My lips, my skin, the hum on my breath.
My beating chest, my insides and outsides, were all once only 15.
15 years of growing and moving and whispers and fractures and bruising and hurting and romanticising.
15 years of not knowing much else beyond the tired dirt road leading from our home town out onto the highway, lined with ghostly gum trees and train tracks and darkness.
At 15 my family and I were living in a quiet tiny country town with only the odd coal train roaring and clacking it's way through the vast empty quiet.
I had traveled that tired, dirt road leading to the highway, thousands of many over my 15 years. Feeling so tiny from my spot on the worn, velvety back seat of our old cream Fiat, as I looked out at the blurred darkness whizzing by. Tiny beams from the headlights leading our way. The Milky Way and the Man in the Moon following us the whole journey. Captivated was I, in my little spot stretching my neck to lock my eyes on the stars lighting up the big, dark nothingness above me.
Shadows of huge trees flicking across us between splashes of the full moon's glow. My mum and dad in the front listening to a song on the radio, their gentle voices lulling me off to sleep.
All of this. And my 15 years. and the dirt road to home.
I liked nothing more then to collect it all up, my skin; flesh and bones; the quiet; the darkness; the clickety-clack - and take it to where I could stretch it all out and lay it all down.
On those stars and that sky, I was hooked.
I would always pin all of my 15 year old hopes on the stars, excitedly believing if I just wished hard enough on the right star - something would have to happen, to change, to mold, to shape, to open up the dark and lead me beyond the highway one day.
I would look up at that inky blue blanket, every chance I got, once we made it back home too.
When my mother gave up the evening fight of forcing me to finish every last bite on my plate, I would plant my dangling feet down on the cool of the floor boards and tip toe quietly outside; stealing away to the moon lit back yard to feel all of it and how big the world was, and how much it could do for me.
One hot and sticky February night sticks with me the most even now.
Me, completely stretched out on our torn and weathered trampoline.
The faded black mat cool and rough under my skin, crickets filling the night air collectively.
I began to wish on those stars - as many as I could like I always did. I can still hear the soft breeze carrying a song from across the field where my neighbours tinkered on cars under a bright lamp laughing and dancing to a Jackson song..
The very best part though, and why I remember so well now, was hearing the back door slide open and my dad rest beside me. The smell of his cigarette and red wine lingering all around us as he pointed at stars and told me all about the things he knew beyond them and the dirt road and the darkness and his 49 years.
We lay there for an hour or so and he never seemed bigger to me. He told me what he thought about it all, life, death and everything in between. He told of how he believed there was life out there in the deep yonder above, and it made my hairs on the nape of my neck stand on end.
We listened to mum as she talked to herself inside, rattling dishes and cutlery and then we giggled together in complete joy and lightness, among all of the dark.
He asked me what is was I wished for, as I picked one star that was the brightest, but in my 15 year old skin, was too shy to say.
I whispered it to the sky though, once he eventually got up and took his warmth with him.
I wished for a huge romance as big as the sky. Someone to one day look at stars with for hours, when Dad no longer could.
I had wished he was kind just like him, with strong morals. I wished he was protective but not possessive.
I wished he worked a hard day and spent lots of time loving me. I wished he had warm sparkly eyes mirroring the stars we gazed upon, and I wished for strong hard hands that were also soft with square ends to fingers. Most of all I wished when he one day came along, that he would be seem giant in his love just like my dad.
It seems wishing upon stars is a good thing to do, because that very love did come my way. He has filled up empty space beside me in a giant-like way. With his skin and his bones, and his warm eyes and kind heart. As simple as A,B,C.
I still often look up into the sky as all dreamy girls do, no longer 15. I think about the simple things that make it all just so.
I think about how easy it is to love and be loved when you are amongst the right perfect people with your heart. Ones who want to gaze at the stars with you and dream.
Like a simple melody, that's how easy love can be.
Emma Kate xoxo