The Sparrow Garden

by Peter Skrzynecki

  All I can see in my mind is a little boy staring at me from an old black-and-white photograph. Turned inwards, in my shirt pocket, his image is facing my heart. His mother is trying to make him smile. She is wearing the same dress that my mother wore when she stood beside me at the linen cupboard. The little boy is frowning. He seems troubled. Is it the weather? The photographer? The clump of weeds he is sitting among?

  Failings

  Wednesday, 5 February 1997

  The entry in my journal reads:

  To Milperra. Faxed poems to RR and had interview with JK re her honours. A bit of shopping for Mum. And banking. Warm day. Andrew to work. In the evening Mum rang and said she’d had a bad attack of asthma. I went over and stayed about an hour and a half. She seemed okay after that. I wonder if it isn’t some kind of mental fear or anxiety. The house is all closed up, stuffy, dark. I said, It’s like a tomb. She said she feels cold otherwise. Returned home just after 9.30!!

  After returning home from doing my mother’s shopping and banking I’d decided to do some gardening. It was Daylight Saving Time and by mid-afternoon it had become one of those stinking hot February days. Sweat poured off me. Dirt was ingrained in the pores of my skin and under my fingernails. The lawnmower started after much frustration and swearing from me! Weeds were gathered and left to dry out on a mound. Grass cuttings were gathered and heaped in barrowloads and taken up to the very end of the yard where, together with the weeds, they’d decompose with mulching leaves. In due course, the compost would be spread out over the yard, recycled, returned to the earth it’d come from and out of which the grass and weeds would grow once more. It was a time when, because of the size of the yard, it would take me two days to do it all, end to end. Jija, our family dog, kept me company all afternoon, following me around from one task to another, running up and barking at birds that would land in the yard, then returning, tail wagging madly, flopping down next to me.

  Around six o’clock my mother telephoned, asking me if I would come and stay the night; she’d had a bad asthma attack in the afternoon and believed she might need assistance during the night. Since my father’s death, two-and-a-half years earlier, there’d been instances when I’d stay the night, or, at her request, stay into the late hours of the night and keep her company until she was ready to go to bed.

  In a way, the call didn’t surprise me and, to a degree, I felt annoyed about it coming at the time that it did. I was tired, needed a bath and wanted to relax after the gardening session in the hot afternoon sun. I wasn’t particularly hungry but my main cause of complaint was having to get into the car and drive. Peak-hour traffic would’ve been over, but traffic is traffic. If I’m not in the mood for it, I loathe it.

  My mother had made several such calls in recent months, some early in the morning, others at night, but I always responded. Towards the end of the previous year, for example, one morning she rang to say there’d been a break-in at her home during the night.

  A break-in, Mum? How do you know?

  Because your father’s watch is missing.

  Dad’s watch?

  It’s not there.

  Where?

  By the bed. You know I use it when I have to check my ventilator times. It’s not there. Come and call the police.

  Call the police?

  Do I have to get a neighbour to help me?

  For goodness’ sake, of course you don’t. Just sit tight. I’ll stop in on the way to work.

  Hurry up. The robbers might still be around. I’m not going out of the house until you get here. I’ve looked everywhere and it’s not where I left it.

  It might be in your bedclothes — or it’s fallen off the bed.

  I’ve looked everywhere.

  It’s there, Mum. Somewhere.

  Are you calling me a liar?

  No, Mum … Just wait. I’ll be there shortly.

  So I drove over, and found her distressed, shaken and worried.

  Let’s search for it together, I said.

  I’ve searched already. Just call the police.

  Okay. I’ll call the police after one more search.

  To this, she agreed. I turned the bedclothes over several times. No watch. Not on the floor? I asked.

  I’ve looked but the bed’s so low and I can’t get under.

  Getting right down on my hands and elbows — backside up in the air — I immediately saw the object of her consternation. But how the devil did she get it so far under the bed?

  It’s there, Mum. I reached as far as I could and was just able to get my fingers to the band.

  Here’s your watch, Mum, I said, handing it to her while still on the floor. See, all safe and sound. There weren’t any robbers. You must have dropped it when you checked the time, then you could have accidentally kicked it under the bed when you got out … Everything’s okay.

  I stood up, straightened myself and turned around happily. Instead of a smile on the face of my mother, I saw sadness on the face of an old woman, shoulders slouched, head bowed, tears rolling down her cheeks. The end of her shawl hung down and forward, like a mask, partly obscuring her face. She looked like a child admitting to a mistake and awaiting punishment.

  I’m just a silly old woman, she sobbed. I’m so ashamed. Please forgive me.

  Mum, Mum, there’s nothing to forgive. You did nothing wrong. I hugged her, gave her a kiss and held her, hearing the ticking of her alarm clock that seemed to sound extra loud. Gradually she brightened up. She wiped her face with a crumpled hankie that she took from her dressing gown pocket and looked at the watch in her hand.

  Your father would be having a good laugh right now, you know.

  You think so?

  He loved this watch. It’s a Seiko. A good watch. It will be yours someday.

  I know. And the Unicorn one that you gave me back in 1968, it’s still good. I’ll wear them both.

  At the same time?

  Always. One on each hand.

  We both laughed — she wiping away her tears, me with the awareness of a strange knowledge that I’d just participated in the enactment of a tableau, a prelude to something more traumatic than I’d ever experienced in my life.

  On the drive to work this feeling persisted, wouldn’t leave. My mother was safe, in her home, probably saying the rosary that I saw in her hands when we said goodbye at the front door — but I also knew that something was passing away between us and our lives would never be the same. She needed me as never before but wouldn’t come out and say it. I, the grown son, had to accept the fact that in her eyes I was still the little boy in the photograph taken in a Displaced Persons’ camp in Germany, the little boy sitting in a patch of weeds, being cuddled by a beautiful dark-haired young woman, proudly holding her frowning son’s hand.

  Flicking back through the pages of my 1997 journal I found the two entries that I was searching for. I read and reread them.

  Monday, 6 January 1997

  To Milperra. E-mails and computing. Shopping for Mum and lunch. Mum rang late in evening to say the wind’s blown in her garage door. I went over. She was very stressed. Also depressed. And lonely. I think she’s getting worse. Is obsessive about tidiness and having all the little things done around the house. I secured the door and got home about 10.30p.m. Very distressed about my mother. I feel she wants me there all the time. She feels insecure when she’s on her own too long.

  Tuesday, 7 January 1997

  Mum ran again this morning. Her ventilator was dancing around (up and down) so that it fell to the floor. She reckons there’s a ghost in the house. She feels that a spirit has entered the house. Talked a while. Said I’ll be over tomorrow.

  As we talked about my coming over on that evening in February because of her asthma, I vividly remembered the three incidents: the misplaced watch, the garage door that’d been blown off its hinges by a strong wind and the ventilator “dancing around” before her eyes. Had my mother been hallucinating? Had her medication affected her adversely, making her imagine persec
utions and break-ins? Maybe if I talked to her she would calm down. Again she asked if I would come over, stay the night and go early in the morning.

  Because of daylight saving, it was still light at six o’clock, and I hadn’t cleaned myself from the gardening or had any dinner. Okay, Mum, I said. Give me a little time and I’ll be over.

  I had a bath, ate a small meal, packed my pyjamas, toiletries, reading glasses and a book. I told my family I’d be back as soon as possible. In the morning I had to travel to Alexandria, to Hale & Iremonger, to collect the last of the remaindered copies of my novel The Beloved Mountain. Because of traffic flows, I planned to set out after peak hour and return during the noonday hours when there seems to be a drop in the volume of traffic on the roads.

  Mum was in good spirits when I arrived and had been watching the ABC News. She said she hadn’t eaten but wasn’t hungry. The idea of eating food nauseated her, she said, and dismissed the idea with a wave of her hand. Watch This Day Tonight with me, will you? she asked. We sat on the lounge at either end like we did in the days when I lived there. She turned off the main lights because it was wasting electricity, she claimed, and we sat in semi-darkness, the room illuminated by the TV screen’s glow and the light from her milk-glass lamp on the sideboard in one corner of the room.

  The talk turned to the past, especially to memories of what her life had been like since Dad died.

  At first I thought it would be easy, she said. The pressure gone, you know, of looking after him. His tantrums were getting worse. He wasn’t a young man. Feeding him, helping to wash him, dressing him, often not getting a word of thanks.

  Mum, he was nearly ninety. Getting senile. Dementia was setting in. We spoke in Polish but I had to explain what I meant using English words because I didn’t know their equivalents in Polish: old age, anger, silences, rages for no apparent reason, loss of interest in clothes and food, ceasing to ask questions about his family, his life and relatives back in Poland. Worst of all, loss of memory.

  The TV screen flickered with the volume turned down.

  She sat for a while, not saying anything, then began to speak almost absentmindedly, yet quite deliberately. More recently it’s been very lonely, and that part of it is getting worse for me. All those imaginings, of spirits being in the house, losing things … You think I don’t know. It’s fear of getting old, of living alone, seeing your face in the mirror and knowing there’s no escape … I left your father because he couldn’t be trusted, you know … He wasn’t faithful … It wasn’t an easy life those first three years, but it would’ve been worse with him … Then I met Feliks … He was a kind man … Treated me like a lady and was good to you … So life went on, all those years, overcoming one crisis after another, moving on … Look what happened last year to me with the shingles, eh? At my age. Shingles! There were times I wanted to kill myself because of the pain … But I knew I could never do that … Germany, the war, the camps, going hungry, not sleeping because of an empty stomach … Bringing you up alone those early years! All my life, never ever anything like those damn shingles. Why would God want to punish an old woman with shingles? The pain was a fire!

  I don’t know if it was God, Mum. It just happened. The doctors say you carried the virus in your body, that’s all, then it broke out. A leftover from chicken pox.

  Bah, what do the doctors know? Chicken pox! I had that when I was a girl. Virus! Huh! It was God’s doing. I know about these things.

  Sure, it was bad for you, but it’s over now. No more shingles. And, yes, you did look after Dad, and I’m helping to care for you as best as I can.

  What can you do? she asked philosophically. You have your own life and your own problems … Work, children to bring up still, house to pay off. You shouldn’t be looking after an old woman like me.

  There was a sense of impending gloom in the air. You could feel it. Shadows played eerily over the walls, over our faces, our hands, our clothes. Colours from the images on the television. Grey, white, yellow, shades of green, red, violet. Real and surreal. We were both alive — yet we could have both been drowning in a sea of waterweeds or floating in the sky under a raincloud.

  I suggested she have a meal. I would fix it for her.

  Why, don’t you think I can get myself some food? I have a little bit of chicken and potatoes I can heat up. There’s also some coleslaw.

  When she returned she’d eaten in the kitchen. Out of the blue, she asked, What will you do with the house when I’m gone?

  What do you want me to do with it?

  Whatever’s best for you.

  Why are you asking me that now?

  Now’s the right time.

  Are you serious, Mum? But she was serious. I realised the answer to my question before I even finished asking it.

  Now I had another sensation in the room, a sense of eerie displacement, a cold quietness — as if a stranger had entered the room and sat invisibly between us, pushing us apart, or a door had been left open at the back of the house and cold was coming into the house, separating us. It was like Death had entered the room. I was becoming uncertain, perhaps even afraid of what was to follow.

  She moved to the lounge chair opposite me. We were now face to face, at eye level. She said, You’ve been a good son, though you didn’t listen to me as much as you should have — and that’s probably my fault for not being strict enough with you.

  I was, as the Irish say, gobsmacked. Just like I’d been hit by an invisible fist. Mum, what’re you saying?

  She continued to speak as if I didn’t exist, almost as if she were speaking to herself — as if she had to say all this, right then and there. You have a heart of gold and there’s nothing you wouldn’t do for anyone. I’ve seen plenty of evidence of your kindness. But you’re immature, even though you are a man. Inside you’re still a child. You need to grow up.

  Maybe I’m okay, Mum. Maybe I like being who or what I am. What I’m still becoming. Then it occurred to me that I was about to start an argument with my mother and I didn’t want that. Not tonight. Not ever again … Yes, Mum, whatever you say. Can I make us a cup of tea?

  Yes, that would be nice, she agreed. The TV had been turned off and she suggested we watch a movie together. It was like the previous few moments had disappeared under the doorstep, out of our lives, and into the late summer darkness.

  When I returned from the kitchen with the tea she’d turned off the chandeliers and we were back into the earlier semi-gloom. It was about half-past eight and a black-and-white movie was starting. Citizen Kane, starring Orson Welles.

  He’s a good actor, my mother said. I’ve always liked his movies.

  Liked his movies? How many had she seen? How’s your tea, Mum?

  Fine, just fine. She spoke very delicately, deliberately accentuating her vowels, like an actor on stage, making sure she could be heard.

  The movie began with its opening dark scenes. The voice of the narrator matched the gloom. A chill ran through me and I wondered if this was the right kind of movie to be watching. Repeatedly in movie surveys of the twentieth century or in post-World War II movie lists Citizen Kane ranks number one. Various reasons are given, ranging from its being a psychological drama and capturing the essence of a detective story to its being a milestone in movie-making. An old man lies alone in a mansion called Xanadu that he has built, an extraordinarily rich man whose wealth is too great to calculate. He utters one word, “Rosebud”, and dies. From his hand falls one of those small crystal balls, a snowdome. It shatters.

  We could feel the silences in between our sipping tea and the stirring with our spoons. More than that, we could hear the echoes of the silences. Darkness had enveloped the house and the lives of the two people inside it. Mother and son. Unspoken words floated in the air between them, their breathing, the beating of their hearts. Their thoughts were almost audible — linked to all that existed around them by the darkness and the silence. House. Plants. Flowers. Trees. Grass. Starlight. Cricket song. Frog croak. The w
aters of Duck Creek running through the reserve behind 10 Mary Street, Regents Park, through the bulrushes and the weeds … Towards the Parramatta River … Away … Into the night …

  Suddenly, like a knife, my mother’s voice cleft the silence. No, go home. What will be, will be …

  Just like that, out of the blue — or in this case, black — I was being sent home. But why, you wanted me to stay?

  No, I feel fine now, my asthma’s much better. But before you go you can help me get my ventilator ready for when I have to use it during the night. Turn off the TV, will you, I’ve seen this movie before.

  But I haven’t — not fully. Whenever I’ve watched it something’s happened and I’ve never found out who or what Rosebud was.

  Doesn’t matter. You’ll have other chances to watch it.

  In her bedroom we prepared the ventilator, piecing the various parts of the mask to the tube, breaking open the nebules of Ventolin and Atrovent and mixing them into the nebuliser.

  Unscrewing. Screwing. Until all she had to do was put the mask on her face and flick the switch on the machine. She entered the times of her medication into a notebook beside her bed so she wouldn’t forget. Every four or five hours. I checked. The book and a pencil were there. She preferred pencil to pen. In recent years her dependency on the machine had increased because of the deteriorating condition of her lungs, but that was to be expected, considering her age. And to think that when I came to this country I didn’t even know what a headache powder was, she used to say.

  At the front door I kissed her goodbye and gave her a hug, like I always did. I’ll call you tomorrow, Mum. I have to go to collect some books from a publisher, but I can come around after that if you need me.

  Books, books, why do you keep writing those books. Is anyone ever going to read them? Forget them … You’ve written enough. Give your mind a rest.

  I enjoy writing, you know that … It gives me a hobby, as you’ve said before. And it doesn’t do anyone any harm.