Stand and Deliver!

The heading’s a Philip Glass reference and it won’t make any difference whether you get it or not – although your cultural and intellectual life would be that much more enriched if you were familiar with his work, particularly the bits that swirl, orchestrally, while choirs chant ‘Who?! Huh?! Who?! Huh?! Who?! Huh?! Who?! Huh?! Haaaaa! Haaaaaa! Haaaaaa! Who?! Huh?! Who?! Huh?! Who?! Huh?! Haaaaa! Haaaaaa! Haaaaaa!’ over images o traffic congestion, teeming hordes of pedestrians and other elements of modernity running amok.

Now imagine those same images in the back streets of those suburbs just north or Manly, where Harbord meets Freshwater, a block or two from the beach. Impossible to conceive of it – moreso if you know the area. Quiet, sleepy seaside suburb.

I wonder if there are any suburban goths in this area, so close to the sea. Cos you never really see goths on the beach.

But if they were in any of these beachy Many Warringah suburbs, I know where they’d be: somewhere they could find the stuff that turns them on.

Not the quiet, leafy streets within earshot of the calming, crashing waves, surely.

Well, maybe one street.

In fact, one corner in particular. One corner, at the other end of the block that leads to the parking area just in front of Freshwater Beach. It has gore.

Not just a modicum of gore, mind. Not just any amount of gore.

A considerable amount of gore.

More gore, if you will, than any other – that doesn’t prove to be the address of an abotoir or some hitherto unknown abode of a serial killer.