From shining star to sea: the journey of an unlikely promise

Welcome!

Succulents are perfect for Adelaide summers

We are in the midst of a record-breaking heatwave. I am so grateful to live in the Adelaide Hills where the trees give refreshment even in scorching weather. We have seen koalas a lot more than usual as they move into the suburbs in search of water. The magpies, wattle birds and silvereyes appreciate our birdbath, which has to be topped up frequently. The garden is surviving the heat well – my deep watering approach seems to be working but it requires daily diligence as I use a sprinkler mornings and evenings in different areas of the yard. We used to have it all rigged up with automatic systems, but the garden has changed and the system has aged beyond usefulness.

In recognition of Christmas in one week’s time, here is a Christmas story with a difference. It is based on a rather odd Victorian Christmas card (c. 1880).

From shining star to sea: the journey of an unlikely promise         

Robbi lay back down on a rock near the shore, terrified, yet almost relieved that his fears were being realised. It was a fool’s journey, but what else can a mouse do? He tried to explain it to the lobsters again.

                There was much clacking of claws. It dawned on the mouse that they were laughing. He wished they would kill him and be done with it. His mission made no sense anyway.

                The last of the sunlight was swallowed by the ocean. The mouse, still wet, began to shiver. An order was given to carry him to the beach for a gathering of the clan. Robbi’s tail was pinched in a large claw and he was dragged to the sand, pressed by dozens of hard-shelled bodies.

The biggest lobster spoke at him. ‘There was an ancient promise about a message from the King of the Land. Frankly, it sounds like nonsense. But truth comes in strange packages. You might go to our King, if you’re convincing. Speak up.’

                The mouse trembled; he knew he had no powers of persuasion. His death was imminent.

                He spoke quickly, hastening the inevitable. ‘I was in a forest. A large beast was caught in a hunter’s trap, a net of thick rope binding it. When I realised it a was a lion, I knew I should have listened to my father.

                ‘The lion did not kill me with its huge paws. It asked for help. I chewed through the rope in all the places the lion told me, and expected to be eaten for my troubles.

                ‘I darted away as he wriggled free, but froze with terror as a roar shook the ground. He bellowed, “I, the King of the Land, thank you, little mouse. If you dare, come close again.”

                ‘My legs were stiff with fear, but I went close. After all, even though he’s a lion, he is my King.

                ‘"You are a brave soul,” he said. “I will need you again one day. Will you do what I ask if I call you?”

                ‘Not long afterwards a new star had appeared in the sky. Every creature began rehearsing old stories of a long-forgotten promise. The King called me. He said the time of reconciliation had begun. He sent me to the King of the Sea to say: Peace, Joy, Health and Happiness from the King of the Heavens.

                ‘I warned him I would fail. I had so many reasons why he should entrust the message to someone else, but he would not listen. He asked, “Will you go?”

                ‘What can a mouse do? I said yes. And here I am.’

                A hint of moonrise lit the underside of a cloud, making the lobsters restless. They twitched their antennae, waiting for a signal from the Boss. He was in deep silence.

                ‘Boll! I charge you with taking this mouse to the King.’

                Boll, the mouse’s former guard, stepped forward. ‘But I can’t.’

                ‘You can and you will. Go, and may the favour of the King of the Heavens follow you. Oh, you’d better take this.’ He passed it a white oilskin with some incomprehensible words written on it. Then he dismissed the young lobster with an imperious wave of a claw.

                The rest of the clan fled to the safety of the dark waters as the moon lit the winter night.

                Only Boll and Robbi remained on the beach, shifting uneasily. ‘What do you think it says?’ the mouse asked the lobster, indicating the oilskin in its claw.

                ‘How should I know?’

                ‘Oh.’ Gulping, the mouse said, ‘We’d better just go.’

                ‘Right. Er, how? You can’t swim.’

                ‘I can, if my head is above the water.’

                ‘Right. Ride on my back.’

                Robbi climbed on and slid off the other side.

                Boll clacked. ‘Better hang on to one set of my feelers. I’ll use the others.’

                They tried again, with more success, and Boll took a few steps. ‘Okay up there? Hold the message.’ It handed the oilskin to the mouse.

                ‘Okay,’ Robbi said, all his senses alert. ‘Let’s go.’

               

The Boss watched from his rock at the water’s edge. It was the strangest sight in all his long years, a mouse on the back of a small lobster, the white oilskin message hanging down from a paw. One mouthful and they’d both be gone. The skin had been in the Boss’s family for generations. But what can a lobster do? It was the King of Heaven’s problem now.

I echo the message of the King of Heaven: may you have Peace, Joy, Health and Happiness this Christmas and in the new year.

See you next time!

Claire Belberg

City Lights

Welcome!

summer plenty

Adelaide is famous for its summer heatwaves, days on end of temperatures over 35 degrees Celsius (95^o Fahrenheit). Just yesterday the mercury hit 44^oC (111F), a real scorcher. Our forecast was looking seriously hot for the next week, and I’m not sorry it’s been downgraded a little.

One of the delights of living in the Adelaide Hills is the gully breezes most hot summer nights, giving us overnight temperatures more comfortable than on the plains. But although our nights are mostly cool enough at the moment, I am puzzled by the winds – changing direction frequently, and very gusty all day and night, as if we were spinning around a gyrating compass. Unpredictability in unpredictable ways; all out of kilter. No matter how good we are at forecasting and explaining, the elements play with us and we just have to take it as it comes!

This post’s creative piece is a drama written to an ending quoted from DH Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers. Not having read the novel, I have no idea if my story has anything in common with the original! Sometimes it’s freeing not to know (but maybe now I’ll take a peek at Wikipedia!)

City Lights

           'Come on, Sven,' Lana called impatiently.

            Sven concentrated on following the clattering of Lana's ridiculous heels down the rough steps. He hadn't yet worked out how she managed to wander up and down the back streets and outskirts of the city without ever turning an ankle.

            She entered the poorly lit bar without waiting for him. Sven stood in the doorway, adjusting his eyes to the darkness and trying to assess the situation. He felt a familiar twinge of resentment at the role of bodyguard that seemed to define his relationship with her these days.

            Lana lit the darkness, her white blonde hair and long white satin evening dress drawing what little light the flickering lamps emitted, giving her an aura. As he drew closer to her, weaving his way between the patrons who deferred to his height and Western visage, he was reminded of a moth. No matter what crazy places she insisted on taking them, Sven found her achingly irresistable. He took up his place at her side, where she put a hand of ownership on his arm. Her slender white fingers showed no sign of the tension he could sense in her, the thrill of anticipation, the drive to extract every ounce of juice out of her unorthodox adventures, to ride the wave of risk that threatened to carry her too far only to be brought short at the last moment, leaving her satisfied and him weary. So weary.

            'Ah, Miss Raffen, you honour us with visit.' An old Chinese man bowed obsequiously to her. He turned to a young man – a boy, really – behind the bar, and snapped, 'Give her a drink.'

            Sven coughed slightly and addressed the boy. 'And I'll have a brandy on the rocks.'

Another evening spent as a spectator to Lana's escapades left Sven wondering what had happened to the beautiful and talented woman he'd fallen in love with. Now she stretched the boundaries in all directions as if the wealth and status of her life as a senior diplomat's daughter was a cage she sought to escape. Sven's ambitious dreams for his promising education consultancy firm were dwindling as rapidly as Lana's reputation.

Lana was sure she knew the way to a friend's house nearby. After all, she'd lived in Hong Kong most of her life. After several dead ends,  Sven was starting to feel nervous. He was sure he'd heard footsteps behind them.

Lana was complaining. 'You're no fun any more, Sven.You used to join in but now you just watch me with disapproval. You're getting as dull and boring as the rest of the pack. But Sandy will know how to live it up tonight. She's a fun girl, that one.'

            Oh my god, thought Sven. Sandy, of all people. Yes, of course she'd want to stay with that freak. It was probably Sandy who'd put Lana onto the old man. He'd plyed her with drink, set up the poker game that used every last dollar Sven had had on him, and given her a stamp-sized piece of paper. Lana's ticket to fun for the rest of the night.

            At that moment Sven's fears were realised. Three men, the old man's muscle men, pushed Sven to one side,  and surrounded Lana,.

            'Sven, do something, for god's sake,' Lana said, laughing nervously. She looked like a queen whose courtiers had suddenly turned hostile and even now she couldn't quite believe it. A smile, a look of camaraderie, but the muscle men paid no attention. They were deliberately steering her, without touching her, to a darker corner.

            Sven looked around for a weapon. He picked up a rust-ragged steel pipe in one hand and a broken brick in the other. He launched the brick at one head, and swung the pipe at another. The posse broke into fast motion. The brick missed, flying between the aimed-for head and Lana's shoulder, dropping into the third man just as he made a grab for her. It stopped him for a moment. The pipe struck, and one man was down. The others became more frenzied. The man hit by the brick was intent on dragging Lana around the corner, while the one the brick had missed was lunging at Sven.

            He called out Lana's name, and having activated his voice, strings of oaths followed as he dodged and punched his attacker. He received more than he gave and, with the wind knocked out of him, he stopped cursing. Finding himself on the ground, his head feeling split by the fall and a karate fiend launching itself at him, Sven was puzzled to find the world suddenly flooded with light. His attacker twisted away and disappeared into the dark.

            Sven pushed himself up on an elbow, shading his eyes to see where Lana was before making the monumental effort to stand up. He was sure his head weighed three times what it had, pounding like war drums. He staggered, but still he couldn't see Lana. He couldn't see anything, and pondered the irony that more light was less helpful.

            'I'm all right, Sven. Sandy saved the day.' Incredibly, Lana laughed, as if the events of the previous minutes were simply the highlight of an entertaining evening. 'See, I was right. She does live round here. You'd better come in and get cleaned up.'

            Sandy took up the invitation with a brusque, 'You look like someone chewed you good and proper.' Nevertheless she took Sven inside her two-roomed shanty and found some water and a cloth to clean him up with. She pushed him into a chair and gave him a cracked glass. 'Drink it. It will help the headache.' He did as he was told. It tasted foul.

            But it worked. Within half an hour he was ready to go home.

            'You can stay here,' Sandy offered, but Lana answered for him.

            'No, he'll go home, sleep it off and turn up bright and early tomorrow at work with a neat cover story. He's good for that, at any rate. You should have heard some of the whoppers he's told to keep me in the good books.'

            It was her nonchalance that made the penny drop. No recognition that she'd just about got him killed, that she'd given away over one thousand dollars to have her fun without even asking, risking their lives in her search for the perfect high. In privacy she had been honey and passion, but in public she had shamed and belittled him. He'd told himself for the past few weeks that it was just a phase, that she was testing his love, that she was covering up the depths of her feeling for him because she didn't want the gossip that inevitably accompanied romances in this hothouse expatriate community. But he'd been telling whoppers to himself, he now saw. He was possibly the only one he'd fooled.

            'I'm off then, Lana. Thanks, Nurse Sandy.'

            'See you tomorrow, Sven,' Lana called as he walked into the lane that would lead him to the main road and a late night bus.

            'No, Lana. Not tomorrow. Not any day. It's over.' He couldn't believe he was saying it. The words sounded feeble, like a bad movie. Humphrey Bogart might have pulled it off, made it sound manly.

            'Sure, Sven. Bye.'

            The door closed. He heard the giggles behind it. She didn't believe him. She knew he was in her thrall. The very risk-taking that disturbed him about her excited him. She was vivacity, charm and challenge, a siren. His siren.

He stood in the dim glow of a flickering street light, torn between the desire to escape and the anger that wanted to make her believe him.

He stood. Remembered. Ached with desire, with shame. Her image burned bright within, and once again he was blinded. And then the street light stopped flickering, and the darkness was complete. Beyond the shanties he could see now the glow of the city lights. Here was darkness. There was a light by which one might see.

He could stay, remain in the darkness of her light. But no, he would not give in. Turning sharply, he walked towards the city's gold phosphorescence. His fists were shut, his mouth set fast. He would not take that direction again, to the darkness, to follow her. He walked towards the faintly humming, glowing town, quickly.

Until next week…
Claire Belberg