Читать книгу Forever Baby: Jenny’s Story - A Mother’s Diary - Mary Burbidge - Страница 14

No, it’s definitely the time. I proved it. Today I switched on the computer with an hour for writing and not an idea within cooee. And I produced a lovely story — poignant, nicely shaped, deep, the right length and not quite the right form for the ABC competition.

I just started typing and the story appeared. 'Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago?' I typed and the flowers of long ago bloomed in my mind with their attendant remorses and guilts. The childhood reminiscences flowed but metamorphosed. While I gave Jen coffee I become a boy, as I put her in the pool the dreary reality of the lily incident gained drama and humour, and as I hung out the washing a satisfying ending appeared. By 7pm it was done. Long swim for Jen, and late tea, but a gratifying afternoon’s work indeed.

And apart from that . . . a full morning at work, no dramas. All the dramatic possibilities of Wednesday fizzled into normalities when the results came in. Good. That sort of drama I can do without. Brief Urimbirra business and a lengthy house-call ate into my afternoon. Likewise shopping, cleaning, cooking, washing.

After the story was done, I had a swim with Jen and baked a carrot cake for her birthday and turned the left-over stew and left-over spaghetti sauce into a delectable-looking meat pie, but since no-one was here to eat it and comment on its delicious golden pastry, it hangs on until tomorrow. This pie deserves an appreciative audience.

After tea I produced a draft ‘Conditions and Entry Form' for the CAA Short Story Competition. I'll get comments over the weekend. Kate Veitch dropped off the material she promised. A good sign.

I had another chat with Phillip about Ant. They've agreed that the cleaner looks at his room daily and, if he needs to clean, Ant is charged for every half-hour he spends. And they're sorting out Joanne’s finances so that she can stay too.

I decided, while having my swim and listening to ‘Books and Writing’, that perhaps my ideal job would be as a driver, driving endlessly in and around Melbourne (always within range of Melbourne radio stations), delivering supplies to milk bars, or cake shops maybe, and listening to ABC radio. I'd become so wise and knowledgeable. I'd know and understand everything, and during repeats I'd listen to glorious music on FM or talk-back on 3LO. Bliss.

The man on ‘Books and Writing’ was talking about time, and space, and order, and he made it all so fascinating and elegant. I even enjoyed the hour on the history of pop music while I made the cake and pie. It was about the Beatles. Amazing interviews with utterly hysterical, weeping and hyperventilating young girls after a concert, and descriptions of fans swarming onto the ground at a stadium, and the pressure of them actually knocking over a caravan that the Beatles were waiting in before going out to sing. And some thought-provoking comments from a peeved John Lennon about how all these epileptics and disabled people and people who couldn’t talk used to be brought out to their dressing rooms by their parents or carers and they didn’t know how to relate to these disabled people who wanted to touch them, and how at concerts the front two rows would be filled up with these disabled, brought along and propped there, as if seeing them or touching them would produce a miraculous cure or something. (Read all the preceding in a Liverpudlian accent.)

Andrew went to work early and came home late. He did some good shopping though. Found a vibrator for Jen that seems just the thing. And a dress. And a magnificent crystal decanter for Lynette. I caught passing glimpses of Jo and Jim, and Annabel is still away. She might like the vibrator too.