Rhona Cameron

Can I get a box or something to stand here? Cause otherwise I just stand underneath (the podium) to do it cause I am the shortest person here. Okay, that's sad isn't it? And I was looking so sophisticated as well up till then. Yes, now I haven't done any homework because what I'd actually like to do... I have got some notes. I'd like to get off the box cause it feels silly. I don't know whether anyones ever been to an AA meeting here, butI haven't either - don't feel awkward. But there's a bit where somebody actually tells their personal experience story and that's what I'm going to do with you today. I'm going to tell you my real story, cause I once was an ignorant person. Yes, and I was very unhappy, had no friends. I was miserable, and yes I was unpopular. So unpopular that only saving a small child from drowning would help me...I'll get funnier very soon.

So, there I was, a miserable, ignorant young person. I was so lonely, I had no friends, cause my friends were more knowledgeable than me, and let me tell you, it's far from bliss being lonely. I was so desperate, I'd go to the pub, right and I would call my apartment. I would leave myself an answer message. I would go back and react to it. I'd play hard to get - with myself that is. That's how lonely I was. So, this idea (looks at Judith)...I can't get over your face... I stuck my tongue in. That's all we're thinking about now right? It's like mmmmm, she's quite nice really.

Everybody's ignorant for a certain amount of time you know. We're all fairly ignorant when we're young, and that's what you're twenties are about. You can behave as badly, and as ignorantly as you like. When you're young, everybody finds it attractive. They go, "cute little confused young person there, but they're a bit loveable." Behave like that in your thirties and you're just sad aren't you? So, all of us, we've got to strive to be more knowledgeable. We have, we have. I'd like to take a quote from my dear mother at this point. My mum used to say, "What do I want with a big tin of ham?" Don't know why she used to say it.

Yes, you know, when you're young, you're in your twenties, you think that it's a happy time. It's not. Being young and being ignorant is miserable for a start. Being in your twenties is miserable isn't it? Cause it's exhausting, cause all you're doing is dancing for ten years like that aren't you? You know nothing, you're braindead, you're going, I'm so tired, I wish I could go home, but I can't, I'm in my twenties. I've got to stay out and drink more, and take more drugs, pretend I'm having fun with people I don't like. I want to visit a library! I want to go to a garden centre! I want to eat fruit...I'm gonna get scurvey. I don't even know what scurvey means, I just read about it somewhere.

Then you get to thirty, and you change. You change because you're older and you have more knowledge. You see, every single one of us here tonight, every single human being here tonight has got problems. We've all got a certain amount of problems and if we were to be ignorant and we were not to address these problems, we would never grow as people, we would never develop as spiritual beings. Moved? I hope so. We've all got a certain emotional complexity in us, and we have to look at these things, otherwise we only mess up. When you're young, you fall in love with someone. You don't know anything. You move in with them after 24 hours don't you? And you think...I could grow to love them. When you get older, you know you can't behave like that, you have to be honest, and honesty is knowledge, and knowledge is power, and that's bliss not ignorance ladies and gentlemen. So, we have to look in ourselves. We have to find depth and knowledge and wisdom.

I'd like to tell a really true story now. A sad story of ignorance from my own beloved parents. I remember I passed my drivers test at 17, and I took my mums car out, and I was late home cause I was driving recklessly as an ignorant young person, and I actually killed a dog, ladies and gentlemen. I've never told anyone this before, but I killed a dog. Yes, yes, and I thought that was funny, and I went home. I was scared to go home cause I knew my mother would go absolutely mad, and I was scared, and I dreaded to go home. I took hours to go home, eventually my mum was to greet me at the top of the garden path, and I said, "Mum, I didn't want to come home because I killed a dog." and she said, "Well Rhona, your uncle Jim knocked down a Pakistani in 1955, and he felt awful." I don't know why you laughed, cause that was ignorant. Bliss is nowhere near ignorance. Bliss is having Sigorney Weaver and Holly Hunter in the same film. Bliss is having your nipples pulled on when listening to Farriers (?) Requiem. I'm glad you realated to that. Ignorance is not bliss. Ignorance is nothing like bliss. Ignorance breeds fear, and fear breeds prejudice, and prejudice is not what we want society to be aboutotherwise we'll be racially intolerant, miserable, and small minded and I'm not just talking about North Queensland. Ignorance is not bliss, ladies and gentlemen. Shagging Judith Lucy is. Thank you very much.