I have moved around all my life. Starting aged five; I came to Australia on a ship-full of hopeful families from Europe and the United Kingdom. I was in the USA at 10, and again at 16. I returned at 26. London, Edinburgh, Brussels, Bruges; they have all been home at one time. Australia has been home again since 2004. So I am used to goodbyes, ‘though not good at them.
I hang onto small, insignificant items – throwing away anything causes me great anxiety and grief. I never throw away people. Those, I keep safely tucked within a deep pocket, and I take with me wherever I go.
This latest, and, perhaps, last trip, to Spain, necessitates a clearing of belongings; jettisoning 7 years history in this beloved cottage. The pile of discarded memories that the council picked up yesterday contained folding chairs we took to summer pool and…
The sign has gone up. Our cottage is sold. This week, I read in the local paper that Penrith has been re-zoned for high-density housing, and the ground for 13-storey apartments is already being broken. The plan is to cram another 50 thousand souls into this “city” within the next ten years. Our timing is spot-on.
On Sunday we fly to Galicia. We will land at Santiago de Compostelo airport, via Frankfurt, on the 21st May. We will walk around our new home for the first time on the 22nd. We have already arranged the date for signing the purchase contract on 31st. As we land back in Sydney on 5th June, if all goes according to the plan, we will already own a house in Spain!
We will then have exactly a month to vacate our little home of seven years; pack it…
Today was a sunny Saturday. Our usual routine would involve shopping and housework. But we are in a strange state of being now; the routines don’t apply anymore. They have no purpose. The new owners of our home dropped by to look at the window-frames – they are applying for a council grant to replace them.
We chatted, on our/their verandah. Monday is the end of the “cooling off” period, when they will sign the contract and pay the deposit. No going back, for them or us.
Before they arrived, I pruned the rose hedge, for the last time. I have done so religiously every May – tip-pruning after the last blooms of summer – and a hard prune in July before the first frosts. I prune once more in October, to prepare her for the summer show of flowers. This year I caught lady-bugs and gently moved them onto…
“Spanish is The Loving Tongue”, sang Bob Dylan. It is also the tongue in which we must conduct the documentation required to make our dream a reality.
On May 20th we will fly to Santiago de Compostela, approximately 114km (70 miles) from our new home. It takes about an hour and a half by car, or we can take a train to Monteforte de Lemos (just over an hour) and a taxi to our village. I say “our village” like the house purchase is a done-deal. In our hearts, it is.
This is not to say that we have lost all reason, and bought a house without having seen it! That is what this trip is all about: matching the dream with the reality. And reality means legal necessities, such as obtaining a Número de Identidad de Extranjero – identification number…
We bought this lovely 128-year-old cottage seven years ago, when we moved from an apartment in the trendy Inner-West to less trendy, Penrith. We wanted a house with a garden, and a dog. We acquired both!
Penrith, sitting a the foot of the Blue Mountains, used to have the dozy air of a country town. It was quirky, quiet,and you could get a park on the High Street even on a Saturday. Our new neighbours were friendly locals, and we fitted right in. We joined the bowling club, the RSL Club and the Panthers Leagues Club.
The commute to the city to work each day was longer, but only by 30 minutes. It previously took 45 to travel the 8km by bus from our suburb in the Inner West, into the CBD. Such was the traffic congestion back then. It is worse now.
We lasted just twenty-seven minutes after midnight chimed. One glass of whiskey, a toast to the coming year, and we were off to bed. I had to cat nap between nine and ten o’clock just to make it to the bells! A far cry from the new year celebrations of my youth.
I moved to Edinburgh in July 1981, and my first Hogmanay was a brutal shock, even for one blessed with the genes of hardy Highlanders! It was minus 16C, and I recall staggering home through icy cobbled streets, to a tiny, unheated flat I shared with a lass from Inverness, whose capacity for Pink Panthers (a noxious combination of lager and cider topped with blackcurrant cordial) was legendary, and not in a good way. The ghost of my New Year’s Day hangover of 1st January 1982 still skulks around Edinburgh in the haar, frightening students into sobriety. We came upon a bakery in Morrison Street, where we bought hot rolls and scotch pies. The baker lads gave us tin mugs of scalding sweet tea and let us sit on flour bags in a warm corner to eat our breakfast. Happy days. I think I ‘lost’ my pie somewhere between Morrison Street and Fountainbridge…
I was up before six as usual this morning to pray The Angelus, light the fire in the kitchen, make coffee, and feed the cat, who becomes vindictive and destructive if her bowl is not filled before dawn each day. I did a little formatting work on my book, having received a proof copy, and noting some issues. So, a week after launching, a second edition is imminent. I am nothing if not meticulous! Here’s the link to Amazon in case anyone in the galaxy missed my numerous hints.
The first sunrise of 2022 was exquisite. God pulled out all the stops this morning, determined to impress. I had planned to whine about the resurgence of the virus that absolutely was not created deliberately and released ‘by accident’ by people who knew exactly what they were doing. But one look upwards, and all I could do was smile in wonder. Will it be a good year? That’s up to me, and to you.
I didn’t make any resolutions. I try to keep to the same ones that guide my daily life: be kind, be decent, be honest, be fair, be thankful, be helpful, be grateful and work hard. There’s not much more one can do to redress the imbalance and unfairness that is life on this earth.
So, don’t look back this first day of 2022. Look up. Look up in wonder. Look at the sun, the moon, the stars, the clouds, the rain, the snow, the trees, the birds, and be happy. It’s the least you can do.
Cover photograph by Scott Liddell. From the Dark Edinburgh series. Cover design by S. Bush.
For Christmas 1967 I received three books: one was about the birds and animals of Australia, one was about the changing of the seasons, and the third was “The Children’s Bible in Colour.” I still love to read about the natural world, and three months ago I began to study The Bible in earnest, online with an accompanying podcast. I am sixty years old and neither I nor my interests have changed much since I was six.
Back in November when I wrote about “Living the Dream” I referred to a manuscript that I carried around with me for around a decade. Well, this year I finished it. The completed novel emerged through many, many drafts; the characters’ names changed, plot lines altered, and the setting, Edinburgh, moved along with the times, just as real life does. I finished it. I actually wrote a novel! Seventy-four thousand words. Two-hundred and sixty-four pages. And I have been told by my fiercest critic and best friend of almost thirty years that it does not suck!
I re-read it four times, just taking it in: “It’s finished! I did it!” Perhaps I should have run around the garden a few times whooping, or let off some fireworks? But that’s not my style. I sat quietly at my desk beaming into my coffee, but I do confess, I did perform a little “chair dance.”
Now my book is uploaded on Amazon, I am referring to myself an as “the author” and I expect people to buy it. I, the kid who slouched at the back of the class until it was time for art or games, when I could come alive. I, the one who couldn’t sit still or concentrate; the kid who distracted herself, and everyone else, from the mysterious tedium of formal education, by being a noisy pain in the ass. I stopped arsing about once, long enough to write a short story; homework for my English O- Level class. I was rather pleased with it at the time. My English teacher read it, raised her eyebrows, and sent me to the Headmistress to “confess” that I had cheated and copied it, or had someone adult at home write it for me. Fat chance: my grandmother could not read or write, and my parents both worked in factories. They left school at 14.
Yes, I have written a book. All by myself. I didn’t copy it. Nobody wrote it for me. I found the self-discipline to sit still, to create a story, characters and events; with a structured beginning, middle and end. So, two-up to the form mistress who wrote the terse summary on my Third Form Christmas term report in 1974: “Has ability. But fritters it away.” And the same to the voice in my head that mocked me for many years: “Don’t get above yourself, it’s shite, you’re not a writer.”
The book (my book, the book that I wrote, so, get stuffed, Mrs McLaughlin!) is now on Amazon, in paperback: “Festival of Death: an Edinburgh Murder Mystery” by Heath Savage. It’s a bit rude, it’s a bit sweary, it’s a bit like me – not everyone’s cup of Darljeeling. I am quite glad that my dear departed mum and dad won’t be reading it! My best friend, who is a discerning reader, reviewed it and announced proudly: “It isn’t shite!”
Tomorrow is Gaudete Sunday, the third Sunday in Advent, a time to relax the rigorousness of our spiritual preparations, and succumb to childlike anticipation of the grand celebrations to come.
I know that this period of the year has diverse meanings, so I speak only from a personal perspective, as always. I foist none of my beliefs on anyone, but I will say that the materialism which has overwhelmed the solemnity of this season that I cherish does depress me slightly: the festival of avarice and greed that is celebrated by the media and advertising industry makes my stomach turn over. They sell feasting without need for the preliminary fasting that makes it meaningful.
When I was a child, under the influence of Roy Wood and Wizard, I enthused to my mother: “I wish it could be Christmas every day!” She said: “If it was, then it wouldn’t be special, and you would soon be bored with it and want something else.” My maternal grandfather was a Presbyterian Ulster-Scot, so I forgive my late mother her tendency towards a spiritual austerity that I, being of the Roman persuasion, never shared with her!
So, what is Advent from a purely secular viewing point? We prepare, we anticipate, we reflect. Winter begins, in the northern hemisphere, on Tuesday the 21st of this month. The shortest day of the year; the longest night, the darkest. We share the expectation of brightness to come, and we celebrate that, together. Darkness is lonely: in darkness we reflect, and retreat within. Brightness is joyous: in brightness we anticipate, and we rejoice without.
At this time of year people usually travel to visit family and friends. Often they are returning to their birthplace, retracing steps, recalling people and places that may be gone; reflecting, perhaps. But they travel in hope of a celebration at the end of that journey, of feasting among loved ones. This year, again, travel is restricted, due to the virus which name we may not utter! Paradoxically, the proselytizing prophets of earthly utopia always seem to create a colourless, joyless, oppressive earth, where fear replaces hope.
So, have the Doom Goblins and Grinches managed to suck all the joy out of this season? Not bloody likely! In Casa Girasol, we turn towards the light! In our beautiful, bright home we will be hosting new, dear, friends this Gaudete Sunday. While we rejoice in good food and good company, I daresay we will also rejoice in a few glasses of good wine. Gaudete!
The 28th of November was the first Sunday of Advent, and now December is upon us we are well into the whole “Christmas thing.”
I think most people know about Lent, the period following Advent and Christmas, which leads us into Easter? I am often asked: ‘What have you given up for Lent?’ Interestingly, I am asked this most often by friends who are non-Christian/Catholic. But unless it is part of your own personal practice, I imagine that few people know about this period of Advent fasting.
The Eastern rite call this pre-Nativity preparation Phillip’s Fast, because it begins on the day after the feast of St. Phillip. It lasts for forty days. The fast was introduced to prepare the Church for a worthy celebration of the Birth of Christ. The regulations for the fast were far more lenient than the Great Fast, that of Lent, before Easter. In the Western/Roman rite, Advent is called Little Lent, because, traditionally, it has included a period of increased prayer, fasting, and good works, and in both the Eastern and Western Christian traditions it is a time for reaching out to those who have less; for sharing, for giving, and forgiving.
I fear that the secular Christmas Lite that we have come to know has become nothing more than a mawkish celebration of gluttony, self-satisfaction and avarice: we spend more and more, and we give and receive less. So, for me, fasting throughout Advent is a way to express thankfulness for all that I have, and to share that with others. It is a time to remove the focus from pleasing oneself, and to re-focus, on ways to give joy and comfort to others. You don’t have to be a believer in the Christian faith to do this. Some of the my most generous, kind friends are raging atheists! The fasting part is simple: I eat less of the rich foods that will be a central part of my Christmas feasting – the dairy, the meats, the sweets, and I will spend the money that I don’t spend on these things on others instead. I will give things away. I will invite people to eat with me.
A lot of people who already did it tough before the pandemic are now in crisis, so we can all help them by taking less for ourselves, and by sharing that which we have. Maybe we can help simply by inviting someone we see very day, who looks like they might need a hand, to join us in a cup of coffee? Maybe we can help by asking someone whom we know to be in need: “What can I do to help you out?”
I was in Belfast a couple years ago, the last Christmas that I spent with my late mother, and I often attended mass in a lovely Georgian church in the heart of the city. On Christmas Eve I took my self into the city for a day out, just to get a breather and absorb some of the Christmas spirit. and I went to mass.
There was a beautiful Nativity scene outside the church – full-sized – with live animals in it, and volunteers who were dressed as the Holy Family, and shepherds and angels. It was truly marvelous to look at, There was a box fixed to it, where people could donate money for distribution to various charities.
It was a freezing day, with sleet lashing down. And I noticed that just a few yards from the Nativity, a young woman sat by herself on a piece of cardboard. She was clearly very cold, and she didn’t have that Christmassy beam on her face that all of we well-fed, warmly-dressed people had. Everyone seemed to be moved by the beauty of the Nativity scene, and they were dropping money into the boxes generously. But nobody even looked at the girl who was sitting huddled against a wall, just yards away.
So, I went over to her, and I gave her my hat and scarf, and I asked her if she would like to join me in something to eat and drink. And she surprised me. She said: “I would love a hot drink, but I will get something to eat at a day centre I go to later on, thanks.” She didn’t snatch at the opportunity to take something that she thought she didn’t really need. But she accepted the hot drink, and I had one too. We sat together on the cardboard in the sleet, and we chatted for a while, drinking our hot coffee, because the guy in the cafe I bought the drinks in would not allow her to come inside. And I was the one who was moved; by her resilience, by her good humour, by her sweetness of spirit. So, in fact, it was she who gave me a Christmas gift. She who had so much less than I.
1998 marked the end of a decade I lived in Edinburgh. I moved there in 1981, went to university, in Stirling, in 1983, took a year out to live and work in LA in 1986, then returned to finish my degree in 1987. In 1988 I moved to London to work in media sales for a small independent publisher. In 1989 I returned. It didn’t work out for me. Edinburgh was where I wanted to be.
From the age of ten I wanted two careers: chef, and writer. I watched Graham Kerr, the Galloping Gourmet on the tv, and I read cookbooks like other kids read novels. Aged 14, I joined a book club with my parents’ reluctant consent, to qualify for the introductory gift, chef’s Bible, Larousse Gastronomique. The same year, I read Camus’ L’Etranger and, Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago (don’t be too impressed, I was not that precocious. I was still reading Bunty and Beano and not doing brilliantly at school!) Classmates at my all-girls high school were experimenting with make-up, discos and boyfriends. I was having an existential crisis and experimenting with cheese-making. I would never go on to achieve that casual popularity some people are blessed with. But I could make a damn fine Duck a l’Orange by the time I was 15.
Paradoxically, Domestic Science was my worst subject at school. The beefy strong-armed ladies who tried to teach me to sew, knit, and prepare Queen of Puddings could do nothing with me. At 17 I went to work at a local restaurant as a kitchen hand while I studied for my exams. Heaven! Real chefs, at last! Making all the classics! I coveted the starched white jackets and toques the way other girls coveted designer shoes. I was permitted to prepare cold starters and salads, then crêpes, when the Head Chef saw that I could make them better than the second year commis.
I asked the chef to take me on as an apprentice: “I would if you were a boy. You’ve the makings of a bloody good wee chef! But no. Girls can’t be chefs.” So, bugger that! I went to Edinburgh and worked full time in TOP SHOP and part time in pubs and office cleaning, then I went to university to read English and History.
I was writing (very bad, very derivative!) poetry back then. Inevitably, I got interested in drama. I wrote a (very bad very derivative!) play. I did become a chef, eventually. I got a job in a French bistro when I was 26, and I never looked back. I ran a writers’ workshop with a friend in my spare time, and I wrote some more (very bad very derivative!) poetry and short stories.
In 1990 I began writing a novel. It was actually not half bad, and I may yet resurrect it. Life, as they say, got in the way, and by 1999 I was living in Brussels working as a chef and bar manager. I was keeping journals, writing (not bad, less derivative) poetry, and beginning to sketch out a crime fiction novel. In my limited spare time (I worked six days, 70 hours, a week) I was reading everything, from Marie Claire and simpery, formulaic “Chick Lit” to Kurkov’s exquisite Death and the Penguin and Kinky Friedman’s outré detective novels, starting with Greenwich Killing Time.
I carried my hard-copy, hand-written manuscript to Australia with me in my backpack in 2002, and on my new partner’s PC, typed it out and transferred it to a floppy disc (remember those?) I carried that around for the next ten years, chipping away at the book, then abandoning it, many times. I worked as a chef in my own bistro, both in Sydney and in a village on the south coast of NSW. Of all those jobs, my favourite gig was cook on a square-rigged wooden sailing ship.
I studied for some post-graduate qualifications part-time, and began a second career, in vocational education and case management, working with some of the most challenging and challenged people I have known. I missed cooking. I wasn’t writing. I was compromising my life away. In 2017 I spent three months in the UK caring for my mother, who was bed-bound and travelling towards her passing from this world. While I did so I watched a great deal of television and I read a book a week. I also began to cook up a plan.
I went home to Sydney and laid a far-out, risky proposition to my partner, who had just lost her mother, and she surprised me by agreeing to it – that good old Aussie spirit of Give it a go. She’ll be right! In 2018 I retired from full-time work, cashed in my (pitiful) superannuation, and we did “give it a go.” We bought an old stone farmhouse in need of renovation, and planned to run a B&B. For various reasons, that got going well, then we had to cease trading. My partner keeps us in grand style by working full time from home as a proof-reader and copy editor, for clients all over the world. Her new business saved our asses financially. I am just a tiny bit proud of her! She too is living her dream, and she has enabled me to live mine.
I spend my days in my study writing, in my garden growing vegetables and flowers, and in my kitchen cooking. I am constructing the skeleton of my first cook book, with stories, photographs and poems sprinkled among the recipes. And yesterday, I finished my novel. It will be released on Amazon in December, paperback and kindle versions.
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Casa Girasol 