Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?

Holidays are almost at an end. And what lonely holidays they have been. For the last 2 weeks I have been living at home by myself (Im not complaining about that) as my parents and sister traveled to the Gold Coast by car via Byron Bay, Coffs Harbour, Noosa and Fraser Island (by their request I am to join them in a few days to visit the worlds of Movies and Dreams – I was studying my body in the mirror trying to work out how I would look walking down the beaches but I realised I’m too white and everyone will be blinded by the reflection of the sun off my body). I was thinking of going up a bit earlier and visiting Hamilton Island so I could catch up with my brother who has been working there for the last few months because, dare I say it, I have missed him these holidays. Back in the old days we would do everything in the holidays together, especially in the winter. Whether it be backyard cricket/footy/soccer by ourselves or with the neighbours or massive Nintendo competitions, we would have fun.

Lets go back in time to when I was 17. My brother was 15, the 2 next door neighbours 19 and 21, the neighbour across the road 16, his sister 13, neighbours two houses down him 14 her 16, the girl across the street and a house down 19. On any days of sunshine massive street cricket games would erupt, made even better by the fact that we live in a no through road meaning the only cars that came down were those that lived there. Or if there was only a few of us, the next door neighbours had a half-court tennis court so smaller cricket, soccer, tennis, basketball games would entertain us for hours. Or if it was raining we would play cards. I learnt and mastered many games including that of Cheat, Warlords and Scumbags, Entrepreneur, Black Jack (although not much luck at the casino) or the strategical board games of Risk, Space Crusades, and Cash Flow. Or if it was just me and my brother we would often spend hours in front of the Nintendo (or more recently the Xbox) and try and out do each other, especially at Mario Kart 64. We once even went all the way and started a massive Mario Kart 64 tournament consisting of competing in all four cups at 50cc, 100cc, 150cc and backwards with the ultimate champion being the one who earned the most points through all races. Bonus points were awarded for the cup win. And the same character had to be used over every race. I was a Donkey Kong fan. We would even spend hours taking it turns in time trials on different circuits to try and determine who the Ultimate Champion was.

Back to the future, and we have all grown up. No more street cricket or backyard soccer. And with my brother gone no more Ultimate Champion tournaments. As the song says: 15, there's never a wish better than this.