Photography

When my babies were born, people told me they were beautiful, but I knew they were being polite. My babies were born beautifully, but what birth did to them was no aesthetic. They were squished, swollen and bruised and not the least bit beautiful. Of course, now that I am a mother myself, it is this very grumpy, very ugliness that stirs the greatest emotions in me regarding babies, but they were not, for many weeks, beautiful.

I remember being given a voucher for newborn photography with the Elfling at one of those shopping centre places hawked by those that spring out between racks of tiny clothes and ask you to sign up for packages before you've even seen the shots. And while I baulked at the idea of the ubiquitous gerbera behind the ear, I allowed the photographer who was probably months older than myself to try and pose my newborn baby while she took photos.

And I remember recoiling from the hideous photos she took, displayed as they were on giant screens, at the thought of taking home photographs that looked like that. My babies were not Anne Geddes munchkins that look adorably smooth with little dimples in fat wrists. They were red and scrawny and smooshed. And they way she had posed her, it seemed to point to these things as flaws, as if to show how unbeautiful she really was. And so I bought none, and vowed never to do that again.

But as they grew, not just into their long scrawny limbs and their peculiar features, but in character and spirit that shone through their little faces and they became beautiful. First to me, and then to the greater world. And nothing gives me more pleasure than capturing that on film (or with many megapixels these days as I am up to my very last roll of black and white film). I love taking photos when they aren't looking and when they're not posing. I try not to line them up for photos aside from the standard sibling sets which are hilarious for how bad they inevitably are. I love catching a glance or a moment and being able to keep that memory in beautiful, delicate colour. I loe catching something that belongs to them, and not to a calendar baby, however cute they may be.

We were at a birthday party today for a little girl who has fought very hard to make it to the party which is never a fair thing for any one year old to have to fight. But hardest still, for this little tiny girl, is that the reason she has fought so hard is easily seen on her face. Her skin. Still delicate, but not baby soft. Not smooth. Taking her out is difficult because there is no normality, no hiding, no anonymity. It is there and it is visible.

And it doesn't matter that she has cheeky dark brown eyes and round chubby cheeks and a perfect cupid bow in her lips. Because most won't see any more than her skin, before they look away. Not sure how to react, or worse, reacting with distaste. I didn't shush the girls when they asked, because it was important to me that their curiousity not turn into something other than it should be. I just explained, simply, that her skin did not work like theirs, and she needed special medicine for that. And being children, they understood, and the Elfling jingled a toy for her, and played as she would play with any other baby.

But even at almost 9, the Elfling had questions on the way home, about how sad it was and how unfair it was that someone so little should have to deal with that. And she was very quiet for a little while, as she took it in.

I took my camera to the party, because I always try to, and the weather was hot and steamy and yellow. The end of Summer in a humid golden glow. And I took photos of the Possum as he raided the lolly table, and the Monkey as she swished in her pettiskirt, and of various partygoers too. But I also wanted to take photos of the birthday girl. So I did, photos of her playing with her grandparents, and when I was jiggling soft rattly toys with her to make her smile.

And when I opened my SD card tonight, I could have photoshopped them into oblivion, wiped away all traces of that which society finds hard to deal with and I wondered if I were her mother, if that's what I would like, and I knew it wasn't. So I fixed my light source and my white balance, and I flipped a few into monochrome because I'm a sucker for children's photos in monochrome. And I looked at the photos that came out, and I was truly happy with them. Photos of a happy little girl on her birthday, that looked like her. That had been tinkered with, sure, because a little bit of extra shadow and contrast can make a subject jump off a page, but I didn't up my saturation to where only her eyes were visible, or correct any of the shine from her creams. And I hope that her mother and her grandmother like them too.

As I went through the photos, I also found a few of my Elfling, looking ethereal and embracing her Rivendell heritage. And it was an awful day when I took them, where I cried for the first time in a long time and revisited things I thought were gone and buried. And I was bitter and devastated and miserable and crumbling into the cave inside my chest when I took them, trying desperately not to cry in front of her. When I saw her climb up onto a rock, her yellow sundress billowing lightly around her knees as the sun rays from above hit the golden lights in her hair. And none of it mattered any more. I may have plenty of things that are pushing my buttons and trying to pull me down, but I still have her. Embodiment of the Gleam.

November 3

I am so out of practice with the writing thing that I thought I would try and write every day for the next month. A plan that failed spectacularly when I realised that it was already past the first of the month and that I had not written a word. I wanted to write about not me, and not my work, but because I find myself both tired and lazy, it's hard to think of much else.

I leave soon. Within a week this little 5 roomed apartment will have another tennant who may or may not care about arranging the furniture in ways that are designed to be appealing when you walk in the door. They may not bring flowers in every week or go to Bunnings and buy big leafy green plants to purify the air and soften the walls. Who won't leave out their overripe fruit for the wallabies. Who won't wash on Sundays and mop the floors on Wednesday nights. And curl up on the couch with the contrasting cushions and the soft fuzzy blanket on the nights when it's hard to be alone.

In spite of myself I have loved it here. Being alone for the first time in my life has been something that I think I needed without even knowing it. It will be hard to go home to a house of continual noise and competing needs. Here the only needs have been mine. I have been allowed to be completely selfish and it has been nice, though I'm glad as well that it's over.

I went out last night with a friend. A friendship that forged on quickly the way they used to when I was a child and I would be only in one place so briefly that it was a necessity. It has been fun. I've forgotten what it was like to just make friends without having to fit it in between everything else. And I've had opportunity for more but have held back a little. Knowing I'm leaving and not wanting to leave too much behind.

We went out to a pub dressed the way I would have dressed if I was a 30 year old woman who had nothing but a little apartment to go home to that was always cleaned on Sundays, even if it was 2 in the morning. Who spent her time doing yoga when she hadn't gone to bed too late reading terrible literature and ate asparagus dipped in fried egg on the couch when she came home from on call shifts. A sequinned dress that dipped a little over the cleavage and far too high on the thigh, pulled together with a classic black blazer so that it was just that little less obvious.

I kicked off the sparkly platforms, rejecting them for their very sparkles, put on the simple pumps instead and headed out to a venue that hadn't yet kicked off, driving myself so that I couldn't drink while my carefully curled hair went limp in the humidity. We played pool and drank iced water while the crowds ebbed and flowed. Losing the game by sinking the white on a foul shot with a rueful grin.

We found a livelier bar later and while she danced I perched up on a stool and people watched to my heart's content. Not needing to make conversation and enjoying myself quietly. Apparently an open invitation, that clearly I was in need of company that was offered often, sometimes politely sometimes not. Rejection that was taken and sometimes not. Grateful for the bouncer that moved along one man who seemed unable to understand my reticence.

It was worse at another club, where I was physically pulled onto the dance floor and another where I danced to try and make myself less conspicuous (my dancing is terrible at the best of times) and was immediately approached. Touched. Something I've never been fond of and we finally went somewhere where the crowd were less forward. It surprised me because as a tiny 18 year old I was always hyperaware, hoping for attention and it was a rarity.

But for that, I enjoyed myself. It was a punctuation mark about this whole interlude. A break from reality underscored by a strange night that smelled of acetaldehyde and cigarettes, bad fake tan and worse fake hair. It reminded me of the artificiality of this whole experience. Of how even though the nights I've been able to spend looking after only myself eating what I wanted, when I wanted, falling asleep on my preferred side of the bed instead of the one I've been designated and tangled in sheets that don't overheat and smell like clean laundry. Of the few days off spent doing whatever I wanted to do. For all that I still want, more than anything else, to go home.

I want the girls. I want to see their homework and do their hair for ballet. I want to read their funny stories and hear about what they did at school today. I want to wake up with the Possum standing by my side of the bed in the moonlight, waiting for me to lift the covers so he can curl up into me and steal half my pillow. I want my house with my porch and the smell of hot nights in my hammock. I want my new antique cedar dressing table with the mirror that's flaking on the sides in that perfect way that old mirrors have.

But most of all I want Bingley.

On My Own

I woke up on Sunday morning to the brush of the Possum's silky head against my cheek. The musty unwell smell of him as he curled in against the curve of my neck, his knees tucked up against my belly. I rubbed my cheek against his head involuntarily and listened to him mumble in his sleep while I cried. Silent sobs that matted his already damp hair.

I think I thought then, that I would not be able to forgive myself for later that day getting on a plane. And certainly, while I stood in line at the gate and the tears messily rolled off my chin and onto my new hand luggage I did not feel optimistic. All of my perspective and determination deserted me, left me desolate as I walked across the tarmac, wind whipping my hair into my eyes.

It was a short flight, bumpy, turbulent as my neighbour sculled Bundy and Coke while I stared out the window, watching the flat blue sea blend into the winter blue sky. The tears dried up somewhere near the Proserpine coast as my ears popped painfully for descent. I looked out at the water morosely, not wanting to find anything to appreciate. Enjoying my special brand of misery, branding myself with it to alleviate the guilt. The guilt of being a mother who abandons her children for 3 months. Even if she had no choice. Or no real choice at all, when the choice is unemployment and poverty and throwing away all the years of training.

My forehead rattled against the cold window as the mountains came into view. Beautiful mountains that reflected in the still water. In spite of myself, my tears dried as I watched the clouds graze across the fields, fluffy herds in the sky as we dove between them towards the tarmac. I felt the tiniest prickle along my spine as the possibility for adventure filled my mind for the first time. 3 months to head off to the beach after work to watch the last light on the water if that's what I wanted to do.

But as I walked off the plane, and into the cramped, tattooed and sunburned departure lounge I was grateful for familiar faces as we pulled my luggage off the carousel and headed to the hospital to pick up the keys to what was to be home for the next few months. The tears nearly started again when I saw the ugly apartment with the dirty floors and the stained carpet. The bed with the polyester blend green and yellow garish sheets and plastic pillows. The broken toilet and the dead phone line, and worst of all, no internet. If it had been just me I would have wallowed, then. Curled up in a ball on the thankfully clean couch and sobbed until it too was manky to match the rest of the house.

But my beautiful guardians took me to the shops where I bought new linen and groceries and a plant, so that I would have at least one living thing with me in my little house of mismatched ugly furniture and cheap fittings. And once they left, and the house echoed with all the sounds of silence, I didn't fall into a heap. Instead I moved the furniture around, trying not to notice the inch of dirt under each piece, as I made it less cramped, and more welcoming. Banishing the ugliest things to the room I don't need. Made my bed with the lovely light natural fibred linen and fluffed up the pillows. And I stocked my shelves with fresh food and fruits and curled up on the couch to watch some TV before crawling into bed and wondering at the vast emptiness, while I curled up on my side.

The next day was Monday, and my first day of work. I looked nice. I looked respectable and I was on my best behaviour. I smiled as I met new people, eager to make a good impression as a hard worker, a team player. And I smiled tightly every time someone reminded me I was staying for 6 months and tried hard to look enthusiastic at the thought. Knowing my eyes told the truth but not wanting to offend. Until someone asked me if I had any family, noticing my wedding rings and asking in that polite breezy way. Asking if I had children, and how many? And I thought of my sick little possum, who I had sung to sleep only 24 hours before as he rocked feverishly in my lap and I burst into inconsolable tears. Ruining my first day make up. And as much as I tried they would not stop. I did not care that my director was in front of me. Or some man that I do not know. Or that I never cry at work. Because I needed to cry and it's natural to cry and to be sad and to miss my babies. No matter how many people tell me that it will be fine.

But I got through the day somehow. Relieved when I could just work. Relieved that it was stuff that I knew how to do and that I could just get in and do it. Surprised when the end of the day came, and everything was ok and there was no fear in coming back. And I caught a taxi home in the afternoon light, put on my running clothes and went for a wander along the river. The beautiful river turning gold as the breeze teased ripples along the surface. The trees whispering quietly to me, to not be afraid while the birds chirped merrily. The heavy fog of murraya and honey blossom, warmed by the winter sun perfuming the air. And it finally felt ok. Felt worthwhile me being here. And I knew it would be ok.

Pastel

My toenails are blue. The paint job is decidedly wonky but I'm getting better. I tried my fingernails too and I look like a 4 year old who has stolen her Mum's makeup. I doubt they'll still be painted tomorrow as my tolerance record for paint on my nails is about 14 hours. But for the moment they sparkle like the twilight sky and the acrid smell is pleasing. And if you don't look too closely you can't see the uneven cuticles. Besides, it stops me biting them. Mostly.

I have been studying so hard that it feels like my brain is battered and bruised. But the panic still rises inside of me and bubbles up in a fountain of acid in my throat so I keep pushing on and forcing more knowledge about the popliteal fossa into a reluctant and terrified brain.

I am sleepy tonight, the first night in a week. No caffeine today. It was raining hard and friends visited so I drank cider on the couch and laughed instead, but the nagging fear crept along my shoulder and whispered in my ear about the time I was wasting. Was I not afraid of failure?

Last weekend for Easter I studied hard when we weren't visiting or listening for the Easter Bunny. But it wasn't enough and I spent last week feeling guilty and anxious. We went to the rainforest and climbed rocks for hours until my limbs felt soft and heavy and ached to move. We swam in rock pools and under waterfalls and I climbed halfway up a waterfall to take pictures of rainbows in the spray. We left the path and down to where the water is hidden and took off all our clothes to swim in the stream. It was so beautiful that for a few hours I forgot to be anxious and my eyes glowed gold. I climbed a fallen tree that was over a gorge and I lay there in a shaft of sunlight through the green sky with my cheek against the softly curling moss. I dangled my arms down and watched the rushing water 3m below me and thought about all the patients I see with broken bones and bodies who fall 3m. Then closed my eyes and smiled. Bingley just shook his head.

I was so sore the next day. Not in my legs, which I expected because of all the steps. And the climb. And the bounding over rocks. But it was my arms that hurt. I had used them to cling to the rocks, especially the slippery ones so that I wouldn't fall. Up there, half way up a waterfall. It was worth it.

I finished reading my first Hemingway book two nights ago, giving into insomnia. The Old Man and the Sea. I had never read Hemingway before and did not know what to expect. I am still not sure. I feel a little awe and a little despair because he makes me feel as if I waste words. His words are so sparse, so spare. And yet they paint pictures that my airy adjective heavy narratives always seem to fall short of. I never thought of writing having colours and texture before, but I saw it after reading that little palm sized book. I feel like my writing is weak and pastel and his is bold and bright. I think pastels are often pretty but I live for colour. I want to write in colour.

I want to go away for a while and study and not have responsibility or things to do. I don't want to pack school bags tomorrow morning. Or brush hair that has been matted by the soap bubbles that they foamed in the bath tonight. I want to sleep and drink caffeine and go slightly crazy with no one to be sane for. I want to wake when I wake and the breeze is brushing the curtain across my cheek and sleep when I collapse. I don't want the accusatory faces when I just want to sit. When all rational thought has fled and instead there are only the cacophonous voices of tangential strings. Medial head of gastroc and tendon of soleus. Semi membraneous. Semitendinosus. Synovium. Remnant of sciatic artery and division below popliteus.

I don't want to get up again while writing this, and pat and rock and sing him to sleep for him to get up yet again and smile cheekily over the back of the couch. It's not funny tonight and his beautiful eyes make me frustrated.

I want to go away for a while and be crazy somewhere. Hear the waves crash and cut my feet when I jump through rock pools. Feel my hair swell with salt. Watch the moon rise. Drive for hours through the bush for a sprig of wattle and stand on top of the pulpit overlooking the schism. Red cliffs on one side and blue mists on the other. Sunlight on my face.

I'm not sure how I will live another week of this.

Huit

For weeks after I had given birth I could tell you with total accuracy the exact events of those 6 hours; every tiny detail played over in a constant loop even when I was sleeping. It was so vivid, so striking, so completely outside of anything I had ever experienced before that I felt absolutely certain that it had imprinted on me indelibly, never to be washed off or dulled. It was one of those certainties that such a momentous day, such a monumental feat, the day that my Elfling entered the world and I became a mother should surely stay on in memory so clearly.

But I realised on Friday afternoon as I hurried to my car on the way home from work that I couldn't remember what sort of morning we had woken up to or even if I had slept. I don't remember if it was raining or sunny. I don't remember if it was hot or cold. I remember getting in the car in labour and the first burst of fear as Bingley closed the garage door and the wonder in knowing that there would always be three of us after that night. I remember the stars and I remember the lights on the bridge as we drove and my blue pyjama pants. I could draw you the exact pattern on them.

But I don't remember hearing her cry when she was pulled from me and I don't remember vast swathes of the labour. It's like it's on an old fashioned VCR and the tape is sped up so you get fuzzy glimpses, intangible and refusing to stay still long enough for me to appreciate them. I remember the exact colour of her cheek and the single golden hair on her forehead in amongst the newborn down. I remember the slight revulsion for the vernix and the smell. I remember letting my sweaty hair down and the way the super long tendrils uncurled on my damp, naked shoulders. I remember not wanting to let her go even when I was being stitched up and in tears from the pain and Bingley fumbling her tininess.

I remember her fuzzy ears and her long skinny legs and toes. I remember the eyelids without eyelashes and the horrible lump from the ventouse. I remember gently unwrapping her from her blankets to change her but I don't remember bathing her for the first time. I remember the smell of the room and of the baby wipes. I remember using the big soft paper napkins they have in hospitals to change her too. And feeling overconfident but petrified at the same time, not knowing how anyone could possibly entrust the care of something so precious to someone so woefully unqualified.

I don't remember coming home. I don't remember putting her in the car or the walk upstairs, though writing that I had a glimpse of it before it flashed away again. I don't know if we slept or what we did next. There is so much that I don't remember.

I tell myself that days like today, where she ran around in a pink and white confection of tulle and lace with her long honey hair bouncing and her friends all around her, thrilled to be eight years old and the centre of attention with her very own owl cake and helium balloons and streamers, showing off and dancing; I tell myself I'll remember. But I possibly won't. I won't remember that I stayed up til after midnight so that all of the layers of the jelly cups would be perfect for her and her friends. Or that I zhuzzed tissue paper until the house was decked with big bowery papery blossoms. I won't remember the hilarious but disturbing scrum as the children dived into the carcass of the pinata and emptied it of its spoils.

I feel like I should remember how we woke at dawn to the soft grey rain and dismayed at how that would work for a birthday party where the whole class had been invited. And then 15 minutes before the party the sun came out and all was green and gold. But I won't.

I may remember the shock as she leant over her birthday cake to blow out the candles and eagerly grabbed the knife and started cutting of how tall she is looking. How long her arms and legs. How her face is so in-between that of little girl and who she will someday be. Of her delight in winning a prize in the pass the parcel or her pride in showing off her new Nintendo DS.

But I hope I will remember that sometimes I did not feel like we were fighting a war between us of protracted battles about homework and brushing teeth and hair. That I did not spend her whole life picking at the edges and trying not to be frustrated because she is the first and I still don't know exactly what I'm doing with her. Not so much has changed there in eight years.

It all feels so vivid now, as if life will always be this stark, this bright, this painful, this beautiful; but I know better. Time will cover this with new layers and shades and obscure the fine detail. Things that seem so important now, so vital, will be masked in years to come even if I document it the contrast will be lost and only the mellow shades left.

I often wonder if perhaps my Elfling would have done better with another parent besides me. Someone less ambitious, more patient, less tired, more loving, more affectionate. More. On bad days I feel numb inside for her and the horrid luck she drew in the parent lottery, see the wistfulness in her eyes at friends whose mothers help in the classroom and stand at the school gate in the afternoons and chat to the other Mums. Someone who wasn't just fumbling her way through her life but already had read the text book and the accompanying study guide and knew exactly what they were doing. And I hope that like me she remembers just the highlights, and the excitement and the joy of being a little girl. And that one day she understands and forgives me for not being all that she deserved, because she does deserve it all. My ethereal baby girl who made me into a mother.

Merry and Bright

3 Christmas helpers on Christmas Eve

Decorating the table for Christmas Eve

Met with approval

Dessert

By candlelight

The stockings were hung by the french door with care

In hopes that St Nicholas soon would be there

Finished Christmas dresses that I was too tired to "press"

Stealing away as Santa distributed his booty

Mayhem and paper

The Possum carefully reading each book, savouring each gift before slowly opening another

The hit gift - a marble run for cars!

Watching TV at Nana's place

Nice photos at Nana's place

Attempts anyway

Golden light

Whenever did she get so big?

Toasting with cherries

Glow sticks and fairy lights

Sparklers

Tired and full, coming home.

I am a mother, no really

'Twas the night before Christmas Eve when all through the house, not a creature was stirring (except the husband playing Star Wars Online and the neurotic cat). The children were nestled all snug in their beds, while visions of Pillow Pets danced in their heads.

4 hours driving today to bring my babies home and I have MISSED them. I miss them of course any time they're away, I missed them when Bingley and I had our Parisian extravaganza, but truly, this last week I have missed them most. I missed their excitement about Christmas and stealing overheard whispers about Santa. I have missed getting ready for tomorrow while they giggle and laugh and get under my feet and ask me a million questions. I have missed curling up in bed at night with a brightly coloured Christmas book and weaving more magic. I have even missed being woken to the excited babble of the latest window in the Lego Advent calendar.

I have missed being able to do Christmas cooking and making pompoms for the table with them, and though I sat down last night with plenty of time to cut out the Christmas dresses I couldn't do it. I needed them home with me, and now that they're here I feel like singing again.

For our little family it is Christmas Eve that I look forward to beyond all days on the calendar. It is the day where magic reigns and no matter the year I/we have had or how miserable or cynical or overwhelmed I may have felt in that year, I have never ever failed to feel the veil between adulthood and childhood lifted on that magic night. I always believe in magic, but sometimes a wave of cynicism swamps me and tries to muddy it up. And even the most brilliant moon or a stunning eclipse or the twinkliest stars can't make a dent in it.

But Christmas, Christmas is sacred. The night when bells ring on the stillest breeze and somehow every wish is possible, just might be granted. And in amongst it all the feasting, the togetherness and the family all trump. Until stuffed and exhausted I curl up in my bed, brilliantly lit from the fairy lights in the next room and I smile until my face aches.

It was pouring with rain when we came home tonight and slipped across the wet grass in the dark as we climbed the stairs. The chatter of excited children all around me as I invited them to turn on the gaudy festive lights that I had spent an afternoon unravelling and tacking to the banisters. And as they exclaimed and clapped, while the rain misted over us and sparkled with the lights I could not help but feel that the greatest gift I have ever been given is them - they make everything worthwhile.

And now as the quiet drum of the rain rhythmically caresses the roof, and the gentle gurgle of the gutters and the wet splash on the grass echo through the night, I have my right to steal into the softly lit rooms where little people are curled. And to smooth locks of damp ruffled hair from high smooth foreheads and gift them good dreams as I tuck in dimpled limbs and kiss their baby skin, sniffling in the darkness at how wonderful it is to have them home.

Big stars and little stars

First weekend of December now holds two beautiful traditions - the ballet concert and of course, the tree. This is our third year of rocking up to ballet, finding our seats in the darkened auditorium and waiting for the moment when I burst into tears over tiny ballerinas in pink tutus. I wish I could show you pictures, but our ballet school prohibits photography AT ALL during performances and this year didn't even do a curtain call. I am fairly miffed about that. 

The two ballerinas were ethereal, tiny and graceful, and completely worthy of my blubbering all the way through their performance. The older girls might technically be much more aesthetic, but watching the Monkey twirl and the Elfling flutter her gossamer wings was just beautiful. Proud mama. 

After ballet, I was allowed to finally unleash Christmas upon our house - or as Bingley described it, "vomit tinsel" while listening to Bing. Our new tree is lovely and lush (though I think part of me misses our old one) and we chatted about all the many special ornaments as they went on the tree. Each girl and boy helping to slide them on. Checking that we had all 12 days of Christmas, and that each trinket and bauble was located just so.

I had also bought the kids each a mini tree, with their own string of lights to decorate as they wished. They had great fun with the tinsel and lights and loved being able to choose whatever they wanted in the lay out of their own trees.  I finished off the room with our snowflake icicle lights and giant star, and sat in front of the tree long after everyone else had gone to bed, with a fruit mince pie and a glass of milk thinking of just how much I love Christmas.