Character building

I'm struggling with my Irish ancestry, specifically trying to replicate a half decent Irish accent. I've put it off for weeks because in my head I can do an excellent Irish accent...but as I've discovered throughout my life what you sound like in your head is not at all like real life.

For instance, I used to think my voice was actually quite deep and sounded smooth and seductive...and then I hear a recording of myself or see myself on a nationally broadcast TV game show called The Contest and I realise that in fact I sound like a pale imitation of Woody Allen...more middle ground Woody Allen actually rather than full blown nerdy nasality. And I find it quite grating...but that's not the point. There have also been times in the past where I haven't looked my best...maybe a bit looser around the middle than I'd like...a little wobbly in the chins department...but have been able to look myself up and down in the mirror, smile at myself, do the gun point and wink, maybe throw in a 'Looking good tiger' and have completely fooled myself into thinking I look gorgeous. Self delusion is the easiest form of flattery.

So I thought I could do Irish. I read a passage with my Irish accent and recorded it...and whatever that accent was, it was not Irish. It was like some dumb cartoon dog from an old Hanna-Barbera show or something...with strange sounding vowels and consonants like 'O'im thunking aboot the parst' (I'm thinking about the past).

Crap is the word.

And since the character description basically says: 20-30, Irish Accent - I only fulfil half the criteria required for the character. So I think I'll see what I can do about listening to some Irishness in a movie or two over the next few days...see if that helps.

But it got me thinking about character and building character...specifically the things you do in your childhood that you initially thought were terrible and then later...you still think are terrible...and then a few more years pass and you think those things are less terrible. For example, in my case our Dad use to make us go to a farm...a hobby farm really...with an apple orchard, corn, strawberries, sheep (I think)...but not in vast amounts...small...like 20 or so acres...and he'd make us go there nearly every weekend (it seemed like every weekend it may have been less)...and me and my brother kicked up a fuss, but in reality we didn't really have anything better to do, we were about 10ish. So this was Dad's way of getting us into the outdoors to a degree...and obviously we hated it. It had spiders...maybe rats...there was work to be done...and sometimes nothing to be done.

And when I look back on those days, I still remember the hate and dislike of the whole damn thing, but it's now ensconced in a nice hazy glaze of nostalgia...I remember the walnut and mulberry tree, the time my brother and I rode a motorbike and slid on some dog sh*t and did a wheelie halfway around the house, playing Gin and Go Fish, watching The Bill on Saturday nights, playing board games, the black floral couch, the small TV, the oil heater, the time Mum lost her ring and then found it in the old wood fire oven, the regularity of Dad after driving us all the way there getting called back at some point during the weekend and leaving us there, the gas gun in the orchard, apples, riding on the doors or in the tray of the truck, the sore back from picking strawberries in the sun terrified the whole time that a Red back spider was going to get you, the creek, tracksuits, gumboots, the chickens, the goats, the smell...everything.

And it's a funny thing. I'm now in my mid-twenties (26 on Monday...Jay-zus!) but all that is stuff that I now cherish and would love to do again. To go away somewhere for a weekend and not be working in an office and just enjoy the atmosphere of the outdoors and to not be in suburbia. I guess it takes some growing up and other life experiences to realise that those kind of activities and experiences are really quite important to who we are, what we do and what we want out of life. Who wouldn't love to drive off after work on Friday to some retreat and live on and off the land? To forget the drudgery of the working life and pick up a shovel and dig a hole...for no other reason that to just dig a hole! A hole! And luckily we live in a country where hole digging opportunities are abundant. Do it. Pick up a shovel and just dig. You won't regret it!

And I know that if the day ever comes that Kirilie and I decide to have children (and may that day never come!) I will enjoy inflicting the same torture on them that my father inflicted on me and my brother...and I know that they will be better people for it...they'll hate it at the time but later they'll grow up to thank me for the experience...and you know what, they may even do it in an Irish accent.