Mother's Day

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Isabel.
Isabel who?
Isabel needed on my bike.
Oh that's an old one. That's as old as me.
But it made you laugh!
Who said I was laughing at you?
I just know.
Maybe I was. A bit.
And you'd light up another cigarette and take another sip of your beer and return to your favorite pastime of gazing out over the Devlin Street traffic and the vista of the valley clean all the way to West Ryde,
And you would be gone.
I could have sat there watching you all day. Sitting on the carpet pushing toy cars or hand painting an Airfix kit or playing with my prized Big Jim doll or reading books about telling the time and How The Snowies Were Made and learning about jobs long vanished such as steeplejacks and icemen.
You gave me that wonder, Ma. You gave me the gift of everything's going to work out and work out well somehow. You gave the gift of talking out of turn in a too-loud voice ensuring everyone remembers the occasion for lifetimes to come.
You gave us life and you gave us love.
You gave this much and much more besides and in return all I've given are the occasional pale remembrances and this stupid smile that appeared the day you brought me into the world.

Jean Isabel Connell nee McKee 1919-1998.

I wish I was a fisherman...