The one I can’t forget

Ted 1954

The date hit like a fist to the heart. I’d forgotten his anniversary. And it took me two weeks to even remember that I’d missed it.

Thirteen years since my Dad died. And I didn’t ring my Mum. Or speak to my brothers. Or even register the date until two weeks after it had passed.

What kind of daughter does that?

Then I imagine him, looking up from his newspaper (the Catholic Leader or Queensland Graingrower, for sure), eyes huge through the lens of his reading glasses.

The half snort, half laugh. That’d be right. Then the sly look. You still miss me?

Yes, you old stirrer, I do. You’d be thrilled to know how much… And you’ll also be pleased to know that I took your advice –

My advice? You became a nun? Good. I told you: it’s never too late; Mary Magdalene became a saint-

Uh, no, but-

You got married? Before you  lost your looks completely?

Well, yes – but you already knew that. You were there, remember?

I imagine him then, losing interest in the conversation. Going back to his newspaper. I was safely married, he could relax. And maybe one day, I might still become a nun and make him proud…

I wonder then if he remembers the other piece of advice. The one I can’t forget because it was delivered from a hospital bed just before he died:

…be what you were meant to be, do what you were meant to do …

Thanks Dad, I took your advice – and became a writer instead.

Someone with only one foot on the ground, and a head in the clouds.

Someone who feels her father’s presence more deeply since he died. But forgets to ring her Mum on the anniversary of his death.

Someone who goes back through her diary to see what kind of daughter does that, and finds this entry: ‘How to Destroy Earth (Part One) 13,419 words – it’s getting there!’

Someone who takes time out today, when the word count stands at 20,064, to spend an hour just thinking of her dad.

And so we beat on, words against the page, a middle-aged woman, unsuited to the cloistered life, still trying to make her dad proud.

 

 

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On ‘happy’ birthdays

My brother’s home isolated by flood waters

The older I get, the more I suspect happiness is linked to low expectations.

I expected nothing from yesterday’s birthday, had planned nothing in the aftermath of floods and other dramas, and yet 24 hours later I’m still aglow from the unexpected pleasures it brought.

A romantic dinner with hubby the night before… Great Italian with the kids last night. A call from an old pal – celebrating a 43 year friendship that’s still going strong. Another from my brother – hearing his voice on the phone after a tracheotomy tube had prevented him from speaking for a week was the most joyful of birthday presents.

All six of my brothers remembered, even the one on night shift in cyclone-torn Central Queensland. Such great blokes, and lord knows, they all had more important things on their minds.

The 42 people evacuated by helicopter from flood-devastated Jambin included one brother, his wife, their daughter and granddaughter, and another nephew and niece.

Water surrounded my family’s homes in Biloela and Jambin, but didn’t make it inside, thank the high heavens. Chooks and dogs survived, but not the four black snakes my brother killed while clearing debris from around his front steps.

Mum’s street in Bilo

A neighbour across from my Mum admitted panicking as the rising waters turned the surrounding streets into canals. ‘Oh, I wasn’t worried,’ said my 84 year old mother. ‘I’ve been through this before.’ And she has. More times than most. Despite power failures and unreliable telephone coverage, she somehow managed to send me a beautiful bunch of flowers, bless her.

The floods of the 1970s made an enormous impression on me as a teenager and decades later featured in my first novel Dust: ‘Silently, like a thief, the flood had crept up on us, stealing our land, our paddocks, the path to our back door, our bottom step.’ This year, the flood waters made it two steps higher.

Me during my Suzi Q phase

Back in the 70s, I was a Suzi Quatro-obsessed teen.

And in a strange twist of fate, as the flood waters recede yet again in Central Queensland and the indomitable folk begin yet another clean up, I’ll be reliving that teenaged obsession.

A good friend has surprised me with tickets to Suzi Quatro for my birthday – and try as I might to keep my expectations low, they keep bubbling up.

Can the Can, baby, we’ll be Devil Gate Driving tonight!

A twinkling of brides

Collective nouns aren’t normally associated with brides, what with only one usually in a room at a time (South Korean mass weddings notwithstanding).

But oh my lordy, we needed a compendium of collective nouns to describe the bevy of bridal treats that turned up for our 20th wedding anniversary party on the weekend.

Dozens of my nearest and dearest slipped, shoe-horned and shimmied their way back into their wedding finery to celebrate with hubba hubby and me.

A train of brides chugalugging on champers. A bouquet of bridesmaids blessing us with their fragrant presence. A gabble of groomsmen that could be heard a suburb away.

Oh, and for some unexplained reason, hubba hubby chose to wear a safari suit, but each to his own.

I love him dearly and when it comes to wedding parties, no-one cares what the blokes wear, do they?

V-Day flour power

Hubba hubby and I don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day (even though our children would prefer that we confined any lovey-dovey-ness to just one day of the year).

BUT we did get a kick out of our daughter’s V-day surprise.

One enterprising lad gave my little cupcake flowers flours – two kilos of self-raising flours, to be exact.

An inspired V-day gift for our family’s uber-baker. 🙂

Hope your Valentine’s Day was full of sweet surprises too.

Here’s looking at you, Mum

Back in 1966, at the age of 36, my mum had given birth to six children in the previous six years – including two sets of twins.

She’s pictured here (at Kemp Beach, Yeppoon, with the younger twins), looking effortlessly elegant in her brother Neil’s hat.

Forty-six years later, she’d probably still fit into that dress… legacy of a lifetime of taking only one potato – and then promptly offering it to the nearest child in need (I suspect I was that child a bit too often for my own good).

I often wish I could be more like my mum – but it’s probably too late now to say no to potatoes – so tonight I’ll simply settle for being with her.

I’m hopping on a plane and flying up to Bilo to help celebrate her birthday. She didn’t think turning 82 was worth making a fuss about, but I beg to differ.

Every birthday is a cause for celebration. And we’ll remind her of that every year from now on:

You only live once, Mum…but if you do it right, once is enough. 🙂

Happy Father’s Day

To all those Dads who encourage their children to do what they were meant to do … 
and be what they were meant to be. Thank you.♥

Catty’s gone

Sixteen years ago a friend walked in with a grey ball of fluff that his daughter had given him.

‘My kids have grown up,’ he said. ‘I don’t need any new commitments. You take him. You’re not going anywhere for the next sixteen years. ‘

Still in the glow of newly wedded bliss, I let that one slide and picked up the kitten. ‘Does he have a name?’ I asked.

And surprisingly the little ball of fur answered for himself. ‘Al,’ he meowed, and I was sold.

Who could resist a cat that could say his own name?

Yes, he was my cat, but to his credit, he took to each new child with delight, sleeping at their feet at night, and trotting up to the school through their primary school years to walk them home.

He was the ultimate party cat: jumping the fence to join the fairy circle at the neighbour’s birthday party; displaying a bizarre affection for family beach holidays; and always finding the lap of whichever visitor had the strongest aversion to felines.

It took him more than three years to forgive us for getting the beagle, despite the pleasures he discovered in tormenting him.

And for sixteen years, he was my little mate. I spent more hours with Al than with hubba hubby or the kids or my friends or all of my extended family put together. And yesterday he died in my arms.

I thought I’d cried myself out, but it seems that I haven’t…

RIP Allan Hallam, you dear old thing.

You will always be the best catty ever.