A memoirist’s nightmare:

Eleven people living under the one roof is certain to attract mess.  Our place was no exception.  

The paint, most of which had turned a yellow brown through my father’s smoking peeled from the ceilings, while down below the skirting boards and architraves were pockmarked with gaps where the white undercoat showed through. 

Although he had built his first house in Australia, this one was a rental property and my father saw no need to bother with repairs.  Besides, he had no time.  Nine children and he worked full time in a city accountancy firm and by night tried to study for his advanced exams to become a chartered accountant at the same time as he fought off and oftentimes gave into his desire to drink away his sorrows. 

His sorrow piled high like the unwashed dinner dishes in the sink and he spent as much time ignoring them as we kids spent trying to escape our various sets of chores.

All except my oldest sister, who as the oldest girl, took on the role of substitute housekeeper willingly, or at least that’s how it seemed to me then, though these days my sister reports she resented all the tasks that fell to her. 

At the time she could see no way around it.  Plus, she hated the mess.  

The weekly washing needed to be done, washed in the ancient washing machine in the laundry, tugged through the roller and hung out to dry.  When dry, the washing also needed to be brought in sorted, folded and some of it ironed. 

Before she went out to to work in a paid job, my mother sometimes took the pile of washing into the lounge room, piled it onto a chair beside her, dragged the low lying coffee table in front of her own chair and covered it with blankets and a sheet to form a temporary ironing table. 

From there she sat behind the table and ironed my father’s shirts, school dresses, the boys shorts and other items that needed their creases ironed out.  As she ironed she watched the television and sipped from her cup of tea, the one that always sat beside her. 

Three times a day, my mother allowed herself a cigarette, for morning and afternoon tea and then after dinner, sometimes she smoked a cigarette as she ironed, lost in the fog of television and the rhythm of cigarette to mouth, cigarette to ashtray, hand to iron, iron spread out across the back or collar or sides of a shirt till it was as flat as a full yacht sail in a breeze and then upright with the iron as she rattled the shirt into its place on a hanger. 

My mother lined the ironed shirts alongside and hung them from the window ledge. Her face the picture of preoccupation and pain.  

My older sister was lucky then that the ironing did not always fall to her but once my mother took up her job as a child care worker at the Allambie reception centre for children who had been forced out of their homes through domestic violence, parental separation or whatever, my sister had to take up the ironing as well. 

I stood in line reluctantly.  Not for me the housework, the ironing, the cooking and the cleaning.  Not for me the smooth running of the household, I wanted to escape much like my mother had done before in her own girl hood when she loved nothing but to be upstairs away from all responsibilities with a book. 

My mother kept up this habit into adulthood. 

I did not spend my hours reading so much as I wanted to play or explore the streets outside, or camp out with my brothers in the back garden.  I did not want to spend my days locked in domesticity.

And then there came the days when my oldest brother who was soon to leave home decided the house needed an overhaul. 

I could not escape such times, none of us could.  

Somehow my oldest brother must have persuaded our parents to stay in the lounge room with their cups of tea and cigarettes – my brother only succeeded in this while our father was not drinking, and then issued instructions to the rest of us on how we might proceed to clean up the mess of the kitchen and surrounds.  

He gave the taller boys the task of washing down walls.  We little ones washed and dried dishes.  My sister, second in command, one below my second older brother who might well have been in the infectious diseases hospital at the time, put things away. 

My older brother instructed another sister on the art of sweeping the floor.  Another he directed towards the dustpan and brush and talked to yet another brother about how he might stomp down on the rubbish bin outside to make more room. 

In those days we did not have green plastic garage bags.  Rubbish went directly into a bin and the more compacted it became the more you could add on. 

The orders continued as each task was completed.  

My brothers were given the job of collecting hot soapy water in a bowl and then taking to the windows, one to wipe clean with soap and water, the other to clear away the streaks with a fresh old towel.  

And so we turned the squalid kitchen into a sparkling jewel, the one great pleasure my mother’s satisfaction when she came in after several hours and admired our handiwork. 

I was ten, maybe younger, surely younger, because this happened before my oldest brother – ten years older than me – left home as an eighteen year old, and so time plays tricks on me. 

The point of describing this mess and its transformation in such detail is both to talk about how much memory can play tricks on us.  The events we remember from childhood can be inaccurate, such as my age when all this happened and the sheer details of who did what.

There’s a brawl going on in my family of origin at the moment about the family archive on my mother’s side. 

This same oldest brother who managed to clear up so much of the mess.  No, that’s not true, he didn’t clear up the mess, he issued instructions for the rest of us to clear up the mess.  This same brother has decided that an archive should be more a repository for factual details of births, deaths and marriages, and for documents that contain ‘accurate’ details about how lives were lived, preferably in the long ago. 

This same brother is concerned that the archive not turn into the rubbish bin I described earlier.  With no plastic garbage bags to keep the rubbish in place, he fears the archive might become compacted with the detritus of people’s lives, people who are still alive.  

This same brother worries that some of us us might write things to include in the archive that might offend others; that maybe some have already offended others.

 So begins the memoirist’s nightmare: How do we write our stories without causing offence to others who do not want to be cast in a particular light?

Who holds the key to the archive?  Who decides on what gets included and what is left out? 

I reckon let it all be included but let people put their names to it and when factual details like dates and places of birth or death or names are wrong, correct them.  

At the same time, memories and observations and so-called opinions are those of the writer only and the writer cannot speak for others only for herself, however much she might represent others in her writing and they might then see themselves there through the lens of her words and they may not like it, but you cannot control how readers read and what writers write and if you try, something like what happens in the Lego movie will result.  

The evil Lord Business tries to glue every Lego piece into place so that his worldview prevails and can never be moved or made different. 

In other words, sterility sets in.  Instead of a living breathing archive filled with beauty and with mess, we have a static universe. 

Cross your fingers: a short story

The sound of the radio wakes me.  Saturday morning and the announcer calls out the details of the horses that will be running in the various race meetings of the day.

I turn over and his pillow is empty.  A typical Saturday.  I find my man in the kitchen, toast crumbs on his plate, the newspaper folded to a manageable size. He holds a red biro in his hand and with it circles the details of each horse and race to establish where he will put his money.  His preoccupation with the form guide borders on insult but I do not take offence.

I start the day by loading whites into the washing machine, whites and lights first, followed by the darks.  When the basket is full to overflowing I take the clothes out behind the apartment block and hang out as many as the line can hold.  I try to keep the excess washing to a minimum forcing clothes together as closely as possible and sharing pegs.  I know it will not speed up the process of drying but to me there is a certain satisfaction in a full washing line without a chink of light between the clothes.  Recently there has been an underwear thief in our neighbourhood.  I do not relish the thought of some stranger stealing my knickers, worn and un-sexy as they may be.  I will hang our underwear on the small clotheshorse that stands on the balcony of our apartment.

My man  comes out to say goodbye as I clip his shirts in order of colour to the washing line.  ‘Wish me luck,’ he says.  I wish him luck and any niggling feeling of dissatisfaction I tuck away inside the peg bag.  My man provides for me while I am a student and have very little money of my own.  If my man wins today we might go out to a flash restaurant and if he loses they may yet turn off our electricity next week because the bill is still unpaid and long overdue.  Ours is a tempestuous life but I tell myself I like that.  I thrive on the uncertainty.  Never a dull moment I think as I hang out the last of the white handkerchiefs.

The day goes by quickly enough, floors to mop, the toilet and sink to go over with Ajax.  I do not dust the surfaces in the bedroom as there is too little furniture in there beyond the bed to warrant it, but I dust everywhere else and in the kitchen I wipe down the bench tops and scrub the stove clean with a hard scrubbing brush.  I drag the vacuum cleaner from the bedroom to the lounge until my back aches with the effort.  Bend and straighten. This is good exercise I reason and the rewards are great.  Soon I will have a house that is spick and span, my man will come home, and we will be able to relax in the comfort of a clean home.  I cross my fingers and hope for a win.

My man has devised a system whereby he can maximise his returns.  He is ruthless.  He does not become emotionally involved with the horses. They generate an income that is all.  Twilight and I hear the clip of his heels in the stair well.  The door rattles open.  The look on his face tells all.  We do not say a word but crawl into bed for a coupling that offers comfort to both.  He for his day on the job and me for my domesticity.  Afterwards we will decide what to do for dinner. 

Grateful for crumbs

‘Have you no friends?’
‘None, Sir. I had a friend once but she died a long time ago.’
Jane Eyre’s words to Mr Rochester.

They stay in my mind this morning and rattle around there when I think about the task of letting our dog out into the back garden after his night asleep in the laundry.

For the past year we have kept the dog corralled in a corner of the kitchen living area, which includes a window with a cat door through which the dog is free to come and go. He has the whole back yard in which to play. The dog is small. He can use the cat door with ease and he does so, but not often enough it would seem.

The dog - perhaps like most dogs left to their own devices - prefers to sit inside in his small kingdom under a table on his bed hour after hour until someone walks him or encourages him outside.

My daughter came home from school last week and announced that the kitchen stank of dog.
‘He has to go outside more.’
And so we decided to seal off the cat door and keep the dog outside by day.

It is summertime and although the weather has been unpredictable and far from ideal, it is not so cold that a dog would catch a chill.

We continue to let the dog inside at the end of the day while we prepare and eat dinner. We still let him roam around inside until last thing at night when he now knows to take himself off to the small indoor laundry for sleep.

In the mornings, I feel bad about locking him outside.
‘He’s a dog,’ my husband says after I express my misgivings. He’ll get over it.’

I have no friends. The words resonate. A dog has no friends. Human friendship seems fickle.

The dog keeps interrupting my writing time by barking. He sits on his bed now transferred outside onto the veranda out of sun and rain and barks. He barks every time he hears a neighbouring dog.

Can I blame him? Is his barking a form of communication? Is it out of boredom that he barks? Does he need a friend?

The responsibility of another dog is almost more than I can bear. I did not want this dog in the first place. We have three cats. Enough I say.

Dogs unlike cats need so much love and attention. Dogs are companionable, loyal. They love to play. They want to be near. These qualities, this need for attachment stirs up the maternal in me, both the warmth of affection I now hold for him, but also my guilt.

I anthropomorphise this dog to death, but I do not believe he is without feelings. I can tell when he is unhappy and when he is not. I can tell that this new arrangement does not suit him.

And perhaps my husband is right: the dog will adjust. We all adjust in time to unfortunate circumstances, but it does not ease the pain I feel when I consider this dog’s life.

To me he is like an unwanted child, like Jane Eyre in the home for unwanted children. Such children were forced to be grateful for crumbs, a dog's life.

I remember when I was little I used to ponder on the nature of gratitude. How old was I? Ten, maybe twelve, when I considered that a child should be able to exist in the world without all the time having to be grateful for her very existence. There were things I considered then that a child like myself should be able to take for granted.

I had argued with my older sister. She said I was lazy. Why did I not help her with the housework? Why did I at least not tidy up our shared bedroom?

It was a Saturday morning. I did not want to clean the house. I did not want to be like my older sister who spent what seemed like her entire weekend, washing clothes, hanging them out, scrubbing out the bathroom, cooking and ironing.

She was the oldest girl; the job fell to her especially after our mother went out to work in a children’s home nearby.

In Allambie Children’s Reception Centre our mother looked after over fifty children at a time. We stayed at home and my mother’s oldest daughter took on the task of caring for us. My oldest sister was meticulous then and now, unlike me.

I ran outside to escape my sister’s harangue. I sat on the brick ledge of the front gate and felt the sun through the thinness of my cotton dress. I sat there still and quiet until I felt dozy and in my reverie I considered these matters.

It was then I decided that children ought to be allowed to live free from the burdens of excessive housework such as my sister demanded of me, until they were much much older. Children should have childhoods, I thought then.

I still think this now, though I recognise the need for some effort to be made on the part of children to 'make a contribution'.

What hope would I have had in Jane Eyre’s day with attitudes such as mine then? Though if I were born into different circumstances I suspect such thoughts would not enter into my head.

‘You'll be hopeless in your old age,’ my daughter said to me while we discussed the disarray in our household, which is in need of a spring clean, a spring clean I refuse to undertake myself. I am still the ten to twelve year old of years gone by, but I no longer have an older sister to whip me and the house into shape. My daughter takes her place.
‘You’ll even stop washing yourself,' she says. 'You’ll let your house fall down around you. You’ll spend your days in front of the computer writing and nothing will ever get done.’

My daughter jokes but there is a sting to her words.

I do not care for the domestics as I once did when my children were younger and before I took up this writing life.

This writing life that I can only fit into the nooks and crannies of each day, but these nooks and crannies my daughter might argue should be filled with housework and cleaning and putting our house into order.

I have said it before in a quote from the writer Olga Lorenzo, when I die I do not want to have it written on my gravestone: She was a good woman. She kept a tidy house.

I want to read something else. I prefer the words: She wrote well.