I just felt like talking
Hi Granny,
today I just felt like talking to you. The breeze was mellow and the sun stinging the back of my neck and I had found shelter inside for a moment. It was like those days growing up out in that small country town, coming back to your place after a day at school. Those hours from 4:30-6 where dad was still working and I was too young to be at home on my own. You were always so patient with me. I'd see you sitting small behind the steering wheel in your car under the shade of a gum tree beside the road. I'd stumble off the bus and you'd open up the boot of the car for my school bag. And we'd go to that little fruit and vegetable store on the road heading out of town. No matter what the price of strawberries, you'd always make sure we had some for dessert with caster sugar sprinkled (poured) on top. You'd let me pod the sugar snap peas, and buy extra because you knew I'd eat half of the little bag in the process.
Who's The Boss came on at 5pm every day and we'd both convince Gumpy that it was more important than Channel 10's news broadcast. That little flute intro would play and we'd grab our cheesy biscuits and sit down on the couch together, the dogs staring at our biscuits then into our eyes, and back again. You'd feed them some in disregard for Gumpy's protest and the vetenerian's warnings that "they'll get fat." And later I'd sprawl myself over your lap and demand, with a "please" thrown in for good measure, a back scratch.
It's almost ten years on since those times. But when I visit, I'll still take a stab at ticking off one or two of them. But it was, above all, your voice that I really missed the most. And so I called you today. And you told me about how your dog is getting better at being left at home alone (though I can tell that's all very much an opinion, she's definitely scatterbrained), and how the weather is too hot at the moment. Those are two things I can rely on when I call you up - a dog update and a weather update. You'll tell me the garden's a bit dry and you're looking forward to the rain. You'll tell me dad's been too busy to visit. You'll ask me how my mum is, even though you see her more often than I do. You'll ask me if I need any money. And I'll lie and say no, because your generosity in the past has left me baffled and humbled.
And I'll tell you I'm still floating between jobs and between semesters and between life commitments and we'll laugh at how terrible I am at keeping contact despite really having nothing going on. You'll call the iPad we bought you a couple of years ago "the thing" and ask why the videos of Corgi puppies are no longer on there (I am yet to gather the courage and effort to teach you about how YouTube actually works).
But at the end of the phone call, as frustrated and none-the-wiser as I may be, I am so happy to have talked to you. And I wish we could lie in silence on your couch on a summer afternoon away from the sweltering and stagnant country-town heat and watch The Nanny on TV1. It's not all gone, but it's drifting.
today I just felt like talking to you. The breeze was mellow and the sun stinging the back of my neck and I had found shelter inside for a moment. It was like those days growing up out in that small country town, coming back to your place after a day at school. Those hours from 4:30-6 where dad was still working and I was too young to be at home on my own. You were always so patient with me. I'd see you sitting small behind the steering wheel in your car under the shade of a gum tree beside the road. I'd stumble off the bus and you'd open up the boot of the car for my school bag. And we'd go to that little fruit and vegetable store on the road heading out of town. No matter what the price of strawberries, you'd always make sure we had some for dessert with caster sugar sprinkled (poured) on top. You'd let me pod the sugar snap peas, and buy extra because you knew I'd eat half of the little bag in the process.
Who's The Boss came on at 5pm every day and we'd both convince Gumpy that it was more important than Channel 10's news broadcast. That little flute intro would play and we'd grab our cheesy biscuits and sit down on the couch together, the dogs staring at our biscuits then into our eyes, and back again. You'd feed them some in disregard for Gumpy's protest and the vetenerian's warnings that "they'll get fat." And later I'd sprawl myself over your lap and demand, with a "please" thrown in for good measure, a back scratch.
It's almost ten years on since those times. But when I visit, I'll still take a stab at ticking off one or two of them. But it was, above all, your voice that I really missed the most. And so I called you today. And you told me about how your dog is getting better at being left at home alone (though I can tell that's all very much an opinion, she's definitely scatterbrained), and how the weather is too hot at the moment. Those are two things I can rely on when I call you up - a dog update and a weather update. You'll tell me the garden's a bit dry and you're looking forward to the rain. You'll tell me dad's been too busy to visit. You'll ask me how my mum is, even though you see her more often than I do. You'll ask me if I need any money. And I'll lie and say no, because your generosity in the past has left me baffled and humbled.
And I'll tell you I'm still floating between jobs and between semesters and between life commitments and we'll laugh at how terrible I am at keeping contact despite really having nothing going on. You'll call the iPad we bought you a couple of years ago "the thing" and ask why the videos of Corgi puppies are no longer on there (I am yet to gather the courage and effort to teach you about how YouTube actually works).
But at the end of the phone call, as frustrated and none-the-wiser as I may be, I am so happy to have talked to you. And I wish we could lie in silence on your couch on a summer afternoon away from the sweltering and stagnant country-town heat and watch The Nanny on TV1. It's not all gone, but it's drifting.
