Talking with tradesmen

Hey Bree! Hahaha. I talked to Bree in New York this week and she says she checks my blog every day, so I thought I should update. Between closing up the store and trying to do my own writing I haven't had much time or energy left for blogging recently. The store packup continues. I felt a little off-kilter when we first started packing up, worried about my life post-Plup, but since then my thoughts have been less ambivalent, and I'm just looking forward to being done. I know there are things I'll miss about the shop, but it will take a while, I think, before I have enough perspective to write about them.

Today I went out to one of those industrial estates to purchase some rack shelving we need. Such places, and the people who work there, make me nervous, and today I think I figured out why. I think there is a class distinction in Australia - not a particularly rigid or hereditary or even financial one, but there is a cultural gap between people who go to university and work in comparatively professional jobs, and people who do trades, and I'm very concious of it and intimidated by it. One of the areas where you can see this, I think, is that there is a difference in accent - for want of a better word - and more obviously, in language. Those who work in trades talk "mate" language. Now I know plenty of people who can easily slip into talking this way, but I find it very difficult, it always seems to sound horribly forced and phoney when I try to talk it. The "accent" goes with it. Call it Broad Australian, or the Australian drawl, or whatever.

Now here's the thing. At least in younger Australians, I think this drawling, laconic way of talking mimics the tones of sarcasm. Think of the comedian Dave Hughes for the sort of voice I am talking about. I don't think it's meant sarcastically, but it registers on my ears as sarcasm.

So here is what happens. I go to one of these places where there are all these strong men working with their hands. I fumble about my business, which they know much better than I do, feeling all the time like an effete asshole, and imagining that this is how they perceive me, which they probably do. This puts me generally in a paranoid frame of mind. Now what inevitably happens is this: one of these men will use their favourite phrase, which is:

"No worries, mate."

Here is what I hear:

"No worries, mate."

See the difference?

The guy who helped me was nice - at least, I think he was, but I felt like a fool the whole time I was there. After I'd bought the shelves they were all piled up for me and I began taking them out to the car. I took them out four shelves at a time. After I was about halfway through the guy I'd been talking to, who had already said goodbye, came over and more or less picked up the rest, threw them up on his shoulder, and without a word took them out to my car.

"Thanks," I said, sheepishly.

"No worries, mate."

I think the jumbo dollar sale will be starting on Saturday. Mention this blog and receive a discount of up to one hundred percent, depending on how much I like you.

posted by Nicholas @ 10:35 PM