Me, Mum and the Albatross

My first published short story in 2014.

One cool muted morning, making mother her usual drink, standing by the sink in our sunny open kitchen, I found the intensely beautiful colours from the rising sun outside the window, blinded me, briefly halting my daily routine. I loved that the light had ready access. Was pleased that I’d not bothered putting up blinds last year,  when redecorating. The sky all powerfully hummed with bursts of pink and orange cradling together, pushing effortlessly through the trees in the garden, weaving through into the house, tossing more of itself around me. There one minute and gone the next.

A short time later, walking down the hallway slowly with mother’s tea (no milk, no sugar); stepping into her bedroom, which unlike the kitchen,  discovered the still atmosphere soft and warm, like putting on a cosy slipper.

I tried to waken her but was unsuccessful.

I cleared away a light green woollen dressing gown from the well cushioned chair beside her more than comfortable bed, with its’ oh- so smart padded cotton coverlet, minus any crinkling and sat down abruptly. I wasn’t surprised. This event had been a long time coming. She was nearly 104 after all. I stretched a weary arm under the sheets to find hers. With my right hand I finished off her lukewarm mug of pale black tea without spillage!

This was clearly, not, as I’d rehearsed!

Soft hues melted the corners of the semi darkened well aired bedroom. Leaning forward I clung for a while to her yesterday’s image shining out from her well framed more than attractive photo close by.

I allowed random thoughts jump around in my head, from positive feelings in refrain through to silhouettes of sadness. Yes, Mum and I had, had plenty of adventures of late delighting in each other’s values,  for the first time, unashamedly.

We had all done her proud, partying well into the night on her hundredth birthday nearly four years before. Many times I’d marvelled at her character when young, illuminated in the many letters left behind in the attic, written to dad during the war years. She always saw the funny side when I joked: “Your daughter will make you famous one day mum.”

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The doctors rooms felt chocker as I helped navigate mother through the sturdy newly painted wide entrance way. The late morning February heat warmed arthritic shoulders of which she never complained. Mother’s ‘bright green shiny walker’….her helpmate…. assisted her short journey forward towards a high backed leather chair placed directly in the corner. 

“Good morning,” she exclaimed audibly, carefully taking her seat.

Despite the volume of patients the place was audibly quiet, except for a newly installed ceiling fan. Pleasant calming music from Radio Coast was playing from somewhere in the background, it helped to assuage the sound of the monstrous fan. Radio Coast, how apt. The upbeat music seemed to partner the coastal traffic outside. 

“Mum are you happy sitting under that whirring sound?” Trying not to make a fuss, after all she was a centenarian plus!

“Does it dear, I hadn’t noticed.” She was not one to daily wear her hearing aids, unless her daughter produced them.

Mother had never quite owned up to anything being amiss within her. She’d been very homesick in the early 1960’s. Later I found her family the Witts from Fordingbridge had been living across the Hampshire region for over five hundred years, possibly trekking over from Holland all those years ago!

Today she looked serene and elegant. I remember her being a very stylish woman, enjoying dressing up, pencilling her eyebrows and applying crimson orangey lipstick, which I now use. We’d go to shows; mainly musicals and comedies, and in her single days she loved being on the stage herself in dramas and musicals. She kept her programmes. Her ‘hey days’ were the 1930’s, 40’s and 50’s.  After the birth of her two children: Roger and Sarah, she gave it all away, or almost.

“I’ll just go and sign us in mum.” 

I approached reception where Vanessa was busy on the phone. The elevated counter helped give her a degree of privacy. She’d just returned from an overseas holiday apparently.

“Vanessa, that fan sure has a mind of its own. Does it irritate?” Her light pink finger nails contrasted with the black telephone resting in her hand.

“The music helps drown some of the sound. How’s your marvellous mother Evelyn doing?”

“She’s amazing Vanessa, she seems to have more energy than I do at times. She’s still reasonably lucid too, which is somewhat reassuring.”

Returning to my seat I noted mother looked comfortable. The pictorial magazine kept her occupied, especially now that she couldn’t read anymore. 

“We’ll have a bite soon,” I suggested, lightly touching her arm, as I picked up a dog eared décor type magazine, and flicked through it liking the before and after design shots for domestic spaces. In no time I had redone the large windowed old kitchen area in my home up the road. The background music brought me quickly back to why I was here, interspaced with vague memories of our dancing days lingered somewhat.

“Can I get you a drink of water mum?” 

“Yes please dear.” She responded. Politeness,  important, as was music to her sweet soul.

At five she’d begun learning the piano, then, after we were born we’d hover around the keyboard in the sitting-room together. Dad loved singing the old cowboy songs, perhaps therapy from war time when he gave concerts in the Thai jungle. Sometimes neighbours and friends joined us.

Someone sneezed loudly snapping me back to waiting room reality. Mother had coped well  this morning, managing to avoid scattered toys and the sprawling legs of a tall young man. Mum like chaps. We’d noticed he was wearing unusually well-polished large leather boot’s, they stood out like a boxers bruised eye.

Seriously though this had been one of our last three monthly visits together to our independent  doctor Carmel, always a thorough and most rewarding a time spent.  She was always impressed with mother’s health stating:

“You are doing well aren’t you Evelyn!”

Mother consistently responded with an, ‘Am I?’ or I’m alive!” 

Our doctor seemed satisfied with her care and health in general. Our visit wrapped up, we rearranged ourselves before moving back out into the warm sunny shopping environ. The handsome young man in tall shiny boots, long since gone, via the other doctor. He’d told us he was off soon on his O.E.

“Better not forget your shoe polish,’ mum had joked cheekily with him. Sharing her sentiments, the young man laughed then settled himself back behind the plain cover of his varsity legal studies.

Mother had been physically healthy for most of her life, apart from varicose veins, and minor eye issues. She had obviously enjoyed her shortish time in the education system, as she had kept her somewhat entertaining to me, school exercise books, no disrespect, which today sit behind me in our office type space. She had worked hard in the family business, leaving school at fourteen not unusually. It was said she had been offered a job at the local town bank. 

She also participated eagerly in various sports such as badminton, and tennis. I found a photo of her with her older sister Norah in their Morris Country dancing team. It must have been fun as it involved travelling to nearby country areas.

(mum bottom right, Norah her older sister bottom left.)

Mum and Dad met at a dance during the war in 1941. Dad left a year later after their wedding week in June 1942. They were apart for going on five years. We migrated to Auckland in 1958; she found life here in Auckland very difficult, understandably. Dad loved the romance of adventure, we travelled around a bit for a few weeks whilst dad job seeked.

They bought a business in town in the late fifties which I helped in and my brother too in their second one some years later. Dad was the first secretary of the Restaurant Society, 1970 I think. 

“Ok mum, let’s go and share some lunch, it’s an easy walk to the café, the weathers kind at the moment, don’t you think?”

“Yes dear, I’d love that. It seems such a long time since breakfast. I’d like to go down to the beach and sit for a bit too. There’s a seat down there I remember”

It took just a short step and a hop from the surgery to find the well-lit café.  Inside, the eye-catching clock wore a face, sporting: ‘I love Roma.’ (I’d lived there in my early twenties.) It sat immediately above a loud hissing shiny Italian coffee machine. 

“Sarah, this is good arriving before the main lunch crowd isn’t it? I’ll go and sit over by the window. You know what I like to eat, tea will be fine please.”

Queueing wasn’t a problem. The attractive blonde haired woman wearing striking cameo earing’s, probably Italian, as I saw the factory when I visited in 1958 on the way to New Zealand, on the Orontes ship, took my order and placed the dishes on a tray for me. (Different ordering system,  twenty plus years ago.)

“My, that looks good.” Mother announced appreciatively as our tray advanced, bearing nourishing sandwiches, a couple of cakes and her favourite cuppa tea!

For a while we didn’t speak, we were hungrier than we’d realised. Afterwards we found an easy park down by the flattish beach where the tide gently lapped at the clean, soft edged shore line. For a short moment or two we tilted back in our car seats for comfort and looked across to the other side of the water, where the cliffs emphasised the green of many trees and bushes. Hillsborough was my home where Mum had loved to stay periodically. We could never understand why some people suggested we cut the trees away. We’d point out what I thought was obvious.

“They’re assisting the security of the cliff,  I’d say with baited breath, don’t you think?” 

We sat for a while reminiscing the distant harbour shapes. Beyond and to the right there’s Puketutu Island Mum, and further over we can see the hilly green of the Waitakeres she added.  We should be tourist bus drivers we joked.

“Wow look isn’t that an Albatross dear?”

“Not sure Mum, they’re a southern bird anyway. I think it’s time we visited the optician again, don’t you?”

It’s true, we were often teased for our attitude around birds, who loved the trees on the cliff. During the busy mating season the Tui’s would swoop down splashing differently in the bird baths interestingly, the sun light enhancing their iridescent and black feathers, a striking memory.

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The old wooden church awash with atmosphere enveloped our family and friends, as we navigated the huge main portal towards the front pews, where our mother and grannie lay. The colours of our flag of birth coupled with the generous floral display.

Mother had requested to wear make -up and her favourite green dress,  one which she held treasured memories of. We sang in great heart special songs Evelyn had picked out, suggestive of her timeless values. The music from the well hewn rafters suspended above us, voice and organ tumbling out across the high vaulted ceiling:

‘Pack Up Your Troubles, Spread A Little Happiness, Amazing Grace’ and so on.

She had hoped we’d singalong together (as would have Dad) remarking in those quiet moments out on the road or down by the water’s edge.

Yes, we sang your favourite tunes Mum. That’s what you wanted and that’s what you got!

Bright stars navigate your way now dearest. The ‘bright green shiny walker’ has a different home!