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In A Whale of a Celebration, I posted a gallery of shots I took during a morning off the Sunshine Coast watching whales heading south to their Antarctic feeding grounds. The experience was a gift – one of the most … Continue reading
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Perhaps because I’m lavishly curvaceous myself, curves have always been most appealing to me. From the almost modern curves of the Winged Victory of Samothrace to the perfect sickled curves of a water buffalo’s horns, the great arc of Niagara’s … Continue reading
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As I have just today decided that it is Queensland I will return to when I go back to Australia, I thought it appropriate, if a little sad, to post a late dusk shot of the quite marvellous River Walk … Continue reading
Here in paradise, the sun shines on a world of lurid greens. A bunch of orange thamibilly* punctuates the middle distance. To the north, a bank of octopus ink clouds is advancing toward us, a stark and dramatic backdrop to the world outside my windows. White herons are flying to safety from their feeding grounds in the paddy fields down by the canal; the last of Hanuman’s Troupe has bounded across the roof, off to … wherever it is, they go, to shelter from a storm. In the garden, the three new flagpoles of black bamboo execute a staccato gavotte, powered by the blustery breeze that’s flying ahead of the storm.
It grows darker, and darker. Now, the monsoon-feed clouds collide in an almost continual roar. Is that the sound of distant cannon fire I hear? Am I in my aerie on the rise behind the Parliament in Sri Lanka, or with Pierre, listening to the sound of Napoleon’s Grande Armée advancing on Borodino?
What am I doing in the middle of this raging battlefield?
The battlefield is in my mind. It is a conflict begun years ago, not long after I returned to live on my paradise island. On the one hand, the Voice of Reason, covertly whispering snippets of financial reality in my ear as the strands of the global economic crisis began to enmesh me into the growing maelstrom. On the other, an expanse of emotional certainty, which steadfastly refused to be anything other than enchanted.
Not entirely unmindful of the likelihood that what was threatening to bring down countries, must also affect me, I sought to achieve a compromise. I moved. I relinquished my dream home; the garden I had created. I uprooted The Girls and brought them here to the edge of the city. Significant savings were envisioned. Then I fell down the stairs, and a third protagonist entered the conflict. “What if it had been a stroke, or a heart attack, Parkinson’s, cancer?” “You think you’re helpless now, because you have your leg in the air and can only negotiate those steps on your backside?”, this new voice jeered.
Physical incapacity is not something I’d ever experienced. The thought of it had never entered my mind. It shocked and frightened me. Equally, I knew now what my mother and father had felt, at the end of their lives, unable to do for themselves, without me.
Very soon it will be a year since I began clawing my way back to full mobility. In this year of a myriad small cuts I’ve learned a thing or two about life, and myself, the least palatable of which is that I’m overwhelmed by the decisions I have to make, and have been procrastinating about examining my options. Lotus eating here in paradise is my preferred option.
Then, last weekend, a friend had a stroke – one he will live through, and, with a mountain of hard work and help, overcome. As did my mother. But not only did Dorothy have her redoubtable determination to drive her, and me to prod, chivvy and love her. She also had access to a team of stroke specific therapists in a rehabilitation centre not far from her home. How will G climb that mountain I watched my mother summit with so much difficulty? How would I? I know the answer to that now. Without family, without the type of medical help we’ve grown accustomed to in the West, I wouldn’t be able to.
So, it’s clear. I must go back home. Experience, and my old nemesis, the Voice of Reason, tell me I must do it while I can – while I have options, and time to create a new life for myself.
But I quail at the first decision I have to make – it is the reason I have been unable to face it these last several months. I must leave my girls behind**. I must find them a new home here in paradise. Not until I have done that will I be able to think about where I might like to live, what I would like to do with the rest of my life, how I might make a little extra money, figure out the complexities of a large physical move to a place unknown, or cope with having my wings clipped.
The rumbling continues, the storm moves slowly, inexorably on. The light changes hue – no longer black-purple with lime, but the smoke flecked fire of a distant battlefield …
Notes: Thambilly – Bright orange king coconut. ** Seven months quarantine, six in Singapore, one in Sydney, alone, is jus too cruel. This isn’t a sympathy seeking post – no commiseration, if you don’t mind.
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Ailsa’s Travel Theme this week is oceanic. I thought you might fancy a whale of a celebration in honour of Oceans Week. Shot off the Sunshine Coast, Queensland as these magnificent creatures migrate south to their Antarctic feeding waters. View … Continue reading
Summer is the beach. We lived 500 miles southwest of Sydney. And after the disaster of 1956, beach holidays weren’t a given, but always, in my mind, summer means the beach. And it’s no wonder.
Despite the notorious poverty of the headmasters of Anglican Prep schools at the time, (Dorothy said Grandpa often balanced the books by not paying himself, and Granny was never paid for the work she did), summer holidays at the beach were a cherished tradition in Ma’s family.
They would take the train down to the coast – and thence by some type of horse-drawn vehicle to the rented lodgings Grandpa will have organised. Curumbin Beach, on what is now the Gold Coast, was a favourite, as was Tewantin, the forerunner of Noosa. Dorothy fondly remembered her father renting rowing boats to take them down the river to the fishing village of Noosa, so the whole family could play in the surf.
Ma with Granny and Grandpa, Curumbin, Circa 1925
Grandpa taught Ma to surf and she was a keen body surfer all her life – only transferring her allegiance to a (body) board in her mid-70s.
Ma surfs Alexandra Headland, 1990
And so, with sunshine in our veins, off we went to the beach.
Ailsa at Where’s my Backpack? has challenged us to post a taste of summer - where we come from.
My first thought was of the heat: the interminable, unremitting, dreary, life sapping heat that only water could assuage. Of days spent trapped inside, curtains drawn against the heat. Of enduring daytime hours reading on a makeshift day bed I assembled, directly in front of the Breeze Air water cooler, on the drawing-room floor, waiting for the relative cool of the evening before all three of us – Papa, Ma and me – would troop down to the dam for a delicious – though totally terrifying – swim in its muddy, yabbie-infested waters. Or of the defiant days, clothes torn off as too restricting, when I would take my book to the front lawn, the hose playing its cooling stream across the inadequate shelter of an umbrella.
I’m not certain, but I think this was the summer after the flood, when we knew for sure most of the farm was dead, and my beloved Ruggie too. When our spirits were momentarily bent … I’m not sure, but something made it indelible … So I present to you, Hanwood Summer, circa 1956/57:
The three bears take a swim
Kookaburras, Sulphur Crested Cockatoos, Galas, Whip Birds, Butcher Birds, Magpies (the list seems endless): the Australian bush is filled with the loud, raucous, joyous sounds of birds. It’s the only thing I’ve ever missed, and so of course, “K” must be for Kookaburra. Rather than present it’s genus and other biological credentials, I’d like to let my father tell you a about his first encounter with our iconic bird.
Papa arrived in Sydney on the Thursday before Easter, 1924, the remains of the Five Pounds his grandmother had given him as travelling money jingling in his pocket, and a precious envelope with a further Twenty Five, “to be banked”. As it turned out, his arrival wasn’t as anticipated, and instead of being met by his sponsor, the friendly farmer from Coonabarabran, he was thrust on the mercy of the Department of Immigration.
Times were different, back then. Instead of being handcuffed and led off to the nearest Detention Centre, young Nevis spent Easter with the Woods, at their home over near Manly.
His encounter with the infamous Laughing Jackass, that weekend, was the first of many faux pas the sixteen year old with the big hands was to make before somehow he became an Aussie, and is a story he loved telling against himself. But let him tell it in his own words:
“We swam every morning, except for Sunday, when we went to church. I was shown the Botanic Gardens, and on one afternoon went to the zoo, where I was to see the famous Australian ‘Laughing Jackass’. Well, I heard the wretched thing laughing alright, but when the family tried to point the creature out to me, I just couldn’t spot it – until Mr. Woods laughingly explained it was a bird. And here I was, looking for a beast with two large ears and four legs! “
"... and I was looking for a beast with two large ears and four legs!'
This fellow used to visit us frequently ,once the drought set in. Competition for food was fierce and the lush, sub-tropical gardens of the Sunshine Coast hinterland played host to a myriad of prey animals for a hungry Kookaburra and his family. He would sit atop this stump, still, barely moving an eyeball, watching for frogs, and lizards within the understory of the garden. But that’s not all – seems we also had a steady supply of snakes for this vigilant bird.
Here in paradise, there’s no sunshine today, and that matches my mood. For today is ANZAC Day, a special day for Australians and New Zealanders, and a special day for me too.
Very few of the original ANZACs remain with us now. They were the young men – boys really – of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps who marched off to defend ‘the motherland’ at the beginning of the First World War, only to be pinned down on the cliffs of Gallipoli, pawns in a game of politics being conducted by London. It was a disastrous campaign, ending in massive casualties and ignominy, yet over the intervening decades, ANZAC has come to represent the maturation of the young nation of Australia (barely fifteen years old itself at the time), to the point that young people today see it as the first step in real independence from Great Briton. And there’s something to be said for that.
For my father, and his generation, survivors of the Second World War, ANZAC Day was the day on which they honoured their fallen mates, allowed themselves to remember the things a man should never have to remember, and to celebrate their lucky escapes.
Even at 90, Papa would polish his medals, and attend the service at the war memorial. But now, as for many of us, the Lest We Forget has become more about shame – the shame that old men are still sending young boys off to fight wars they barely understand.
As some of you might know, I grew up on a small farm on the western plains of New South Wales: the daughter of an English immigrant and a fifth generation Scott who never called Australia home until well into her seventies. Until I was in my late thirties I had met only one person of Aboriginal descent, and poor, put-upon Francis Glass would have been unlikely, and probably unwilling, to explain the meaning of Country to the new girl, who took her under her wing as an act of pity, and shame. But a recent photo challenge promoted me think about “Nature” and my place in it, and after thinking about it on and off for the past week or so, I think that a little of what country means for the first people of Australia, is what I mean when I think of nature.
Like my mother, I didn’t always feel I had a strong allegiance to the nation of Australia (distrusting all forms of jingoism, and the forced sense of camaraderie inherent in the cosy notion of mateship and nationalistic fervour). But unlike her, no matter where I was, where I was living, a visceral attachment – like an umbilical cord – kept me connected to that piece of this Earth from which I came, to its scarce and denuded soils, its prehistoric rocks and ravaged mountain ranges, its trees and “The Animals Noah Forgot”. And, like a child who jealously guards everything it perceives to be its own, I have noticed a vigilance on Australia’s behalf – I mean the land, that squashy shaped continent that rides the waves between Antarctica and Asia – only half acknowledging a love so deep that the only way I can describe it is protectiveness.
Now, I have been aware of this attachment, this protective impulse, for a long time, because I have been feeling its pull on me since I can remember. But beyond this sense of place, the competition challenged me to question what I really mean when I think of nature. I don’t think I have ever consciously tried to formulate a definition before – you know, it’s our environment, and I’m a good citizen of the world, I don’t litter, I turn off lights, walk when I can, I support the Greens, you know, nature. For the competition I came up with some facile distinction between animate and inanimate and would probably have left it at that (because I’m not in the mood for introspection right now), except that a comment by orples (about what ‘man’ is doing to the environment), and Mothergrogan‘s “that’s the end of that Journey” post (of a freshly felled tree), prompted me to concentrate a little, dig a little deeper.
A Chameleon's Eyes are Nature.
Call me a child of the ’7os, call me a ‘tree hugger’, but what I realised was this: to me, nature describes all that is – every atom and every molecule, every particle of sand, every rock, every mountain, every stream, river or sea; every blade of grass, every flower, every tree; the air we breathe: everything that pertains to our planet – and beyond, because to me, nature also includes the Moon and the Sun, the tides, and the energy which fuelled life from the primordial soup, and the cycles which continue to support the life of every organism on our planet, and keep Earth in orbit around the Sun.
When a person asks you “what is nature” and you are told “everything” you might be sceptical. But I’m one with my fellow countrymen – the original inhabitants of my piece of ground – who say “country is both a place of belonging and a way of believing”. The only difference is in scope, and belief. Just as our world was created through attrition and accumulation, one anomaly at a time (I’m sorry, but that’s what I believe), I have to believe that we can begin to reverse the negative effects of our short but disruptive tenancy of our place in the universe.
I start with a definition, and end with a plea; seems I feel protective of everything.
PS If someone could just magically make me understand how to proclaim myself a Post A Day girl, I’m ready to give it a go …
