‘No, not a chance,’ I said. ‘If she was even thinking about it she’d have contacted us. What about an address for her work? She’s moved offices as well.’
‘Has she? I wonder when. I think I last spoke to her in January. Yes, it was not long after Christmas. She never mentioned moving offices. Maybe it’s just happened.’
‘Anyway, it doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘I’ll keep phoning and get her soon enough.’ It was 1980 and of course mobiles weren’t invented then. No doubt things would have evolved very differently if we’d had them.
Debbie and I turned and walked across the cricket field. Two boys were tossing what looked like a flying saucer. Later I learned it was a ‘Frisbee’; they’d just been invented.
‘Mum said you’ve been sick.’
‘Did she? Oh boy, never tell a lie, it always comes back to bite you. She wanted me to come down and visit her, meet some bloke she’s got. I told her I couldn’t travel.’
‘What is it between you and Mum? I mean I never really knew who she was but you must have grown up with her.’
‘Who knows. We’re just chalk and cheese. A black sheep and a white sheep - though I’m not sure which is which. Just because you’re born into the same family doesn’t mean you have to like each other.’
I thought about me and Kitty. For us it was exactly the opposite.
‘You still doing the Tarot?’ I asked.
She laughed. ‘Gave that up years ago. I think I just got tired of it.’ We crossed another footpath. ‘Still got the cards though.’
‘With your persona in them?’ We glanced at each other and she smiled.
Winston cinched the lead, squatted and dropped a large turd on the grass. Without hesitation Debbie pulled out a plastic bag, snatched it up and tied it off. She swung the bag as we walked along. She didn’t look like she’d fallen off a wharf. She asked me about my legs and I said they were fine, which wasn’t exactly the truth. Even then they sometimes gave me hell.
We veered past a council bin and Debbie dropped in the plastic bag. ‘It’s time the council started coming down on people with dogs,’ she said. ‘Sometimes this park is a mine-field of dogshit. Only times it disappears is when the lawn mower smashes it to powder. Imagine that in the atmosphere.’
Suddenly she said, ‘How old are you now?’
For a minute I didn’t want to say, then I realised she was twenty years older than me.
‘Forty,’ I said. ‘My fortieth was two months ago.’
‘I’m sixty,’ she said, ‘an awful age. When you’re in your fifties you still feel as if there’s plenty of time. But when you turn sixty you really start to feel the social stigma; you can’t help it. The papers, the TV, the government, everyone seems to have a fixed idea about what sixty and over means - whatever it is. We all think about retiring age of course, but it’s more than that. People judge you. They don’t mean to, but even when they say how young you look it’s a backhander; they mean for your age.’
As she spoke I was preparing to say, You look good for sixty, Deb. Instead, I said, ‘We just want to be younger.’
‘Ain’t that the truth. People don’t dye their hair for nothing. Ask Heather.’
We detoured around a huge fallen limb.
‘We broke up last year,’ I said.
‘So I heard.’
‘I didn’t want to mind you. I mean, I tried everything …’
‘Don’t feel bad, Jack. The fact is, relationships just run their course. People don’t seem to get that. It’s only in recent times that we’ve developed this idea of permanence. Permanent love and permanent partners. It’s a false social custom built on a false idea: that people stay the same. Very unnatural. Even family love doesn’t necessarily hold.’
‘Except for me and Kitty.’
‘Not saying it never works, just that there’s no norm. Nothing’s typical. People can marry out of blinding love, but it won’t make a scrap of difference to what happens in the future.’
That night I thought about Debbie at sixty and her take on aging. I decided that she was part of the problem; we all are. How old are you, she asked me. How old. Not how young or even what age. Of course, we set that train in motion from the moment a child can talk. ‘How old are you now?’ we ask, the implication being that older is best. Until you reach my age of course, and then it’s reversed. Somewhere in the middle ‘old’ switches over; it changes sides. ‘Old’ - such a grubby little goblin of a word. It comes creeping in at night and hides under the bed. One morning you wake and there it is, curled up beside you forever and ever.
For two weeks in a row I managed to avoid the art therapy group in the common room. Unfortunately I happened to mention to Dell that I was once a signwriter and suddenly I found myself roped into some ticketwriting: ‘First Work 2002‘, ‘ Best in Show‘, ‘ Most Improved‘ and ‘ Oldest Resident‘. I could have done those cards in my room but of course Jean Stinson gave the orders: ‘No paint jars in the rooms’, so this afternoon I was obliged to attend ‘art group’. Quite funny if it wasn’t so tragic. Poor old Joe trying to paint a picture with his nose almost touching the paper. Dooley with his big clumsy hands trying to glue confetti onto a cigarette pack, Clem trying to glue his onto a tennis ball. The supervisor doesn’t seem to care what they do - a carer from the other wing. I think her name is Townsend.
Skeleton Joe kept working at his bit of paper for half an hour and then nurse Townsend whipped it out from under his face and pinned it on the board. Poor Joe had no idea where it went. He looked around as if there’d been a change in dimensions.
‘Stuff this,’ I said and wheeled over to the pin board and pointed out Joe’s work to him. ‘Up here, Joe,’ I said. ‘There’s your painting. Not bad, eh?’ The poor old bugger didn’t even seem to recognise it. Patricia in the wheelchair gave me a look; I couldn’t tell what she was thinking.
Yesterday I cut Joe’s hair. I’d have mentioned it earlier but I wanted to write about the trip to Sydney while the thoughts came to me. When I agreed to do his hair, permission was granted to use one of the bathrooms and also the plastic chairs they use in the shower. Joe sat there silently, his poor spine bent double - I shaved his neck, no trouble at all.
‘How would you like it, Joe? Short back and sides? An Elvis trim? Beatles cut?’
‘Beatles, I think,’ he said, his voice so thin I nearly didn’t hear it. Like the wind through a roof rack. I realised it was the first time I’d heard him speak.
‘Beatles? Aren’t you a bit old for that?’ He must be ninety at least, born circa 1910. Would have been in his late fifties when the Beatles came in.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘Just an ordinary one then.’
To be honest, I can’t think why I agreed to cut his hair. Why can’t they bring in a barber? I know they have someone doing the women’s. I think I decided to cut his hair just ‘to keep my hand in’ as they say. I’m really not interested in getting mixed up with all these old people. I hope they leave me alone now. Though I must admit when I saw old Joe at Art Group his head certainly looked a lot better. Then they jerked his picture right out from under his nose while he was still holding the brush and the poor old bugger thought someone had switched channels.
I was also very angry when I got back to my room. Chris had been to visit but I did not see him! Why didn’t he come to the art room? He must have walked in and walked out and no personal items delivered. Instead, he left me a note and a little green plant in a blue ceramic pot.
What’s the good of that? The note: Dear Dad, sorry I missed you. Brought you this to remind you of the mysteries of life and that life goes on. Love Chris.
What the hell is that supposed to mean? The boy is as barmy as some of those in here. I was about to throw the pot out the window when the call came for dinner.
Of course I arrived in a foul mood.
Jim says, ‘What did you make of the art class, Jack? Good signs you made. And good to see you help Joe with his art.’
&nb
sp; I glare at him. ‘I didn’t help him. I just wanted to see if he recognised his own picture, that’s all. You didn’t recognise it, did you Joe?’
‘What picture?’
‘The landscape,’ says Dooley. ‘The Arthur Streeton.’
‘Arthur who?’ says Joe. Ivan makes a grab for the paper serviette tucked in Joe’s shirt. He nicks it and Joe doesn’t even notice.
Clem looks up and raises a finger. ‘I did a … I did a … what did I do?’ Everyone ignores him.
I decide to set the record straight. I lean in.
‘To tell you the truth, Jim, I think that art therapy group is a load of bullshit.’ I notice that Osborne has overheard me. She gives me the filthiest look.
‘Why is that, Jack?’ says Jim.
‘Because there’s not a soul here, male or female, who could paint a picture of the moon if someone drew them a circle. Because every single thing that is ever made in that room will be put out on bin night with all the other rubbish.’
Pistol Pete leans forward. ‘Yes, that’s true’ he says, ‘but did you see the tits on that teacher?’
‘Are you eating or talking?’ says big bully Osborne.
‘Talking,’ says Clem.
Dooley announces to the room, ‘When I had the pub a famous artist used to come in every Friday night and I always gave him a free beer.’
‘Cheers!’ says Clem.
‘You’re full of shit, Dooley,’ I say.
‘What?’ Dooley looks affronted. ‘What the hell would you know about it?’
‘I don’t suppose it was Picasso by any chance, or Leonardo da Vinci?’
‘I never knew his name. Great artists keep their names quiet. Otherwise they never get a moment’s peace.’
‘Now that’s a subject I understand,’ I tell him.
After dinner I follow Jim down the passage toward our rooms. He goes very slowly and every now and then I give him a gentle nudge with my own chair. ‘Thanks,’ he says, as if I’m helping him along. Near our doors he says, ‘You know that Dooley never owned a pub?’
‘Dooley?’
‘Yes. He was a bartender, that’s all. And only part-time at that.’
‘I should have guessed … Who told you that?’
‘Jan Osborne.’
‘Osborne? Are you on friendly terms with that old cow?’
‘No, not really. She’s a piece of work alright. In fact I think she told me just to put Dooley in his place.’
‘In that case, he’s still a publican as far as I’m concerned,’ I say.
‘I agree.’
When he turns into his door he says, ‘Big week, next week. I’m to be blessed with a visit from my granddaughter.’
‘Lucky you,’ I say. ‘Make sure you are in your room when she comes or she’ll think you’re not home and do a runner.’
‘To tell you the truth, I wish she wasn’t coming.’
‘We don’t need it,’ I say. I look past him into his room. There’s a bedside lamp on and through the door I catch a glimpse of his bed and three or four framed photos hanging above it. The frames cast eerie shadows up the wall.
‘Problem is, she’s a hard case, that girl. Piercings, tattoos and a real nasty streak. Sixteen years of age and the last time I saw her she told me to get fucked.’
‘The young of today, Jim. What’s it all coming to? Why is she bothering to visit?’
‘Court order,’ he says.
Then he tells me that his granddaughter got herself into a bit of hot water by breaking into someone’s house.
Some old lady’s weatherboard, and she caught the girl rummaging through her pantry, apparently looking for a hidden jar of cash. In her haste to escape, the girl knocked the old lady to the floor and fractured her hip. A part of the judicial order is that the girl should complete a certain number of hours doing voluntary work in a nursing home. Her mother, without any thought for Jim at all, dobbed her in for Eden. It’s logical, of course - the right place to do penance is in this hellhole.
‘Stay cool, Dad,’ Chris says. What am I, a fucking refrigerator?
The plant Chris left is a ‘Venus Flytrap’. The label says its name is ‘Jaws’. It doesn’t get more original than that. Also Dionaea muscipula. Latin, of course, the last part relating to either (a) musca a fly or (b) musculus a muscle. (Oxford p. 664.) Interestingly, both interpretations relate. I feel it may be more to do with a muscle because of the plant’s remarkable ability to snap its flowers shut. A gentle touch springs the trap at a speed which appears to be approaching one eighth of a second. (Calculated by halving, i.e. one half of a second is clearly visible to the naked eye, one quarter is also detectable. Halve it again and it roughly matches the speed of the flower. In other words, the movement can be noticed but not actually ‘seen’. So therefore one-eighth.
The question is how does it (a) trigger the movement, and (b) move so fast? As to the action itself, I cannot see how the plant could actually have a ‘muscle’ which is an anatomical feature belonging to the animal kingdom. Therefore it must develop a certain internal tension which is suddenly released. But what causes the release? Can the plant feel? It would need a nervous system. It is a pity we do not have a library here. Or at least a set of encyclopaedias.
Yesterday Jim pointed out that John Lennon and Ringo Starr were both born the same year I was, 1940. And Lennon was murdered the same year I went to Sydney to see Deb and Kitty. That great musician was on his way home to his apartment in New York with his wife Yoko Ono. He went straight home because he wanted to see his little son. Outside his building a man by the name of Mark Chapman stepped out of the shadows and without hesitation put four bullets into him. That same man had stopped John Lennon earlier in the day to ask for his autograph which the latter very generously gave. Life is a very unpredictable condition.
Though when I was in Sydney the shooting hadn’t actually happened - it was very late in the year whereas I was there, I think, in June. Debbie and I went back to her place and again I tried to ring Kitty. She didn’t even have an answering machine. Then Debbie made us some dinner. Across the table I could see that after thirty years Deb was still the same as ever - there was no crazy wallpaper, orange vinyl couches or purple lampshades, but inside that sixty-year-old woman there was the same ‘rocker’ I knew from the old days. Her furniture was polished wood now, Persian rugs and downlights. And the little turntable she once owned was replaced by a state-of-the-art surround sound stereo.
‘What music do you like now, Deb?’
‘Mixed,’ she said. ‘Bowie, Lou Reed, Bruce Springsteen … But the scene is all different now, don’t you think? When you lived here there was an “in” style and an “out” style. Now we’ve got hundreds of styles. From Blondie to Kenny Rogers to AC/DC. What we have now is new music to suit every taste and every age group.’ She served up slices of banana cake that she’d made herself. I’d never known her to bake anything.
‘Well, there’s a lot of money in it now, Deb. Even Kitty is creaming off her share of the profits.’
‘It’s an industry now, Jacko. Bigger than mining, they say.’
I left around nine after trying Kitty’s number again and headed back to the motel. Walking down Oxford Street I passed a movie theatre and they were showing The Shining with Jack Nicholson. I didn’t feel like going back to the motel so I just walked in. It turned out to be one of those movies you never forget; it leaves a permanent mark on you like a childhood scar. It was not a movie to see alone and afterwards I came out onto the street feeling edgy and paranoid. Back at the Koala Motor Inn I never felt so lonely in my life. Forty years old and alone in a town that had gone on without me, Deb in another realm, no marriage, no kids and I had a sister who could not be found. I wanted Kitty’s company more than anything but she had completely disappeared. Why had I left it so long?
Here’s a turn-up. Lisa phones and says, ‘Want to come to the museum? On Sunday?’
‘What about the Science Museum?’
‘The boys want the ordinary museum, Dad.’
‘They have a Planetarium at the Science Museum.’
‘Joseph has a job at the other one,’ she says. ‘He wants Trent to see where he works.’
So on Sunday Lisa turns up out front in her four-wheel drive with two adolescents in the back. I have no idea where Carlos is and I get the feeling I am supposed to have a bonding session with my grandsons. Joe is the older boy, I think about twenty, and he’s a volunteer at the Melbourne Museum which is something to do with his university course. Lisa tells us in the car that he can get us all in for free. I point out that as an invalid pensioner I get in for free anyway. The younger boy, Trent, is around seventeen and about to undertake an Engineering course at RMIT. In my estimation he is not the brightest lad in the world. In fact I do not think he has uttered a sensible word since puberty. Both boys offer a vague hello as I try to get myself into the car. Lisa takes the wheelchair back inside.
‘Hey, where’re you going with that?’ I yell.
‘Just relax, Dad,’ she yells back.
I can see why Jim is not looking forward to seeing his granddaughter later today.
‘They got chairs at the museum, Grandad,’ Joe says.
I hate ‘grandad’. Sounds like one of the inmates.
We take off into the traffic and Lisa does a left-hand swerve into Maribyrnong Road. The number of cars on the road is unbelievable; all blocked up and as far as the eye can see.
‘There must be an accident,’ Lisa says, though I can’t see one. We get about a hundred yards and the traffic comes to a complete standstill. I decide to risk a conversation.
‘What are you doing at the museum, Joe?’
‘Don’t call him Joe, Dad. He prefers Joseph.’ I sense Joe squirm in the back seat.
‘Now I’m doing Collections and Curatorial. Before that I was in the Discovery Centre. They wanted me to do that first to get a bit of experience. I help with the research and management of the collection.’
Smythe's Theory of Everything Page 13