Paint Job (Part 2)

                         Welcome!

Tomato promise

The vegetable garden is looking good but there’s not much produce. I only plant for the summer of the year we stay home for Christmas: tomatoes, basil, chives, and self-sown pumpkin (there’s always some of that going from the compost). We’ve had a few tomatoes, and the basil has been magnificent, but there just hasn’t been enough out of the vegetable garden yet to justify all the water and work that goes into it. Maybe with a few weeks of summer left we’ll start to get the productivity I’d hoped for. But maybe just having a happily growing green patch of garden is worth it anyway.

Here is the second instalment of Paint Job. I hope you enjoy it and look forward to the final part in two weeks’ time.

Paint Job (Part II)

Something wasn't right. Ma wasn't one to back down like that, even though it had her characteristic sarcasm.

            Pete was cutting himself half a loaf. 'Want some, Mattie? There's enough for both of us.' But I wasn't hungry.

            I walked into the lounge room, reaching for the light switch in the dark. The room glowed in its new rich colours, friendly, although it looked unfamiliar with the furniture missing or covered. We'd done a pretty decent job. Okay, we hadn't asked Ma's opinion before we'd launched in but that wouldn't usually send her off the deep end like this. There had to be something I didn't know that would make the equation work.

            And then I saw a piece of paper on the floor where Ma had stood to survey our handiwork. It had fallen, presumably, and had slipped most of the way under the dropsheet. I picked it up, and took it under the light, looking over my shoulder momentarily to be sure I was alone.

On behalf of our client, Mr Roderick Sidney Halston, we are informing you that the property in which you now reside at 14 Delamere Road, Davenlea, and which was solely owned by our client, has now been sold. You received notification, sent from this office on 23 September to the effect that the house was on the market. At your request, no signage was put up at the property, and a buyer was sought and found by a more discreet method. That sale having now been finalised, you have thirty days to take up residence elsewhere. The new owner will shortly contact you to make final arrangements. . .

            I also dropped the letter. It had to be a hoax. Why would my father sell the house from under us? We hadn't even known where he was; he'd never called or written. He might as well have dropped off the edge of the world.

            I couldn't begin to think about what this meant for me and Ma, and Pete. There were no words, so I just watched TV with Pete for the evening and said nothing.

            Ma appeared at breakfast the next morning looking her usual immutable self. She didn't mention the letter so neither did I. Pete and I spent the day on the second coat of paint, putting the furniture back again in the evening. The room looked fresh and warm. I felt I'd been evicted already.

            'He does a good enough paint job, for an electrician,' Ma commented, and Pete beamed. I looked out to the plain, neat front yard, imagining the 'For Sale' sign that had actually existed but been invisible to me and Pete.

            'Good enough to sell,' I mumbled and walked towards the kitchen. I saw the letter where I'd dropped it last night and I kicked it into a corner.

There wasn’t time to fix up more of the house before we had to leave, and why would we want to improve it for the bloody mystery buyer anyway? There was no time for anything except packing up my life into a few battered boxes. Ma wouldn’t let me take half my stuff.

            ‘How big do you think your aunt’s house is, Matthew? You’re lucky you’ll have a room. If Shane hadn’t already left home, you’d be sleeping in the shed with your boxes.’

            I wasn’t looking forward to moving three hours north to Ma’s sister Ruth’s. At least my cousin wasn’t there. Aunty Ruth was all right, but leaving Pete behind in exchange for a second mother wasn’t my idea of a move in the right direction.

            We didn’t see much of Pete in these last weeks. I was trying to work out how I was going to say goodbye to him, daydreaming that he might move somewhere near my aunt’s, knowing that he had no reason to leave this town with all the contract work he was getting. I wished we could have had longer together before life busted us up.

 See you next time!

Claire Belberg

There's life in the old year yet

Welcome!

water in December

The old year draws to an end, dribbling out its final weary days as if all its hope has been transferred to the year about to begin. Isn’t it odd that a day at one point on the calendar should feel like it has less intrinsic value than another?

In Australia, these are the lazy days of summer when many people are on holidays, recovering from the frenzied build-up to Christmas and planning the far more casual New Year’s celebrations – beach, barbecue, all night parties and public firework shows. Some of us have more prosaic concerns, like keeping the garden alive as the moisture level of the soil shrinks and the rain is rare.

One of my motifs in living here in the Adelaide Hills is the creek which runs through our neighbourhood. When the creek is stagnant or dry, which is typical in summer, I languish. When the creek is bounding with white-crested enthusiasm after rain in winter, I feel the energy flow through me like laughter. Late December and a creek still flowing, albeit reluctantly, says to me that this year’s life is not over yet. Make every day count.

The poem for this week is a sonnet about another body of water: the Coorong in the south-east of South Australia. (See my blog called Grandy's House for more info.)

What is this grey and silent place, o'ercast

And windswept, lonely, featureless, yet held

In high esteem as nature unsurpassed?

The Coorong, where the sky and water meld.

Our island sails on through the monotone

As subtleties, the myst'ries of the grey

Emerge to fascinate, our senses hone,

And eerie bird calls cease to cause dismay.

See traces of the people who once stayed

In this secluded waterheld domain;

The mess of fishers' gear is being unmade,

While crushed-shell middens ancient dunes retain.

These lonely lands to creatures wild belong.

We leave, but ever hear its siren song.

The Coorong is not always grey but on a cloudy winter's day, as in the poem, its glory is muted.

Until next week…

Claire Belberg

And Do I Grieve?

                         Welcome!

summer dry
(compare with winter green in July)

As Christmas fast approaches, memories of earlier times jostle with the urgency of the present. Who will we celebrate with this year? Who is missing?

In Australia, Christmas is in summer. It can be scorching, it can be mild, sometimes it is cool and raining. Some families like to maintain the winter traditions of hot roast turkey, cranberry sauce and all the trimmings, followed by pudding with custard. Others throw a barbecue with prawns and snags, followed by a modern summer dessert. In my family we serve cold turkey and ham with salads, and place a bob each way for dessert – a traditional pudding and a pavlova.

The poem that follows is in memory of Phyl Stretton (1916-2007) who, as my honorary grandmother, spent several Christmases with us – and always asked for pavlova instead of pud.

And Do I Grieve?

I hold her hand again, the image burned

Into my thoughts of Phyl in recent days.

A hand surprising for its strength though she

Was failing, held in pain as cancer swelled

Her abdomen. Two years or maybe three

She'd hoped, believing medicine would save

Her from the worst. So when the doctor said,

'If this won't work, there's nothing more to do,'

She could not comprehend. I had to tell

It all again, and starkly spell it out

In letters large. Not only was it hard

For her to grasp the surgeon's careful words,

But she could not be comforted as I

By his expression, anguished and distressed;

My secondhand impressions did not paint

The scene sufficient to relieve the night,

For Phyl was blind; e'en so does age prepare

Us for the eve when this life's day shall end.

I knew her in the morning of my life

As fam'ly friend, and party drama queen.

At thirteen I had grown to trust her so

I'd sought her wisdom for my future plans.

Our paths diverged, locations far apart

And lives that intimated nothing more

Than distant memory we'd ever share.

Vicissitudes of life reversed our roles.

Her widowhood and accidents o'erwhelmed

Her, stole her will, her joie de vivre sapped.

A weekly visit then became routine,

The pattern set before we realised

The name of our relationship had changed –

She was a grandmother to me whose own    

Had lived so far away, they'd seemed unreal,

And I the grandchild she could never have.

These years together as she grew more frail

And independence slowly fell away

We spent by talking life: the daily now,

Her memories of theatre, friends, and war.

E'en then she rarely spoke of spouse or son,

The menfolk in her life a silent void –

Her father'd died in war when she was two –

Yet stories of her youthful lovers showed     

A need, perhaps, that never was fulfilled.

Romance came to her briefly at the end

Of her long life. Her friend, her 'lover', gave

Her final days a comfort and a joy.

Her love of feeling loved was like a girl's –

And he no less delighted. What a pair!

They quickly made a name among the staff;

Detractors had their say, and with just cause,

But he revealed his worth as she grew weak:

He rarely left her side, he went each day

To her in hospital, and he no youth.

I'd meet him there; we'd each take hand held out,

'With you both here, I've nothing more I need',

She'd say, her dry eyes closed, skin tissue-thin.

I found an hour all that I could bear

But faithful lover stayed with her all day,

All days. There was one special hour before

She came, at last, to her own bed, when we –

Myself, the chaplain, Phyl, beloved friend –

Received Communion, simple, deeply felt,   

Her fav'rite people joined by Heaven’s love

The first and only time. For faith was birthed

As age exacted tax on former health,

And heaven's vision comforted in part

The loss of what before had been her life –

The theatre, parties, long-held friendships – God

Had drawn her close, his death and life now hers.

We talked of him together and we prayed

The last time I was with her, holding hands.

I said, 'Goodbye', but only for the while

We'd be on holiday. I wrote her cards

From Torquay and from Lorne. I sent the first

Before the phone call came to tell her death;

I've kept the rest.

                                    There was no funeral.

Possessions bagged for charity, her son

No want for things beyond the words she'd breathed

Of love for him; so late for him. We spoke

The third time in the decades we had shared

His mother. Does he grieve? Do I? For whom?

My visits with her were a chance for me

To talk about myself, my hopes, my fears

And hear her words of affirmation, backed

By thoughtful questions and remembered news.

She listened. She believed in me. She loved

As grandmas well can do, without regard

For faults and flaws, just seeing diamonds gleam

Where I saw only quartz, my stumbling words

Of poetry and prose heard carefully

And shared with friends. For her I read aloud

The poets she had cherished long and oft

Recited on demand, her stagecraft strong.

And yet she was an ardent advocate

Of my poor lines. How she would scold if now

She heard those words!

                                    So what remains of Phyl?

Nought but relationships she'd deftly formed,

And stories told, which we may choose to weave

As colour in the cloth of our own lives.

Recalling Christmases, the fam'ly thrilled

When Phyl was one of us, pale matriarch,

Or was she fairy godmother of old?

Bestowing gifts and blessings on her folk

Who valued trinkets, kindly words, bequeathed

As evidence of this grandmother's love.

Her presence veiled now, still she lingers, whole

In spite of fractured memories. I cringe;

The image fixed before me now is soiled

With pain, with my own helplessness and urge

To run from clutching hands and sickly smell.

And weeks before that, when her usual grip

On what was real began to falter, slide

Into the past, the present gone, I braced

Myself to bring her back. But past was kind;

Did I betray her when I chose with love?

Yet death by cancer was the thief which stole

From her the clarity of thought and speech,

Expended her élan. Remember, though,

Her sense of fun, her biting wit, the quips

That yet broke through the haze. On our last day

Together, only half in jest we talked

Of heaven's plan to throw a merry bash

To welcome her. We'd no idea how near

That day – one week from then until she left.

And do I grieve? For her sake I rejoice.

And for the memories I'm truly glad,

And for the richness extra fam'ly brought

To all my kin. Of life lived, what remains?

A hand in mine and many lives enhanced.

Until next week…
Claire Belberg

Lucky Beanie

Welcome!

Already the grass is drying out in the absence of rain. As much as I enjoy the weather warming up (and it has done this quite gently this year, unlike the typical skip-the-middle-numbers temperature spikes), the yellowing as the season marches towards summer is a bit depressing. It gets harder and harder to water the garden enough (while trying to be responsible with our limited water resources), and the risk of bushfire increases. Still, if the possums and parrots don’t get them first, we do have wonderful summer fruits to look forward to. It’s difficult to be too sad about summer.

The story for this week is a quirky play on a song my daughters sang as a warm-up exercise for choir rehearsals. Let me know if you recognise the song!

Lucky Beanie

I pressed the end-call button on my mobile before I let myself go.

            'I did it! I got myself a gig at the Crooked Crown. It's my break, Seona! Do you know who hangs out at the Crown? Talent spotters for record companies, that's who!' I whooped and danced around our flat like a tribal, singing an impromptu tribute to my lucky gig beanie. I just knew that beanie would give me the edge I needed to become a famous singer-songwriter.

            Seona just smiled, the crinkles at the corner of her eyes revealing her genuine, otherwise unexpressed, pleasure. 'Oh, and thanks for the idea,' I mumbled. Seona doesn't say much, but she's so smart, what she does say is worth more than I can think in a week.

            I stayed up late that night finishing off a song I thought I'd debut at the gig. I spent the next two weeks planning and rehearsing my bracket. I made flyers and handed them out to my friends, hoping they'd turn up to boost the friendly numbers. I even told my parents ─ and then had to invent a good line to prevent them from coming. I knew they'd be proud of me, but performing to old folk whose idea of real music is a violin virtuoso in a painfully silent room doesn't bring out my best.

            I should've realised the dream was doomed by the way everything rolled along so easily ─ until Friday.

            On Friday I thought I'd pop by the hotel to suss it out. It's one weird place.   While I was there, I had a chat with the manager who, after some checking and rechecking, finally accepted that it was me who would be playing between nine and ten the next night, and that, in fact, I would be playing a twelve-string guitar and singing original songs, not doing a stand-up comedy act accompanied by a trombone. It's all good, I say.

            At home I pulled out my guitar ─ my favourite, still-paying-the-mortgage guitar ─ to find pale green and black slime all over the fretboard and dropping in lumps into the sound hole. Ah yes, the snack I'd packed for my last band practice and forgotten to eat. Fortunately avocado doesn't smell too strongly.

            Yep, it's all good. Then, as I cleaned the strings, the top E-string snapped. Hurried phone calls to the guitar-playing friends since the shops had shut by then. They'd open the next morning to find a large number of guitarists keen on buying spare E-strings because it turned out that none of them had one. And to make sure they didn't sell out before I rocked up, I camped on the doorstep from six in the morning. Only got moved on twice by the police and once by a drunk who thought I looked like his last landlady.

            By 9:03 I'd been told that the distributors were currently having difficulty supplying steel strings. At 10:03 I found the spare E-string I suddenly remembered I had. Why I had hidden it in a hiking boot remains a mystery. It's just a good thing I tipped up all my shoes in order to find my beanie.

            You've got to understand about my lucky beanie. It's as ugly as heck, murky brown wool mixed with something like sludge green in a rough fibre. It was once my Great Aunt Farula's. I remember the way her eyes sank into the layers of wrinkled skin covering her skeletal head ─ and the beanie she always wore, which I studied intently to avoid looking at her face. Somehow I knew when I inherited it that it was going to change my life.

            I hunted through all my shoes, all my drawers, the dirty washing, the ironing pile and the bags of clothes waiting to be sent to the refugees. I found the much-needed E-string, but not my beanie.

            It was getting dark. I sat in the cramped lounge of our third floor flat, looking around the room at every picture, poster, photograph and ornament as if they might turn into the mysteriously absent beanie. I was out of ideas. I was working hard to push aside the terrifying thought of appearing at the Crown, on this, the night of my big break, minus the beanie. Deep, agonised silence. My thoughts had collapsed into a soggy formless lump.

            Who knows how long I might have remained in this state if my beanie had not inched its way, with jerks and jumps, before my initially unseeing eyes. It was most of the way to the kitchen before eternity thawed into a distinct now.

            I pounced. My beanie screeched. I picked it up. It shuddered. I dropped it. My beanie had never behaved this way before. In fact, it had never behaved. What had gotten into it? I flipped it over ─ and stared, uncomprehending.

            Clinging to the inside was a jelly-like purple thing with tiny nose, mouth, limbs and claws. It quivered but it wouldn't fall out no matter how hard I shook the beanie. I turned the beanie inside out; the purple creature stretched to cover what was now the outside. How dare it take over my lucky beanie! I put it under the tap, first the cold, and then, with a rush of jealousy, the hot water. It made no difference, other than the thing spraying me like a dog shaking to get dry.

            The time was nearing seven. I had to eat, dress, and catch a bus to the hotel by eight-thirty. I left the beanie on the kitchen bench while I prepared some food I had no appetite to eat. I wondered whether Seona would come home, turn up at the hotel, or spend the evening in the library as usual. I cooked her some fried rice anyway.

            I made a crucial decision while I was eating: I would wear the beanie, even with the purple creature inside if it came to that. The beanie hadn't moved for ages. Maybe the thing slept. Maybe it had gone when I wasn't looking. Anyway, I didn't have to wear the beanie until I played, so I stuffed it into my backpack.

            By 8:35 I was at the Crooked Crown. Not a lot of people yet. Which ones were the talent scouts? Couldn't tell, so I searched for faces of friends. Couldn't see any. I dumped my gear at a table near the corner where a couple of guys were playing bass guitars and singing tunelessly. I sat at the bar with a Coke, taking in the smell of stale beer and the distant clatter of poker machines, trying to tune into the mood of the place. Not much mood; everyone was ignoring the musicians. Good, I thought, they'll be fresh for me. I couldn't wait to get started.

            When I returned to my gear, I thought for a moment the backpack had moved. I intercepted a look from one of the bass players, whose gaze returned to the pack just as it lurched towards him. I looked inside, acting nonchalance. Everything seemed as I'd left it. The beanie was still and silent again.

            The guys finished their bracket to a few slow claps, packed up and pushed through the drinkers. I took a deep breath, said a prayer, and moved into the corner to set up. A couple of friends turned up, and sat at my table.

            'Hey, Jodie,' boomed Sasha. 'Looks like Mara's about to play. Should be a great show!' He winked at Jodie.

            I stepped up to the mic quickly. 'Good evening, all. My name's Mara Simbaya, and I'm going to entertain you with some of my original songs. I hope you'll enjoy them. I'll be around afterwards for a chat. So lean back and feel the flow of good vibes.' I pulled the beanie over my dark hair, strummed some chords and launched into an old favourite. It felt good, and the crowd settled to a quiet hum of contentment, while Sasha and Jodie clapped and cheered.

            As my confidence gained momentum and the audience seemed to be eating out of my hand, I tried a few one liners as I moved between songs. They went down well. But in my fourth song the mood shifted. The crowd were watching me closely but they seemed distracted. My song wasn't reaching them. Sweat trickled from my forehead into my eyes; my confidence leaked away. How had I lost my audience? And my best songs were yet to come.

            'Oh my God!' Jodie screeched. 'It's moving! Look at the beanie!'

            Her words drew me out of a desperate focus on the song to the strange sensation on my head. I realised it had been happening for a while. My hair was being nibbled and tugged, accompanied by a squelching sound. I quit strumming to peal the beanie off, intending to throw it aside. It wouldn't budge. I finished the song, and tried some banter into the microphone while I wrestled with my beanie, subtly at first, then with growing urgency. It was beginning to hurt.

            My audience was laughing, clapping and throwing comments to me. Sasha and Jodie had slunk away. I had attention; I wished I was invisible.

            Seona! I saw her at the edge of the crowd. I tried to telegraph her with my eyebrows to come and help me. She saw, watched some more, and then began an infuriatingly calm progress towards me. Nobody rushes Seona. When she reached my side she whispered, 'It's a purple people-eater. Loves hair. Very rare. I borrowed it from the laboratory but I've got to return it on Monday.' She slipped her hand under the back of the beanie, flicked, and removed the beanie without too much of my remaining hair being pulled out. I was free.

            I could feel the heat of the lights on a patch near my crown. I resolutely continued my bracket, but I had no energy for performing, and the listeners drifted away. The last twenty minutes dragged. I couldn't satisfy the half-hearted calls for jokes; I couldn't think. When the feature band of the night moved to take over, I fled to the bathroom. I couldn't see it but I felt a bald patch on the top of my head, and the slight dents of teeth marks in the tender flesh.

            I tried to sneak out the back way, but the manager caught me by the kitchen door.

            'It might have worked better with a trombone,' he said, his droopy eyes flicking past mine, cold as a lizard's. I left without answering. What can you say when your dream dies at birth?

* * *   

That was last week. Last week, last year, time frozen in eternal wastelands.

            I visit Seona at her laboratory on my way to the city, offering to donate the traitorous beanie to support her research on irritating jelly-like creatures.

            'So what's your plan?' Seona asks as she stares at the beanie, which still has a skein of my crinkly hair attached to it. I can see her mind is somewhere else.

            'Some woman rang and asked me to meet her at the Blue Fish Café for lunch. She didn't say much, just said she had an offer she wanted to put to me. No idea what it's about, but I haven't got a life anymore, and, hey, it's a free lunch.'

            Seona is with me now. She's grinning. She knows something I don't ─ so what's new? Her smile stirs hope in me though.

She offers me the beanie. ‘You’ll be needing this, Mara.’  

Until next week…

Claire Belberg