loss, family, friends, photo walks, cats and dogs
It seems odd to say 2023 was one of the better years for me recently, despite Mum passing on 1 March.
Realistically, I’d probably started mourning her loss in March 2018, when I believed that would be the last time I’d see her in person. It was a mixed blessing to have one more opportunity in October 2019. But I knew when I left Tasmania at the end of that visit that would be the last time.
By the time she passed, we hadn’t even been able to have Skype calls for about a year and a half. And our calls hadn’t involved actual conversation for a long time before that.
So, her passing was more of a continuation and perhaps the closing chapter of my mourning.
Don’t get me wrong: I still semi-regularly well up and have a good cry while thinking about her. But it’s not been as intense as it would have been without her prolonged descent into dementia and multiple false alarms to prepare me for the final eventuality.
We said our farewells, and Mum set off on her final journey on 18 June 2023, when Dad, Robert, Peter and I could finally be in one place.
An old friend, Dee, messaged me soon after to tell me the ocean currents may have taken her to New Zealand.
It was the first chance we had to be in one place as a family to say goodbye to Mum, but it was probably also the first time the four of us had been together since early 2007.
With family, loss and the passing of time on my mind, I predominantly spent my month in Australia catching up with family, especially those I hadn’t seen in far too long.
My uncle, John, is one member of my extended family I’ve managed to see on all of my visits since leaving Australia in January 2011. But I enjoyed spending another few days of quality time with him, talking about family and family history, debating politics and catching up with his partner, Verna. And I managed to set him up on WhatsApp so I can call him regularly at no cost.
My Mum’s side of the family has been harder to catch up with over the years, mainly due to geography. For most of my childhood and teens, they lived in Calgary. And when they returned to Australia, they settled in Perth.
I met Rhys (pictured at left, taking the group selfie) when I was about 11, but I didn’t meet my other cousin, his twin, David (centre back), until Rhys’ wedding about ten years later, in 1998.
I’m ashamed to say that was the last time I’d seen Rhys and my uncle, Graham, until this year. Although, I stayed with my aunt, Patricia, in 2002, when I returned to Australia after my first stint of living in the UK and caught up with David then. Christopher (back right) wasn’t yet born.
So, it was lovely to spend a couple of days getting to know Rhys better while he played tour guide, to spend a few days with his family, and to spend an evening with Mum’s family.
I would have liked to have spent more time with them, but I had so much to cram into just a month. Hopefully, I’ll be able to spend more time next time.
And I caught up with Rhys, his wife, Jenny, and their daughter, Georgia, for an evening when they were in London a few months later.
In addition to spending time with family, I was pleased to catch up with my first-ever best friend, Narelle, for the first time in around 39 years. And to spend time with Lisa and Sarah.
It was a pleasure, as always, to spend time talking and dining with Victoria while I was in Tasmania, including a rain-sodden wander on West Ulverstone Beach.
We wandered around the Tasmanian Arboretum with Cheryl after scattering Mum’s ashes; just what I needed.
I did spy a platypus and took some photos, but they may need quite a lot of enlargement to confirm that!
I took many photos of Perth in the glorious weather as Rhys played tour guide.
Here’s one of a frilled neck lizard sculpture in the Mindeerup section of south Perth, part of Karl Kep Ngoornd-iny (Fire and Water Dreaming) by Yondee Shane Hansen.
In addition to my family, who offered up beds and couches to me during my stay, I want to thank everyone who could make the time to catch up during my (relatively) short time in Melbourne.
It was lovely to catch up with Jess, Preethi and Feih for drinks one night. Ian, David, Pete and Corey the next night. Brunch with Richard and his daughter, Sienna, dinners with David and Anthony, and a pint and chips with Jason.
(I hope I haven’t forgotten anyone!)
Special thanks to Amy and Chris for shuttling me and Richard to Springvale Botanical Cemetery to visit Anthony Horan’s grave and to Richard for the engaging natter on the train (and apologies for getting us on the wrong train!)
Usually, my visits to cemeteries are for purely photographic purposes. But this year, I found myself in cemeteries to visit friends.
That’s how I came to be in Brookwood Cemetery, the largest cemetery in the UK. It used to have its own dedicated railway, including first-class carriages for the dead, running direct from the London Necropolis Railway Station in Waterloo.
The same station still serves it. But now it’s just the living commuting by train from the main Waterloo Station.
(I knew about the cemetery and the railway well before my visit because of Catharine Arnold’s book, Necropolis: London and its Dead, which I read many years ago. I’ll return for a more leisurely photo walk in future).
I did, of course, also visit cemeteries for purely photographic purposes.
In chronological order, I wandered the following cemeteries:
Plaistow Cemetery in Bromley (on my birthday)
Brockley Cemetery (part of Brockley and Ladywell Cemeteries)
Ladywell Cemetery (part of Brockley and Ladywell Cemeteries)
London Road Cemetery in Bromley
Paines Lane Cemetery in Pinner
Pinner New Cemetery (probably the worst maintained cemetery I’ve come across, and I include those maintained within the concept of ‘managed neglect’ in that comparison)
And Hither Green Cemetery, which I’ll have to revisit in 2024, as I arrived about 15 minutes before they closed for the day.
All this talk of death and loss may have you concerned. Never fear: there’s life in the old girl yet.
I didn’t travel as far afield as I’d hoped this year, but I did spend a day wandering Birmingham, its canals, and marvelling at the city’s Spaghetti Junction with fellow photographer Phil Ivens one Sunday.
I spent a lovely weekend with my distant cousins in Uxbridge, including a day in Henley-on-Thames.
And Hambleden.
Once again, it was lovely to spend time with family members I don’t see often enough (though there’s less excuse with these guys as, apart from Malcolm, we live in the same city, albeit on almost opposite sides!)
And in November, Scott joined me for the next stretch from Palmers Green to Enfield.
And, on Boxing Day, I took what I thought was a scenic shortcut through Grove Park Nature Reserve, aiming for Hither Green Cemetery, only to find the footbridge as part of the Railway Children Walk was closed for maintenance.
And now, the part of my annual wrap-up you’ve all been waiting for (drum roll).
Here’s the roll call of the new kittehs (and doggos!) I sat this year.
I sat 17 cats, 11 of which were new clients (though two were new kittehs for existing human clients).
I sat three doggos, all new clients and all lovely beasties. Unfortunately, Dougal (pictured above) has now crossed the Rainbow Bridge, passing around the day I left for Australia.
I sat ten fish, four of which were new clients. Six have now gone to fish heaven (only one on my watch, purloined from its pond by a cat or a fox).
Jilly arrived in Bounds Green as Lottie’s successor.
Oscar joined my three regulars in Bromley.
Frank, who loves to cuddle (which is a good thing, as he’s so smooshable!)
Pebbles, an old soul.
Treacle, who is as sweet as…
Milo loves a good game of tug-o-war.
Mango can be entertained on a shoestring (literally) and loves a lap.
I visited her four times over three days in the summer. She knew exactly when I was about to leave and when to curl up cutely on my lap.
Bobby with his “come hither and rub my belly” gaze.
Cino, Bobby’s less aloof brother.
These two were hilarious to listen to when they chatted while they played with their toys.
Bobby and Cino had some fishy friends (two of the three pictured).
George, a cheeky tabby who lives next door to my regulars.
And Lottie, George’s housemate.
I visited these two thrice daily one weekend while sitting my regulars.
And my newest and youngest clients, at 14 weeks, David.
And Stevie.
I slept in someone else’s bed for 160 nights this year (no, not like that).
Between pet-sitting, a weekend visit with my cousins, and my visit to Australia, I was away from home almost 44% of this year!
I loved it, but I will admit I missed my bed, iMac and my own room (though not the scaffolding surrounding our flat for about six months).
The coming year looks quite busy already, but it will be interesting to see whether it will be more or less busy than this year. I already have four new doggo and two new kitteh clients scheduled over the summer.
Before I wish you all a happy new year and the best of everything for 2024, I want to thank all my friends and family who have been there for me during 2023 when I really needed it (and, in many cases, every year before that).
I hope I have been and/or will be there for you when you need it.
Love to you all for 2024 xx
peace wreath
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 10 December 2023].
all that glitters is not gold
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 1 December 2023].
a bird in the hand
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 21 November 2023].
i only want to be with you
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 13 November 2023].
also perpetuating
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 7 November 2023].
happy birthday, anthony
This year's visit to Australia was predominantly about family and officially saying goodbye to Mum.
But alongside that and reuniting with some wonderful friends, I also had the chance to (officially) say goodbye to one of my oldest friends, Anthony Horan.
My thanks go out to Anthony's brother, Chris, and mutual longtime friends, Amy and Richard, for accompanying me and making the visit possible.
It was lovely to finally meet Chris and reunite with Amy and Richard after so long.
It was a sombre visit. Rain threatened. There was much mud on the 'lawn'.
But there was also cheeky humour amongst us, in keeping with the sort of comments and jokes Anthony would have made if he'd been able to reply to us as we stood by the grave his ashes share with his father's remains.
When I visited, there was a temporary marker for Anthony and his dad. I'm sure when I visit next it will look different (if it doesn't already).
I've been catching up on sharing iPhone photos from my trip on Instagram, and this morning, I reached my photos from that day. I thought I would share them on the second anniversary of his passing in January, oblivious to the date.
But, when I remembered later in the day it was his birthday in Australia, it was obvious today was the day to share.
It's currently his birthday in Melbourne and London.
So, the penguins and I are raising a toast to an old friend.
Love and miss you, Anthony. Always. xx
shot through the heart
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 27 October 2023].
like water for chocolate
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 16 October 2023].
uplifting angels
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 10 July 2023].
crucifixion
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 7 April 2023].
On a rainy day in late September 2021, I was returning from a few days away in West Sussex with my friend and fellow photographer, Phil.
That day, I was scheduled to return to finish my first cat-sitting with the kittehs I'm currently sitting.
Shiloh is nestled in my lap as I type this, despite my semi-regularly lifting her off my lap to go to the fridge or the bathroom during the past few hours of photo editing. When I do that, she gives me a Marge Simpson-like sound of disapproval.
I had an off-peak return ticket to London from Chichester, which meant I could take any train on any permitted route to get back to London within a month of the original booking.
Arundel was on the route back, so we drove there and wandered through the drizzle. Visiting a bookstore. Visiting Arundel Cathedral and the nearby St Nicholas' Church and its churchyard. And having food in a local cafe before Phil dropped me at the station for the next train.
Coincidentally, the train I had planned to be on was cancelled. But I digress.
In the churchyard of St Nicholas' Church, we experienced drizzle, rain, the beautiful after-rain sunlight and the saturated hues post-rain brings to stonemasonry, plant life and... well, everything.
In the churchyard, we also found this elaborate crucifixion scene.
At the time, I presumed it was a monument for someone with a lot of money. Perhaps with a name in the local community.
But, in retrospect, I presume it was installed by the church. Though I can't find anything online to confirm or deny that.
Since I took these photos, I've been keen to share them, but I knew I had to share them as a series, not as individual photographs. And, obviously, Easter is a timely point to share them.
I didn't capture a long shot showing all the participants in this act of mourning together. But, from the individual photographs and the photographs of Christ and the two women, I'm sure you get a sense of the scene.
I presume (with my limited atheist knowledge) the two women closest to Christ are his mother, Mary, and Mary Magdalene. A quick Google search tells me the man is unlikely to have been Christ's father, Joseph.
Earlier today, I tried calibrating the monitor I'm working on, but I'm unsure how successful I've been. Hopefully, successful enough that I don't have to redo the edits on these photographs over the coming days.
Happy Easter to those who celebrate it.
death in reserve
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 26 March 2023].
As with many of my friends and lovers, my parents reached a point where they not only accommodated my obsession with visiting and photographing cemeteries, graveyards, churchyards and other final resting places. But they facilitated it.
Sometimes I wonder if it was because they felt they owed me for all the times my brothers and I were left to our own devices in winery car parks in our childhood and teens. While they tasted and purchased wine, muscat and/or port, whether on a day out or on a road trip.
I spent most of those times reading the books I was absorbed by, and I came to enjoy wine in my early 20s. My brothers didn't. Maybe they "owed" my brothers more than me.
Sometimes, it was because the cemetery was near where they or their relatives lived at some point.
I vaguely remember Mum mentioning that one of her relatives was buried in Peachester Cemetery. Dad confirmed it was one of her cousins.
Whatever the initial reasoning, my parents seemed to find them interesting the more they lurked in them with me.
And with Crohamhurst Ecological Reserve on its borders, Peachester Cemetery was one of the more scenic cemeteries I've photographed, although the graves were simple.
agrostemma
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 11 March 2023].
Sorry once again for the radio silence.
As I mentioned in my post of images from Bosham back on 10 February, I had some worrying news about my Mum.
At 19:20 GMT on 28 February, I found out my Mum passed away 10 minutes earlier (though, technically, she passed away at 06:10 on 1 March 2023 AEST. Time differences are weird when dealing with someone's time of death).
So, as you might expect, I've needed some time to process that.
As I do in these situations, I've been writing.
It took time, and there were many tears along the way.
I'm currently editing photographs of Mum and photos taken by Mum to go with the piece.
I'll share it here and on my blog as soon as it's ready. Hopefully, tomorrow but definitely in the coming days.
In the meantime, here are some Agrostemma (common corncockles) I photographed in the gardens at Helmingham Hall on the last road trip I took with Mum and Dad in 2017.
Hold your loved ones tightly.
memories of you
I started writing about Mum about two hours after I learned she had passed away. My Dad had shared the news with my brothers - Robert and Peter - and me about 10 minutes after her official time of death.
Through tears, I just started writing. But it was hard to organise my thoughts.
And, as Pete and I had shared photographs of Mum on our social media accounts after we got the news, family and friends who knew about her long battle with frontotemporal dementia realised what had happened, despite our lack of words accompanying the images.
I was overwhelmed with so many kind words that I couldn't focus on writing.
And it felt too raw anyway.
I needed time and space to come back to it. Which I've been kindly given.
So, the thoughts, memories and feelings I've pushed down in my heart since that Tuesday evening have been able to bubble back up, and I could finally allow them to play around the edges of my mind.
Memories of a woman who was creative and resourceful.
Over time, after Mum moved into the nursing home, her clothing gradually needed replacing. When it did, my Dad struggled with finding replacements from clothing shops. She had made her own clothes for most of her adult life. Very little of her clothing had tags inside the collars, along the side seam or at the waistband telling him what size she was because it had been stitched together using her own sewing machine and overlocker, using fabrics she selected herself and patterns she'd perfected over many years, sometimes decades.
She didn't care for passing fads or seasonal styles. She made clothes she felt comfortable in, both formal and casual.
As we were growing up, she also made most of my and my brothers' clothes. I probably didn't own any store-bought knickers until I was almost a teenager. The bathers we wore in our kidney-shaped swimming pool in Aspley were all made by her.
Growing up, I had a favourite plum-coloured dress with floral-patterned panels, which she made.
As a tween and then a teen, I finally owned my first pairs of denim and corduroy jeans, and I went through a phase of wearing hand-me-down surf wear Rob had tired of. But often, these were paired with knitted vests my Mum made for me.
When I moved back to Melbourne to go to college and spent many a night out on dancefloors of indie clubs, I must have told Mum about my habit of putting my money in my socks by my ankles. And about the loose change bruising my ankles as it banged against my skin while I danced because none of my club clothing had pockets.
She quickly produced a solution: a collection of small "pockets" made from off-cut material with a strip of velcro across the top. She sewed the other half of the velcro strip (the soft side) into the inside of the waistband of polyester trousers I wore under skirts at the time, so I could wear the trousers with or without the pockets. When I danced, the pockets held my ID, bank cards, notes and loose change. When not in use, I could pop them in the washing machine to clean them of the sweat I produced over three to five hours of dancing.
When I could no longer get the trousers and skirts I liked in the shops, and other people's cigarettes had left burn marks in mine, we found almost identical material in Spotlight. And Mum made new trousers and skirts for me, using the originals as a pattern.
Many years later, she used the same skirt pattern (a simple A-line) to create a range of skirts I could wear in a business environment, complete with lining. I picked out the colours, and she did the rest.
I still have all those skirts though they don't currently fit me. But I wore a different colour almost every day of the week, matched with shirts and tops bought new and secondhand, along with matching tights and shoes. They served me well for many years, and if I could fit into them and had to be more corporate again, I would return to wearing them.
I lost count of how many dresses and skirts she took in, took up, or redesigned for me. I would buy brightly coloured and boldly patterned dresses from charity and vintage shops and take them with me when I visited for her to adjust. She was more than happy to, in most instances. Though, when I was a size 10, and I took her a size 16 dress, after wrestling with it for a time and finally successfully transforming it, she told me never to bring her anything above a size 14 again.
When we lived in Darwin, she took up screen printing and would decorate her homemade t-shirts with distinctive floral designs.
She embroidered clothing, cushions, and pictures that hung on our childhood bedroom walls.
She taught me to knit as she made jumpers and knitted vests for herself (though I barely remember how to do such things now).
She explored and took me through almost every late '70s and early '80s crafting trend: macramé, papier-mâché, tie-dye, patchwork, crochet, découpage, etc.
She even made a doll's house for my Littles using patterned contact paper as wallpaper.
She also loved to take photographs. I don't think she ever saw it as more than a hobby (though she and Dad both sold prints, postcards, etc., on RedBubble), but there is at least one photo of her with a telephoto lens in her 20s.
She was always armed with a camera during holidays and whenever one of us kids had a dress-up or other important event. And, over her life, she captured so much of her time living in various parts of Australia and Papua New Guinea and her extensive travels before marriage and with Dad and us kids.
When the letter arrived to tell me I had been accepted into the Diploma of Illustrative Photography course at Photography Studies College in Melbourne, she called through the bathroom door to hurry me out of the shower as she was possibly even more excited than I was to find out whether I had got in. (Mum would never open other people's mail without their permission, even when we were small children, so she had to wait for me to dry off to find out!)
Memories of a woman who encouraged my creativity and learning.
Before I fell in love with photography, my Mum was enthusiastic for all three of her kids to learn an instrument. She researched and tried to find musical instruments matching each of our temperaments.
She had learned to play the piano growing up but would honestly have admitted she never grasped it that well. She loved the sound of piano music, so I think she was thankful I took to it and played for so long.
She bought me a piano when I first started learning around four years old with the idea that if I didn't take to it, she would play it. I don't think she ever really had many opportunities, as I often sat on the piano stool practising, even during the week after I said I didn't want to play anymore when I played even more than usual.
Every time I visited after I moved out, she would encourage me to play. She would listen to anything I wanted to play while she made dinner around the corner in the kitchen. She was as happy to listen to me playing hits by Madonna from the 1980s to Radiohead songs she probably had never heard the originals of, as well as classical and modern pieces I learned for various exams over the years.
It was like an extension of our time together when I was in late primary school and sat at the breakfast bar in our kitchen as she prepared dinner and read to her whatever book I was devouring. I honestly couldn't tell you what I read to her, but I presume at least some of it was Judy Blume's novels. I'm sure I didn't read any of the terribly saucy Jackie Collins novels I used to borrow from the library or the Sweet Valley High series I was prone to reading in grade six. But I'm sure the content wasn't even that important to her.
It was initially a way to encourage my reading and help me with new (to me) words. But it would also have been a way to relieve some of the tediousness of making dinner for five most nights of the week and to feel less alone and like a servant to her family. I know Mum enjoyed cooking, but I'm sure there were days when she would rather have had a break. I probably never thought of it that way at the time. In retrospect, I was an analogue version of Audible for her.
Memories of a woman with a wickedly impish sense of humour.
It's probably safe to say I got my dirty mind and love of double entendre from Mum. Possibly my love of puns. And she, in turn, probably got her sense of humour from her parents.
When Mum and Dad ran a motel and restaurant in Stawell, a small former gold-mining town in Victoria, she loved to pick up dirty jokes from the sales reps who regularly passed through. She relished retelling them to anyone who would listen. I rarely had the talent for joke-telling, but Mum truly enjoyed sharing those jokes with the staff and guests and the belly laughs or groans they inspired.
When we were kids, Mum never seemed to shy from causing controversy in the neighbourhood. She raised a bit of a stir roaring down the incline of our suburban street in the billy-cart my Dad made for us kids (using the wheels from my pram to my initial mortification but then enjoyment). Apparently, that was a bit much for our north Brisbane neighbourhood.
To this day, I don't know why Mum put a pig's head in our oven (maybe pig's cheek recipes were popular in the '80s?), but I do remember finding out that several of the neighbourhood children's parents expressed their horror that Mum gave their kids the teeth of said pig to take home.
That was one of the hardest things to grapple with when Mum's dementia took hold. She literally lost her sense of humour. Her laughter was almost entirely absent for much of the time after she was finally diagnosed.
There were exceptions: the day I arrived in Tasmania in October 2019, mere days before her 74th birthday, she knew me. She was pleased to see me. She proudly told anyone who would listen who it was that had come to visit.
Though her recognition of me slipped away within a short while with the distraction of being in a hospital and her confusion about the various things attached to her body, every now and then that day and the next, a wry grin would sneak across her face. And we poked our tongues out at each other playfully on one occasion. They were the last moments of humour I shared with Mum in person.
There were the odd moments on Skype calls when I returned to London where I would see glimmers, but they were 'blink, and you'll miss them' moments.
I was wearing a summer dress with thin shoulder straps one night when one of the carers helped Mum and me have a call, but my long hair obscured the straps causing Mum to think I was naked and to make a cheeky joke about it. And another time, when the carer told Mum she was talking to her daughter, she made a self-deprecating joke that I was too pretty to be her daughter.
Pete took two self-portraits of him with Mum in the last few years that capture her true essence in what I imagine was a brief moment of her old self re-emerging. I will forever be jealous of that moment and that he managed to freeze it in time. But happy for him that he had that moment and caught it for all of us.
Memories of a woman who exhibited endless affection.
Those self-portraits also capture Mum's all-pervading affection. Another aspect of her personality that was all but obliterated by her dementia. She went from being one of the most affectionate people you could know to someone who often seemed repelled by human contact.
Mum was always giving hugs, asking for hugs, kissing all of us on the cheek, and open to us kids curling up into the crook of her armpit or sitting on her lap as we watched television or when guests visited. Her family was like that, and she encouraged that environment in our home.
Dad and his brother had grown up in a loving but not physically affectionate family. My Mum gradually and proudly brought the affection she was accustomed to into their lives.
When I was a child, my uncle would shake the hands of my brothers and me as a greeting and on departure. As we grew older, he had been so well trained by Mum that hugs replaced handshakes.
Memories of our ever-changing relationship.
My almost 46-year relationship with Mum went through many stages.
Almost without fail, she was an encouraging and supportive guide when I was growing up. She saw my potential in many areas and nurtured it. She encouraged my love of reading, music, photography and learning, even if she didn't always approve of what I read, the music I enjoyed, the photography I created and the beliefs I earned through my learning.
In my teens, she was protective and supportive but let me find things out for myself. To forge my own way. Maybe she figured she had no choice, as I was often headstrong and stubborn. But she would also have known she'd prepared me well for those years. In my formative years, she was always open about puberty and sexuality. And tried to reinforce common sense and self-worth.
When I left the family home, she took me completely by surprise by saying goodbye through tears. I had presumed she would be glad to have another child out of her hair, and I was excited about what the future held and looking forward to that. So it had never really occurred to me before that moment how this event would affect her.
But in those next few years, I saw Mum as my best friend. We spoke on the phone for hours at least once a week. I knew I could ask her about anything. I gave her updates on my life, and we talked about everything and nothing.
I called her each time I realised I hadn't been paying enough attention to what she'd taught me about cooking, laundry, or whatever. Despite my parents giving us plenty of guidance on cooking and implementing a monthly meal where the three of us prepared a three-course meal, I had forgotten even the basics of boiling water. And I sought her advice on methods to know if my eggs were safe to eat because I'd taken them out of the carton, put them in the fridge door, not kept the use-by information and couldn't remember when I bought them.
In my late teens or early 20s, I spoke with her one evening to say that I'd often felt she was there for my brothers more than me as we grew up. It wasn't recrimination. Just telling her honestly how I felt.
She took my comment as intended and told me honestly that she had often felt I didn't need her as the boys did. That I always seemed to be so self-sufficient. I never really seemed to need anyone, as so much of what I did and enjoyed didn't require anyone else. That I always seemed to enjoy my own company.
Our strong relationship was based on our ability to talk honestly like that. As I moved into my thirties, we seemed to lose some of that and grew apart.
Memories of a woman with insatiably itchy feet.
When I moved to the other side of the world for the first time, I gave my parents another excuse to travel. So I was able to see them and travel with them in 2001.
My parents shared an insatiable passion for travel. They travelled a lot before they met but even more together, including with us kids.
We also moved so much during my childhood and adolescence that people would ask if my parents had been in the RAAF, especially having lived in Darwin and Stawell. At the time of Mum's passing, my parents had lived in five of Australia's eight states and territories.
Mum's last international trip was in 2017 to the UK and Ireland, and I joined my parents for a road trip around mainland England for some of their time here. It was a difficult trip.
I'd had difficult holidays with Mum before because we clashed more often than we agreed by about 2010. And, on some trips since then, I'd felt like an interloper.
But 2017 was harder as her (as yet undiagnosed) dementia was evident. It caused stress for my parents as Mum frequently put valuable items like her passport in unexpected places. So there would be frantic last-minute searches for the item with the possibility that she had left it somewhere (thankfully, she hadn't).
When I was travelling with them, Dad and I would discuss our hopes for the next day (we knew they would often only be hopes as we didn't know what Mum might cope with, how far she could travel, and when she might suddenly change her mind and refuse to do something she had been enthusiastic about earlier in the day), and Mum would often become paranoid. As though she wasn't entirely sure who I was or why I was there. Or that we were talking about her behind her back (which we were, but only because of our love for her, trying to figure out what would be manageable).
Despite how difficult that trip was and how far dementia had already impacted Mum's memory and personality, I loved seeing moments like the one I captured between my parents in the photo above as they walked through London: still reaching for each other's hands after 47 years of marriage.
One of my strongest memories of Mum will always be her love for Dad and their love for each other, though dementia obscured her feelings for the last four years of her life.
Memories of a woman who was quite different to me.
Despite my grandparents being quite progressive in many ways, Mum grew up in a home where you didn't talk about politics or religion in polite company. So over the years, as my views on both became more outspoken, particularly about politics, Mum and I often clashed. I would have healthy discussions and debates (though quite heated at times, I wouldn't have called them arguments) with Dad and my uncle that Mum found quite stressful, which I, in turn, found hard to understand.
Despite the conflicts that arose from those exchanges, when the conversations turned to her family, the places we'd lived together, and so on, we would find common ground again. And we would pore over her photo albums, and she would tell me stories of her family.
I wish I'd encouraged her to write down those stories and experiences. Some of them stick with me still, but as I only have two cousins and she had 36, keeping track of the who, let alone the what and the when is hard enough. I don't know that her brother carries those stories the same way she did, and with most of her cousins passing before her, I fear many of those stories are forever lost.
I think Mum and Dad's overarching hope for all three of us kids was for us to be happy, whatever that meant for us. But I think Mum also struggled with the fact that the paths each of us took were quite different from her own. And maybe different from what she would have wanted for us.
I know, for example, that she would have loved to have been a grandmother. But, for various reasons, that never happened.
Now just memories.
We knew this day was coming for years, but it still feels unreal in many ways.
It's been about five months since things started to feel imminent, but I've been grieving since the last time I left Tasmania on 31 October 2019. Knowing it would be the last time I'd see Mum alive and hold her as we hugged in the Devonport airport. I couldn't contain my tears as the stewardess went through the safety instructions once we'd boarded the plane and taken off.
We managed Skype calls here and there with the help of the supportive staff at Mum's nursing home and Dad when it timed in with his visits. But we'd had to give that up when it became evident it was too stressful and confusing for Mum.
Our last Skype call was in early October 2021, and I couldn't return to visit since.
When the nursing home advised in early to mid-February that Mum had lost the ability to swallow and hadn't eaten anything for two days, we knew the time for false alarms had passed.
Her time of death was at 06:10 AEST. With the time difference between Tasmania and London, she passed away at 19:10 on 28 February GMT. But, in reality, she died on 1 March. For the evening, I could almost pretend her death hadn't yet happened.
Before she passed, I asked Dad in one of our Skype calls if he could take a photograph of her after she passed when the time came. He did and sent it to my brothers and me via WhatsApp when he was with her for the final time.
As you'd expect, it's a hard photograph to see (and I'm obviously not sharing it here). But it was a way for me to acknowledge her passing fully and for the reality to sink in as I was so far away for so much of her illness.
Although the grief has come in waves for so long, and things became "final" two weeks ago, I'm still not sure it will hit me fully until I can visit Dad in Tasmania and be in their house and feel her permanent absence.
Rest in peace, Margaret Alice Hyde.
24.10.1945 - 01.03.2023
I love you,
Miss Mouse.
now he's gone aloft
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 19 February 2023].
jesus christ pose
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 17 January 2023].
life's a short summer, man a flower
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 1 January 2023].
The final stanza of Samuel Johnson's poem about Winter (with some tweaks), inscribed on a headstone in Arbroath Abbey that I captured in April 2011.
The original quote reads:
Catch the, O! catch the transient hour,
Improve each moment as it flies;
Life's a short Summer - man a flower,
He dies - alas! how soon he dies!
Though the quote on Wikiquote varies from the above and attributes it to a poem with a different name and only cites the final stanza.
I don't have a copy of the original poem to be 100% sure which is correct, but I'm okay with artistic license on headstones.
arseways round
The portrait of Mouri above I took while cat-sitting her and her father, Dugla, nicely sums up 2022.
It wasn’t a bad year as such.
It was just a bit befuddling, stressful and a constant balancing act.
I experienced worse and more frequent panic attacks earlier in the year due to health issues. I’m hoping the trigger has just turned out to be a new food intolerance (the jury’s still out). But I became near-agoraphobic for a period.
In addition, I got a bite guard and discovered I was both vitamin D deficient and B12 anaemic again 15 years later.
With some time, stern self-talk, medical tests and procedures, I seem to have brought the psychological impact of the potential food intolerance under control. But I need to confirm my suspicions before things return to “normal” (though, even then, the likely culprit is so widespread that “normal” is definitely subjective).
My year started well with temporary work beginning in mid-January. It allowed me to get back on my feet financially after a couple of years of sporadic work and the lingering psychological impact from previous jobs.
And the job offer came despite my being open about my experience photographing roadkill. I shared that in the context of the organisation focussing on haematology as I would potentially have to interact with graphic and disturbing imagery.
Almost a year on, my managers and co-workers are some of the best people I’ve worked with.
They’re inclusive. They understand work-life balance. There’s zero bullying and no alpha male egos to contend with. Bliss.
At this stage, I expect to continue to work with them for a few more months at least, but we’ll see what lies ahead.
Despite the positive start to 2022, the year was bookended by death. And there was also the loss of a beautiful kitteh I stayed with in October.
Anthony left us unexpectedly in January, and a friend’s mother passed in November. So I attended my second-ever virtual funeral toward the beginning and my first-ever in-person funeral toward the end of the year.
Though the degree to which I knew each was quite different, both were meaningful losses.
On the positive side, this year I:
Had my hair cut and coloured for the first time since early October 2019.
Attended my first live gig since the pandemic started.
Visited four art exhibitions.
Read a book cover-to-cover in one evening (okay, technically, it was a short story, but it’s the most I’ve read in book form since 2021…)
Resumed my language studies (late in the year, this is recent).
Continued my letter-writing (albeit just one this year…)
Took some new self-portraits.
Continued to share curated series from my sepulchre work and travel photographs, and I swapped fungi for flowers.
Created the odd digital collage.
Dabbled in AI art.
Engaged with at least 40 people on dating apps (though at least five turned out to be douches) and went on dates with 10 of those I chatted with (who were mostly not those who turned out to be douches).
This year, I found something of a second home in Bromley, cat-sitting Lily, Sammy and Poppy most months of the year.
The current Primark was originally Medhursts department store, where David Bowie used to buy vinyl. And I popped by to look at a couple of the houses he lived in as a lad.
Earlier in the year, while cat-sitting, I revisited the Imperial Arms in Chislehurst and wandered through
Elmstead Wood and
I didn’t travel as far afield as I’d hoped, but I did manage to venture out of London to visit
Leeds Castle and
in Cotton End, just outside of Bedford, and an overnight stay in Bedford a few months later.
And days out in London included revisiting
Regent’s Park with my new co-workers and visiting
the Sky Garden for the first time with friends old and new.
It was a quiet year on the cemetery front.
I revisited Abney Park Cemetery on a first date.
I visited Grove Park Cemetery for the first time.
And dropped in to see William Blake and John Bunyan in Bunhill Fields for the third time.
Stopping to chit-chat with the resident squirrels.
Sitting Lottie (and her loss) led to a renewed friendship with Sarah and a wander along the New River (not new, not a river) from Hornsey to Bowes Park.
Hopefully, in 2023, we’ll continue that walk north from Bowes Park.
It was an absolute pleasure sitting with Lottie earlier this year despite her being poorly.
I love this portrait I took of her because it’s so uncharacteristic of such a sweet-natured kitteh. Obviously, she was yawning - not threatening to decapitate me - at the time. Though it may seem otherwise.
Alongside my new friendship with Lottie and recurring stays with Lily, Sammy and Poppy, and Meg and Mog, I added
Mia (including her cat-sitting me with her cat-mother, Sophie, post-medical procedure),
Dugla,
Mouri and
Bentley to my close feline friends this year.
In 2022, I spent 63 nights with smooshable kittehs and visited kittehs locally 13 times.
I had 10 furry clients. Five of them were new clients.
I’m hoping my mojo will be fully restored in 2023. So I can enjoy kitteh-sits, doggo-sits, and photo walks further afield. And continue to hang out with my faves closer to home.
And on the creative side, I look forward to creating and sharing:
Themed chapbooks (including photographs, writing, collages, sketches, musical compositions and curated playlists).
Collaborations.
Possibly some AI art (but likely incorporated into other work).
More instalments of existing series, including my love letters to london.
New series I’m yet to discover.
I hope your 2022 went as smoothly as possible and that 2023 will bring you lots of good things. xx
until next year #136
[I originally posted this entry as early access for my Patreon patrons on 27 December 2022].