Web of Life

Web of Life

Grandmother came over to discuss plans for a baby shower. Arrangements being made for a family gathering, celebrating our cousin, Jenny’s baby bump. On this happy event, Gran wanted, as usual, to stamp her signature. So even though left-over wedding champagne barely consumed, and cake slivers topped with thick white almond icing hadn’t even been fully distributed, plans were well underway to celebrate impending arrival of my new second cousin.

‘You can’t be serious; you’re still doing those cards?’ She asked when Grannie saw Jenny bent over thank you notes and wedding themed stationary.

‘I’ll never get them finished if you don’t keep disturbing me.’

‘Message received.’                                                                

Family rumors' flew, always behind Jenny’s back, whispers this pregnancy not planned. As the youngest, used to be a time I thought planning a family some sort of sick joke, surely you can’t plan children, they just happen after marriage.  

Gran barely contained her disgust.

‘These young’ns…in such a rush.’ She uttered with clicked dentures.

I’ve seen my old’s snogging, behind Uncle Barry’s pear tree. Real disgusting, how can they? Also wondered did they get into tongue action around those dentures?

‘In this day and age, you’d think Jenny and Sam understood precautions,’ Continued Gran’s diatribe. By this time punctuated with spit driblets stuck in her lip corners. Some other gems she uttered, barely registering my Mum’s attempts to contribute to this conversation.

Don’t want to brag, but I do math. My Gran married in March, and we celebrate Uncle Barry’s birthday just before Christmas. Go figure, right quick.

‘A war on. People got married.’ I’m told.

Another warning to bug out and mind my own business.

As Mum and Gran worked through picnic versus BBQ, disagreements about who should prepare what food for Jenny’s baby shower, I noticed Gran getting flustered. Time to distract the old girl, I thought.

Legacy of being the youngest, I get dragged along to Grower’s Markets on those early Saturday mornings. Way too early, way too cold. While Gran gets off on this whole scene. I’m bored as, while she chats to stall holders, and fights off people half her age. Once working my moves on a cute girl, wearing a Heidi outfit selling Orchard Fresh Apples. Thought I’d made a total dickhead of myself by getting my arm caught in one of those marquee ropes. Looked down to see instead I’d been grabbed by Gran’s beige jacket, her fingers wrapped around my elbow.

‘Come on Jamie, we need to get eggs, before they’re gone.’

Babe sniggered, while I am dragged away. Gran’s expensive walking shoes cutting a pace faster than Usain Bolt.

‘You’re wasting your time, young man.’ My crinkled old companion cuts any amorous attempts down to size. ‘She lives out near Batlow, past Mount Victoria, only comes down occasionally. Especially when they want to boost sales by appealing to suckers like you.’

‘Leave the boy alone, he’s trying things out,’ Gran chastised when Pop tried to force me to shave hairs sprouting along my chin line.

All my efforts to sticky-beak through Gran’s bags, rustled wrappings, attempts to pull out contents go unheeded. Even at my most annoying and hovering presence, close enough to encounter Gran’s heavy, expensive perfume which makes my sinuses shudder, Gran will not be side-tracked.

‘Frankly, niece Jenny and her beau Sam’s carelessness revolts me. Gives me a headache.’

Mum and Gran are still talking about weddings and babies happening a respectable distance apart when Gran toppled over. She hits our floor with a dull thud, as if a huge bag of potatoes or bag of garden mulch tumbled on the deck.

My instant reaction, not sure why, a leap for the phone.

‘Even a five-year-old know how to ring 000,’ Aunty Glenda said once.

Never imagined a use for such knowledge. 

Although Gran is flat out, like a drunk, or homeless person sleeping, Mum still spoke to her as if continuing the baby-shower conversation.

‘You can’t let Jenny’s or any other grandkid’s actions bother you so much. I am sure they don’t consider what you think beforehand. See what stressing is doing to your health.’

This Gran trait, worrying about what us kids do, jumbles in my head while I am answering questions about, ‘what service do you require?’ ‘Nature of your event?’ ‘Address?’

Either my mother has no idea of what’s happening, or speed she gotten over any shock from Gran’s collapse is record-book-worthy.

‘It’s going to be fine,’ Mum now says with chilly tone often used toward Gran. Like she’s angry, crunching her teeth, but holding aggression inside. Usually, a voice appearing when cleaning out spare room cupboards in an effort to declutter books and stuff. Or following Gran’s instructions for putting out recycled rubbish. As if Mum thinks everything is going into a rubbish truck, so who cares if papers aren’t stacked up together, or bottles are laid with their tops to bin hinge ends. I’ve heard Gran go off.

Finally mum twigs to the idea Nan needs serious medical attention, and I am trying to get help.

‘You’ve taken a fall, but James is phoning an ambulance.’

Phone smells like disinfectant, holes under my chin remind of worm holes. Mum looks up, waiting for me to do or say something. My brain goes whir, whir…clunk.

Responsibility makes my head spin, dizzy as if I’ve ridden my scooter in too tight circles. Ever since I crashed the car Mum hasn’t really trusted me with anything even semi adult. Alright, it was Sydney Easter show dodgem cars. Poor dad wound up with a cut above his eye, and beetroot sized lump on behind his head. I thought my dad’s biggest head-space issue centered on being helped by boys who were match-stick thin and only just older than me. I swear every time I bring up driving lessons, I see Dad’s hands begin to tremble and beads of sweat form on his top lip. For a long time, I thought this just part of dad’s anxiety to my being in control of a motor vehicle, then mum let slip, ‘your father’s little sister, Cecilia. Only seven, you know. She died in a traffic accident. Not very long after he got his license?’

‘Is she breathing?’ I called to my mother. Is my voice so squeaky loud?

With fingers, not thumb, Mum needed to pull down patient’s jaw line near an ear to a dent near her windpipe and settle there to find Gran’s pulse. I am in relay mode, ‘…don’t squeeze too hard, or pressure will slow beats, and constrict brain oxygen.’

‘Yes,’ we were able to inform phone dudes, ‘Gran’s heart is still beating. She has a pulse.’

Now I think of it, Gran has a dust-strewn CPR leaflet tapped to side of her fridge. About as useless as those various other notes, fridge magnets and photos of me in short pants, at a wildlife park holding a snake, plus a fluoro pink pen used to write homemade birthday cards.

‘Check for obstructions,’ I relay to mum. Echoing phone words. ‘And don’t move her neck any.’

Sure, enough Gran’s dentures slipped, so mum reaches into Gran’s mouth, ee-uck, to retrieve her uppers. Why would anyone touch those? And since when did Gran Edith wear falsies? I couldn’t remember noticing more than three or four of Gran’s teeth. Right now, her choppers are set out in a grin on the carpet! Should start snapping, jumping across floors like a wind-up toy so popular not so long ago. Be hell to play if Gran remained compos mentis. Mum can’t even rearrange Gran Edith’s hand towels. Shift them incorrectly and in a nanosecond, Nan will sniff mistakes out.

Phone voice says, ‘what state is she in now?’

New South Wales, I’m thinking.

That whole mouth-teeth-hand inside head thing forced me to look away. Focus on something on my level, bow-legged old fashioned lounge chairs. Carpet with muted burgundy patterns in clover shapes. Always thought this pattern looked like slightly hairy seed pods. Or our shelf, at Mum’s university graduation photo. She wears a spotted dress below her academic gown. Gran Edith held a degree certificate corner as if trying to pull the precious thing away from her daughter. Even though most I heard Gran say was, ‘it’s only Arts.’

‘James has rung an ambulance.’ Mum kept saying. Call center man’s voice is skipping over words, missing bits, I want to listen, and repeat instructions correctly, but am I?

‘Has this happened before?’

How the heck would I know, as if my parents would tell me Gran tumbles down like a bowling pin on occasions?

‘Is your grandmother coming to now?’

Coming to where? Can’t even remember how I answered half those questions, because my ears were ringing listening to a clock tick. Never heard it before, still don’t know where from.

Wherever, this clonk, clunk slowed down. How much longer before an ambulance comes blasting, as best it can, down our narrow street? Later I learned paramedics arrived within five minutes of our call. I would swear my mother knelt at Gran’s side, talking in an off-putting calm voice, for at least twenty minutes. Saying over and over, ‘it will be fine.’

Whole time I think, this is it. We’ll need to sell our house. Which no one will buy because this is where Gran croaked. They’ll point at carpets with a, someone died, right there. What will I do? How will I forget? What will make these pictures go out of my head? Worse than any horror movie.

Weird, too weird to think about now, my grandmother in her lady pantsuit, always so straight and formal now slightly rumpled, laid out on our carpet, like some sort of museum specimen. Reminds me of a nightmare where I encountered Gran with wolf hair sticking out from her flannel PJs, tiny little violets around her neck. Brothers Grimm got a lot to answer for.

‘James, put down the phone.’ Said mum. ‘Go out into the drive. Make sure you tell them which house.’

I morphed into a doorman. Holding onto our, ‘warm toned hardwood’ (those are builder’s words) door open. We’d scraped our names inside bottom left corner before installation. Gran Edith got cross, called it, ‘…just plain destructive.’

When those ambulance guys took over, mum turned to me with a, ‘Thanks. Now out of their way, James.’ Just then my mouth dried up, I felt my chin quiver. Wondered if fear is my default response to women in my family? Like one Christmas when I wanted a bike, but as usual Gran Edith showed up with collared shirts. My days feigning joy might be over.

Mum sat on the floor, over her mother, talked to her, felt, with her fingers no less, about in Gran’s mouth. Right before men in blue uniforms appeared mum’s chatter stopped. Wound down like one of those old, pre-digital watches. Likely she heard sirens to cease any mother-daughter time. At this moment mum looked down, leant over further, and put her cheek against Gran’s. As if everything depended on being near Gran’s stern, old face. Sure, as eggs, no way I would get so close to Gran Edith’s notorious frown. In a muddle knowing if tears, confessions, or anger are required when caught one of Gran’s razor-sharp glares or quips. Like her constant harping on about Aunty Carmel’s vegetarianism. Right back from its beginnings with thin edges of AC’s giving up coffee.

In the hospital Gran’s eyes were half closed, and her mouth hung open as she labored to breathe. Yet for ages she’d grasped at mum’s hand. From time-to-time Mum released tangled bed sheets, but mostly Gran clasping was tolerated.

‘Yes, I know, it is missing. You want the wedding ring. I know it’s lost. I will find it for you, mum. We’ll get it back on your finger. Either way you choose, whether you decide to stay or go, you’ll have your ring.’

She looked over at me and said, ‘your grandmother lost her wedding ring a week or so ago. We turned the house upside down. Whole way in here, she kept grabbing at my ring finger. I know she is trying to tell me; she needs her ring.’

I thought those hours spent at Grans something to do with current de-cluttering projects. Or maybe new concerns about Gran’s safety, like getting Gran to agree to let mum shift storage boxes down away from top shelves, ‘so she doesn’t do it herself.’

Mum is saying, ‘I don’t know how much longer I will be able to cope. There is also James to think about, finishing his exams… getting his driving lessons. I am being book-ended and there is only so far I can stretch.’

Not to mention aftermath of my cousin’s wedding. I only found out not so long-ago Gran Edith wasn’t too keen on Jenny-bride using panels of antique lace from her own wedding gown. Even though, on the day, Gran went gooey harping on with, ‘isn’t it simply divine.’

Trying to avoid getting tangled in various machine cords and tubes, mum says ‘Here,’ and places her own gold band onto Gran’s knobby hand. ‘You wear my ring until I find yours.’

Images of panic ridden searching for a lost wedding ring clashed with my entrenched perceptions Gran. I can’t imagine her distraught. A woman who used to say, ‘I don’t believe in sexual equality, because women have always been superior…’ Another of Gran Edith’s sayings being, ‘A place for everything and everything in its place.’

Once babysitting me, a kid too young to be left alone, in love with Harry Potter books, reading The Prisoner of Azaban. Gran Edith forced me to turn off bedroom lights at a ridiculously early hour. Couldn’t shut my eyes without seeing, when I haven’t got my Patronus charm sorted, Dementors puckering up for a kiss, akin to one required Gran every family function.

As other random family members shuffle in, adding to cramped zones around a curtained off Emergency cubicle. As if we are queued up for a table at a Sunday lunch buffet, down at local Leagues club.

Mum and Uncle Barry go out into an antiseptic reeking hallway to talk about their mother’s prospects, like the rest of us are too fragile to hear their conversation. As if curtains could dampen voices. No way does Gran Edith makes sense of their words. About the only time she won’t get cross at being talked about. Out-to-it big time, gone floating off this planet. Except as they came back in, Gran’s eyes popped open and she clawed at Uncle Dan’s wrist, same as earlier grabbing for mum’s finger.

‘What is it mum? What do you want?’ He asked.

I stood bed foot end not knowing what to do. Mum already said I should say good-bye to my grandmother. I’d prefer a wave from afar, say a few quick words like… so long, thanks a lot for everything you tried to do…looking after me when I wore nappies… nicer if you could let me read Harry Potter…but I am over it. Such stuff. Problematic saying farewell to someone spending any remaining portions of life’s energy craving a misplaced ring and now pawing at her son’s forearm.

‘Maybe she’s wondering where your watch is,’ said mum. ‘You’re not wearing dad’s watch, Rolex, he got when he retired.’

My uncle leaned closer, almost touching his mother’s wrinkled brow, and said, ‘I used to wear it everywhere, but I got a digital one. So much easier to read. Listen Mum, Dad’s watch is at home, on my dresser. Never get rid of it.’ He stroked her thin hair. ‘You know it’s precious. When I come back tonight, I’ll bring it. You’ll touch it. It will be ok; I’ll bring dad’s watch for you.’

I looked at my ancient, grandmother, someone I never really liked or known. Hit me she didn’t want to be parted from anything connected with Pop. Frightening to witness this intensity grabbing at reminders of her husband, just now, with possibility of their imminent reunion.

I never asked her how they met. Or enquired about what they’d been through in their years together? I knew snippets about a miscarriage and then a still-born baby after Uncle Barry, somehow, I can’t imagine Gran Edith dealing with these type of things. Back then doctors probably just hid away fatalities, told parents not to think about their loss, get on and produce another baby. Everyone expects oldies to croak it, but no one thinks about loss of a child. Dreadful things were in my family history I’d never thought about. I would never know how they coped, what tears they cried. Part of me wondered if Gran Edith’s current fixation about his watch could be to do with Pop’s death. After his dreadful fall down the front steps. An accident? Or did he get sick of living as a crumpled old, seems to me, wizened, dominated man. Still scares me to think about Mum’s huge panic. Declaring, ‘I can’t live with possibilities of Gran Edith slipping too!’

‘I think it’s time for us to go,’ I said to mum.

Knew they expected me to kiss Gran. I advanced to the bedhead, bent over, and gave her a quick peck. Skin on her forehead dry, and no part of her, not her eyes, mouth, or hands; nothing registered a grandson’s fleeting kiss. I’ll admit, bearing in mind ferocity with which Gran tried to contact symbols of her marriage, this lack of reaction to me disappointed.  

‘Bye,’ I said, trying for an instant to feel anything. I might never see her again. Surely an overreaction. Better to focus on something mum said earlier, it will be OK.