There are now seven screwed up bits of paper to my side.



Last year as we were packing a little suitcase together for the big-grade-three-camp my daughter asked me a simple question.

Will you miss me Mummy?

Of course, I answered.
Her face crumpled a little as she placed her left gumboot into the case.

It’s funny, I said as we folded the prescribed number of size-eight sweaters into neat rectangles, when you love someone and they are headed off on a grand adventure you have what they call mixed emotions.
She stood, looking up at me while wringing a pair of High School Musical Socks between her fingers.
I feel sad, I continued, that you will be away from me and yet also blissfully happy knowing that you are going to have such an amazing time.
She rolled her socks into a ball and stuffed them into a runner.
There, she said ticking off the last item on the list-of-things-you-must-bring, all done. She smiled.
Then she zipped up the case.

In front of me is another sheet of blank paper.

I can’t quite get the words out of the thicket that is my head, down past elbow, wrist and finger tip and out through the pen onto the page. I’m stuck on I’ll miss you.

I try again. She is only nine years old. She doesn’t require an elaborate message. I’m pretty sure she’d be as happy with a page of red-biro love hearts as with perfectly worded sentiments.

I hold her camera for inspiration.

My plan is to photograph the note.
I know my daughter. As soon as she shoots a few frames the first thing she will do is turn the camera around to marvel at the images she has captured.
She’ll flick past the cheesy shot of her Daddy trying to hold the leaning tower of Pisa aloft with the palm of his hand, and the three shots of Nonna and Nonno smiling over their short black espressos in a cafe on the Piazza dei Miracoli and she will reach the end of her snaps…

and find my message.

If I can actually ever figure out what I should write.



I’ve laid out all her summer clothes on my bed. I am the mixn’match travel Queen. Everything has a purpose. Anything unnecessary is ruthlessly dumped.
She looks at the outfits I have selected… we are negotiating whether to bring pink runners as well as white ones. She decides one pair is enough.
Besides, she says, that leaves more room for souvenirs.
Clever girl.
She smiles as she zips up the case.



I think it’s the amount of time that she will be away that is causing my brain to seize. Over one month. Four and a bit weeks. Nearly five. Exactly thirty three days.

The little white squares of August suddenly take on new meaning.
I shut my calendar.



I unfold my seven attempts and smooth them out in front of me.
I see the same three words written over and over.
I’ll miss you. I’ll miss you. I’ll miss you.
Three words.
Three words.
Three
words.
oh.
I stop.

Three words.

I just had the wrong three words.


I write with conviction. I love you. It’s perfect. It’s simple. And it won’t make her cry.
And she will know it is woven, richly, with all of her Mother’s mixed emotions.

I frame the shot, take the pic and throw away the written evidence.


I put the camera, with its secret embedded message into its little protective bag
and I smile.
Not a very big smile. It’s a bit wobbly round the edges.
But a smile nonetheless…

Then I,
very carefully,
zip up the case.

And now she’s lying on a thin bed that’s covered in a utilitarian width roll of paper towel with nine little probes on her chest, no I think it’s ten, or more…no I can’t count them anymore. And I’m trying to focus on her perfect pinched face but this fucking noise is distracting me.

I think I’ll tell the nurse or the pathologist or whatever the heck she is to turn the radio off, I mean forgawdssake who puts the radio on that loud when you’re doing this stuff anyway… but the woman looks at me as though she’s seen me have this kinda reaction before, even though we have never met, and says politely,

“Love, there’s no radio playing, it’s okay… you know this isn’t gonna hurt.”

And I know it isn’t going to hurt, this blip machine that plots spikes and falls. It’s the reason for doing it that hurts.
And the noise dies down the minute I realise that it wasn’t the radio at all, not some techno, repetitive gunge blasting from anywhere external.
It was an internal noise.
A mantra repeating over and over, rising from shaky knees up into the perdition of my stomach, stuck like broken vinyl…

please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing don’t worry just a routine test please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing just to check everything’s okay please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing routine test please let it be nothing please let it be nothing just to check everything’s okay please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing please let it be nothing…
Please let it be nothing.

And then I wonder if maybe I should pray to someone.

All the usual suspects flit through my mind. But they have no fucking clout anymore in a world that is contemptuous and derisive about faith. Spirit of cynicism thriving on wrappings and baubles and mine is bigger than yours… and my mind clouds over darkly…

I will kiss the back of your ages old scaly hand and give you the only shard of my soul that is worth anything and I will worship you forever and I will go down on my knees for you till the end of days if you just make these spikes and falls mean nothing.
Nothing at all.

And then she smiles and I smile back, toothpaste-ad-cheerful, and say,
“See honey, it didn’t hurt…”
“Yeah you’re right Mummy,” she says, “I felt nothing. Nothing at all.”

~
~
~

February 11th 2010

Our girl is fine. The Specialist told us so.

Happy, happy…happy Valentine’s Day

to me.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them. – Mary Schmich

I’ve been waiting and dreading

And yet also dreaming of the day

You would ask me this question.

The day you would come to me for advice,

Flushed and heady, sparkling eyes,

Full of that somebody new.

What will I say to you my love?

It will be a wrench to see you all grown up

And yet such a sweet victory too.

But truly…there are no directions for this.

No instruction manual, recipe or crib notes available.

You must wing it on emotions and stirrings of lust.

Look for chemistry,

In the worst of clichés,

Such as hearts that skip a beat

And falter

And are resuscitated by warm lips.

And soft words.

But,

Don’t ever think you can time it,

Nor tame it,

It is not yours to possess,

Or to have or to hold.

It’s organic and mysterious,

And grows in dark places.

Between words,

In the rain,

And on the sea.

So the best advice I am able to give,

Is this simple message,

Without form or clarity, 

I will shrug my shoulders and say to you,

That you will just know,

You will simply just know.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts. Don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours. -Mary Schmich 

My post today is double inspired by Mary and Dear Me Books.  

Dear sixteen year old Carla,

Today all the wobbly Aunties are going to pinch your cheeks and cough up a lame old joke with a little spittle of phlegm, 

Happy Birthday lovey.

They’ll all say.

Sweet sixteen and never been kissed eh?

They’ll all chortle.

Just smile and nod your head. Only you know about that boy in Surfers.

The one who stared at you in the sauna, waiting till the bubba in her nautical one-piece and gold neck chains had left before launching himself, without warning, at your lips.

In a few weeks time your mum is going to walk out on your dad.

You will immerse yourself in your year twelve studies and avoid the darkest places that are stained purplish-green with blame and hatred. 

You should know that you will eventually find out secrets that will shift your perspective.

You will see that your dad’s eye, the one that was a little lazy, the one that he squinted with, wasn’t quite so lazy after all.

You will, one day, applaud your mother for being brave.

Don’t hide your chest under chunky sweaters. It’s damn fecking annoying that the world is this way, but this is the truth. Your boobs have powers. Take advantage of them. 

When you are eighteen you will be high on life and without the need for artificial substances. On the dance floor you will notice a dark haired guy staring at you. 

This is the man that you will marry. 

On the night that you meet him my advice to you is- don’t change a thing.

When he smiles and motions for you to come over, keep dancing and nod no. Then look up at him through your lashes and motion for him to come to you. 

Trust me he will come.

When you are twenty your boyfriend will be tempted to go solo to a party, by his cousin- the one who likes to play devils-advocate with the relationships of others, because he has a cavity in his own slow-pumping heart. 

When your boyfriend tells you that he has decided to go to the party whether you effen care or not, hold your head up high and drive yourself home. 

There is no need to tell him it’s officially over. Your total absence, your lack of voice will allow him to work this out. 

Do not shed a tear when you hear he has walked into every shop at Chaddy looking for the one who has employed you that Christmas. He would never have found you anyway. It was your day off. 

You will never receive the letters he leaves in your mailbox or the flowers under the windshield wipers. Your mum and sis will sanitise the world for you, because they think that you need it. 

Drive to Queensland and have a wild time with the cop who pulls you over one night, blue lights flashing, just to ask you for your phone number. He already had your heart racing anyway.

In six months your ex-boyfriend will lay his heart out on a sandy beach.

He will walk  back so as not to influence your decision.

You can choose to step on it with your spiked heel and watch its’ flesh split and bleed.

Or accept the mournful beat it plays.

I suggest you leave it for just a moment longer than necessary before cradling it in your arms. 

That organ needs to learn a lesson.

When you are twenty-one your Uncle, the one who offered you a toke, will make another stupid mistake. This will change the relationship that you have with your family forever.

Tears and tantrums will never traverse a divide and they have no effect on any amount of dumbass.

Remember black sheep are unique. And anyway, people always root for the underdog.

Enjoy Europe. It is the last time you will truly be on your own.

At twenty three don’t listen to your mum when she tells you she has a secret. This way you will be genuinely surprised when your boyfriend offers you a carat at dinner.

On your wedding day you realise that you are marrying a man you would die for.

Ignore the short, dark haired woman in the corner who is crying.

She will cry tears of happiness in a few years time. When your belly swells.

Until then you will have to be patient.

When your boy arrives your perspective shifts.

You will now gladly push your husband under the bus to save your baby.

This is a warning. Do not tell him.

There are some things better left unsaid.

At the required hour you will stand in front of your religious leader and request permission for something that is eternally important to you.

You will be denied.

You will want to leave in a dignified manner, but at the last minute you will turn to the leader and beat at your chest and point to the sky and furrow your brow.

After this agony of conviction the balance of power is swayed.

Your wish will be granted.

One day you will sneak into a pumpkin patch and avoid all that is blue.

The thing you hold in your hand is like a wish upon a pinkish star.

When your girl arrives contentment will plump out your heart.

Think twice before sending your daughter to crèche. It would be better to wait one more year before returning to work. It’s feasible that she’s going to meet her bestest-besty-best-friend in the entire world at school anyway.

The universe works in strange ways.

Don’t make business decisions based on emotions.

Learning how to render your emotions  to create a subjective self will be the most difficult task of all.

It will feel as though you are trying to split your own personality.

You will revolt to do a voldemort but this is very important.

Do not accept being treated as inferior when dealing with the boys of the world of finance.

Remember those boobs? They have powers for both good and for evil. Use them wisely.

By the time your nemesis is completely mesmerized you will have also won him over with your intelligence. Intelligence is the only way to garner respect.

How you captivate your audience to prove your intelligence is up to you.

Some may not want to reckon with your forces. That is okay.

Smile at them and if you get the chance, in their presence, push your sunglasses up your nose using your middle finger.

After smelling like coffee for seven years you will desire to know what it is like to smell like paper and ink.

When you see that advertisement in the newspaper know that it really is a sign.

Do not ignore your own yearnings, the ones that have been buried under maternal duties and wifely duties and work duties.

You are not being selfish.

Everyone will survive.

In fact, they may even be proud.

And now we have arrived here.

Not at the end of the story,

and not even half way through it.

The chapters that remain are yet to be named and the pages are yet to be numbered.

But for now you are still just sixteen.

The world will feel as though it is a mystery.

But I can tell you,

The blood you bleed,

The aches you feel,

The swells of joy.

It is you,

who is the mystery of the world.