Southerly by David Haywood

Here's a list of five things that I loathe: religious ceremonies, wearing a suit, listening to stupid speeches, too many people, and dancing. Put these all together -- and you've got the average wedding.

I remember the exact moment when I realized the true awfulness of weddings. I was a teenager, and a family friend was getting married in church. A flautist had been hired to play 'Strangers in the Night' as the vows were exchanged.

My first thought was: "Surely this is an ill-advised choice of music?" Then came a second thought, bursting through my consciousness as per the enlightenment of Saint Paul on the road to Damascus: "Even if the music weren't 'Strangers in the Night'*, this whole wedding thing would still suck".

At the time, I assumed that -- deep down -- everyone must feel this way. Weddings, I guessed, must be one of those things you just have to endure in life: like having a tooth extracted, or seeing Paul Henry on television.

It wasn't until my late teens that I began to realize that some people genuinely enjoy them. This was thrown into sharp relief when I visited a friend's house one day, and spoke to his 28-year-old sister. She'd seemed perfectly normal on the previous occasions that I'd met her; but now she talked as if her brain had become decoupled from her mouth.

"I must tell you about this beautiful wedding dress I've seen," she gabbled. "It's scarlet! Can you believe it? I'd love to wear it, but I know Mum would have kittens."

I deduced that my friend's sister was about to be married.

She continued: "Mum and I have been looking at venues. We're leaning towards having a marquee at the Corban's estate in Henderson. Mum says that small weddings are better -- so we're keeping the guest list under 200 -- but we've got the seating arrangements all figured out. I'm thinking about asking Kevin if he'd let me use his Charger as the wedding car. And when I walk down the aisle, I'm going to have a choir singing: 'Up Where We Belong' or 'Islands in the Stream', I haven't decided which one yet."

It sounded like a nightmare to me -- but to be polite, I asked when the wedding was timetabled to occur.

It was here that her brother interjected. "Ha!" he said. "Never, if you ask me." He went on to explain with typical brotherly candour: "She and mum are planning her wedding, and she doesn't even have a boyfriend."

Frankly, the whole situation was a real eye-opener. Here was someone who not only didn't find weddings utterly appalling -- but, on the contrary, loved them so much that she was spending all her time making plans. And this despite the fact that she had a large groom-sized blank space to fill.

Happily, I can report that she managed to tie the knot about 18 months later -- although, according to her brother, the groom still remained something of a blank space.

Over the years most of my friends have got hitched. I was happy to see them married, but the weddings were excruciating. Each celebrant seemed more insincere than the last; each father-in-law more rambling and incoherent; and each posse of line-dancing bridesmaids another dagger in my heart.

I began to feel sad and twisted. What was wrong with me? Why didn’t I enjoy weddings? I wondered if I was the only person in the world who felt this way.

But then I met Jennifer. During our first conversation, she described a bride of her acquaintance as resembling "a giant sobbing brain-dead meringue". And that was when I knew that Jennifer was the woman I would marry.

The drawback, however, is that a mutual detestation of weddings does not make the nuptial process very easy. In New Zealand, the law requires that an authorized officiant must perform the ceremony. Both Jennifer and I agreed that a marriage celebrant was an appalling idea (speaking for myself, I don't even like the word 'celebrant'). And even a Registry Office wedding requires vows and a ceremony.

The answer was Chicago. Jennifer had lived there for nearly five years, and one of her friends was Reverend Scott, a mail-order vicar who'd paid fourteen cents for his religious qualifications. Under American law, all we needed was his signature on a State of Illinois marriage licence.

We flew to Chicago.

At the Cook County Clerk's Office, the marriage licence queue was supervised by a policeman with a gun. Behind us, a young Hispanic woman was weeping from either joy or misery. Her husband-to-be whispered: "It's okay, baby, stop crying. It's gonna be okay."

In front of us, a women yelled into her cell-phone: "Look I don't care what you have to do to get her to the wedding. Now are you gonna act like a man? Or do I have to come over there and bitch-slap some sense into that 'ho' myself".

The queue moved at glacial speed. Just before the clerk's desk, a line was painted onto the floor. "Keep behind the line, please, sir," the cop told me. A few minutes later I inadvertently stepped over the line again.

"Sir, can you please keep behind the marked line." American policemen have developed a technique of saying 'sir', but conveying the word 'dickhead'.

I apologized, and then accidentally stepped across the line a third time. The cop came over, and put his face next to mine: "Sir, if I have to tell you one more time not to step over the line, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

When we reached the counter, the clerk was brusque and efficient: "Okay, I need to see a driver licence from both of you."

She squinted at our licences, transferred our names onto a form, and then handed it to Jennifer. "Congratulations. You gotta three day cooling-off period, and then you can hold your wedding. Next please."

Three days was perfect.

It transpired that Reverend Scott's niece was cooking dinner the night our cooling-off period expired. She was a trainee chef -- which seemed highly promising for a surprise wedding. On the downside, however, it turned out that it was only her first day at chef school. Dinner consisted of lettuce and imitation bacon made from soy-beans. I found it strangely delicious.

After dinner, we presented Reverend Scott with our marriage licence. He was clearly very surprised, but quickly regained his composure. "Well," he said. "I guess this calls for a round of my special extra-dry vodka Martinis."

He made the drinks, and then signed the licence. We were married.

It grew dark. We sat on the balcony and watched fireflies. The Martinis tasted like petrol. Reverend Scott talked about his religious convictions.

"I'd have to describe myself as agnostic rather than atheist," he mused, "because of the Burt Reynolds analogy." He paused to let this statement sink in.

"Now take our bedroom closet. What if you told me that Burt Reynolds was in that closet right now? Well, that'd be very unlikely -- the probability would be approaching zero. But I couldn't actually prove that it's completely impossible."

He took another sip of his Martini. "If you see what I'm getting at," he added.

It was -- and I'm entirely serious when I say this -- the loveliest wedding I could imagine.

There are certain disadvantages to being brave. For example, your dentist might decide to economize on the anaesthetic when drilling your teeth. Or your workmates might nominate you to sing Der Hölle Rache as the warm-up act at your office karaoke party.

Or, even worse, a hospital midwife might not believe that you're in labour.

In Jennifer's case -- a year ago today -- it was the latter. Generally speaking, women in labour tend to have their minds focussed on the agony of the birthing process. Jennifer, on the other hand, preferred to devote her mental resources to her laptop computer. As she explained, there were a number of emails that needed answering before the baby arrived.

This prompted the hospital midwife to assure us that birth was not imminent. "You wait until you're really in labour," she said. "You won't be playing around with your computer then, lovey."

Ten minutes later, Jennifer and her bed were hurtling down the corridor towards the emergency lift.

As a non-patient, I wasn't permitted to enter the lift with Jennifer. "Take the stairs and meet us down at the birthing suite," snapped the midwife.

"No, don't go!" said Jennifer, as the lift doors closed. I sprinted downstairs. The emergency lift delivered Jennifer directly to the birthing suites. The stairs delivered me to a reception desk, a locked door, and a formidable-looking receptionist.

By this stage I was rather agitated. "My wife's in emergency labour," I gabbled at the receptionist. "And she's been taken down in the emergency lift, and I've got to find her birthing suite, and it's an emergency."

The receptionist gazed at me without emotion. "I can't do anything," she said, "until your wife's information has been entered into our system. Please have a seat in the waiting room."

"But this is an emergency," I yelped.

"When the paperwork has been processed by staff," said the receptionist calmly, "the information will come up on my computer, and you can go in. But until then you have to go to the waiting room.

I was -- and I'm not joking -- just readying myself to jump over the reception desk, when I heard someone calling my name. It was a friend who works as a nurse. Ignoring the receptionist's protests, she swiped open the door with her security card, and led me directly to the birthing room.

When I arrived, Jennifer was alone on the bed. "Glad to see you," she whispered. Some distance away a knot of hospital midwives stood gossiping.

Jennifer was not being monitored in any way. I called out to the midwives: "Excuse me, but my wife has pre-eclampsia -- you'll be wanting to keep an eye on her blood pressure as well as the baby's heart rate."

One of the hospital midwives turned to me. "I've phoned your own midwife, and she'll be coming soon," she said. "We'll give your wife an examination if your midwife's not here in 20 minutes."

"Should I be pushing?" called Jennifer anxiously. "I know that it's dangerous to push too early."

"When it's time to push, dear," said the midwife, "you won't be able to stop yourself."

Jennifer realized that she couldn't stop herself. I took a wet flannel, and began to wipe the perspiration from her brow. Each time I drew the flannel across her forehead, Jennifer said: "Thank you, David."

After a few minutes, one of the midwives wandered over, and lifted Jennifer's hospital gown. "Oh," she said in astonishment, "I can see the top of your baby's head."

The other midwives stopped gossiping. They looked silently at one another, and then quickly filed out of the room. The hospital midwife who'd noticed the baby's head was the last to leave. "Someone will be along momentarily," she called over her shoulder.

It didn't seem the right time to point out her incorrect usage of the word 'momentarily'.

A few seconds later, a gowned figure appeared at the door. She glided into the room using the disconcerting style of locomotion favoured by nuns (those of you unfamiliar with nuns should imagine a Dalek).

She halted at the foot of the bed. She spoke very softly to Jennifer: "You're doing well. Keep pushing. Nearly there."

"Another push. That's it."

Our own midwife materialized at the door. She strode into the room. There was a moment's confusion; and then our midwife was holding a baby in her hands -- like a fielder snatching a ball from the air just before the boundary.

A terrible scream reverberated through the birthing room. "Nothing wrong with your son's lungs," observed our midwife.

It took nearly an hour for a nurse to stitch up Jennifer's wounds. In short order, Jennifer and the baby were relocated to the maternity ward. In even shorter order -- as a consequence of hospital regulations that prohibit men from staying overnight -- I was ejected into the hospital parking lot.

It was snowing. My car wouldn't start. I called State Roadside Rescue. Amusingly, they kept cutting me off before I could give my location. It was four o'clock in the morning. Eventually I started to walk home. It didn't seem possible that I was a father.

The next morning, Jennifer called me with news that the baby wasn't feeding properly. When I arrived back at hospital the midwives were calm and reassuring. "Nothing to worry about," they soothed. "We see this all the time. Babies have sufficient reserves to go happily for days with minimal feeding. "

The next morning they reiterated their reassurances. On the third morning, one of the midwives decided the baby needed a cold bath in order to wake him properly for a feed. The baby wasn't screaming anymore by this stage -- he just mewed piteously as tepid water sluiced over him.

The night matron came to see us at the start of the evening shift. "I've looked over your notes and I'm worried about the possibility of brain damage," she said. "We need to get your baby to the intensive care unit right now."

It's taken me an entire year to build up the courage to convert my diary jottings into readable form -- to force myself to think about feeding-tubes, incubators, parents weeping beside cradles. Ten days with a baby in intensive care seemed like eternity; although it was utterly trivial compared with the experience of some families.

But, even in prose, I wouldn't want to re-live any part of it.

.

Above: Bob-the-baby in the intensive care unit (three days old).

Above: Bob-the-baby eating cake on his first birthday.

So anyway, me and Bollard are flying to Canberra for the International Monetary Policy Conference. We're sitting in business class -- which, in my opinion, is basically like being in heaven -- and we're getting well-and-truly plastered.

We start feeling a bit musical somewhere above the Tasman Sea, and when the pilot announces that we're about to land in Canberra, Bollard launches into a tune of his own composition entitled: 'Still Time for Another Vodka.'

I'm providing musical accompaniment by dinging the call-button beside my seat; but when the stewardess finally arrives, she gives us a filthy look, and goes: "I think you two have had enough to drink."

Of course, this totally gets on Bollard's tits, and he's like: "Listen up: I'm the governor of the Reserve Bank. You don't tell me what to do; I tell you what to do." But the stewardess is already walking down the aisle, and Bollard's left talking into empty air like a dick.

So then Bollard's all "Fuck this"; and he's out of his seat and into the kitchenette where they keep the drinks trolley. Thirty seconds later he's nabbed a couple of bottles of Smirnoff, and tosses one of them to me.

A litre of vodka is a lot to put away before we land -- maybe even too much. Next thing I know I wake up on a luggage trolley, and Bollard's pushing me through Canberra airport.

So now I'm asking Bollard what happened, and he's giving me the most incoherent explanation I've ever heard. Telling me how everyone at Air New Zealand is against him, and plotting to get him fired from the Reserve Bank. And then he's like: "You don't remember the fight on the plane? You don't remember when I punched the pilot?"

I never get to the bottom of it -- because as soon as we get outside into the fresh air, about a million flies attack me, and I lose my train of thought. Bollard's getting the same treatment, and we're flapping our arms around like a couple of spastics before Bollard manages to wheel the luggage trolley to a taxi.

Of course, Bollard's all "Fucking Australia -- full of fucking flies." And the taxi driver's like: "Are you disrespecting my country?" And Bollard goes: "What are you gonna do about it, you fucking sheep-shagger?" By this time we've reached the motorway, and Bollard's like: "And why are you driving like such a pussy?" And he grabs the steering wheel, and suddenly the taxi's slewing and skidding all over the road.

Next thing we've been kicked out of the taxi, and we're standing beside the motorway with flies crawling all over us. I just have time to go: "All we need now is for the cops to arrive," and right on cue a police car appears. But then Bollard shows the cop his diplomatic papers, and the cop starts calling him "sir" and everything. And it all turns out fine -- because we ride the rest of the way in the police car for free.

So now we're driving through Canberra, and frankly the whole place looks really lame and embarrassing. It seems like the council's bought a bunch of those big Nazi-type statues from a movie set or somewhere, and bunged them up all over. I'm trying to think of something clever to say, like maybe: "It looks as if Albert Speer had been commissioned to redecorate Ashburton on the cheap" -- but then Bollard hits the nail on the head. He just goes: "Fuck me, it's worse than Palmerston North."

We pull up outside Parliament House, and right on the front lawn is a dead kangaroo with another smaller dead kangaroo sticking out of its bum. So Bollard's like: "What the fuck is that -- some sort of sculpture?" And the cop goes: "Nah, what happens is that a car hits a small kangaroo so hard that it shoots off the road and straight up a big kangaroo's arse and kills him." Of course, we all have a big laugh at this, but I'm still wondering if the cop is kidding, or if that really happens.

We go inside, and the first person we see is Genevieve the Canadian. She's a television journo for TVNZ -- and if there's one thing Bollard hates it's Canadians, and if there's another thing he hates it's television journos. Not to mention that Genevieve the Canadian has done a bunch of stories on the Reserve Bank that basically amount to 'Why is Alan Bollard such a dick?'

Bollard gives her the fingers right off, but she's looking the other way -- which annoys Bollard, but it means we avoid having another slanging match before our tripartite meeting with the Japanese and Australians.

What with being kicked out of the taxi and everything, we're running bit late, and the other two are already talking by the time we sit down. Masaaki Shirakawa from the Bank of Japan is at the head of the table, and he's going: "We have the Yakuza problem in my country. And, of course, crime detracts from the efficiency of the economy. The way I see it, when a criminal organization starts to make an impact on economic performance, it's just the same as if they called me a bitch to my face."

Now he's opening his jacket, and pulling a gun from a shoulder holster. "So that's when my friend here comes in useful. This is the Glock 21 -- weighs about three-quarters of a kilogram, and holds 13 rounds of 0.45acp hollow-points. We go to a love hotel, and wait in a room for the Yakuza and his girlfriend to turn up. When they walk in the door we fire maybe 50 or 100 rounds into them. No more problem from that Yakuza."

I find out later that the Bank of Japan often don't wait for the Yakuza to walk into the room -- they just shoot the door and whoever's behind it full of holes. And sometimes it isn't the gangsters, but a hotel maid or bus-boy. Luckily, however, such people are of no importance in a macro-economic sense, and so no-one cares.

After Shirakawa's speech, the Japanese and Australian delegates give a round of applause, and then Glenn Stevens gets up: "Masaaki's presentation gives me confidence in the approach we're taking at the Reserve Bank of Australia. We've just tooled up with the Walther PPK 7.65 mm. No disrespect to Glock fans, but the Walther PPK's the gun that James Bond uses, and so we feel that it's more of a tried-and-tested solution."

He opens his briefcase, and holds up a PPK so everyone can have a perv. "I haven't actually used this yet, but I've got it all figured out. When I get face-to-face with one of the godfathers from the Aussie Mafia, I'm going to say to him: 'Don't make me pull my PPK -- 'cause if I do, you know I'm gonna shoot you dead.' And then when he tries to pull his gun, I'm going to pull this out real quick, and shoot him first."

There's a big round of applause at this, and then Glenn Stevens looks over at us, and he goes: "So what do you guys pack in New Zealand, Alan?"

Bollard leans back in his chair, and he's like: "Let me tell you a story, Glenn. Anyone gives me any problems, I use this." He taps his forehead.

I assume Bollard means that he dishes out a head-butt (actually, I find out afterwards that this is exactly what he means), but Stevens goes: "That's a cool story, Bollard. You use your brain -- I dig that. But the way I look at it, there's a time you gotta let Mr PPK or Mr Glock do the thinking for you."

So then Bollard's like: "Let me tell you another story, Glenn. The way I look at it, guns are for pussies."

When Bollard says this I'm quite surprised, because I know for a fact that he's been badgering the prime minister for years to have a gun. And apparently Helen Clark is like: "Get fucked Bollard -- you're the last person I'd trust with a firearm." I begin to realize that international diplomacy is more complicated than I'd thought.

Of course, now Shirakawa is starting with the old "Who're you calling a pussy?" line. So I'm on my feet, and I'm like: "I'm afraid that Dr Bollard has another appointment now, so we're going to have to move along."

I get Bollard out into the corridor, and he's totally pissed off. He's like: "Everyone else has a gun, why won't they give me one?" And then he's like: "And I'm the only guy in there with a real Ph.D. -- Professor Shirakawa, my fucking arse!"

Now we're walking down the corridor -- and I'm congratulating myself on having avoided a nasty spot of aggro -- when who do we meet but Toshihiko Fukui, the former Governor of the Bank of Japan. Fukui is a nice polite white-haired old guy, who stops and introduces himself. But the next thing Bollard smacks him in the mouth and sends him flying. Then Bollard moves in and starts giving Fukui a bit of foot-leather.

So I grab Bollard and wrestle him into the lift, and then I'm like: "What did you do that for?". And Bollard's like: "He told me to get fucked in Japanese." And I'm like: "That's just his name, for fuck's sake."

We get to the hotel room, and now Bollard's holding his hand awkwardly. And then he goes: "I think I might have hurt myself." I take a look, and I see that one of his knuckle bones has burst through the skin, and is waving around getting a bit of fresh air.

So now Bollard's all: "Can you push it back in for me?" So I put my finger on the end of the bone and press really hard, and Bollard's like: "Fuck that hurts!" And he jerks his hand away -- and suddenly the knuckle bone comes right out, and pings off into the sink.

I go over and look at the bone, which is all bloody and dripping. And I'm wondering if Bollard's hand will be crippled with a missing knuckle, and whether he might have to have it amputated or something. But then I realize that it isn't a knuckle bone at all, but just one of Toshihiko Fukui's front teeth.

So we open up the mini-bar, and Bollard has a few drinks to sterilize the cut on his hand. And I have a few drinks so that Bollard isn't drinking alone. Then we mooch on down to the conference dinner.

Of course, Genevieve the Canadian is standing outside the restaurant, and she's all over Bollard with a microphone: "Can you tell me about the altercation between yourself and Toshihiko Fukui?" But Bollard just goes: "Why don't you Fukui yourself, Genevieve" -- and walks straight past her.

The conference dinner is long and dull. They're only serving Australian beer, which if you ask me tastes like normal beer, but with sugar in it. Fukui is a real downer all night: sitting at his table feeling sorry for himself with a black eye, swollen nose, no front teeth -- and everyone keeps staring at us like it's our fault. Later on, I hear Bollard explaining to Svein Gjedrem from the Bank of Norway: "Someone tells you to get fucked in Japanese, you can't just stand there and take it, can you?"

After dinner, Bollard and Gjedrem ask me along to a pub they've heard has half-price non-Australian beer after midnight. But I'm tired after a long day, and waking up on a luggage trolley and everything, and so I head back to my hotel room.

Next morning, first thing I hear is a bunch of police sirens, and naturally I'm thinking: "What's Bollard done now?" I try to get to his hotel room, but the police have blocked off the whole floor. So I head downstairs to the lobby, and to my surprise there's Bollard in the restaurant -- scoffing down bacon and eggs, and looking chipper. I give him a "hello", and sit down and order breakfast myself.

Now Bollard's telling me the events of last night. He goes: "So anyway, I'm just having a quick slash before we go to the pub, and I see Toshihiko Fukui talking to the economists from the Bank of Japan, and suddenly they're all getting out their Glocks and checking the magazines. Of course, I don't think anything about this at the time -- but when I get back, I start wondering if maybe they're waiting in my hotel room to fill me full of hollow-points like they do with the Yakuza.

"So I figure: better safe than sorry. I phone Genevieve the Canadian, and I'm like: 'Sorry I told you to get fucked earlier tonight, Genevieve . It's just that I've got cancer of the balls, and it's making me bad-tempered. Maybe you could do a story on it -- Bollard's Brush with Bollock Cancer -- that sort of thing. In fact, I think I might even cry on camera. Perhaps you should get your film crew and come up to my room?'"

Just then Bollard is interrupted by a group of cops carrying three stretchers down the stairs. Looking over, I see that the dudes on the stretchers aren't feeling too well -- they've got sheets tucked over their heads, which is generally a pretty bad sign.

Next thing a cop stumbles, and one of the corpses plops off the stretcher onto the floor -- and blow-me-down it's Genevieve the Canadian. Mind you, I can only tell from her dress because the rest of her is just strawberry jam. It makes me feel quite ill for a couple of seconds. But then breakfast arrives, and it smells so good that luckily I regain my appetite.

So now I'm turning back to Bollard, and I'm like: "Then what happened?"

At that moment, a bunch of New Zealand television journos come rushing into the lobby, and they're all fighting each other to get a good photo of Genevieve the Canadian's corpse. Then one of them sees Bollard and now they're scrambling over to our table shouting: "How do you feel, Dr Bollard?"

Well, you've gotta hand it to Bollard -- he can turn on the old gravitas. He just clears his throat, and he's all: "This morning, in deeply tragic circumstances, New Zealand television journalism lost its brightest star..."

Note:
David Haywood is a close personal friend and spiritual advisor to Alan Bollard. He is willing to sell the exclusive rights to this true story to New Idea, Investigate Magazine, or as a cover story for The New Zealand Listener.

Long hours of darkness during winter are one of the few disadvantages of Southland. We set out from the crib at quarter-to-eight in the morning -- the sky was as black as the inside of a coffin.

Overnight, a storm had transformed Foveaux Strait into a jumble of spray and foam. Inky waves were washing onto the road outside our local dairy. The wind picked up a sheet of water, and hurled it across our windscreen. I felt as though we'd been submersed in a giant cup of espresso.

Jennifer phoned the airline to ask if they were still flying. Unbelievably, they were.

On the open road after Riverton the gusts grew even stronger. It felt dangerous to drive at more than two-thirds of the speed limit. The car twitched sideways whenever we came to a gap in the hedges. Jennifer called the airline to inform them that we might be a little late. She asked them -- hopefully -- if the flight had been cancelled. It hadn't.

At the airport it took considerable effort to open the car doors against the wind. I recalled my mother's words from our telephone conversation the previous evening: "Promise me that you won't fly if it's still stormy." She had embarked on a long story about the day that Buddy Holly died, and then enlightened me on details from the autopsy of Kathleen Kennedy. As an encore, she performed a telephonic re-enactment of the final scene from 'The Glenn Miller Story'.

"We fly in this sort of weather all the time," the pilot told us. The plane shuddered and rocked as we waited for clearance to roll onto the runway.

It was unquestionably the most alarming flight of my life. Raindrops hurtled into the windshield like bullets. The plane swerved and see-sawed; the world vanished as we careened through dense cloud. We were tossed violently around in our seats. Sometimes the plane yawed almost at right-angles to our direction of travel. Below us, Foveaux Strait looked like an uninviting place to crash-land.

Stewart Island wobbled over the horizon; plump little hills dressed in green baize. We swayed above Rimu trees and matchbox houses. I caught sight of the airstrip -- heaving like the deck of a ship. "Kathleen Kennedy's eyeballs actually exploded when her plane hit the ground," my mother had told me.

The landing was straight from a textbook -- not even the slightest bump. We rolled gently to a halt on the runway. If we'd been anyone but New Zealanders, we'd have all rushed forward to kiss the pilot. As it was, one of the passengers merely murmured: "Nice work". The rest of us grunted our agreement.

At our rented cottage, a kaka cawed loudly in the front garden. From the top of Observation Rock we could look across Paterson Inlet to Ulva Island. It was ludicrously pretty. The island might have been designed by a jeweller; the inlet by a mirror-maker. I felt as if we'd been kidnapped by photo-retouchers, and imprisoned in one of their brochures.

In the information centre at Oban, we asked about suitable activities for parents lumbered with a bad baby. "One thing I can absolutely recommend is the local bus," said the clerk. "You'll go all over Oban, and the driver will tell you everything about the history of the island. It's a really wonderful experience -- you'll love it."

My Scottish ancestry jumped for joy at the possibility of a cheap outing on a local bus. Three minutes later, and $70 poorer, we boarded the coach -- with my Scottish ancestry in medical shock. The clerk from the information centre climbed aboard, and sat in the driver's seat.

We were the sole passengers, but the clerk insisted on the full-service treatment. Despite sitting less than a metre in front of us, she delivered her monologue via the coach's loud-speaker system. "As many of you will be aware," she began, "We are in New Zealand's third-largest island..."

Early the next morning we briefly departed from our nation's third-largest bit of map; a water-taxi carried us to Ulva. It was pleasant to have an island to oneself.

The only buildings on Ulva are a couple of elderly cribs. The forest floor is surprisingly navigable -- with a thin undergrowth of knee-high ferns. Exotic-looking birds drifted through the canopy: native parakeets and Stewart Island robins. Jennifer, whose diet has been restricted since the birth of Bob-the-baby, wondered if they would taste as delicious as they looked. We ate apples in a grove of totara trees.

Our departure from Stewart Island was like the Prozac version of our arrival. The plane seemed to be hardly moving. We floated above Foveaux Strait as if suspended from balloons. Riverton could be seen in the hazy distance -- a homely lagoon and a cluster of fishing-boats.

Five days later we awoke to a sorrowful dawn. I loaded our possessions into the car, locked the crib for the last time, and slipped the keys under the door. "Goodbye crib," said Jennifer. "Goodbye lovely Riverton." And then later: "Goodbye Invercargill -- we liked you!"

The Catlins were our final leave-taking from Southland. Imagine a child's drawing of a landscape: hills humped in cosy catenaries; meadows dotted with sheep; green copses of lollipop trees; the occasional smoke-puffing farmhouse.

I pressed my foot onto the accelerator, and we began our journey northwards.

On Lambton Quay the verandahs were crowded with pedestrians avoiding the rain. Bob-the-baby squirmed nervously in my arms -- hiding his face in the collar of my jacket. We splashed our way across the intersection at Stout Street. The railway station was packed with commuters.

In Riverton we'd have been arriving home from our afternoon walk. The leading lights would be showing across the river mouth; fishing boats would be returning to the lagoon. I'd be stacking the night's firewood, and taking a last look across Foveaux Strait in the twilight.

It's a long way from here to there.

On Thursday night at 2.03 am, the Moon decided it was time to get McNulty. With a single stride it scissored the Tasman sea, and by 2.07 am it was outside McNulty's bedroom door in Grey Lynn.

"Come out, McNulty, so I can get you," hissed the Moon angrily through the keyhole, as it rattled the handle of the locked bedroom door.

McNulty lay trembling in his bed. Moonlight streamed under the door, and filled the room with a harsh silver glare. The hallway floor creaked loudly as the Moon attempted to crouch low enough to look through the keyhole.

At 4.11 am, the Moon became tired of waiting. "McNulty's out," it said to itself. And it glided back to hover over the mid-Pacific, where it should have been all night.

The next morning McNulty visited a psychiatrist.

The psychiatrist worked in a slender tower that stretched above Queen Street. He wore a stethoscope that matched the lamp on his desk. His teeth were the colour of snow.

"I know what you're thinking," he said to McNulty. "You're thinking that I've painted my teeth with typing correction fluid."

McNulty lowered his eyes.

"Let me tell you something," the psychiatrist paused, "that might help you with your paranoid lunar hallucinations."

"We're on the 30th floor here, McNulty. People say that a kitten thrown from the 30th floor will land on its feet -- and walk away completely unharmed. However, I can tell you that this is not true. I've thrown dozens of kittens out of this window, and they have all died."

"It's an illness actually. So you see we have that in common, McNulty. You have a delusion about the moon, and I have a medical condition that involves throwing kittens from windows. In fact, I can tell you candidly that I'm a much sicker man than you. My illness is not easy to live with. Nor is it cheap. "

"I obtain the kittens from animal shelters. But they become suspicious if too many are collected at once. So I've developed a network of shelters that I visit under assumed names. I have to drive enormous distances to reach them all. But that is the price I pay for having a condition like mine."

He gazed at McNulty across the shining expanse of his desk. "You see what I'm getting at, don't you? If a man as sick as me can put in a full day's work, then there's no reason someone as comparatively healthy as you should be shying away from employment. Why should the state spend money to put you in a mental hospital when it won't do the same for me?"

McNulty looked past the psychiatrist to see the moon's huge eye pressed up against the window. "I'm coming to get you, McNulty," the Moon growled, sending a deep subsonic rumble through the building.

"Run along off to work now, McNulty," said the psychiatrist. "It's best if you continue your life as normal."

McNulty was employed in a dim and primeval factory. He operated a device that inserted objects into boxes. Mr Blackburn was his manager. "If you're late one more time, McNulty, you'll be down the road before you can say 'no redundancy payout'." Mr Blackburn was calm and efficient; he had no time for dead wood in his workplace. "This will be your only warning."

Green worked next to McNulty on a conveyor belt. "Did you hear what Mr. Blackburn said?" asked Green. "He said you'll be down the road if you're late again. That means fired, McNulty. So you'd better not be late again. Or else you'll be fired. With no redundancy payout. That's what Mr Blackburn said."

As penance for his late start, McNulty worked into the evening. While he laboured, Mr. Blackburn lectured him on becoming a better employee. Mr Blackburn was a passionate orator. Tiny flecks of his spittle rained upon McNulty's face, and some landed in his mouth. "My taxes already pay for enough people like you on the dole," concluded Mr Blackburn. "Not to mention living the life of luxury in prison."

The Moon waited in the parking lot outside the factory.

McNulty finished putting his last object into a box, and removed his overalls. The building was shadowy and silent. The only noise was the hiss of the polishing machines.

As he opened the factory door, McNulty could see Mr Blackburn's legs in the moonlight. They were lying about five metres apart. There was a smear of black on the concrete that might have been blood.

"I saw everything," said Cleaner Bill from the dark shadows. "First the Moon pinched off his arms, then his legs, and then it twisted off his head. Mr Blackburn was screaming right until the end. I thought he was singing at first, but then I decided it must be screaming. I don't think singing would be normal under those circumstances."

Cleaner Bill came into the half-light and gave McNulty a hesitant grin. "Of course, the Moon's been after me for years. But I'm safe because I never go outside."

He restarted his polishing machine. "It drives the Moon mad with frustration that it can't get me," he told McNulty. "Recently it's been trying all sorts of tricks. It's started putting little television cameras inside my fruit -- even in the tomatoes, which most people would regard as a vegetable."

When Cleaner Bill had finished polishing the floor, he took McNulty to see the tunnel. "I've been working on it for years," he said. "I'm nearly all the way through."

The tunnel was illuminated by thousands of cigarette lighters. McNulty felt as if they were travelling into a gigantic birthday cake. An earthworm the size of a sofa inspected them as they clambered along. McNulty's face was brushed by dripping roots. At the far end of the tunnel a thin crack shone with daylight.

Cleaner Bill inserted a shovel into the crack. He lifted a slice of dirt. Now they had a glimpse of seashore. He took another slice. Now they could see palm trees. Another slice. Now the tunnel was illuminated with glaring tropical sunlight.

They wandered onto the sand. A salty breeze tugged at McNulty's clothing. A bear was sitting in one of the coconut groves.

Its jaws were the size of a deck-chair. McNulty caught the flash of a horrified face as the bear crunched and tore. He saw polka-dots of blood. The bear gulped down the last mouthfuls of Cleaner Bill, and galloped away to the tropical forest.

McNulty wondered if bears could swim. He waded into the water. After a while the bear padded back onto the beach.

"This is the other side of the world," said the bear in Cleaner Bill's voice. "The Moon never comes here."

McNulty sloshed back to shore, and sat down beside the bear. The sun fell below the horizon. There was no moon.

'The Moon and McNulty' was written in 1988, and unearthed (while sorting through old papers) in February 2008.