Kiwifruit

This wee spider sunbathing on a hebe blossom is the pick of my usual Sunday afternoon photo session, which sees me dawdling round the garden in my sexy pink crocs, contorting myself to get artistic angles so I can commune up close and personal with Mother Nature.
It’s blissfully quiet round here after the Beige Barn contingent and Bruvinlaw’s parents came over for lunch to celebrate Lil’Sis’s 38th birthday. The menu consisted of mussel fritters, courtesy of Dad, quiche lorraine and roast chicken (my contribution) and a luscious chocolate mud cake with chocolate ganache icing (baked by Mum) and all the dishes were done by the Other Harf in his pretty pink rubber gloves, bless.
For the next 52 days I’m only one year older than her, so I’ll treasure this time while I can!
The rest of the day? There are plans for a bit of lummoxing on the sofa (we’ve got [The Wrestler](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1125849/) and [Duplicity](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1135487/) to watch – Clive, Clive Oweeennn….), leftovers for dinner and early-ish to bed. Daylight Saving, which miraculously happened overnight is really awesome but I suspect, no, I *know* that extra hour is going to be rather difficult to deal with tomorrow morning. Don’t do mornings.

In the late 1930′s, my grandparents bought a bush-covered slice of land on a peninsula in the tiny settlement of Ostend on Waiheke Island. They built a fibrolite bach, with windows lining the front, overlooking sleepy Anzac Bay. It was a holiday home, with second-hand furniture, leaky roofs, a long-drop and a grouchy old wood-stove that took forever to heat up the three rooms. Generations of family spent summers there, but the bach held a special place in my father’s heart.

Forty years later, in the early 1970′s, my parents scratched together enough money to buy the bach from my grandmother, and our little family moved from suburban Massey to live in the middle of the bush. I was five years old, and Lil’Sis was three.

Life on Waiheke Island was about the sea. The school buses were timed so the buses could drop all the children off and get to Matiatia in time to meet the ferry. The tide controlled whether we could get home along the beach (the quick way) or whether we had to climb the steep, gravelled road that ran along the spine of the peninsula and down the track through the bush (the long way). In the summer, the telly was never switched on – we swam, we rowed, we fished, we played in the rockpools or explored the peninsula, collecting shells and mermaid’s necklaces (which you could pop in your sister’s face).

It was also about living in the bush. Our little house was completed surrounded by punga, karaka, kawa-kawa, ponga and manuka and tui, fantails and kereru flocked in the trees. We made huts and climbed to the very tops of the tallest trees, and every now and then we came across vivid green plantations of five-fingered plants (grown to supplement the income of the resident “alternative lifestylers” or, as they were known back then “hippies”). The bush was alive in the summer, pulsating with cicadas during the day and swarming with mosquitoes at night. During the winter, it was dark and sodden and so, so cold. Those chunky, hand-knitted jumpers of our childhood definitely served a purpose.

We saw very little of our father during those years. He left for work at 5am, catching the bus to meet the 6am ferry to Auckland (a journey of an hour and a half) and catching another bus to his job as a signwriter in Grey Lynn. He was home just before 8pm, and it was only during the school holidays that we were able to greet him on his return. Weekends were spent maintaining the track, repairing his boat, or having a few beers with his mates over at the Onetangi Hotel.

Mum worked part-time in the office for the local transport company, and during the school holidays we had to come to work with her, and play on the typewriter or the adding-machine while she did her thing. To make up for those tediously boring hours at lunchtimes she would take us for fish’n'chips at the takeaways in Oneroa, or we could take our pick from the stock of yoghurts in the chill-store. Sometimes we were allowed to go over to the manager’s house and hang out with his kids. They had colour-telly, which Lil’Sis and I thought was pretty damn fancy, and an automatic washing machine, which Mum admired greatly. 

Life wasn’t so advanced for most Waiheke residents, however, and most of them liked it that way. Potters, painters, weavers, carvers, organic gardeners and farmers and greenies in general found the island a haven for their lifestyles. They lived in ramshackle bachs or houseboats and often one of Greenpeace’s yachts would moor in our bay, painted in rainbow colours and stamped with the No-Nukes symbol.

In 1980, our life suddenly changed. My grandmother asked my parents to move in with her into her large state house in Waterview (in inner West Auckland) – she’d had several burglaries (one in the middle of the day – a man had walked right into her house and helped himself to jewellery while she watched, helpless and terrifed) and was starting to fear for her life. She was also finding in increasingly hard to maintain the house and the big quarter-acre section.

So, along with all this, Dad’s plans to go into business on his own and bearing our future education in mind (the local highschool had quite a poor reputation back then) our family moved up to the Big Smoke, leaving our idyllic island life behind to start a new chapter of our lives.

It has been a considerably poor effort, blogging wise, from me over the past week. I had ideas, I had plans, I fully intended on at least three posts but then? Nothing. I can’t pinpoint the pinnacle moment of (hormonally induced) apathy, but the realisation prompted the purchase of a two month supply of 30Plus, a packet of pills that I’m hoping will save my blog and my marriage. Bah hormones!

Anyhow, this past weekend was taken up with two celebrations that occupied my time; the first being Niece G’s 10th Birthday Hoedown Hoolie, which saw 18 cowboy-hatted children run riot in the shed/our front yard (the Beige Barn is not able to cater to such celebrations as yet, seeing as it is still part construction site). The designated four hours stretched out rather tediously, with games (tug of war, the chocolate game, three-legged race, treasure hunt), food galore (cheerios – the Kiwi version - not the cereal, sausage rolls, Cheezels, Mallowpuffs, chicken nibbles and a wonderful “10″ shaped vanilla cake with mint-green frosting), Taylor Swift and Hannah flippin’ Montana on loop, heated discussions on the merits (and subsequent swapping) of the party gifts and some deep sighs of relief when the last child was spirited down the driveway. Yee-hah!

Sunday I attended a work colleague’s baby shower, which I had to forcibly extract myself out of bed for, but knowing the high catering standards of the Mum-to-be and her family there would be a lovely spread laid on that would more than make up for having to drive into Whangarei on an extremely dreary, wet afternoon. And oh, how I was right; melt in your mouth Russian Fudge, divine, densely chocolatey Afghans, lusciously moist carrot cake with lashings of lemony cream cheese icing and fresh cream-filled chocolate eclairs. And of course, there were lots of lovely gifts to cluck over and some hilarious photos of the Mum-to-Be in her high school ballgowns – lots of big hair, crushed velvet and elbow-length lace gloves. 

This weekend it’s time for another celebration; Lil’Sis turns 38 (at which point I can gloat for a whole 55 days that I’m only a year older than her) and her requests? No party games or Hannah Montana, Homemade Quiche Lorraine (this will be my first attempt), Dad’s Infamous Mussel Fritters, all rounded off with a side of Chocolate Mud Cake (purchased with care and attention from Maunu Bakery).

Yes, celebrations are TOTALLY about the food. If you ask me.

Sunday afternoon and Mum, bless her cottons, has just popped in with half a freshly baked banana cake, which (as I delicately nibbled on a lady-like sized slice) I noticed was stll warm from the oven and had the most perfecty sweet/tart lemon icing. Absolutely delicious! Thanks Mum!
It’s been a busy outdoorsy sort of day today due to yesterday’s weather consisting of one big solid raindrop. So, as well as doing a three hour stint of weeding, I (along with the Other Harf, Dad, Lil’Sis and Clive from down-the-road) helped Brunvinlaw move their massive six metre long bifold lounge doors from the garage to the Beige Barn, a journey of roughly 100 metres across the shingled driveway and down a small slope. There was a lot of huffing and puffing, a bit of swearing and a couple of foo-foo valves were almost busted, but we got it there eventually and there was much rejoicing.
After that I did a spot of cattle-rustling helping Dad and the OH move the beasties from the side paddock to the front paddock, a procedure made potentially dangerous by the fragility of the fences in the latter. Over the past six months or so the cows have pushed their way through it ooh, at least six times, frolicking in my garden and potholing the lawn, not to mention running for the hills, so I had to stand guard while the men quickly moved the mobile electric tape fence from one side of the property to the other to keep the pesky bovines confined.
Ha! But not for much longer; the whole of the fence lining our driveway is due to be replaced this coming week with a brand new creosoted three rail fence, courtesy of a really good bulk deal on wood at Bunnings and the handy-dandy carpentry skills of my husband and my father.
That’ll learn ‘em!

I count myself fortunate that I don’t have many regrets, but I do have one that stands head and shoulders above all the others.

I met Ray when I was 18. He was nine years older than me; short, weedy, mulleted, kind of weasly, still living at home with his mum, cleaning cars and pumping gas for a living, and the owner of a wonderful 1970 metallic blue Holden Brougham, which despite being a Holden (I was a Ford girl back then, through and through) more than made up for Ray’s shortcomings.

He was parked up on Queen Street one Saturday night, and when he offered to take me for a spin I couldn’t resist. In my circle of boyracers and their girl followers, the kudos of being in the passenger seat of such a car was almost as good as driving it.

Ray played it cool, and even let me drive that night. Oh how I revelled in the throaty gurgle of the Brougham’s V8 as I roared past my friends watching on the roadside. How cool was I!

We started going out, and Ray treated me well. He was generous and paid for everything, charming my friends and convincingly playing the part of the cheeky, happy-go-lucky man about town. He even let me borrow his beloved Brougham to go cruising on a Saturday night with my friends will he pumped gas at a Shell Station in Grey Lynn. In my eyes, he was quite the catch.

Then, six months or so into our relationship, his ex appeared outside my work. I was on my way to catch my bus, and she stepped out in front of me,

“You know who I am don’t you,” she said. I nodded, even though I never met Debbie, I had seen her photo. Her and Ray had two kids together, but her rampant jealously and erratic moods had been too much for him to cope with, so they had split up the year before.

“I don’t think you and Ray will last. He’s supposed to be with me. He still is! Just let him go, ok?” Debbie was nervous; her hands shook and she kept dragging on her cigarette and looking furtively over my shoulder, as if she expected to be seen off by somebody.

Flustered, I just nodded, and she walked off, head down. I told Ray but he just laughed it off. “Crazy bitch,” he said,”It’s just the sort of shit she does. Forget about it.”

But Debbie was to keep appearing in my life (I was later to find out that Ray would frequently pop in on the pretense of visiting the kids and end up sleeping with her – yep, no wonder she was so screwed up…). She turned up at work again, this time fronting up to reception and asking for me. I asked a work colleague to tell her to go away, and every time I left the building my heart would be thumping, looking out for her.

Then there was the handbags at dawn scene in the supermarket, and later on that year, Debbie turned up on the doorstep with a carving knife, screaming for me to come out, and when I wouldn’t, she began kicking the side of my car, wailing and crying, all with the two kids watching in horror from her car across the street. Only when the police turned up did she back off. I was petrified, but again Ray urged me to forget about it, and said she wouldn’t really hurt me, but deep down I knew he was just too weak to stand up to her and nothing was ever going to change.

Meanwhile, our relationship was deteriorating. Ray was becoming jealous and suspicious of me if I wanted to spend time with friends, or do anything without him and he would interrogate and pick arguments for hours afterwards, constantly baiting and sniping at me.

I withdrew, and Ray’s arguments and accusations esclated to throwing-matches, and then began to include a nastier, silent kind of bullying. We’d be out with friends, and I’d be too quiet for his liking so he would squeeze my hand until I could feel the bones grating, just to punish me. Once we were home, he’d punch walls and threaten me, push me, never hitting me but coming oh-so-close to it.

The carving knife incident was the final straw, and I moved out of the flat one day while he was at work and went back home to live – to the huge relief of all my family and most of my friends. Ray rang me constantly, pleading for me to return but even as a niave 19 year old, I knew he was bad for me. He started hanging round my neighbourhood and followed me home one night. Nobody was there, and he began hammering on the door to let him in, he only wanted to talk. I cracked it open to tell him to leave, and he barged in, grabbing me, yelling at me that no-one was going to leave him like that, who did I think I was? I managed to shove him out the door, but that wasn’t the last I saw of him.

A couple of months later I moved into a flat with my friends T and Paul, and we decided that we’d have the mother of all housewarming parties that night. I’d had plenty to drink, and was dancing in the lounge when Ray appeared in the doorway. He pulled me through to the back the house and I pleaded with him to go, just leave me alone, I was never coming back to him. He pushed me into the toilet and grabbed me by the throat, and crushed me up against the wall, his eyes bulging, shouting furiously in my face how much of a c**t I was, how much he hated me, did I think I was going to get away with this? I screamed and screamed, tears and snot running down my face as Ray’s hand tightened harder and harder round my neck.

Paul bashed through the toilet door at that moment, and he and a couple of mates grabbed Ray and took him out on the street. I don’t know what they did to Ray that night, but I never saw him again.

Till three weeks ago, Tuesday. Standing on the corner of John Street and Cameron, still with his stringy blonde mullet and weedy frame and faded black jeans. His face was haggard and wrinkled, but I instantly recognised him.

I turned and walked the other way, as quickly as I could, heart pounding in my chest, memories and fear and regret surging through me.

(more…)

This being almost 40 bit seems to have inspired a bit of navel-gazing, so seeing as my vast readership of four are whiling the hours away over at Facebook instead of here, I thought I’d dedicate some of my posts to writing about those forty years, the good, the bad, the best, the worst, the milestones, the ups and the downs. A half-memoir/diary/writing exercise that I can chuckle indulgently over in another forty years time and think to myself, if only I knew then what I know now, while polishing off that last chocolate in a family sized box of Cadbury Continental.

First up: The Biggest Regret.

• That I’m about to progress into a whole new demographic in the “What Suits You?” in the beauty section of women’s magazines.
• 34 sounds young, 27 positively childish.
• Tie-dye, stone-washed skinny jeans, day-glo and “bodysuits” (complete with those pube-snagging crotch-poppers) have all come fashion full circle and this time I can’t bring myself to wear any of them.
• The bags under my eyes concertina overnight, and stay that way for a good hour after I’ve gotten out of bed.
• Fashion can suit me, if I pick the right fashion.
• I’d rather watch Country Calendar with a glass of wine on a Saturday night than do almost anything else.
• I inspect my hairline for greys every morning
• Random, spirally bristles keep appearing under my chin instead of pimples.
• I only check out men in their late 30′s and 40′s; anyone younger feels kind of creepy.
• Weekends are prioritised for gardening and sleeping in.
• That I’m older than some, younger than others.
• That there are old 25 year olds and young 65 year olds.
• When it comes to makeup, it should be all about accentuating the positive, not obliterating the whole.
• That getting on with people is all about give and take.
• That I have really only one regret in life. I saw him in the high street of Whangarei a couple of weeks ago and felt sick to my stomach with old fear.
• How very lucky I am to have all the things I have.

I finally persuaded our internet connection to upload the Taupo photos (thanks for that, Vodafone, it only took me days, days which I will never ever get back, ever…) and here’s one taken at The Craters of the Moon, a geothermally active area just north of Taupo and a few minutes drive away from where we where staying at the Bayview Wairakei Resort (the Other Harf can highly recommend the buffet in the Fairway Cafe, Miss 9 the heated swimming pools and I have fond memories of the power shower, the Continental Breakfast Bar and the complimentary organic toiletries).

Our small band of tourists did a circuit past craters, fumeroles and pockets of steaming earth, the whole while flanked by low-growing prickly scrub that went by the name of “prostrate kanuka”, which sounds more like a medical affliction one wouldn’t want to admit to at a party than a member of the tea-tree family, but there you go.

We also took in Lilliput Farm, which is a lovely wee animal and fun park situated a few kilometres north of the hotel, which all the kids (and the adults, even those without kids) loved. We fed goats, deer, pigs, miniature ponies, donkeys, sheep, alpacas, geese, chickens and ducks, and Miss 9 got to cuddle some incredibly cute baby rabbits and kittens while the birthday boy S had an in-depth conversation with an Indian Ring Necked parrot which went something like this:

Parrot: “How are ya baby!”
S – “Yeah, I’m good, looking forward to a few beers later, how’s yourself?”
Parrot: “How are ya baby!”

I was most taken with the incredibly affectionate cats in residence, which all seemed to love to find a lap and smooch up. My kind of cats; I can’t be bothered with the snooty ones – if I’m gonna feed you, at least show me some love.

Here’s the latest additions, which Mama Cat didn’t mind in the slightest about being picked up by enthusiastic children. And if you’re ever in Taupo and you’ve done Huka Falls and the Huka Jet and all the usual suspects, check out both these places – we can highly recommend them.

It’s been a sickly day at home for both me and Miss 9, with Everests of snotty tissues and Lempsips galore. For her, it’s her second day at home, but my lurgy kicked off late last evening with a wicked sore throat and swooped on me overnight, supplying me with some interesting, fever-induced dreams – one of which involved me telling my old boss (the one I worked for in that job) what I really thought of her. There were choice, cut-to-the bone insults and some long overdue home truths (from me) and finally (on her part) there were extensive tears and slammed doors as I flounced from the office with a huge smile on my face.

Oh, the satisfaction!

The other one that I can clearly recall involved me paddling a canoe to a deserted island to escape hordes of aliens in purple spaceships, but that’s another story, slightly less satisfying…

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