on a red wagon

Sun-bleached now the red wood paint, the Radio Flyer has been towed around the world for 26 years.

My friend’s children the last to ride and mostly now with pot plants to be moved or just to fill a sacred space in my backyard — a space seen from my window, a glimpse each day of the child that he was.

This wagon, sent as a flat pack from the Midwest to the North of Italy on the occasion of his 2nd birthday, my son.

An American icon in Italy, the Radio Flyer, with wood-slatted sides for removal and bumping down a steep hill with legs splayed and the toddler in between — rare moments of abandon with uncertain wheels on the rutted and hardened earth of a hillside in urban Venteto.

And to the market the wagon would take us with only the boy at first, but on return the boy and vegetables, or linens, or sweets from the paneterria.

It made the outing a covered wagon odyssey down the paved lanes towards the market on a Saturday morning when nothing else was to be done on the early awakening of a too tired mother and her little boy.

The gift of the wagon was from her father, probably seen in a Wal-Mart store and looking like the shiniest red thing a boy turning two could want — a grandson too far.

Too far away by land and sea and feelings. An opportunity lost — the first grandson — Preston, named after the grandfather’s hometown in the plains of Kansas in the midwest of the United States of America. She opened the heavy box with its brackets, screws, boards, hinges and shiny black wheels with white in the centre.

She assembled the tools she thought she would need and settled down on the driveway of the appartemento and the little boy rode his Big Wheel around and around…‘dai mama, dai!’ — ‘hurry mama, hurry!’

And she bites her bottom lip a little and slowly begins to assemble the big wooden toy that promises so much. It promises so much of her father’s presence and forgiveness and acceptance and love for her and the little boy who didn’t ask to be born and was not called to be born but nevertheless was born.

Later the wagon was shipped back to the States after her orders from the Army sent them away from their Italian home. Then there were trips to the supermarket in Virginia where people smoked in the aisles while they chose their toothpaste and baked beans.

The boy is older, A Ninja Turtle, but not too old for the wagon though he careened then on his own, a bit unsafely for his mother’s liking, down a long grassy hill near the school at the corner of the street that led to the store.

One day his mother tells him they are moving to Australia. She tells him there are kangaroos there which is really the only thing a four-year old boy would care to know about a place. And the wagon is packed again.

A big wooden container arrives at their house and is filled with all of their things and the boy and his mother lock the door on the little wooden house on the street around the corner from the hill near the supermarket and fly to Australia.

When the boy is 21 and it is his sister’s birthday and he is supposed to fly home on the Qantas plane for Christmas…

he trips and falls and hits his head and dies on the train tracks on the overpass at Shenton Road in the suburb of Claremont by the show grounds in Perth, Western Australia.

The train was traveling at 80kms an hour.

The boy was slumped over a girder and dead before anyone could reach him.

The mother wants to think that he didn’t know what hit him — and probably that is true, his red cap knocked from his head and landing nearby, a pocketful of change and some notes in his wallet, a mobile phone with the number of the taxi dialed in but dialed in with a digit out of place — so the boy missed the taxi that could’ve delivered him home that Christmas to the mother and the sister and the brother waiting by the presents in the living room of the house in Australia so far away from where they had been in Italy and Virginia and red wagons and hills to roll down with legs and arms flailing and gasping mouths full of one another’s excitement and laughter.

The flowers on his casket were Australian natives — big plump proteas, choppy eucalypts and feathery banksia — high gold, fuschia plum and frosted fire with a kangaroo paw extending. She brought them home and laid them in the wagon that had been parked at the door at the back of the house under the lemon tree by the verandah.

And every morning after that day, for more days than she could count, and until she packed up this house too and moved away, she burned a stick of incense, as she had seen people do in Vietnam to worship the ancestors, and placed it in the wagon. She didn’t know what else to do.

It doesn’t seem quite right to have the wagon and not the boy. But she does have it still and the emptiness of it.  She has that too.

The Sixth Anniversary

14 December 2013

It is the sixth anniversary of your death. 

I once read a memoir of a mother who lost her daughter to cancer. At the end of the memoir she adopts an Asian child. She learns to love and live and hope again. I am sad when I read this ending and think that there is no such hope for me. I cannot adopt a child. I am too old. I am happy for her and jealous too.

Barack Obama spoke at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service last week. He spoke of the ‘improbable’ trajectory of his life. He spoke of the improbability that he would one day address the assembled world leaders, shake hands with Fidel Castro and attend the memorial service of one of his first and most beloved role models as the first African American President of the United States.

Obama and Castro

This word improbable. It made me feel hope. It made me think of the improbability of my heart ever healing from the death of my first born child six years ago.

improbable, ɪmˈprɒbəb(ə)l/, adjective: improbable

1. 1.
   not likely to be true or to happen. “This account of events was seen by the jury as most improbable”

To have an African American president had once seemed improbable. To wake up one day and have the Berlin Wall crumbling had once seemed improbable. The end of the Soviet Union had seemed improbable. So many improbable things. They give me hope.

On this anniversary today, the improbability is Mohammad.

A year ago a young Hazara asylum seeker from Pakistan asked for help with his English. His name is Ghulam. We met for a number of weeks but Ghulam went on to do other things and we stopped meeting.

About three months ago he contacted me. He wanted to know if I could do English lessons with a friend of his, another asylum seeker. His name is Mohammad.

Ghulam and Mohammad

Mohammad immediately struck me as the Hazara version of my Preston. He is tall and thin. He is taller than I am as Preston was taller than I. His skin is smooth and fair. His face is open and expectant.

I shouldn’t draw too many comparisons between Mohammad and Preston but I do. Probably they are not there. But I want them to be there. I am still searching for my son.

There are the long fingers. I find myself looking at Mohammad’s hands. And already I am afraid that this is somehow not right. That this is somehow not fair to Mohammad to make him reflect back to me the child I have lost. When do I see Mohammad? How can the two both exist in this young man?

One day Mohammad’s mother told him that he must leave Pakistan to save his life. They arrange for him to make the trip to Australia. At this time he is living in Karachi and working in a drapery shop. When the day nears that he must go, his mother tells him he cannot return to Quetta City before leaving as it is too dangerous. He does not get to say good-bye to his mother.

Mohammad’s mother loves him very much to sacrifice what is possibly a final good-bye for his safety. But there was hope. First there was hope that he would arrive. Then there is hope that he will be found to be a bona fide refugee and that we will be given permanent residency. After a time, maybe a few years, there is hope that he might be able to apply for family reunification and his mother and brothers can join him in Australia.

But for now there is only waiting. And a little bit of hope. But even a little bit of hope sustains us. Where there is life there is hope. Where there is death there is no hope. Or is there?

Some days it is hard to believe that Preston is gone. The last day that I spent with Preston was on Melbourne Cup day 2007 in the city. This year, six years later, I took Mohammad to Melbourne. We were together at Southern Cross Station, the last place that I saw Preston alive.

I spent the day with Mohammad in Melbourne. It wasn’t planned exactly. Ghulam’s uncle needed a ride to Ballarat. I mentioned I would be in the city for work. And although the uncle ended up coming earlier in the week, Mohammad had already planned to meet me in the city to drive back with the uncle. I asked, ‘Do you want to come anyway on the train with me?’ And so he did.

We spent the day meandering around Melbourne which was the same as my last day with Preston. I stopped for a coffee and found myself opposite Mohammad at the Gloria Jeans coffee shop. My last coffee with Preston was at a Gloria Jeans shop. I asked Mohammad if I could take his picture.

I said nothing but I was filled with the improbability of this connection. And the connection scares me. Mohammad told me on the 1st of December that it was the anniversary of the last time he had seen his mother. He told me, ‘you are like my mother now.’ And I suggested that maybe all the ‘mother love’ in the world flows from one mother to another and that his mother’s love is flowing through me to him.

And maybe this is the same with the love of the son for the mother and Preston’s love for me is flowing through Mohammad to me. I want to believe that.

Mohammad and I attended my office Christmas bbq on the lawns of Treasury Gardens. Everyone made him welcome and he played on the grass with the others — badminton, cricket and frisbee. It was his first time to central Melbourne. We walked to the Melbourne Cricket Ground. We walked along the Yarra River. We ate a hamburger in a lane way cafe. Our company was so easy. We rode on the train home tinged pink by the sun and tired from all of our walking. We worked on the spelling exercises from an English language book and arrived in Ballarat too soon.

Preston

Today is the sixth anniversary of Preston’s death and I am in equal measure of my loss for Preston and my love for Mohammad. And the loss and love are both great. And I also am aware that I am again making myself vulnerable to loss. And that scares me too.

‘Losing is the price we pay for living. As for our losses and gains, we have seen how often they are inextricably mixed. There is plenty we have to give up in order to grow. For we cannot deeply love anything without becoming vulnerable to loss…’

 Viorst, Judith.  Necessary Losses : The Loves, Illusions, Dependencies, and Impossible Expectations That All of Us Have.  New York: Free P, 1998.

Andrea – my local hero

I have a “sister” who now lives 200 kilometers away from me but I am still moved and inspired by her. Her name is Andrea and she has become a special friend.

I admire the energy Andrea gives to her family, friends and community. She keeps showing up, being passionate, trying new things, and inspiring others.

We remember our first meeting differently, but I’m pretty sure it was when I was having a ‘glamour photo’ done at a local photographer and she did my make up. It was a lot of fun being fussed over by her, and later we met up again professionally and became friends.

Andrea is one of the most stylish women I know. Coming out of self-consciousness in her teens, she now has a confident presence that can light up any room. Andrea is what people might call ‘larger than life.’ I don’t mean this in a loud or showy way. She is just confident and engaging. She doesn’t mind being the centre of attention. She loves a crowd. I wish I had that kind of ease with myself and my appearance. I admire that about her.

She has a lot of charisma, humility and humour. I can’t help but like her and feel happy in her company. I mention humility because Andrea is equally at ease working with disadvantaged individuals and groups as she is with politicians and senior managers. She cares about the homeless, youth and other marginalised groups. She just rolls up her sleeves and gets to work. I think our connection is stronger because we both love our rural community and want more for it, especially for the young people. Andrea’s much more committed than I in this regard, but I am a great supporter.

Andrea and I grew closer when my 21 year old son died four years ago. I lived in Horsham at the time. Many people brought flowers and food. Andrea showed up with a jar of coffee, toilet paper, tissues and other practical things. She organised the power point for the funeral and accommodation for my family travelling from overseas. She helped me dress for the funeral. She ministered to me so naturally and generously. While there were many people who gave so much to my family and me during that time, I’m just mentioning the kind of very practical and loving care that she offered. I think this is what rural communities really excel in and what Andrea epitomises.

Andrea and I no longer live in the same town but I return to Horsham regularly with my job and we phone and email. Recently I’ve had the pleasure of her son boarding with me while he’s in trade school at Ballarat. That’s just another small way the rural network can provide support. She is also one of very few friends with whom I can talk sincerely about spiritual beliefs. I always leave Andrea  more energised  and inspired.

I was surprised to learn that Andrea is such a country girl and that her early life and upbringing in the Wimmera was so simple. She has always struck me as someone with so much style and experience. I didn’t know she was a farmer’s daughter who mucked about with livestock!  She told me so many stories but I particularly like to think of Andrea in the ‘red rattler’ (the train that used to run to Horsham) with her face towards the setting sun coming home to Horsham for the weekends when she was away at school in Melbourne.

No more muddy boots

The Midwest of the United States casts a broad landscape. Within this expanse is Kansas, an expanse in itself. And within the centre of Kansas, where I was born there is an expanse of wheat fields; that is dark, cold and frosted in the winter and of slight undulation, very slight. This was my childhood landscape; an expanse with hidden gems of slow moving creeks or the canopy of a broad cottonwood. The winter sky was so big, as was the sun in the summer, that sometimes you just wanted to hide from it.

My father’s mother lived on the family farm. It was modest. My uncle and his sons farmed it then. We used to visit my Grandmother weekly. It was a 12-mile drive to her house. In those days, it was the longest drive we took. Her small weatherboard house never changed. She had a storm cellar six paces away from the outside the back door, under the milk house. The kind of cellar with a trap door. The kind that you see in the Wizard of Oz when Auntie Em is calling out for Dorothy as the tornado bears down on them. These are places you would never go unless your life depended upon it. There are places like that.

In fact, my grandmother’s name was Dorothy. Like her house, she never changed. She was the same from the time I first remember her until the time she died twenty years later. I don’t think she left the farm very often except to go to the library, grocery store and her women’s group. She lived alone in that house since my grandfather died. Living in a house alone seemed unnatural to me, but I liked the idea of it. It seemed courageous. It seemed like an independent thing to do. It seemed peaceful. Things were in order. Things were organised. Things were in their place and she always knew where to find them.

When I was 14 I was sent to live at my grandmother’s house. My parents don’t remember this, but I remember this. I remember the bus driver Floyd with the big ears. I was the first to get on the bus and the last to get off so I had plenty of time to study the back of Floyd’s head.  As children, we never went to stay with our grandmother. Our grandmother came to us. That would be because there were five of us.

So, as I piece the story together, with no corroboration (given my parents faulty memory and my grandmother’s subsequent death), I was sent to stay at my grandmother’s house. I slept in my Aunt Kathy’s room. It felt monastic. Completely unadorned. Like the landscape. I could hardly imagine Kathy here. At this time, Kathy was the most exotic and fascinating woman I knew. Our mother’s wore the standard polyester twin sets of the 1970’s. Kathy dressed in clothes that looked more like pyjamas. She had indoor shoes as well as street shoes. Her make-up was always on and her bright, red hair always done. She had the polish of her profession, especially as it stood in those days before it was considered discriminatory to fire people because they were fat, old, ugly, married or mothers. She was a stewardess with TWA. She was pure glamour to this young girl from the wheat fields of Kansas.

Every Christmas my father bought his sister, Kathy, a bottle of scotch and a carton of Salem cigarettes. It seemed a funny gift because I was pretty sure that Kathy would buy these things anyway. But what could you buy her? She was a single, career woman with a job that allowed her to travel all over the world. She always had the best French perfume, bought at the duty free shops and her presence wafted through the room in a cloud of perfumed smoke trails to the tinkle of ice cubes in a highball glass. I adored her.

Many years later, when I was approaching my 30^th birthday, the Berlin Wall came down and it seemed to me the beginning of a new world order.  It made me think about how I would want to live my life and I wrote a poem, “No more muddy boots.” It was a poem about a female existence; an existence, a life, where no one walked into your space with their muddy boots on and left a trail of destruction on your freshly polished floor. As far as I knew, Kathy had no man in her life, she certainly had no husband. As a child I deduced that not having a husband meant you got to travel the world and wear beautiful clothes and perfume. It also meant you didn’t have children. You had freedom and clean floors.

Living on the prairie gave me the time and space to think a lot. A lot of thinking gets done under the shade of a tree when it is too hot to move. When I was in my 30’s, I moved to Australia and met a woman from Canada. She was one of many ex-pats who became my surrogate family while living abroad. She suggested that we came to our region in Australia to heal. I think that is because it is another prairie, another expanse, another big sky and another big sun. It is hard for things to hide there, to remain hidden. Its spaciousness doesn’t distract you with so many vistas, changing tides or colourful plays of light on the side of a mountain. It held the space for me to go within. It supported me in exploring my internal world. That is where we go when our lives depend upon it. That is the trap door and the cellar where we go to be safe.

The Cafe

It’s all very civilised really. Even though the tables and chairs are of a size diminutive enough so that patrons can not get overly comfortable. In fact, those in the cafe with me now are indeed poised on their modern, silver chairs; sitting on the edge, leaning forward to be heard and to maintain confidences I imagine.

There is an earnestness in their posture as if they had to come here to share their intelligence and espionage. Sharing a coffee is actually an intimate thing to do in public after all. It’s what we usually do in kitchens. You wouldn’t normally go to a public place to sleep or watch t.v., but cafe’s and coffee are different. It’s a  social thing to do.

It’s mostly women here. We seem to crave that connection more. Some are professional, and many are mums seeking respite from the four walls and the endless, mundane tasks that make up making a home. I see a man and woman now – a couple? I think not, their conversation is a bit too animated and engaged. Couples, married couples, seem to lose their energy for one another. I can say this. I am divorced. I give myself permission to generalise and make judgements about what happens to married people. These judgements are of course reinforced by all my still married friends who call “good sex” an oxymoron. Besides, making judgements about other people in the cafe is accepted cafe behaviour.

Actually, I am ambivalent about not having a partner now, and a cafe is a  perfectly good place to be ambivalent about that and other things…like the price of a cup of java. A good cafe is overpriced so you know that you’re getting quality. Still, one can be disappointed. Today I ordered a scone and had to ration the jam out to make it last the scone. I don’t think they should scrimp on jam. With jam, one should be generous. It isn’t truffles or caviar after all. Anyway, I had my jam and scone and cream (of which there was adequate cream, not really being a cream person) and waited for my girlfriend. (Do you think the world is divided into jam people and cream people?) We were escaping our offices where we work alone (not dissimilar to the mundane environment that our sisters at home have to endure). We haven’t really evolved so far after all. We still want to be part of the tribe, the cafe club.

Cafe banter

Just say Yes

Just Say Yes
The responsibility in being Love is more than the mind could imagine or hold up under. If most human beings truly realized the impact that they have on the whole, they’d be crushed by the realization of it.
But what I’m talking about is being thrilled by it. All you have to do is say “yes.” Don’t make some big project out of it. Don’t make some big deal out of it. Just say “yes.”
You don’t even know what it means to say “yes,” but you say it anyway. You’ll never know what it means to say “yes,” but you do it anyway. Freedom and Love arise when you die into the unknown mystery of being.
~ From: The Impact of Awakening, by Adyashanti

When I read this piece this morning I thought of one of my Sisters. We’ll call her Jane. Jane is in a well (enough) paid, respectable (in a cardigan and corduroy kind of way), interesting (mildly and sporadically), secure (paid every two weeks) and stable (read conservative and uninspiring) job. Jane has done well (enough) in this job and is respected (she hasn’t broken any laws, physically assaulted anyone or publicly embarrassed the CEO). In fact, Jane has had some projects that are regarded as successful and meaningful and has made a wide network of friends and colleagues who trust and admire her.

But Jane is being called and really wants to leave her well paid, respectable, interesting, secure and stable job. She is being called, but who or what is calling? I believe it is Love. She is called to be Love. And all she has to do is say “Yes.” And in being Love, we do not know what the ripples of our influence might be. Maybe the current “job” pond that she is within has become too small and stagnant to contain her ripples; or as Adyashanti put it, “…the impact that they have on the whole.”

And I write to her in an email this morning –

I read this (Adyashanti) and thought of you and your thoughts around leaving the known (job) for the unknown (life after job)  and I wonder if you are being called to say “yes” to change, to life, to Love? I think you are being called, that is the tension – the tension of where you are now and where you want to be (even if you don’t fully understand the wanting). The tension is the call. It is the signal. Being called and having faith. Having faith that you will not abandon yourSelf and God will not abandon you. Leaving all that is known for the unknown. They call it The Hero’s Journey.[i]

Someone else said, “the longest journey is from your head to your heart.” Jane, we know what your head is saying, how about letting your heart speak?

It makes me think of a great explorer, setting out to sea and leaving all that is familiar. It is an adventure and ultimately a discovery. How many real adventures do we get to embark upon in our short lives?

Now I just thought of putting my son Preston on the train in Adelaide to cross the Nullarbor. He had a swag and a suitcase. He walked the streets of Kalgoorlie knocking on doors to find work. God bless him. It must have been scary…and it must have been exhilarating and empowering.

Dear Jane, I’m just saying, as scary as the leap looks from the top of the trapeze platform, I have full confidence that you will catch the swing on the other side. And hey, if all else fails…there is always a net under you. (end email)

I think that I should add here that Jane is no stranger to adventure. She has travelled around the world. She has undertaken aide work in developing countries. She rides a motorbike. She actively seeks out new experiences and embraces them. Perhaps this adventure, this internal journey, this saying “yes” is somehow different. A journey taken in stillness and without movement. A surrender. A letting go. A free fall. Godspeed my friend!

---

[i]Joseph Campbell held that numerous myths from disparate times and regions share fundamental structures and stages, which he summarized in the introduction to The Hero with a Thousand Faces:

“

A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.

”

Mia Sorella Cinzia

I’ve been reading a book l borrowed from my “sister” Rosemarie.  Rosemarie loaned me her copy of The Soul of Money  – Reclaiming the wealth of our inner resources, by Lynne Twist. I won’t go into the book too much, only to say that it is about our relationship with money and it has begun to give me insights into my own life, values and understanding of prosperity. This reflection has made me think of my Italian sister, Cinzia – la mia sorella.

Cinzia lives in Vicenza, Italy – a big industrial town in the north of Italy. Vicenza is midway between two gems – Verona and Venice. While it’s an industrial town, it is not without its own charms, among them Palladio architecture and its vicinity to the Italian Alps, the Lago di Garda and of course Venice and Verona.

Lago di Garda near Vicenza

I came to know Cinzia when I was stationed in Vicenza with the US Army. As I recall, she had a bit of a crush on my company commander and we met at a party.  We became close friends (sisters) and I began to spend time regularly at her family’s home.

Cinzia lived with her mother, father and two brothers in a 5-room apartment on the first floor of a small block of flats in a small court. Her father, Giorgio, had his small machining workshop in the court next to the well and the concrete laundry trough. Her mother, Maria Teresa, could call to him from her balcony off the kitchen. Brothers Carlos and Enrico shared a bedroom. Cinzia had her own small but private room. In addition to the bedrooms there was the kitchen and the living/dining area.

During that time my young son Preston was my constant companion and Cinzia’s family showered him with love and affection. I can picture him now sitting in the middle of the kitchen table while we all basked in his babyhood and antics. I don’t think adoration is too strong a word for what they all expressed for this little boy.

Carlos, Preston, Giorgio, Enrico, Maria Teresa and Cinzia

Within those five rooms however I learned about sufficiency, prosperity and even abundance – all themes of The Soul of Money. In these five rooms where I came to spend every weekend meeting up with Cinzia and Carlos to go to discos and parties, and having the Sunday midday meal with the entire family, I experienced the fullness of wealth. A wealth of family and companionship and the wealth of beautifully prepared food made with love and shared with others. Maria Teresa’s kitchen was tiny and her work space was the small, granite kitchen table top and yet she was able to turn out the most amazing meals. Giorgio took pride in pouring the wine he would decant from huge bottles in the downstairs storage space. The produce from his garden always graced the table. In the Veneto region of Italy, it is customary to pile bread in the centre of the table to represent abundance – a beautiful image and sentiment. The family with bread, wine and friends is never poor.

It was during this time that I began to understand that wealth isn’t measured in square footage but in the space between the hands and hearts that come together for something as beautifully simple as a home-cooked meal prepared with love and a glass of table wine. That’s all there was, and that was enough.

Sista Dana – my sister, friend and midwife

Labor of love

February 16, 1986, Fort Ord Army Hospital, Monterey California. I am pregnant. The baby is overdue. My blood pressure is dangerously high and I have been admitted to hospital. This baby isn’t planned, but is beginnning to feel very long awaited. Dana and other friends from our Italian class at the Defense Language Institute come to visit me at hospital. We are discussing names for the baby. Preston Ellis for a boy. Frances Meridian for a girl. They all hope it is a boy given the choices of names. We laugh and we talk and they all leave into a rainy, stormy night to go out for a meal. Someone mentions that more babies are born on stormy nights. I can only hope that this is so. The hospital is warm, overly warm, for the mothers and their new babies, but I don’t have a baby yet.

They bring me the evening meal. A childhood friend from Kansas, Traci, comes to visit. Maybe I haven’t seen her in a decade, but we still feel the bond of summers in Kansas. After Traci leaves the Wizard of Oz comes on T.V. and being a Kansas girl and I begin to watch in the warm glow of nostalgia. It is the flying monkey scene and I am in the transition stage of labor. Things are moving very quickly. Dana is called back from her meal. She brings Valerie. We are taken to a makeshift labor ward due to construction in the usual ward. Laboring women are seperated by badlly drawn curtains.

An internal monitor is placed on my baby’s scalp. He/she is in distress – could I please push with every other contraction? Well, frankly, no I cannot! Dana reminds me of the “hee hee hee hee ho” from the birthing classes. That doesn’t seem to be working. I am pleading for drugs and the doctor says, “don’t whimp out on me.” I am fading in and out of consciousness between contractions. My focus is completely inward and I think  that I might die.

Finally there is movement and my bed is pushed out of the curtained hallway and into an operating room. Dana’s eyes are wide but she is standing firm. We pass her husband Arthur in the corridor during transit. My fear of death is quickly giving way to elation – something is finally happening.

My baby is born and placed on my chest. I am overwhelmed as I look into his eyes and I imagine that he returns my gaze but the medical staff don’t let us linger. Dana and the baby go to do whatever sisters/friends/midwifes do with the baby. She later tells me that they place him on the digital scales. Eleven pounds. No, that can’t be right. They reset the scales and try again. Eleven pounds.  The doctor then apologises for the “don’t whimp out on me” comment.

Dana returns with the swaddled baby. His face is swollen and he has a very distinct cone head. Slow labors don’t for pretty babies make. I remember that someone once said that all babies look like Winston Churchill. Dana and I think that this baby is beautiful.I will always love her for that and for being with me when he came into the world and for loving my beautiful son Preston Ellis.

My beautiful son Preston died in 2007 when he was 21 years old as the result of an accident in Perth, Western Australia. I miss him everyday.

Sista Pam and Cyclone Yasi

See what I mean?

Phew. My friend Pam has survived the category 5 tropical cyclone Yasi in Queensland Australia. I just saw pictures posted on Facebook of her husband sleeping through the storm in the bathtub. Sleeping through a storm with winds which, according to Grant Denyer, former weather man on the Sunrise show, sounded like “twin jet engines.” I don’t know which is more frightening, weather people on morning news shows, or category 5 tropical cyclones.

All of Pam’s friends, myself included; Facebooked, texted, phoned and skyped lots of well-meant advice to Pam and husband John in the hours leading up to the impact of the storm. Just in case they had spent the day playing croquet or watching DVD’s and had somehow missed the onslaught of emergency messaging and information flowing all over the various media.

Drinking water. Batteries. Radio. Food. Warm clothes. Don’t go outside. Take the mattress into the bathtub. Tape the windows. Open the windows. Close the windows. Open the window when the wind is blowing this way, or that way, or just blowing or not blowing. When the storm stops, it could just be THE EYE, stay inside. Don’t go out. Wait for that nice lady, oh yes, what’s her name? Anna Bligh. She’ll tell you what to do and when.

Pam’s friends told her it was husband John’s privelege to protect his wife in the storm. What a beautiful sentiment. I like it. I like it a lot. In fact, on my post on Pam’s Facebook page, I heart it.

Sista Susan

Susan basting a wee turkey

My friend Susan and I think that we are very funny. We think this so earnestly, and with such a degree of delight and certainty, that it hardly even matters to us if anyone else believes it is so. We are the funniest people we know on a deserted island of humour relishing in the mirror of one another’s faces where we find reflected pure joy and admiration. Susan is my sista from anutha mutha. I am S1 and she is S2 (or is it the other way around?)

We both have “real” sisters. She has perky Wendy and savvy Kate. I have refined Janet, sporty Karen and mascot Katie. In fact, in another life, we could all make one hell of a girl’s band.

Yes, we have real sisters, but there is something very generous about the sista from anutha mutha. Sista Susan always listens and responds just as a sister should.

When I tell her about being cut off in traffic she’ll say, “Oh! You poor thing! How awful! Did you get his registration number! What a pig! A pig I tell you! An absolute, big, fat pig!” And then we laugh and I say, “Your turn,” and she tells me that the hairdresser cut an inch too much off of her hair, despite the agreed strategy of “we’re going to grow it long.” And I say, “Oh! You poor darling! Where did she get her license to cut hair? Off a cereal box! That’s awful! I’m so sorry. You’re still the most beautiful girl in the world though now aren’t you?” And then we laugh and remind one another how incredibly funny we are…again.