ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
A local man has spent the early hours of this morning punishing himself emotionally by watching perfect strangers live out the exact life he wanted for himself.
Stretched out on the lounge with a warm laptop burning into his gut and a half-drunk cup of tea going cold on the coffee table, 34-year-old Dean Moxley flicked between Kayo, the Cricket Australia Instagram feed, and a handful of private stories belonging to people he’s never met but hates with deep intensity.
The time is 2:41am and Australia are a few wickets down at Kensington Oval. Dean, however, is many hours into a rolling existential crisis triggered by the sight of dozens of dancing locals, plastic cups and smiling faces high on rum.
“I could’ve gone,” he mutters, knowing full well that he couldn’t.
“I was going to. I said it last summer.”
Friends say Dean has talked about a West Indies cricket trip every summer since he first saw Michael Clarke ton up at North Sound in 2008.
But each year, the plan has been quietly shelved in favour of rent, interstate weddings, and unforeseen motor vehicle expenses.
“It’s not even jealousy. It’s deeper than that,” he said, watching a bunch of private school blokes turned New York bankers he doesn’t even know upload stories of themselves shirtless and dancing in the outer.
“It’s despair.”
Dean has confirmed he will be staying up again tonight for Day 2, just in case something changes and he suddenly wakes up in Barbados.
He won’t. But he’ll keep checking.
More to come.
