The Signal Is Yours

When you arrive at The Felicity Station, the first person I want you to meet is Felicity. She is smiling into the camera, one arm extended toward the Station as though she has been expecting you. Around her, the stars catch the light, Earth glows in the distance, the Station comes alive, and a song waits on the screen she is presenting.

To me, that image is more than an entrance to a website. It is Felicity doing what she always did so naturally: making a place feel welcoming before you had even arrived, and making somewhere far away feel close enough to reach.

My own journey with Felicity began at Homestead Village in El Segundo. I worked the overnight security shift there, patrolling the parking lots around the corporate apartments and handling whatever came up after dark.

I will never forget the first night I met her. Felicity and two Australian friends were standing outside her room in the parking lot after another guest complained that the noise was keeping her awake. Finding the source was not difficult.

Felicity never liked this part of the story, but the first thing one of her friends said to me was, “We’re Australian. We put out.” They had enjoyed a few cocktails on the flight over, and I am sure they would be embarrassed by it now. I managed to settle everybody down, get them back inside, and the rest of the night passed without incident.

Not long after that, Felicity casually asked me about good places to eat. One thing led to another, and when I was about to leave she called me back, grabbed me by the tie and planted a completely unexpected kiss on my lips. I have never forgotten it. She later told me it was the first and only time she had ever done anything like that.

That kiss changed the direction of my life.

It was November 1998. Felicity later moved to Chicago on her own, but we stayed in touch. By February 1999, with everybody talking about Y2K, I was worried about her and we were talking constantly. In the end I did what became something of a pattern in our life together: I followed her. Like a lost puppy, I made my way to Chicago, and she let me move into her apartment, much to the dread of almost everybody she knew.

Chicago is where our relationship really became a life. It was not a stop between Los Angeles and Australia. It was where we spent most of our American years together, where we learned how naturally we could share a home, responsibilities, work and everyday life.

Felicity worked for Kylie and alongside Christie during those Chicago years. That part of her life mattered. She had people around her who knew her, cared about her and watched this unexpected relationship of ours become increasingly serious. Kylie adored Felicity and even came by to make sure everything was all right.

Her best friend Anthony had the same instinct. Fresh from getting married himself, he came to Chicago to make sure Felicity was okay and had not completely lost her sanity. A few months later her mum and dad flew over to look in on us too. I understood their concern. From the outside, Felicity had moved cities and then allowed the security officer she had met in California to follow her halfway across the country and move into her apartment.

Fortunately for me, security work was easy to find in a city like Chicago. I was soon paying half the rent and sharing the responsibilities. What surprised me was how little adjustment it seemed to require. We slipped into the rhythm of a married couple long before we actually became one. Chicago was where we stopped being two people testing an unlikely relationship and became a household.

We married there in early 2002, only a few months after 9/11. By then Chicago was not simply the city Felicity had moved to. It was part of our story, full of work, friends, ordinary days and the years in which we built the foundations of our marriage.

The difficult part was immigration. The American process became expensive, complicated and increasingly unworkable for us. When the collapse of Aus Travel changed Felicity’s visa situation, she returned to Australia. This time there was never any real question in my mind about what I would do. I went with her.

We celebrated our marriage again in Australia with her family around us and with her favourite priest, Father Steve, performing the ceremony. Eventually I found it far easier to secure permanent residency in Australia than to keep living apart from my wife while the American immigration process dragged on.

I moved to Australia, fell in love with the country, and built the next part of my life there with her. From Los Angeles to Chicago and then to Australia, I followed Felicity everywhere. I do not regret a moment of it.

The Journey begins in El Segundo and Los Angeles, takes root in Chicago, crosses the Pacific, follows the roads she knew, and continues through everything now being built in her name. The People are Felicity, the people she helped, the life we shared, and every listener, reader, friend or stranger who enters the Station.

Put those things together and the tagline stops behaving like branding. It becomes a description of what is happening.

You do not even have to listen to a full song to take part. You can explore the projects, read Signal Notes, vote on the Signal Deck, leave a comment or tell me what reached you. Music remains at the heart of the Station, but a signal only becomes complete when somebody receives it, and sometimes sends something back.

There is a reason underneath all of this that has nothing to do with clever programming.

Felicity will always have a visitor.

Every time somebody opens the homepage, there she is, smiling and presenting what has been built in her name. Perhaps you stay for ten seconds. Perhaps you listen for an hour. Perhaps you read one message and leave. Perhaps a song makes you curious enough to return. Whatever you do, you came to visit, and somebody else will arrive after you.

That is why I never wanted this to become a memorial frozen in time. I wanted it moving. Songs arrive and depart. Messages appear. Lights travel. People visit, respond and return. New work joins the old. The Station keeps transmitting while Felicity remains there to welcome whoever happens to come next.

If you want to keep following our story, there are two natural places to go next: About Us tells more of the life behind the Station, and The Foodies carries the journey into another part of Felicity’s world.

What Personal Signal did you receive?

Share the Personal Signal you received in the comments below. Tell us which three lines arrived for you and what they made you think about. Every visitor sees something different, and your interpretation becomes part of the conversation.