Running Around, Asleep or Awake

I am in the Arkaroola Village, a very remote place in the Flinders Ranges. A $65 a night room feels like a shoebox with two beds and a shower, no soap, TV set, fridge or any other luxuries. You walk in straight from the parking lot, and the room windows are big holes that barely separate you from the street through a cellophane-thick sheet of glass. It’s a place where you have to arrive exhausted, crash into bed, sleep and then go the following morning… Spiders hang in observation, strategically, from two opposite corners of the room. They are watching me, the old furniture reflected in the dark brown linoleum, or the warning signs of a mouse plague hanging on the wall? The covers, a rodent grey shade, are lighter than the sheets, and I can almost distinguish footprints on them. I pray the sheets are clean and at no moment of the night I touch the covers. I smell disinfectant, old poison and spider feet, then I fall asleep. I dream that I am not in Arkaroola, where I just enjoyed seeing the stars like light bulbs through the heavy lens of the Arkaroola Observatory. I am back in Melbourne, watching a pink and purple sunset with boats, crystal waters and a sweet flavored breeze. I am walking alongside St. Kilda Beach thinking of how I got there and how easy I hover, asleep or awake, among all these places I’ve seen in my life.