Big White Towel

Wrapped up in rough white comfort, hiding in the huge white cave, protected from the world or at the very least hidden. Fabric softener pervading the air, wrapping my arms around my dad's knees while he dried my hair. Rough hands on head, the world shaking inside my skull, trying not to move at all, waiting for it to be over. And there were other colours. Reds and blues and yellows and greens, purples and oranges, softer towels laid flat on the sand. Sunlight reflecting all around, a sense of stillness with waves gently crashing a hundred metres away. Muffled conversations, voices thrown across the sand, bouncing once or twice before being buried. A second towel or the corner of my beach towel curled up over my head, almost stifling in the glare of heat but at least my eyes would have their reprieve. Always a memory of a mother or a sister or a girlfriend, wrapping up their long hair in a towel, a makeshift turban, curled perfectly and poised atop, designed to avoid falling over the eyes. Now the towels are smaller, they no longer cover me from head to toe, even the larger ones are just enough to pull the water from my skin so I can hang them back on the rack. And they remind me when they need to be replaced by their musty smell, their damp mouldish odour. Nothing as satisfying as a high thread count Egyptian cotton, fresh from the washing machine to dry me and make me presentable again.

Tiled Balcony

Large balcony, enough to fit a small party of chatting, laughing, smoking drinking people. The tiled floor is a reflector of heat during the whole of the afternoon, but right now I am safe, the square grey tiles are covered in shadow. Each tile is cool to the touch, big enough to fit an entire flattened hand. Dirt from the elements is dry and subtle, resting in minute crevices on the partially rough surface. To stand on the balcony is to listen to the constant stream of traffic from the street. Petrol powered waves crashing on a bitumen beach. Every now and then a large set of buses breaks at the traffic light sandbank. Sometimes punctuated by the deep throated roar of a motorbike exhaust. Overhead planes are like a sudden rain crashing down on the balcony as I lean over the glass edge to let the breeze buffet my face. Petrol, tar, pollution, a slight whiff of nature from the tree across the road. Cicadas rise up, synchronised against the tyranny of the auto-mobile. Painted white concrete on the edge of the tiles supports the glass barricades that display my imprisonment up here, three floors above the road. More gatherings of dirt and pollution, rougher than tiles. If I imagine touching the concrete, I imagine the white powder of paint covering my palms.

Purple Speaker Cone

Round, shiny plastic purple speaker cone. I remember carrying you in the backseat of a taxi, jostling around in the city traffic, a feeling of excitement in the pit of my stomach. The powdery dry touch of your cardboard box on my fingertips and palms. A slight twinge of anxiety related to your demo model status. I brought you home into my so-called studio, a second or third bedroom. You were heavier than I expected. I grunted as I lifted each of you up onto my desk. The desk was easily able to support your weight, after all, it was designed to hold poker machines. I found cables and plugged you in. I felt a chill of amazement pass through me as I heard the sound come from outside the speakers. I touched the purple plastic, wondering if there was actual noise coming out. My fingers vibrated in time with the beat and I was careful not to press too hard. I touch you now and feel the hammertone finish of you black outsides, rough and random. I follow it down to the raised ridges around your tweeter. The thin metal bar across them feels glossy and penetrating. Your outsides have no discernible odour but I recall opening your electronics and after noticing the slight browning around the pale blue foam padding, the familiar smell of electronic components soldered to a circuit board wafting out of your trapped cache of oxygen. Acrid, reminding me of melting flux from the heated tip of a soldering iron, smoke curling through the air and tickling my nostrils, making me recoil but not without some pleasure at the artificial smell.

Milk Shake Maker

Just over 500ml capacity. Markings up the side every 50ml, larger markings every 100ml. But the 200ml marker has faded. Do we hold our hands there too tightly, does our sweat work away at your solid blue paint? Three equally spaced ridges down the side help us to grip you. A screw thread at the top allows us to twist the blue plastic top into your clear plastic body. The top has a useless swinging lid that in theory would allow pouring of shaken liquid through a small hole. But we never use it that way. We screw, we shake, we unscrew, we drink. The soy and dietary supplement green mix I drink every morning with your help makes me think of the Incredible Hulk or Popeye. As if I imbibe liquid spinach or gamma rays to make me more like each of them every day. I find it difficult to clean the powder without my patented method of hot water and a sponge stuck deep inside you and swirled around your insides. But I never completely remove all traces of radioactive shakes and I always notice minute flecks of green powder in your body or darker areas of built-up reside in your lid, smashed into a crevice and impossible to remove with the usual patented method. Every so often, the dishwasher helps. Now I see more ridges inside your body, presumably for the same purpose as the curved ridges and ditches and divets and rivets in your lid. The soy or water must hit itself against these shapes, mashing the green powder into assimilation, making for a somewhat palatable drink. The furry, earthy liquid and solid mix hits my mouth, swirls around, scraping its way around my tongue and down my throat, delivering all the essential nutritional elements missing from my diet. Would I even need you if I ate properly in the first place?

Portable Air Conditioner

Pot bellied, leaves swinging, cool fire breathing, white midget plastic robot. Clammy and bulbous, you are strategically lit blue and green so we can avoid stepping on you in the night. Leaning over, I press your membranous button and feel it give under my finger tips, the thin layer of clear plastic still unpeeled from your panel. If I spread my fingers and push them between your alabaster fins, they will be tickled by four more dancing fins. And if I push further still, I will scrape against a cheese grater grill that lets out a constant blast of icy cold air, numbing my hand into eventual frostbite. Your new plastic, chemical odour is faint after use, but still wafts up into my nostrils, pushed by the stream of air. I open my mouth and taste the plastic artificiality blown onto my tongue. At your back, at your piped and coiled exhaust is a blast furnace of wasted air, pushed out onto the heat of the balcony, dissipating almost instantly, thankfully not returning into the room. Your fan constantly whirs, never slowing down as the job to cool the room is an uphill struggle. Below the whir and the woosh, I hear smaller, tickling sounds of water dripping, moisture being extracted from the air and collected, redistributed into the room, humdifiying it to avoid your tray overflowing. You cool me, you make me shake.