium, not a moment of peoples private miseries or anguish, could be spared from the ever vigilant public stuck in the comfort of their reclining easy chairs. Did you too hear those inane questions from ABC journos; “how do you feel the flooding will affect the people,” it was asked?  Oh, they will be delighted!

There it was, for all to see, people loading up their possessions. Some just carried a suitcase, others loaded up their cars, boats and trailers, with chairs, foam furniture (perhaps from Clark Rubber,) dogs, cats and even a galah. I saw a floating device with what looked like a big fridge on top of a matrass. A couple of men were clear headed enough to load a treasured wine collection with some white wine bottles sticking out. Was it a good sauvignon Blanc or some dreadful heavily oaked chardonnay?

What really took the overall price for a moment of Chekov, amongst all that misery, were a couple of girls wading through the rising waters carrying a huge mirror. ’A mirror,’ now that was really something you would miss.

I don’t know what I would take, perhaps just some old black and white photos that I store in a small box. You know the sort of things that one sometimes peer at and wonder what happened to it all. Did it all pan out? 

 Would I take a passport, banking details? What about some books, my tin toy locomotive?

I don’t know but we had some lovely garlic prawns last night. What else could one have done?