Stories

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Colin Santi's Story

Posted on Sunday, 14 February 2010 at 8:07:03 AM

To Quote Sir Walter Scott:

"Oh! what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive!"

The first line is surely a most apt description of our lives. Well for some of us at least. The second line also had relevance in the times Fiona speaks of. As I grew more so for me.

I never actually knew Nick Cave but for all these years from then to now I have had an aversion to him. It was as Fiona expressed a tough time for her. I was for quite a time the cause a major part of that tough time. It wasn't until I came across the obituary of her father and read this little blog that certain memories flooded back to me of those times of pain and suffering for struggling and growing souls. I have carried the memories of some of my treatment of her as a heavy cross upon my back for all this time. It has been a spectre that has never left me! I came from a violent and ugly background Fiona came into my life with a purity and love that I could not get enough of. But I also could not fully appreciate or understand? I yearned for that love yet I had such a fire of madness and unreasonable jealousies within my heart I could not at that time appreciate fully what I had. Even now I can feel tears well at certain memories of some of my injustices to her. It was at the time of her having her unknown friends to me and the band that she would speak of to me but would not allow me to come that would send me into a rage. Which also marked the beginning of the end. Of course there was much much more involved but that would be a book in its self.
Suffice to say I went on to more pain and suffering in a life of disreputable actions & reactions that left me in a devastated condition for more than a few years. But as I have aged I have luckily learned much of real love and its benefits. I am not a perfect man but I have learned much of my faults and the reasons behind them and have done my best to make up for the ills I have committed. I don't know where Fiona is nor am I planning to seek her out but I am hoping she will return & take another peek at her words of Nick Cave & read this and try to forgive me for my mistreatment and neglect of her welfare. I was young as well and not so well endowed with the love and understanding she so freely exhibited. I was brutish & self serving as was the environment I came from unfortunately and that I allowed her to slip out of my life so wantonly is a stain on my past and the memory of her loving mother that reared such a sensitive and kind child.
Well best I end this now.

I will just place this poem one of hundreds I have written to vent my woes this one wrote after losing her. Apologies for tainting this site with my personal venting but I just wished to let her know after all this time I am truly sorry.

Also apologies to Nick Cave for all these years I have disliked a man I never knew of seemingly great depth and understanding.
He knows me not nor would he probably be to disturbed about this stranger that has wrongly partially attributed the loss of my youthful love. That is the web of life I guess? But I also think deep down he would understand.

PS If Fiona does by chance read this or someone knows of her email to forward this to her I have found Shukri at the time our best mutual friend and expressed my deepest apologies to him for my jealousy & mistreatment. Funnily enough he had forgotten it all and was just happy to see me? I must be over sensitive in my old age?

Colin Santi

19.4."80
To Fiona

Many times we have laughed at one another.
Poked and pried at each others emotional depths, leaving scars of unhealable anguish and torment.

Then there have been times of joy and happiness unsurpassed by any previously felt.

But now those times have been replaced by continually rebounding and agonising mind games of deceit, misplaced and misunderstood feelings.

Till finally all that remains is an ever growing and pulsating emptiness.
Combined with a sense of futility and a faint yet strong yearning for what was.

Annette Edwards's Story

Posted on Wednesday, 15 July 2009 at 11:09:34 AM

I have not yet been to the exhibition . I'm looking forward to taking my daughter this Fri 17/7/09.

I have a special soft spot for Nick that began in the 1970's in Melbourne. Though I knew Nick...more as an aquantance than a friend, It wasn't until years later whilst living here in Perth that I realised that this guy I knew was 'Nick Cave'. I had only known him as Nick...Julies brother and the guy in 'The Boyz Next Door'...the band we often went to see.

The first time that I saw/met Nick was at his family home in Caulfield when I was 16 or thereabouts. I remember being in a car driven by a friend of a friend. (I was tagging along that day and knew nothing of where we were headed nor why) We pulled up outside a house where the three of us got out and ventured inside. The girl we were coming to see was a friend of my friend and we were there to pick something up from her ...she, was Nicks sister. Brought up to be respectful of other peoples homes as well as being a quite a shy person anyway, I stood nervously in the room we entered. I recall that there was some sort of small celebration going on and someone was dressed as a fairy. I recall a piano and how neat the room was despite scattered attempts at party decoration. Mostly, I remember a ' punky' pale thin dark haired guy come into the room dressed in black with pointy boots. At 16, I thought this older guy was mysterious and a bit of a 'badboy'. I looked up and smiled at him. He looked at me and without cracking a smile, nodded his head to say hi. I recall thinking that he was a bit scary . At the time in Melbourne, many 'punks' were angry people who often lashed out at non punks. They certainly didn't warm to the likes of me and my peeps. We were friendly to everyone in a sort of love and accept all...kind of way without considering ourselves to be 'hippies or part of any subculture. After we left the house, only 10 minutes or so later, I recall being a little haunted by that beautiful but intense brother of a friend of a friend.

Later, I was to see, talk and experience more than just a serious side to this guy. My next encounter, saw Nick play the clown in the kitchen of an old St. Kilda house which was the venue for a party put on by mutual friends. He no longer seemed scary to me after that night...he had really made people laugh. After that, my friends and I often bumped into Nick's sister in the course of a night out here and there. I soon learned that Nick was part of a band and we started seeking out the bands gigs. We would act so cool as we stood up the front and watched 'Nicks band' perform. Nick definately had the 'up yours' attitude indicative of many punks at the time but he was not out to hurt anyone and was not 'punk' to the exclusion of himself. One night, friends and I headed to a band venue called 'Bananas' where we often went. It was a small all night place where your entry ticket often included a small meal of fish and chips. Unlike my friends and even Nick at the time, I was doing it tough as a 16 year old without family and was living alone in a tiny flat in Elwood. The little meals I would get from Bananas were a welcome relief from not having eaten much for days. It was at the little window at Bananas where one would collect their fish and chips, that I struck up my first conversation with Nick and experienced a shyness in him not unlike my own. Of course, we both were natural performers and hid our shyness well.

I have many memories of those days living in St. Kilda and Elwood in Melbourne and I will always remember Nick as the guy who in fleeting moments, I connected with not just because there were people connections that saw us run into eachother, but because I could see a vulnerability, sensativity and inner strength to survive that I felt as a teenager living in a wild place at a wild time.

We both also had come from musical theatrical families and were both pursuing a creative/theatrical path. I could see the the boy inside Nick that wanted an audience to hear what he had to say and who knew that he had something that could somehow keep an audience watching and listening.

You did well for yourself Nick!! You kept true to yourself and from what I hear, are still sensative and sweet.....what a great accomplishement! Luv Fi