Cool as a cucumber

Waiting to Exhale. That’s the name of a book. I have it in my bookcase but I don’t remember reading it. There are no underlined pages, so I don’t know what I thought of it at the time. I turn pages and write in margins of books almost as note to future me. I take them down and dust them off and see how the book read me last time, often marvelling at what past me was like, sometimes wondering what was so significant about a sentence or a sense. Waiting to Exhale is a book about relationships and I think it was even a movie, and I’m stealing the title because that’s what life feels like a bit right now.

I have a seventeen year old who is getting his driver’s licence and his pilot’s licence and has his boating licence, so every time he takes to the road or the sky or the water I take a big deep breath in and hold and hold and hold it until he steps out of those adrenaline filled worlds and back into the nest. Yes, I know I have to allow this stretching to occur. Yes I know it’s good for us (I assume the broccoli rule holds true: something that feels so yuck MUST be good) but that doesn’t mean I like it. I spend my professional days helping people to understand the difference between something that hurts and something that harms, so it’s not a new concept, but it doesn’t mean I like it.

I have a fourteen your old who is learning to act and sing and go out all day without me, so every times she leaves to hang with her people I take a big deep breath in and hold and hold and hold until she steps out from those magical worlds and back into the nest. Yes I know I have to allow the flexibility to bend and flow, but that doesn’t mean I like it. I go to yoga classes where I learn the difference between stretch and strain in my own body, so the concept is familiar and maybe even comforting, but that still doesn’t mean I embrace it.

I stole the title of Waiting to Exhale, because for in life as it is in art, our lives are really all about relationships. It’s probably a big part of why we are here: striving to tribe, collecting connections. We spend a good part of our days trying to find ways to connect more dots and see what is hidden in plain sight- what bigger picture will be revealed. We breathe in to prepare ourselves, to fill our brains with oxygen and to get activated. And once the anticipation and the excitement is over, we exhale to calm down and be at peace. To lick our wounds, or lips or each others faces as we settle into our nests to rejuvenate.

A big part of parenting is spent waiting to exhale, and for me that’s a big part of the world right now. We have taken the big breath in and now we wait to see what will happen next, what the next rule will be or what the next stats will show us. So much of the lives that we are playing in are dependent on external things, whilst we hold, hold, hold our breath like big wave surfers running underwater to increase their lung capacity. Like parents in the small hours- half in slumber, yet still waiting for the headlights in the driveway and the key in the front door heralding the arrival of the chick back to nest, and to exhale.

This week my girl has spent hours rehearsing all sorts of musical wonders that I will never fully understand, and my boy has spent hours up near the clouds, tickling his brain with dreams of what will be. I remember once telling him to take his GoPro on one of his adventures. He asked why. I said so you can remember it. He said I remember it here and here, pointing to his head and his heart.

So on my week goes. She sings. He flies. And I sit here, quietly, waiting to exhale.

Do (or did) your kids stretch you like the marks on your stomach? Did you ever bounce back?

…From The Ashers

This is a bit weird:

It’s been so many years since I heard your laugh, yet I still know exactly how it sounds. And your voice. I know your exact inflexions. They were so unique that I guess they are like your signature. It might also be that I used to call your mobile like some kind of otherworld stalker for a bit after you died. I liked listening to your voice mail message. Hey, I said it was a bit weird.

This is also a bit weird:

Maybe it’s because you died, and I’ve captured your words in amber, preserving them forever, or maybe it’s because you taught me so many cool things about raising kids, right when I was ready to listen, that I often hear your words. That happens less these days, because so much of your wisdom was about little dudes. Your kids were only young when you died, weren’t they? They seemed older, but they were tiny little wise souls. You taught them so much. And yet, after all this time, still you are present. Not only in the echo of Meil’s laugh or in the cheeky side-edge of a grin from Kam, but in the energy you brought to the world.

There was always something restless, something new to conquer, something to do, when you were in the room. And always something to laugh at. The way your laugh would burst out of your throat always made me light up. So many of the things you found funny were irreverent or inappropriate, but that just made your laugh even funnier. Bloody hell it was hard to work with you sometimes- I’d be trying to be all professional and composed and you’d be running a circus performance over in the corner, making everyone giggle and have MORE FUN. All caps.

This is not a bit weird:

That over the years I have added your slightly wrong, slightly naughty, slightly messy but absolutely more FUN ways to my life, my work and my parenting. I’ve added a pinch when Coco is being poked and prodded with stainless steel hurty-things, and I’ve added a dash when I have to hang on to the Jesus-Bar in the car when Liam is driving (Yes, he’s driving now- can you imagine? I want to remind you of when you came to his birthday when we had the farm animals and you were blind from the growth in your skull and had to be lead by Greg- I saw the way you clutched onto his arm- but I can’t even write it without tears. Remember your cowboy boots? I do. You stomped right ’til the end my friend. We all remember the way you never let death take you- you took it. And I will always add a big dollop of that gutsy sass to my days.)

This is a bit weird:

I wonder what you would think of the world now. Would you be sitting back and taking it, or would you be out there making a difference, making everyone look up, and see the big picture? I think I know the answer to that, and I promise that we are doing our best to honour you, and keep hold of the world as you would have liked to see it.

Remember near the end when you were seeing flashes of light and you thought that maybe your sight was coming back. I remember, and those flashes are the things that remind me that no matter what, there is always some light. Even if we have to make them up a little from a pathway in our brain.

You were always a bit weird, Rick, in the nicest of ways. And you shone your light bright so all the other weirdos could find you. I like your brand of weird.

Thanks for the light.

Happy Birthday Rick. Miss ya. Love ya.

…From The Ashers

Tiffany knows what I love

I guess I’m guilty: I’m in love with love.

Love hearts are my favourite symbol- I have them all around me- I love finding hearts in nature (leaves, rocks, markings from the exiting tide on the sand) and I love the word love. I even have a biz with a friend where there’s a love heart in our logo and our website is lovecwc.

Most of my favourite songs are about falling in love, being in love, unrequited love or even lost love.

Movies that hit my heart the hardest are the ones where a love is harmed.

Lately I’ve been finding the world is harder than it used to be. Mostly because I feel like there is a loss of love. Maybe not everyone is as in love with love as me. I see people being mean to each other about things that don’t really matter in the big scheme of things. I notice a shortness in some of the interactions that people have with each other based on whether someone is wearing a mask, getting a stab or standing far enough away. I don’t like it when our hearts harden, or when we choose to see the differences between us rather than the things that bind us together.

When we offer up our heart to another person we are at our most vulnerable and our most trusting. With each quivering beat we are at the mercy of another- it is our most thrilling, exciting and terrifying time. It is also our most powerful. For if we can offer up the essence of our deepest selves for scrutiny and sanctuary we can do anything. We are free.

Hearts are sensitive and soft and need to be held gently. They are also strong and courageous and true.

We have to keep our hearts well, to listen to them and respond to their wants, lest they stiffen or become sharp. The vicious edges of a heart that has been neglected can cut as clean as a shard of glass drawn along the length of a finger, throbbing to death as the life and love pulses out of it.

One day a long time ago my boy and I were talking about war. It was ANZAC Day and I was trying to explain to him why the emotion of the day always overwhelms me. Why my usually stoic lacrimal glands seep with tears for people I’ve never known in places I’ve never been. Why the Last Post causes my arm hairs to stand up like so many soldiers. He couldn’t understand it, my gentle boy, and I watched his brain tick over the thoughts one by one, trying to make sense where there is none. Finally he looked at me and said, “No one would ever go to war if everybody just remembered that everybody else has a mummy. The mummies love them. And the mummies will be really, really sad.”

My boy was right.

These days when I get dressed in the morning, my finishing touch and my fortress is my necklace. It was bought for me by my family and it whispers my favourite word, from my favourite shop. I look in the mirror as I put it on, and say quietly, “I’m just adding a little bit more love.” And then I breathe out, and think of ways that I can make my necklace come true.

I think it’s okay to be in love with love.

..From The Ashers..

Carla

So what do you think? Did I get a Carla?

First I’ll tell you the story.

The weekend had been set aside for a girls’ weekend with Jen, Jools and Nic, my uni girlfriends, for which over twenty five years and who knows how many kilometres are wiped away like our anatomy lecturer’s overhead projector scratchings (Hi Dr.Chandaraj if you are still around. You were amazing, but I never was able to read your writing.) whenever we get in a room together. Corona and border closures had other ideas, so we added a dash of hope and postponed it ’til later in the year, crossing our fingers more tightly than our pelvic floors when the first bars of ‘Holiday’ blast out. Please let dance floors and karaoke bars and dancing around handbags still be a thing when the virus slopes off to become merely endemic. We can hope.

So I made plans with the girls I am allowed to play with (Mum and daughter) to shop and eat and shop some more in the little smoke known as Brisvegas by mostly no-one other than old people like Nath and I who like to 1. Annoy our kids 2. Think we are a bit funny.

First stop was supposed to be Zara, followed by H&M, Seed and then lunch, but somehow we ended up at Carla Zampatti. Shock. We went for a ‘quick look’ which ended up with me being suitably fawned on by the excellent ladies there, helping with sizing, squeezing, and little squees as they fussed and fluffed and just generally made an old bird feel like her time for a Carla had finally come.

I narrowed it down to two: one much too hot for October in Queensland, but comfortable AF and extremely flattering, and one a bit more directional (and cleverly called “Homage to Carla” talk about tugging the story-strings), and not quite as sexy..but with POCKETS. What to do? Caught between fashion and function, yet again, and with price tags that didn’t allow for both. I decided to ‘eat on it’, and the lovlies said they would hold both of them for me. They were seasoned enough to know what, “I’m now picturing myself with make-up and proper shoes and my husband’s eyes on the night,” looks like- they knew I’d be back.

Over lunch and reflecting on the pros and cons of buying something that looks great, but will wind up being a velvet version of a sous vide* or, something less sassy sweaty and more classy, I got a call from Carla’s Angels: someone else wanted the second one. Did I want it? The seconds passed. Did I?

I’ve secretly wanted a Carla for years. I know this one looks good and I finally have somewhere to wear it, in fact once outfit the cards were on the table, I quickly invented three more places to wear it. Did I want it? Did I mention it’s called Homage to Carla?

Of course I did. I told them I’d be there shortly, but I understood if they wanted to sell it to the decisive lady in front of them. They declined. Carla was mine.

Of course when we got to the store the ladies were as lovely as ever, and I thanked them for keeping their promise to hold (what was soon to be) MY Carla. But it all felt a bit off. Some of the shine was taken off the purchase, in knowing that me getting this piece meant someone else missed out. You’ve probably seen the videos; the ones where the marathon runner is about to cross the line in second place and the person in front of them collapses, and rather than running on by, they pick them up so they can cross the line together. I love those videos and I bloody love a good win-win. It’s unlikely that I’m ever running a marathon, so this was my chance. I got the ladies to put the search out for another Carla, just like ‘mine’. Yes there was another, they said, but it wouldn’t work for the other lady, as she needed to have alterations done, and the times wouldn’t match up. She would have to miss out.

What to do, what to do? Should I give up what was fast becoming my beloved third child to bring another woman joy? Should I just shelve my Carla-owning dreams and buy something more sensible? Should I get the velvet sauna after all?

In my endorphin-fuelled almost-purchasing inner monologue I’d forgotten one thing: I didn’t need the damn thing for months. I could just drive back to Briso and pick it up another day. Facepalm. I told this to the Angels, and they quickly agreed to an even better plan: through the magic of Australia Post they would simply ship it to me. Amazing. Technology, ‘eh? I was laughing to myself as we completed my purchase and they called the other lady (who I’m pretty sure did a little squeal when they said she could come and get HER Carla), at how when we open our minds to the win-win we can almost always find a way. Sure it felt a bit weird and kind of sad to spend a whole bunch of bucks on an outfit that I couldn’t immediately go back home and try on (which is what I always do with new clothes), and sure it gave me waaaay more time to have buyer’s remorse, but there was something fun about how it all turned out. A kind of fashion solidarity that could be vapid or bullshit or nothing at all, depending on your view. But I like to think that story is important.

I know the brand of Carla Zampatti was forged through passion and tenacity and a desire to make women feel beautiful. I also know that things don’t have any inherent meaning, it’s just the meaning we bring to them. My Carla will arrive soon, and I will have some material with a meaning. Something that reminds me of what strong women can do when they put their heart into a project. Something that reminds me that finding ways to support each other rather than compete will always feel better. And I will be glad that even though I might look not-quite-as-hot as I could have, I will for once have chosen something that fits the function required.

I can’t promise the same thing for my shoes though.

* The process of vacuum-sealing food in a bag, then cooking it to a very precise temperature in a water bath. I hear it’s delicious. Not sure if it is recommended for fifty year old women.

Do you care about brands? Do you have a timeless item with a story? Do you have a Carla yet?

…From The Ashers…

Yes, this is a Jac Pac… Oh how I wanted one of these.

I’m not a fashionista or even that knowledgeable about brands, but I do love brands with great stories. Even more, I love brands that are named after the owner (Hello Veuve Clicquot) and even more when the name becomes synonymous with the thing (Hi there Mr.Biro). The story behind the brand is interesting as we get a little peep behind the curtain, looking backstage at what they were trying to achieve and the reason why they were compelled to get off the couch and press play on a new business. Which is probably never as easy as that first ‘entrepreneurial flash’. Knowing the why behind the what.

Growing up in the western suburbs of Melbourne I didn’t have much call for fancy clothes or designer tags. Mum always made sure we had the latest clothes ‘for good’ and we were always nicely turned out in something from Just Jeans or maybe even Rip Curl, but full designer wasn’t a thing on my radar. I don’t even know if I knew such things existed until Mum decided I could do with a little rounding-out and enrolled me in a course of “junior deportment and modelling” at Suzan Johnston.

Tumbling into the car after Saturday morning softball, we would trek from the west to the centre, as I scrubbed the dust of the industrial wastelands from my legs, and shook out the blobs of dried blood or sweat collected in my mane, to arrive at Collins Street less feral, more fancy. Physically. But it’s hard to wipe the west out of a gal, and some days the switch from being down in the dirt to dressed on the dais took some time. I was a catcher back then, so I spent most of my games in a deep squat, with an umpire’s thighs pressed right in behind me. The catcher’s role is to control the game, set up the pitcher, and legally intimidate anyone you can. It wasn’t uncommon for the umpire to whisper “That’ll do now,” if I got on a nice little sledge-roll about the batter’s mum/dad/brother/boyfriend. I’d always smile to myself when that happened, because it meant I’d come up nice and close to the line of social acceptability. I like knowing where that line is, and how much to stretch it.

Which is why I like brands that do that. Ones that have a story of adversity and triumph, of meaningful contributions and of challenging social norms. A couple of days ago a chick I follow on the socials told us she’s in a throuple. I’ve never heard of it before- turns out it’s just three peeps in love- but she immediately lost 18000 followers, and gained a plethora of negative comments, which is probably more interesting than what she does in her own bed. To be honest, my little old menopausal self admires her verve. I can’t even muster up the energy to cast a sleazy side-eye perv to the surfers getting changed at the beach carpark these days. Good for her love, and even more, thanks for the show and tell. I like knowing more about the person behind “The Holistic Psychologist”.

Over in sky-high heels in the skyscraper Sportsgirl building that housed Suzan Johnston I learnt that there was more to branding than buying Adidas Romes because that’s what my cool-crush was wearing, or getting a Jac Pac because everyone at school was wearing them to the Blue Light Disco on Fridays. Branding was about identifying and then isolating a target audience, figuring out what they needed, and then selling them that very thing in a way that lifted their hearts. So as we sat and listened to the model-teachers telling about this product or that, we were buying brands within a brand who fed back into brands. Genius.

We all knew it was genius because any time we told our friends that we went to Suzan Johnston’s classes, or even on one occasion to her house for a photo shoot, we were met with a kind of half-envious awe. To those who knew what SJ was of course. Those who didn’t weren’t our targets anyway.

Over the years Suzan’s gals introduced us to the work of the fashion icons of the 80’s, and one of them was Carla. I don’t know what Carla Zampatti was known for to the adults back then, but we all knew she was an Italian migrant who came to Australia as a kid, and created a beautiful business as a divorcée and a single mum. Gold on all fronts, for kid from the west from one of the very few ‘broken families’ in school.

Back then Carla’s designs weren’t something I wanted to buy for myself, but rather something to aspire to. I thought one day I would have the means and the need for a Carla. Perhaps I’d own a medical practice and I’d swish past my staff smiling with a whisper of chiffon and crepe. Or maybe I’d tell the women in the typing pool to, “Keep up the great work, ladies,” as my clicking red-soled heels kept time with their staccato keystrokes.

Those things never happened. My life went in different directions as I found my true calling, and such outfits were never required. And yet, I’ve always kept a little imagined snapshot in the deep recesses of my brain, of me in a Carla.

This year, Carla Zampatti died, after a whopping fifty six years in the fashion industry. Women turned out in their fave Carla Zampatti designs to honour a woman who made good. There are rumours that the purchaser of her very first design has the outfit still, and wears it to ritzy Sydneyside functions. (Don’t tell me if that’s not true. I like the story.) Carla’s daughter quipped that her mum would have called the funeral the best dressed function she’d ever attended. That makes me smile. And not a modelling smile either, a nice big real one.

So when Carla died, a little part of me was sad that I’d never owned one of her designs. I’d always meant to go to her boutique in New Farm and get kitted out, but days get busy and the need for flowing fashion can be offset by offspring and functionality and Queensland heat. The cape-like folds I fancy the most don’t really lend themselves wrangling a toddler into their car-seat or keeping the draping fabric free of mashed up banana.

Recently my days have changed a little. The kids don’t eat mashed food any more, and one of them even drives himself. I have more time to shop carefully and take my time with my purchases, and I even have a fancy formal function to go to this year, thanks to said offspring.

So this weekend it was Carla Time. Time to (perhaps) get myself something before the essence of her has left the brand. I don’t know what’s next for them, and maybe the look will remain timeless and essentially Carla, but I didn’t want to risk it. I wanted to get something that may have even had her stamp of approval.

Let the shopping begin.

Do you think I got a Carla? I’ll tell you soon…

…From The Ashers…

Remember joy? It was a thing we used to have a lot of, and we talked about it heaps, back in the day. Then over the last year or so; not so much. So many new words and phrases have jumped into our vernacular that it seems we have forgotten some of our old faves.

And we’ve stopped writing and posting about our favourite things too. At least I know I have.

Things have gotten so serious and scary and strange, that telling you a story about how yesterday I thought I’d like to move to the country, so I drove for over an hour, some of it on dirt roads, to get to the old Kandanga School, a property that I thought I’d buy. When I go there, I realised: it was IN THE COUNTRY. Which meant there was country things like flies and dirt and cows, and not so much non-country things like cafes and homewares shops selling pinch pots and Witchery stores. It turns out that I don’t like the country quite as much as the romantic part of my brain thinks, and Country Road is really nothing much like country roads.

With the world doing weird-world stuff I feel a bit frothy talking and telling about the millions of things that go through my head (why does Woofa the shitcat sit on the back of the couch instead of on the couch, how did that wispy white cheek-hair grow to five centimetres when I only plucked it yesterday, should I start a combined chiro-cafe-bookstore called Crooked Spines, or should it be Aligned Spines, or should I also sell records and call it A Few of My Favourite Things and be done with it?)

So on my drive to the country I played Dan Zanes tunes on the way there (from when the kids were little and Hayls was alive) and Hamilton on the way home (now that the kids are older and Hayls would have loved the MadKing songs) and I remembered a little of who I was before the crazy stuff began. I remembered that I liked to go to cafes and drink coffee (only one or I can’t sleep) and write stories. I remembered that I liked to breathe deeply, to look a the sun shining on peoples’ faces and to talk to strangers about unimportant issues. I remembered that I am not a scientist or a researcher or a biochemist, I’m just a Mum with kids that I want to hold close for as long as I can, and take care of them the best way I know how. I remembered that I like it when people are kind.

So no, this blog doesn’t tackle the big issues. It doesn’t tackle any issues. But it does carve out a little space of joy for me, and so that’s what I’m doing from now on. Bringing back the joy.

Joy to the world.

What brings you joy? I’d love to hear…

…From The Ashers