out and about

A tall, brown-haired schoolgirl walks the pedestrian way in easy strides. Her top is white and her backpack is blue, like her long, skinny trousers. She shakes her head and lifts one arm in a gesture, moving her lips in silent rehearsal or review. Now and then, a syllable goes live.

Two very old ladies are on a mission, powering along Dee Why Parade with walking sticks, urgent looks and identical rolling gaits. Their height and hair colour match but not their outfits. One wears a kind of mesh with black lace over dark slacks, but the other is almost casual by comparison. They exchange terse comments.

A middle-aged man in York Street: grey trousers, light blue t-shirt, short hair pinched on top and held with a rubber band. He lights a cigarette. His coffee rests on a garbage bin and he lurks there, watching the street.

A father is trying to shop in Aldi while his smiling daughter clings to the trolley and walks her shoes up the chiller shelves. The girl has dark hair, red-framed glasses, red corduroy jeans and a pink jumper. As they turn a corner she still hangs on but the red corduroys are at full stretch, one leg behind and balanced on a toe, the other foot wedged on the trolley.

The father remains grimly focused.

A youngish woman prowls along the bus like an angry bird. She has short, curly blonde hair and eyes locked in a frown.

Strange white installations rise from a cruise ship’s deck at Circular Quay. They look like giant cotton buds. Proof of Covid testing.

Millard Street, Drummoyne is drenched in sunshine, and scuttling with newly-minted skinks.

On York Street a wild-haired, angry man adjusts his red mobility scooter, sits back and shouts an obscenity. He lunges forward again, cigarette dangling from a corner of his mouth, and makes another adjustment.

Dark clouds above the harbour, and a crane with beacon flashing in the gloom. School uniforms crowded on a rooftop.

In Neutral Bay a man slips on a metal grate and his hands fly up in the air.

Manly Vale Golf Course: five clean white ibis graze on the rain-washed green.

A portly man in his thirties squeezes awkwardly between the railings, clings to the top one and hangs, suspended above the path. He opens his hands and drops three inches, landing perfectly with knees bent. Straightening, he turns in triumph to his less daring partner on the ramp.

A small girl stands with drooping arms, like a toy put down and forgotten. She has straight, shoulder-length brown hair, a dusty pink dress, pink sandals and white socks. She watches her dad choose a trolley, and when he speaks she scuttles forward with a grin.

A little dog trots wilfully round its human, obliging her to rotate before continuing.

An unusual stroller crosses Triangle Park. It’s black all over, a sleek racing pod with big, spoked wheels at the back. Struts of metal tubing protect the seat, and micro-mesh encloses it. There’s a brand name, too, normally seen on top of cars racing to catch Australia’s two-minute ski season.

I saw something like this in Mosman once, but it was red and contained a pair of angry Dachshunds.

Two people approach the top of the ramp, a mother and her toddler daughter with a topknot, yellow shorts, white t-shirt and sparkling white, velcro-strapped shoes.

‘Yes,’ says the mother. ‘Down.’

The girl surges onto the ramp with a cackle, hands in the air and giggling as she tears downhill like a runaway clockwork toy, all the way to the bottom where she turns and grins with delight.

Her mother joins her there and they set off at a sedate pace, walking on the flat. The girl falls over.

A small boy, quiet but insistent, makes his father stop in the Dee Why Grand. The boy has light brown hair trimmed short, blue jeans and a long-sleeved pullover with blue, red and white stripes. The father passes him a shiny, vicious looking sword that bends in the middle, and the boy reaches up with both hands to slide it down the back of his pullover. First he can’t find an opening, then the sword catches. The father goes back for something they’ve dropped.

Coming in from the rain I encounter a banquet in a tunnel. A double line of tables runs down the centre and every chair is occupied by someone talking, shouting, laughing, eating, smiling. The roar of it fills the space and bounces off the walls and ceiling.

Walking along the line I see that many small groups, unknown to each other, have come together in this white-tiled place between two weather-swept streets, united by their common desire for shelter, warmth and hot food.

Rain clatters on metal tables. Staff bang chairs into stacks. Tyres hiss on the road, and the gutters run.

The cafe is closing but a brown French bulldog sits in the doorway, looking out at the rain. I pause, and the dog’s face turns to stare at me. It blinks.

A vast hair style walks ahead of me, curly and brown, spreading like a river delta. The centre runs lighter, as if muddy foam has coalesced there, and blonde outriders are the debris that sweeps along each bank.

A little black poodle, legs like pipe-cleaners, trots along the path.

A boy and a girl follow their mother into the gelato shop, the boy cradling a ginger Pomeranian like an infant in his arms. When they emerge it’s the girl who cradles the dog, but she attempts a mid-air transfer of dog to mother and ice cream to girl. The dog hangs by a collar.

A schoolgirl swaps her backpack to the front so she can access it while walking. Her ponytail brushes her neck.

With her chignon, sunglasses and slinky dark material, this blonde girl truly is the Hollies' long cool woman in a black dress, all the way down to her white socks and trainers.

She catches the B1.