The sound of the party was spilling into the street, the fireworks , arcing up over the city like agitated cat tails were long gone, the smell of  the their exploding mortars hanging in the memories of onlookers, but back in the ‘burbs’ the party was still continuing. One A.M. now. It was an ‘invite only’ party and everyone had been indulging in snags and steaks from the exhausted barbecue, and crunchy potato chips. Too many teeth had been clenched on salty mixed nuts. Now under the influence of the 6th vodka chaser or the tenth stubbie of finest Tassie ale, things were getting a little bit noisy – the neighbours were unimpressed.

A small crew were in the front room playing cards or watching rage or something similar when the door bell rang and there in a state of excessive drunkeness was the last person on the planet anybody wanted to see. Initially a gentle word of ‘not-welcome-mate’ was issued, but somewhere between the gasoline of alcohol  and the burning match of anger he forced his way through the front door and into the house. A struggle ensued with fists and bouts of swearing which mushroomed as some other folks came down the hall to check the commotion.  At this point the gate-crasher’s fist went flying through the door in anger. He should have broken it by rights, it hurt that much but it would just be a series of purple bruises in the morning. Now a clutch of screaming clawing women had made their way to the front of the house along with several of the more  burly blokes and the gatecrasher decided it was time to cut and run.

The Buddhist calm of the gathering had been interrupted by a  hammer and anvil attack from Satan and the trail of splintered destruction left behind spoke of the powers of evil, the evils of alcohol and the power of anger and rage.   The music was meant to stop around one but some claimed it went til four some til two, the truth may never be known, but somehow in the fractured reality of the next day somebody knew they’d gone too far and things needed to change…..