Live Life Your Way

Chatting, commenting briefly  last night to Hunny the Husband regarding my years of anxiety and social phobia and vomiting before anything at all. We as people can now talk about that side of mental health, more freely. But still I am so frustrated that I just want to scream I told you so! I told you and I told you and I told you.

All those years people thought I was making excuses because I wasn't doing or wouldn't do what they wanted me to do....or even what they needed me to do. Anxiety is like being lost in a giant washing machine where you never know when the cycle is going to change - when you never know when the anxiety is going to hit. And when you try but you just can't. You are frozen and cannot find your way clear. Or when you try, and embarrass yourself - and you prefer embarrassment because it's better than the fear and anxiety eating away at you and you prefer to be regarded as an idiot, fake, clown, airhead, uncaring, blase, silly, stupid or just plaid vapid. Or when your choices are questioned every step of the way and you can no longer trust yourself to breath without crying.

My first panic attacks began were when I was 14 or 15. The year was 1985, I just don't remember whether it was before or after my birthday. My thoughts are I was still 14 as a comment made to be me by a co-boarder (boarding school girlie) was made early enough in the year for me to tell her to stop being stupid. I was entering my fourth year at boarding school. I now know the trigger. And I made friends and met new people, smoked ciggies and drank alcohol when I could, until the end of my status as an illegal drinker. There was an interim where I was no longer the crazy, ditzy creature I portrayed. I was literally an airhead because it's all I could do. I was confused. I was hurting and most importantly - I had no clue what was going on inside me. At one point I was the only person in my very small group of friends who was not yet 18. And I had to put up with my friends quite verbally making it known they were responsible for me to get into a pub because I was under age. Then this...this thing happened. I'm not sure how or when but the fear and anxiety took over. I lost myself in that washing machine of chaos.

And it was then that everything changed within my friendship group. I was now 'legal' and the like - but unlike the others I was looking for work while they were working. Again - out of step with my peers, and wrapped in anxiety for days before an interview. And I guess - when I had no income and everywhere I went was bus or on shanks' pony, i fell out of the slipstream. I had one - two maybe friends who I could count on if they were available. I will be eternally grateful to them. Because, when your friendships become conditional and all it would have taken would be for someone to say I believe you. Maybe I could have been pulled back.

Just a simple phrase or two. Like, I understand. I won't give up on you. And, I believe IN you. As years have passed, I know these same people have ALL reached similar points in their life's journey and for a variety of reasons. No-one is the same. And no, they've not reached out to me. The one person who could empathise - me - was not part of any support required by these people. I only found out by accident so hey - I wasn't even on their radar except for once or twice a year when we'd all jump to attention for a catch up.

Only twice have I been apologised to and once was for a specific moment in time by someone who was not my peer. The other was accompanied by - I'm sorry, we didn't know. You know what? You did know! I told you and I told you and I told you. I told you stuff I couldn't tell anyone else thinking I'd be safe. And yes, I'm talking to you. On behalf of all of those who were never heard when they spoke, I AM talking to all of you.

But you see, you never made the connection. I never made the connection and because WE didn't understand how the world and life and experiences all add up to make us who we are, there were chances and choices and opportunities missed. And our personalities and who we have become have been altered by those missed opportunities as much as if we had had them.

The world is all tied up in one giant anxiety knot because we don't know if we can cope with the next blow. So we all act out in an effort to deal with the pressures of the unknown instead of embracing life.

Instead of being happy for what we have; instead of sharing ourselves unconditionally, we are busy jumping on the ME train on the track to I WANT, at the cost of everything that matters.

But in a world so busy minding it's own business and yours as well, we must grab onto the smallest little thing that can bring the light to us. Something, anything, that will give us hope - a reason to wake up, a reason to smile and a reason for laughing. The cheerful young woman at the supermarket can make a person's day. Saying thank you and wishing someone else on the other end of the phone at a call centre can make their day. You may not be the next big music thing, or the girl who designs an antigravity device. You may not design the perfect home or save someone's life on a daily basis, but there is always a choice to smile or frown.

Love your family and friends more loudly. Laugh out loud for real, not just on the social feeds. Find your joy in life. And smile with compassion at the bullies who can only feel good by making others feel bad. You are not their problem.

The Plain of Mists

Inspired by the absolutely awesome light I saw in this area, during a recent trip to Queenstown, Tasmania. My birthplace and an area still holding that primordial sense of a world being birthed, when you step even just a few metres from the road.  So much change over the last thirty years - yet so much not.


The Plain of the Mists

Purlieu

I crossed over a place,
as a temporary wayfarer does, 
up and over, that world from which I came.
Where forests of childhood memories

are now mere islets of trees,
and scrub now steppes and plains.

And those plains, those ancient plains,

as childhood long left and cold,
Hold a special light.
With clouds limned in radiance.
Enshrouding nearby ranges,
an argent light is reflected...refracted...
draping carelessly, 
spreading unearthly rays,
drawing me in 
through the darkened glass of time.

Rivers sing quietly, muted by foliage

While ghosts of the road makers

Whisper a counterpoint to the

Echoes of ancient, primeval indiginy.

The mist, a tangible amnion,

Holding back the universe,

Keeping in the dreaming.

A subtle murmuring of voices long gone

Can be heard underneath

The gentle sussuration

Of barely moving grasses.

Whispers of the tiger's cough are

Filtered through fingers of mist,

prying...

flicking through my primal fears

sighing....

The muted percussion

of horses' feet stumbling through

the tussock grass, its'

buttons flicking their flanks,

sound along with

the scream of the saw

and the dull thunk of the axe, 

as they fall the ancient giants

feeding the strident devil's maw.

The screams of a past devoured.

A long inhale.

Exhale.

Mist lifts,

burned off by warming sun

(c)2018

Note: photograph is of the mist covered hills of Queenstown Tasmania.

With thanks to Dr Peter Hay for his advice on certain issues I always seem to have when writing.

SHORT STORY: All That Remains...

All that remains of a favorite coat I had as a child is this button. Once I outgrew the coat, my mother turned it into a cloak or cape with a fur collar, buttoned at the neck with one button from the coat.
The coat was a woolen antiquey pink colour with tiny checks and maybe a tiny blue pinstripe, and after it became a cape, I wore it to my first disco and my favorite 'hometown' at about age 6.

It turns out my mother had a pink woolen outfit made for her from which these buttons came. Which she then wore to a 21^st birthday party in NZ before coming to Australia in 1967. My mother was only very young herself, - pre 16.... Age of button? We're looking at over 40 years old and she had a set of 4 or 6 and this is the only one that remains. This story is just a work of fiction, nothing more. But it was triggered by my favorite button that I have stashed away.

Hello my dear! Another new face, another young face! My companions and I, we do wait patiently for someone to bring us out into the light and listen to our stories. For we have many to tell and rarely do we have any new companions join us! Our stories will soon be forgotten if we've no-one to tell who cars just like any thing in life.

We come from an era where ladies and their beautiful dresses still abounded in a world that was rapidly changing, from a country no longer exists as it had and we were scattered across millions of miles to every corner of our globe.

My companions that became my family and I, landed in New Zealand in the aftermath of World War II where women who had worked while their husbands, fathers and brothers were off fighting, were now wanting to dance with those who came home. They wanted pretty, they wanted feminine and most of all, they wanted us as much as we wanted you because it was you who gave us our raison d'etre. Do you know raison d'etre? Do you really know what it is to sit and wait, to be bypassed and overlooked for others while you wondered if you would ever see the light that says you have come home? That emptiness that comes with not being wanted....that sick feeling and slowly, that hardening of emotion?

Time travels slowly for those who wait. My wait was only three or four years and I and my sisters went home with a delightful little girl whose excitement was catching. Instead of having yet another hand-me-down, at 12 years old, Beth was to have a very special outfit made just for her, the first new one since forever it seemed, and she had spent an eternity searching out every little piece from the fabric to the threads and zippers and us. The fabric was a beautiful woollen pink chosen by our young recipient, in a very delicate and fine check that was almost barely there and it enhanced us in our glass beauty, raising our shine up to be as brilliant as the diamonds in her eyes. The fabric enhanced the roses in her cheeks and lips and her unruly black curls fairly danced as she hopped from one foot to another at the fabric counter. “Shhh – be still Beth!” her mother kept repeating as she double checked that she had everything she needed for the new outfit, including ribbons for that hair that to me (and her mother), seemed difficult to tame.

With such excitement did young Beth look forward to her new outfit! Being the youngest girl in the family, her clothes all tended to be hand-me-downs that had all lost their glamour by the time they reached her, no matter how much her mother changed the trimmings where possible. This was something she had never had! A brand new outfit, just for her and she already had a party to wear it to.

While Mother cut and sewed, Beth played with us and other buttons from Mother's button box, stroking us softly. Buttons from Father's old shirt, buttons from Grandpa's long retired cardigan. By far, we were the most beautiful in our soft pink, textured glassiness. We were six. One for the dress itself and four for the coat that went with the dress and just one of us a spare! I was the chosen button for the dress – I had pride of place as I would be seen the most by anyone. How our Spare did envy us but it was quite normal that Spare was all that was left of any outfit after construction. Spare was kept in pride of place with all the other Spares in the button tin – kept safe and sound until the day that any one of them may be needed.

Finally, after several days, we all watched as our Beth tried on the outfit so Mother could mark the places for us to sit and get it ready for hemming. For someone who had waited so patiently for Mother to get this far and to finish, Beth seemed quite...unhappy. She wriggled.....and she wiggled....and she scratched and she scritched. But she did not say a word. Instead – after removing the nearly complete outfit, she kept us buttons aside as she put all of the rest back into the button tin and played with us until Mother was ready for us then handed us to her as she began sewing us on.

Not long after we were sewn on, there was a bit of excitement in the house when an invitation was received to attend a 21^st birthday party of a cousin. These parties were a rite of passage still back then, seeing as it was more likely your 21^st would be celebrated than your 18^th, (which is so much more common these days) and all family members attended, using the birthday as one of those events where they catch up with each other. And these events were quite elegant also by comparison with best dresses and shirts and suits pulled out of the cupboard and hung and aired to drop the wrinkles out and freshen them up. And so we, attached to our beautiful outfit, were also taken out of our cupboard ready for the party. Beth would come over to her outfit and gently stroke us, reveling in our beauty....wondering about our long journey from Czechoslovakia. She still did not seem as excited as she should at the thought of wearing the outfit for which she had longed for.

But without complaint, she put the outfit on and permitted Mother to tie her hair back with a pretty pink ribbon and off we all went to the party. During the night, Beth seemed to grow unhappier and unhappier and wrigglier and wrigglier....until finally her grandmother asked her what the matter was.

Beth burst into tears and wailed into her grandmother's shoulder that she was just SO itchy. That her beautiful outfit was the itchiest and scritchiest thing she'd ever seen. She loved the colour. She loved the fabric pattern. She loved the buttons. She even loved the shiny lining in the matching coat. But she just did not love wearing the dress because it made her itch so much.

“Oh, I see!” Grandmother said because of course, she knew what the problem was. There was no lining on the dress as Beth's mother had only enough money to purchase lining for the coat. The coat could be used with any outfit and the lining helped it slide on over any other clothing she may wear, But the dress? Sadly for Beth, the woolen fabric just made the poor child itch to the point where when she was finally just had to scratch the itchy spots, she left big red welts with her fingernails.

“There, there little one” Grandmother spoke softly. “Not long now and we shall be leaving. “ Chin up, my possum!” And in fact, it was then that Beth's mother saw her daughter in distress and being fussed over by her grandmother and hurried over to see what the matter was. Grandmother just put her fingers to her lips and suggested she say her goodbyes to the hosts of the party.....that Beth was very tired and it was best they went home. Beth looked up at her Grandmother gratefully and hugged her as tight as she could.

Once home, Beth took her dress off and hung it up and went to her bed. We had never seen her face so torn between despair at something she had wanted so badly but wasn't what she had hoped.....and relief that the itchy fabric was away from her skin. She quietly sniffed herself to sleep as I hung in the wardrobe and the coat hung on the door hook.

Some time during the night, Mother snuck into Beth's room and took me from the wardrobe. A few days later, after a visit from Grandmother, I was taken out again into the light and my dress turned inside out and left in the sewing cupboard.

Over the coming weeks and months, Coat went out many times. Not once did Beth come to the wardrobe and look at Dress as longingly as she had when we were first put together. Then came the time for the church Christmas party. Mother told Beth to please go and put her pink wool dress on and bring her pink ribbons and hair brush to her so her hair could be braided back. This meant I would be seen as usually, hair would have hidden me! When I saw little Beth's face in the wardrobe looking so sad, I felt sad myself as I knew she wouldn't be enjoying me and that was all that I had wanted. But –  I had a secret!  

Slowly....snail like....Miss Beth took her day dress off and prepared to slip her pretty dress on. She stopped – a funny look on her face....she sniffed the fabric.

“How odd!” she muttered. “I can smell Grandmother!!!” Must be from last time I wore it, she thought. Then she realised – the whole dress felt a little different...heavier...but only by a little bit....and more...slippy! She looked at the dress further and it was then she saw what her mother had done. Mother had cut up an old petticoat Grandmother had given her and sewed a lining out of it for my Dress. We were then hung back in the wardrobe and left for next time.

Beth squeaked with glee as she felt the dress slip on softly, gently laying on her skin with not an itch anywhere....except for her nose as one of her hairs had managed to tickle it as the dress mussed her hair a little more. She grabbed her ribbons and brush and ran back to her mother, throwing herself so hard at her I would have thought she was going to fall. “Thank you, thank you, thank you Mummy for fixing my dress. “

Of course – Beth grew out of her dress and her Coat got lost along the way and so obviously did my the rest of us – until I was the only one left of my sisters. Even Spare had vanished from the Button Tin. The following year for the next Church Christmas Party, Mother once again took us from the cupboard. She was able to trim the Dress down and around, creating a small Capelet and add a little rabbit fur collar. Me – I was pride of place at the front of the capelet, holding it in place on her. Never was there a happier girl than our Beth when she wore her Cape.

Now – it is time to put me back in the Button Tin and skedaddle off for your dinner because I can hear your mother calling you. Thank you for letting me tell my story. I hope someday I may be made useful for you.

The End

Short Story: I Was Loved

Dear Human, who gazes at me so lovingly wondering what my story is, if you would just sit awhile and be as peaceful on the inside as you are on the outside, my story will reveal itself to you. You pace and wander in your mind while you serenely face the world. Sit. Rest...and listen.

Before I ended up in this beautiful, modern glass home with the bed of pure white sand, with fossicked shells for decoration, my travels were many. My journeys were not as yours as I saw time pass in the depths of the ocean. Oh how I ached for the dry land again, to be wanted by someone again.

I was created in England in a small potting town and was part of a beautiful set of dining dishes. I was passed on from my first owner upon their death, to a beautiful young couple and oh they cherished me! I was treated with reverence and importance....I was loved!

Time passed and the young pair grew older and had children of their own, and those children grew, or did not. Slowly but surely, parts of me were lost. My bowls went first....my dinner plates...slowly but surely through various accidents, my family was decimated until there was only myself and my cup remaining. At the same time, my humans were tried with misfortunes, the deaths of their children from illness and accidents, and the loss of circumstance so that they too were left with very little. Finally the decision was made to leave here, our place of birth and inheritance and travel over the seas to make a new home, where new roots could be set down. I had been treated with even greater reverence than before, kept upon the mantle as a reminder of who we once were....gathering dust and grime but I was still loved! And so, we went.

My cup and I were packed up and we set off to what we thought was the greatest city on earth, London, and there we boarded a sailing ship headed for New South Wales. On this journey, I was used by my lovely bride as she strove to remain positive at this change of circumstance. Of the five children this beautiful girl bore, only one remained....such a naughty lad! But like I, he was loved, he was cherished and he was adored. May-hap this contributed to his mischiefs and misbehaviors. May-hap it was just one of those things...happenstance. But it was he who orchestrated the loss of my whole. The lad was feeling unwell and was more contrary than usual. His mother finished the last of her tea and set my cup down upon me when a flying arm from the boy, sent said cup flying to shatter on the floor into many irretrievable pieces.

I felt the loss of my cup keenly, but for a long time, I could not dwell upon it's loss as the child grew sicker and sicker. I was used as a way of getting liquids into the child during his illness. I worked hard – he was a part of my family! But to no avail. The boy and many others died on that journey to the place we thought would be ours. My beautiful bride also passed and with her, the spirit of her husband.

He had nothing left to live for he said. He had lost it all. He wailed and gnashed his teeth as the lad and his mother were wrapped together in one of their fine linen sheets, and buried at sea where never again, would they be beheld.

We arrived in Australia and at once my man drew a drink. I sat unused, in a small pile of belongings left outside a tavern, as the man lost what was left his dignity. Little wonder that I was stolen with the rest of his luggage.

So how did I get here? I was taken on board yet another ship, to travel who knows where, by who knows who! I was broken! I was mistreated and I was broken in three, no more use to even the lowest of the sailors. My own obsequies at sea were not with the cherishing words and tears of my bride's burial. Instead, I was callously tossed overboard with a curse, my three pieces violently separated by the movement of the waves. The parts of what remained of my whole and I, cried out to each other. We had heard of this place and we were scared. We knew we would never see each other again.

Time passed and I slowly moved around the floor of the ocean, a witness to the power of the tidal motions. At one point I was taken in by a covetous octopus who had created within his home, a beautiful collection of treasures. But – my beauty had been dulled by then so when another more beautiful item was brought home by the octopus, I was thrown out again onto the tide, to travel where it might take me.

I became rubbed down. My sharp edges became soft curves as little chips of me were whittled off by not so gentle landings on sand and stone. My design, a beautiful deep blue, became the faded delicate grey of shopworn pen-ink on cheap paper.

Once in a while during a beach landing, I breathed the salty air and freedom oh so briefly. It only served to remind me of my lost family. I would hear tales from other treasures such as myself – a part of a surgeon's medicament bottle, a piece of a soup tureen lost during a storm and once – another piece of dining ware from the same small town as I whose story was just as tragic. So, I took the chaffing and scuffing afforded me by the beach and waited for the tide to change.

I was always washed off the beaches. I was always returned to the water. Until the last day. I had been flung high upon the shore by angry, stormy waves. Here, there were less shells and more sand. How was I to know that this sand was the remains of us all! A girl was slowly wandering along the beach, rugged up against the stormy weather. Even I could feel her sadness. Every now and then she would stoop to the sand and pick something up. A pretty pebble or attractive shell. She also picked me up. She stroked me lovingly, tenderly. She wrapped me in a handkerchief fished out from somewhere and placed me in the pocket of her left hand. She fondled me gently through the handkerchief.

Abruptly I felt her turn and walk back the way she came. We ended up back at her home, a bright, shiny and warm home, and in a room the likes of which I had never seen. Creatures I know now are dragons, hung from her ceiling in little glass homes, fat shiny cats wandered in and out and a small fire crackled warmly in the hearth. Time had passed for me and oh such wonders that had been created! I could not take in all that I saw, all that I heard! That I had survived for such a long time to see what this world had achieved!

She took me out of her pocket, washing me gently in salt free water then drying me as she looked around her room. I watched as she retrieved what was to become my beautiful glass home from a shelf and filled it with pure white sand. She then picked me up and reverently placed me in the sand, giving me adornments for what was to be my new home.

And that, my dear friend, is my story. Here I will sit, taken out of my sand once in a while to be stroked and rubbed, until that very last day when the last stroke takes all that is left of me and spreads me gently in my bed of sand. But, I am loved.




The End.

 (C)Michelle Evans Catherall 2016.  All rights reserved

We Have It Good

I have no title for this right now - considering how long ago I wrote it - you would think I would.  But no.  And it's not complete either....I'll get to it eventually.  Meantime, I will use the blog and facebook to reawaken my creative bones.   Ciao, MM.


There’s snakes in the back yard
Yabbies in the creek
Sun’s coming up
There’s a drover onthe ridge
Better milk the cows
And get the milk inthe fridge
Hay in the hay field
Ready to go

In the city, kids inthe alley
Showin’ off their art
Shootin up withoutguns
All to find their ownkind of fun
No safety net to catchtheir fall
They have no life atall

We’re rich in ourheads
Poor in our purse
When toy soldiers wereenough for you
And paper dolls wereenough for me
And tyre swings on
An old gum tree
How happy we used tobe


(C)Michelle Evans Catherall 2010 aka MadMikkie

A Coulda Been Kind of Love *Short story*

1 January 2012 at 16:36

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A Could Have Been Kind of Love 
A Short Story.


needs a bit of work


Midway through the service, she slipped quietly into the back row of the small chapel, adjusting her hat and small veil as she did so.  Her desire to be unrecognized fought with her need to run.  Although she herself had faced death, Lily had refused to look at it in the flesh. Today she would change that.  She listened to the remaining words being spoken by the minister, and sang quietly to herself the closing hymn, wondering what Daniel would have thought of it all.

 People began to rise and leave the chapel to the quiet tones of a classical piano and as she looked up, Lily noticed that the attendants were about to close the coffin.  As quickly and unobtrusively as possible, she made her way to the front and put her hand out to stop the closing.  She looked at Daniel, so vital in life, now looking almost like a hand painted statue.  She kissed two of her fingers and pressed them to his forhead whispering “Thank you”. She felt someone beside her and went to move on but was stopped by a hand on her arm.

 “Lily”. It was Sonya, former co-worker, friend and sometimes confidente whom she had not seen in eight years, for no reason other than there had just been no reason. Both busy women, busy lives filled with children and husbands.  “Daniel would have been surprised” Sonya said with a grin on her face. “I am too, for the record”.
“Sonnie! I thought I’d managed to creep in without notice.  Everyone else is at the door or outside.
“What did you mean by ‘Thank you’? Sonya asked.

 Lily removed her hat, she didn’t like wearing them and it was just another part of a mask she wore on a daily basis – another piece of costumery.  “He gave me my first job. That’s all.”
 “But why come in at the end? I mean, it was a lovely service and I’m sure his brothers would have loved to have seen you. Are you okay?”

 Lily gave Sonya a quick hug , “I’m fine, just facing demons and revisiting a few memories.  Tell me, what was the date of his death?” she asked as she quickly put her hat back on and glanced at the waiting attendants.
 “The 5th, why do you ask? Sonya replied with a curious look on her face.
“I’m sorry Sonnie – really, I…I must go.  Maybe we’ll catch up again soon.  I’m in the book.”  And in saying so she walked quickly down the aisle of the small chapel into the brightness of the outside world, snaking her way through the gathering of mourners that had formed at the front of the chapel.  Keeping her head down low, she made her way towards her car. Halfway down the rose lined pathway she heard her name called out in a voice she never thought she would hear again.

  “Lily!  Lily!”  She kept walking, pretending not to have heard over the voices of the crowd.
“Daisy!” Lily stopped dead. No one else had ever called her by that name.
 Nathan. The tall older brother, the only one of the four she had really gotten along with.  Max she never really knew, Daniel was the boss and Jeremy was – well, Jeremy was Jeremy.  She spent half her time avoiding his clutches, the other half despairing she’d ever get anything right if Jason, the Manager, had his way.

 Lily started to walk again but her hesitation had given Nathan the chance to catch up with her.  “Daisy, stop.” His hand reached out and held her by the elbow. She looked up into his faded blue eyes, noting at the same time the strength that emanated from presence. He did not look like a man in his sixties.

 “Nate…I must go” she started to pull away needing desperately to leave.”
“Why did you come then my Daisy? If not to pay your respects to Daniel and the family?”
 Lily sighed, “I really….I don’t….no-one has called me Daisy in over 20 years Nathan…I just…”she searched desperately for an answer that would satisfy.

“Lily….no – Daisy…it suited you much more.  I always thought that Lillies were the flower for funerals, and you weren’t meant for funerals…Lily….why?”

With barely a whisper, Lily replied “You.  I came because of you.”
 Nate was silent and still.  He reached out and pulled Lily closer, removed her hat and looked down into her face.  “You’re still my Daisy, Lily.  And I’ve not forgotten – never forgotten you.  Come, we need to talk.”  And in saying so he lead her towards the Garden of Remembrance, where white bench seats were scattered amongst the standard rose Memorial beds, surrounded by a rainbow of smaller flowering plants, Lilies and Daisys included, all of which was so perfectly manicured it was almost surreal.

 “Lily.  It’s been twenty years.  I may be an old man but there is nothing wrong with my memory.  I’ve not seen you since….”
 “Nate – it isn’t necessary, it really isn’t, I’ve got to go….”
He cut her off. “No. I need to say this. I had no right!” Lily’s eye’s flashed as she spoke sharply
“So you regret it then – it was nothing?  I turned you down, as simple as that! It was nothing, so why  bring it up?

“No, no I don’t regret it.” He reached out and stroked her hair.  “I often think of you when the Daisies fill the garden – I’m sure Gail must think I’m barmy, a sixty year old man mooning over a flower.  I’ve always had Daisys in the garden…all different types.” Lily sat quietly, her cheeks burning. “Lily, why did you really come today?”

 “So you and Gail got married then?” Lily asked trying to change the subject.  I don’t read the newspaper…it was happenstance that I saw Daniel’s funeral notice.  I just wanted to say thank you to him…being my first boss, and a good one.” She gave a bitter laugh, “I’ve had some rotters over the years.”

 “No, Gail and I never did get married.  We’ve been together for nearly twenty-six years and never really thought a piece of paper would make a difference.  No more, no less.”  So – your turn

 Yet another sigh, how much to tell?  With her head down, hiding again, she began. “Nathan, I’m a forty year old woman with a husband and children that I love……really love! But I always felt something was just….missing from me.  I’ve always felt kind of, outside of myself.  Like I wasn’t really inside me being me.  I felt that I wasn’t who I was supposed to be.”  She halted, wondering how to go on.

 “Nate, I had a dream.  In it were you and your brothers – Daniel was so young it was like a shock.  He was as young as the day he interviewed me, which really…well – you know, he was in his thirties but he was so vital and young and I thought it was Max….or maybe one of his sons. Nathan,” she looked everywhere, anywhere but at him and focused on a carpet of white alyssum. “I dreamed it the day he died.”

 At Nathan’s sharp intake of breath she looked at him briefly, but it was long enough.  He was right, he could always read her well.  Every thing she felt, he used to say, was in her eyes and she could never get away from those tells that would show. At least, not with him.  “Go on.”

 “It was like a reunion of sorts, everyone was there from the old days, everyone except for Jason thank goodness.  But it was focused on you brothers.  I saw Daniel, he gave me a hug and kiss on the cheek, Max and Jeremy the same although Jeremy tried to push it.

 “Then you came in and I just…you held me so tight….so tight….and you kissed me.  Not like your brothers, not like a friend, you really kissed me.”  Nathan took her face in his hands, stroking each cheek with his thumbs. Lily didn’t notice as her tears flowed, feeling more than a little embarrassed.   “That day you took me home, you have no idea how much….how much I really did want you to kiss me, to hold me too….I just…..the dream – the dream, that feeling was…is everything I have been looking for I think.  I have never, in my life experienced the emotion of love that strongly – in reality…that I felt in that dream.  God help me – I was only twenty! I knew nothing, not really. All I knew was that even though I said no, it was a choice I made.  Whether it was right or wrong has no bearing on my life except that the dream brought to me what love should feel like.

 As she spoke, her head had dropped lower and lower. She could no longer look at Nathan.  She didn’t want to see the rejection, she didn’t want to face him but he lifted her face towards his with his finger and looked steadily into her eyes. “I loved you you know.  I always have, and I always will. You’ll always be my little Daisy…as old as you are” He laughed softly as he saw her cheeks flush “It’s one of those things….it’s a ‘could have been’ kind of love”.

 “Which wasn’t fair on Gail” Lily stopped him. “And that’s why I stopped you.”
 “And that’s why you resigned?” Nathan asked softly.
 Lily shook her head adamantly.  “No!  Oh, it would have been a bit awkward but Jason came back.  He left not long after I resigned the first time. He was the reason then, and he was the reason the last time as well. He made it so difficult to…to just do anything right!” She shook with remembered fury and helplessness.

“So many times I would be doing something and he would take over and he would condescendingly show me how to do something”.  I was having difficulties with my landlord…but no, it was Jason, always Jason.  Infuriating, frustrating, bullying....”
 “Daisy….we need to….Lily….I want to….” Nathan stammered to a stop and gave up.  Instead, he leaned forward and softly kissed Lily, gently at first and then with a growing intensity.  “And that my beautiful Daisy is something I’ve waited twenty years for”.

Lily looked up at her former employer and smiled through her tears.  “And that, Nathan, is exactly how it felt in the dream.  Thank you.  For making a dream come true”.  At that, Lily picked up her hat and walked away, not looking back, only forward.

 When she got home, she held her husband close and whispered in his ear “I love you”, and, when the children got home from school she held them so tightly they squirmed with embarrassment complaining that it "hurts  mummy" and don't squeeze do hard mummy".

 Several months later, a large envelope from a solicitor’s office was delivered to her door requiring her signature.  Opening it curiously, she peered inside to find two sealed envelopes, one with hand writing vaguely familiar, the other – not recognizable at all.  Shrugging she opened the first one and saw the signature.  It was Nathan’s.  “To my Daisy…I asked Gail to marry me the day of Daniel’s funeral.  We got married six weeks later.  Thank you, Daisy, for everything you ever meant to me and for your loyalty to a woman you never met.  Our time in the garden will be with me for the rest of my days. All my love Lily, Nate.”


A warm feeling filled her as Lily opened the second letter, this time the signature read Gail.  “Dear Lily, as I’m sure Nathan would have written in his letter, we got married finally, after all those years.  So many marriages fail before they even reach the end of their first year, I think we both felt afraid it would happen to us. Relationships change with marriage and we liked what we had. But after Daniel’s funeral, Nathan changed.  He told me what happened in the garden, but I knew anyway…I saw you both and as I watched, I could see it for what it was.  A completion of something that began a long time ago. I never knew what part of himself he kept hidden, I do now and I thank you from the bottom of my heart that you gave him the opportunity to give of himself to me fully.  At fifty-eight years old I was a blushing bride!

 But I had him as a husband just a short time, and I think he knew that was going to be the case because we discussed you and he and all of us, what his wishes were..  He died in his sleep three weeks ago, peacefully, quietly, with a smile on his face.  He didn’t want you to know because he wanted you to remember him as he was.  As he put it ”A bit of a dodderer but still good for a wave or two”. He loved his surfing. We scattered his ashes over the water at his request, and no notices were put in the newspaper.  He said to tell you “Daisy, just remember the ‘could have been kind of love’”.

With my sincerest regards, Gail.

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