On Accidents and Coincidences

I had an odd experience today.

I woke up on my day off, and went for a 15 km run. I was almost home, on the last stretch of the Merri Creek when I ran past a girl on a bike. A moment later I hear a light crunch sound in the background of my music. I turn around to look back and there’s no-one there, so I assume the girl has just sped around the corner, but on a whim, I stop and run back a couple of steps.

When I get back to the bend where I passed her, I see she’s slipped with her bike off the edge of the path and fallen down the edge of the creek. There’s some big hefty rocks along the edge of the path and she’s standing in a crack between two of them, holding the bike up above her head with both hands.

There’s a lot of screaming, coming from a baby I hadn’t noticed, strapped to the back of the bike. It’s hanging off the edge of the bike, which is hanging off the edge of the rock, all supported by the girl underneath who is holding it up and out of the water.

I jump off the edge and grab the bike from above, drag it back up on to the path, then help the girl up. We take the baby out of the bike seat (still screaming) and I walk the bike around the corner and drop it off the side of the path for her, then go back to collect her pannier that has fallen down between the rocks. We walk back around the path to where her bike is as checks the baby is ok.

She’s a little shook up, but seems to be mostly fine and the baby starts to calm down. I give her my phone number on the off-chance that when the adrenalin wears off she starts to fall apart, and then run home.

When I get home I scrolled back through my Instagram to check out the date of my own bike accident.

Turns out it was one year ago today…

What an odd coincidence – that I could be there to help someone with their accident, the same way that someone was there a year ago to help me with mine.

I still remember the feeling of disbelief, of shock, the lack of understanding I had in the moments after I came off my bike, and how lucky I was in hindsight to have someone ride past just then and stop to help me pick up my things, put my laptop and water bottle back into my backpack, and walk with me, pushing my bike along the path until we got to a road where I could call Steve to come pick me up.

Also how lucky I was to have Steve to come pick me up and drive me to Emergency, how lucky I was to have Grace come sit with me while I fainted in the ward.

The kindness of strangers is a big thing, and I’m glad I was there to help out when someone else needed me. I got a message a couple of hours later from the girl, saying she’d taken the baby to emergency to make sure there was no injuries and that they were both fine.

One year on from falling off my bike, and what a year its been.

…

I’ll be honest, it’s been an up and down year.

Finger first – there’s still some ongoing issues, namely that the first joint is a bit stuffed – the finger straightens out now (thank goodness), but the way the bone set, the tip of my finger doesn’t really feel like the end of my finger. It kind of ends a millimetre to the right of where it used to end, which makes some things painful – namely playing guitar and pressing elevator buttons.

Playing drums is fine – I’m back to two handed and as fast as I’ve ever been (not very fast). Although I do miss the spectacle of playing with one arm in a sling and the positive reinforcement I got from crowds at Woodford post-show, being able to get around with two hands is a blessing.

Playing banjo is mostly fine, with a thin neck and close spacing of the strings I can mostly play it fine, although there’s a handful of chords that I can’t quite reach.

Guitar is off the cards. It’s just too painful – the way my finger tip ends and the way the first joint is kind of locked means most of the stuff I used to be able to play I can’t play any more, and playing for any length of time really hurts.

It’s a shame, because I’ve had an underlying urge to head off on a solo tour, but I haven’t had the time to commit to the practice I need to get my guitar skills back up to scratch. I keep telling myself that if I put in the effort the finger will callus up and I’ll be able to do the thing again, but motivation is low and it’s been a buuuuusy year anyway, so whatevs.

Speaking of busy – it’s been a two album year, all recorded mixed and mastered at mine. It would have been a four album year but I’ve been waiting on other people to get their act in to gear – the older we get the harder it is to get people together into a room to do the things.

The Backyard Banjo Club released our debut EP in August and have done a nice handful of shows throughout the year, including a gig on a tram. Hilarity ensued. I’ve started writing the next album for that band and will probably wrangle it together in the first half of the year.

We’ve got one gig left for the year, out in Hepburn Springs at the wonderful Palais-Hepburn, details here.

Gusto has been flat chat. I counted up our gig dates and in the eighteen months we’ve been playing together we’ve played 54 gigs. Pretty wild. The band is feeling tight and the gigs are joyful. We dropped our second EP in November, a collection of songs I wrote a year ago, and we’ve got a whole set of new songs written with the goal to record in February and release in the middle of the year.

The band is touring right now, doing a never-ending run of shows around the country. Every time I think we’re getting to the end, the next month rolls around a bunch more get booked in. We’ve got a particularly exciting thing planned for next year, but its tentative and I don’t want to put it out into the world before its ready for announcing, so for now you’ll have to watch our old stuff and just imagine what we think might be an exciting time.

We’ve got one Melbourne gig left for the year, a free entry show next weekend which will be a late night affair and a little raucous, if you’re free, come along and see if you can pry some information out of me!