Happy Birthday Dianna

Today is my friend Dianna's fiftieth birthday, and this year was my fortieth. I can't help but cast my mind back ten years to the year 2000, the year I turned thirty and Dianna was forty, and we were all young and free and full of... well...

Let me set the scene. The Sydney Olympics were fast approaching. I don't know why, but it seems the sun was always shining back then. Dianna lived in Arcadia, near Dural, and the grass was always green. I'm sure it was. Or could it be rose-coloured memories? I don't know. I lived in Surry Hills in a gorgeous terrace which I loved with my best friend Mavis, which I also loved. He was great company and our life was a ball. The most serious decision we ever had to make was whether to go ice-skating, or to the movies, or both. Kylie Minogue's 'Spinning Around' and 'On A Night Like This' were always on the stereo and on Channel V, and serious time and effort went into emanating her style.

Dianna decided, with the assistance of an individual who shall remain nameless (although, funnily enough, I do remember her name), to throw a 40th birthday performance/dance party extravaganza called 'Olympia'. Obviously, the theme would be Ancient Greece. Months of preparation and significant funds (which shall also remain unidentified, although this, too, I recall quite clearly) went into the event.

For our part, Mavis and I got stuck into the costumes. Mainly Mavis of course. He is the genius. I provided late night company and moral support and some glue gun assistance. My costume was a beautiful 'Aphrodite' number - funny, exactly ten years later, here's Kylie's 'Aphrodite' album to remind me. It was a gold corset with beautiful flowing pink chiffon trains over each shoulder and more pink chiffon bunched at the hips, gold sandal stilettos with gold leather straps winding up to the knees, a gold g-string (those were the days...), and a long strawberry blonde wig complete with gold vine leaves. Sadly, I don't have any photos of this, it was one of my favourites of the many beautiful things that Mavis made. I do, however, still have the costume.

He made a number of outfits for Dianna (as did Alex Perry), but the most beautiful thing of all was a full length Indian headdress with long pure white feathers with small pink and yellow feathers attatched at the base and the tip. It was stunning, and it took a long, long time, a lot of work a great deal of lightheadedness from inhaling hot glue fumes to create. I am not exaggerating when I say that Mavis is a genius. This thing was absolutely beautiful.

So let's skip to the night. Let's see. My recollections. I'm gonna skip over some details. I'm gonna skip over a lot of details. Here's some snapshots:

Sitting with Dianna up in her bedroom before the show. She had placed a ladder up to her first floor bedroom window so she could get backstage without anyone seeing her. Dianna throwing her arms in the air wailing "I'm bankrupt!" and Adam and I - her front of house staff for the evening - assuring her all would be fine and that hundreds of people would be there. Surely.

Standing backstage during a costume change with Portia and Mavis as Dianna got halfway through a change before slumping to the floor, naked, wailing "I'm ruined!" while the Olympic Games opening ceremony flamenco dancers looks on, bemused. (Yes, the flamenco dancers from the Olympic Games were there for Dianna's 'Dove L'Amore'number. No shit.) Portia giving me the "Go and help her" eyebrow and nod. Me heading over with a glass of champagne, which Dianna promptly spilled all over herself with a dramatic flailing about of the arms. Me telling the stage manager to stop the next number and Dianna interjecting "No! Let's get this over with!"

Let's see. Back at the boys' house at Dural. Finally warm after a chilly evening in not many clothes. Standing cuddled up to Dianna while the boys and Portia told her all the stupid and terrible and careless things that person who shall remain nameless had said the night before after a few post-rehearsal beverages. Promising Dianna, all of us, that we would help her through, that we'd never let her starve.

Ha. Funny. Well - not really. Little did we know that promise would soon be put to the ultimate test.

So. Ten years on. We're older. We're wiser. Though I hope not TOO much wiser. You never did things by half, Dianna. Happy Birthday, and here's to many more.

Shelby xxx