Gardenvale

 

The eye alights upon Legoland crimson tilework cobbling downward from divides, nestling on its laurels curving amiably about the highslung gutters and ageing eaves. Rooftops and cupolas and penumbrae of illustrious eucalypts meet the window vision of Jaded Bayside Commuters (JBC) semi-slumped in their select blue train seats, their eye tracing ibis-like antennae standing on one leg above jigsaws of roof corners tracking who knows what frequencies of telecommunication to their visual ends, or did once upon a time, countless screens beneath geometries of tin and tile, metal-grey and Tuscan-brown, rust-lined and lichen-patched, corrugated and crenelated, wavy and choppy. The eye is the most refined curve inspecting cubist roofscapes of the cubist age, the bayside squares of Georges Braque rampant between beachfront and ten-lane highway, those famed half-shadows sudden hard edges in relief, those multiple vanished vanishing points someplace behind solid walls abutting complexities of cut-and-paste. Rainwashed spires, rainsoaked leafage lining rainflecked guttering, raindashed aircons, raindropped wroughtiron laceworks are drying to the eye that discerns the differences after the rain. The eye registers redbrick amidst piled high foliage, mission-style chipping grey patches behind rounded wattles and pruned exotics, zigzags of units’ railings rusting under mountains of jasmine and scarlet native pea. The eye has scant seconds between doors opening airily and doors beeping shut again, to discern curlicue Victorian gothic, post-Victorian reshapes, mock Queen Anne tendencies, pre-deco daring, pre-modern modern, peeled deco stucco, charmless postmodern modern, post-deco parapets, harmless prosceniums, balcony frames, and pottery sculptures, some terra cotta. Gardenvale’s orderly mazes are spaced distinctly for good living, the eye would seem to be saying, assembled across bayside sandy soil: larger foreground, distinguishable middle ground, wherever the eye gazes towards distant rooftops of the same. Except, the mind of the JBC says, what are the lives going on apace beneath this vision of dwellings, their names, their desires, their ins and outs? The mind kickstarts imaginings of daily activity, as the carriage shifts gently into action again, wishing to step Alice-like through passing casements of dull reflection and portholes of inner glow and infrequent double-glazing row upon row and business frames with repeat lighting and repeat bay windows and Georgian fanlights, if only to catch a glimpse within, of whom? Not that the mind can, as roofscapes accelerate to be replaced with others, downpipes, solar panels, satellite dishes, offset by green firework palmtrees, powderblue gums, deleafed elms decidedly deciduous …