As you get older your memory can start to fail. With my mental illness, this was somewhat worse from a younger age. By the time I was thirty and had been diagnosed I lost a lot of memory function. Every now and then something from the past bubbles up into consciousness. For me, I feel like all of my memories are still intact but they are locked away in cold storage somewhere in my brain. I remembered something from the late 90s. I remembered Elf Tranzporter and his crew. I would always see them around the cafes in Darlinghurst. They were always freestyling raps and writing lyrics. Sydney still had some soul even though now it is mainly lost. I follow some new Sydney artists and keep an eye on who is doing what. Yet these days I am out of touch mainly due to the fact that I am not going out much. I don’t really hang on the streets or go-to venues. I am glad to see Elf is still making music. I have been trying to follow Australian artists and buy merchandise or stream music. As an artist myself with no income stream I try to share what I can to support a little bit. A few years I got right into Sevcom (Severed Heads) and did some music buying and generally started to watch local artists and see what they were selling. Most money is heading overseas rather than to local artists. That is of course unless they get the golden goose egg of overseas acceptance. It makes you wonder what will happen to Australia if we can’t support our own artists. People do of course but not enough underground performers get any dues. I was always pretty aloof back in the day. I was always watching and observing the general goings-on in the areas I was hanging out in. The memory just suddenly came to me so I asked an old friend from that time about it to jog my memory. Then of course I googled it. Most people I knew from that era moved out of Sydney as generally, it has been a tough gig with housing prices going through the roof. Melbourne was the main go-to for a lot of artists escaping Sydney. They were probably the lucky ones. I am lucky to be able to live in Sydney at all and I have a full-time job. Well, I am glad I remembered and I love his album (from 2007). There is a new single out and he has featured on a lot of albums.

I remember I saw a lady from that period and at first, I couldn’t remember how I knew her. So I avoided talking to her, then a few weeks later I remembered but I couldn’t remember her name or the people’s names from that group. My memory is actually improving, at least I think it is. I remember little funny things I would say to my ex-partner. Then I think is remembering the best thing? Yes and no. Maybe when we have a trauma our brains shut down to protect themselves. Now I just need to find those connections again.