[Miscellany]

When I was a little kid and morning television was filled with re-runs of old shows from the 50s an everyday run of the mill family looked like this:


There you have the quintessential respectable family. No messing around with mum and and dad here. No siree. These folks would ground you faster than you could say 'awww shucks', just for sassing your mother! Watch out.

Then by the time I was in Primary School in the mid to late 80s the modern family looked a little like this:


Again, perfectly normal looking family (even if there are a few tragic fashion mistakes). Can't mistake dad here! There he is in the middle growing enough facial hair to make a coat. Where's mum? Oh there she is, looking mum-ish. These are the folks you want to go see when your boyfriend breaks up with you and you don't know what to do or when you need help with your calculus final.


By the time I was a teen "mom and pops" looked more like this:



or this:


or this:

Yep, no mistaking in any way shape or form who mum and dad are in any of these families. Kinda weary. Kinda tired with a bit of grey creeping in. Looking like they've been around the block a time or two... as it should be. I mean, their kids are TEENAGERS! How fresh faced can you be?

Lately I've noticed that either I'm getting really fucking old or TV mums and dads are pretty much the same age as their kids!

We've got this from The Secret Circle:

and this:

They are apparently parents of 17 year old kids. What's that you say? How can these man-children have produced enough sperm to father anyone above the age of 7? I'm wondering the same thing folks. It's clearly a Christmas miracle...like Jesus!


Then we have the parent group from Life Unexpected:

this:

and THIS:

LIFE Unexpected? Parents unexpected more like it. But... but isn't that the guy from Dawson's Creek? The same Dawson's Creek that had Katie Holmes in it... the same Katie Holmes who now has a 3 year old daughter with a crazy man? Yes, 3 years old, not 17 years old! The mind boggles.

And what about these two knuckleheads from Awkward?:

They have a 16 year old daughter you say? Seriously? SERIOUSLY?

And when I saw this recently I literally spit my coffee out at the screen;

Yes, that's right. That's the guy from Clueless - the one who left his Cranberries CD in the quad and wanted to go get it before somebody 'snagged' it.

...Yeah, I remember the Cranberries. They were around when I was in high school. I also remember watching Clueless when I was a teen. Funnily enough, in Clueless the dad looked like this:

...which looks NOTHING like

and yet they are both supposed to father 16 year old girls. I'm sure it could biologically happen but that doesn't mean that it's NORMAL.

What is going on in TV land? Am I crazy or do modern day TV parents look completely unfit to be doing anything except navigating a hard day of doing beer bongs in the backyard while sitting on their outdoor sofa couch donated from grandma who also happens to slip them a $50 every now and again to 'tide them over'?

I really can't wait until Dakota Fanning's younger sister turns up as the mother of a 34 year old in next season's premiere of "Just a Normal Family".

I may have to stick to re-runs of The Beave..

Labels: family, old, rant, TV, wonderings

posted by M at 12:16 am 7 comments

I will always associate Crunchie chocolate bars with my Uncle R. He would bring them with him every single time he came to visit. When you are 8 years old and you are given Crunchie every time a particular person comes to visit - you very quickly develop a Pavlovian response to that person. Beat up old Holden in the driveway = saliva. Never fails.

If everyone has a crazy Uncle, then mine is R. He would refer to Christmas at Easter time, make stupid jokes at the wrong moment and do the Mexican party cry YOW YOWYOWYOW in the middle of an otherwise sedate family dinner. Definitely not for the fainthearted - or for the sensitive of hearing either.

He died today.

I don't know what else to say about that - except that it wasn't really a party at the end, nor was there a Crunchie in sight. Eventually he went peacefully, but it was a struggle for years and years.

I wish I knew how to deal with this in a normal way. I've not cried or blubbered once. I'm just dazed and feeling kind of worried, with a bit of dread settling deep somewhere in my belly - though I can't tell you why or what for. I want for nothing else than to be a blubbering, snotty mess and unable to cope. At least I know that reaction isn't forever - it's a truck stop on the way to a better place. Instead, I don't know what to do with with what I've got but I have a feeling I'm going to be stuck with it for a while.

Labels: change the colour of your day, family, feel like crap, nostalgia

posted by M at 11:13 pm 7 comments

Miss Nat tagged me and so...I'm gonna...

7 things I may (but hopefully not) have written in this journal before.

1) I'm big on gag reels. I'm always hopeful that one of the DVD extras of any film I watch has a gag reel. If it does then usually I'm too impatient to even watch the film first. In fact, while watching I'm usually thinking about the gag reel all the way through! I especially like those goofs where everyone on set starts laughing at some mistake or another - or can't keep it together while saying their line. I can't tell you how spazztastically hilarious I find the whole thing.

2) I have regular perverted but so realistic I can feel them dreams. Not just chicka-chicka-wow-wow type playboy mansion dreams but really fucked up ones that I can't stop thinking about all. day. long. There was this one the other night where...okay I can't do this. But it was fucked up, let me assure you.

3) I am never admitting this again, and if you call me on it I'll say that aliens took over my brain and made me write it but have a major jones for supermarket music but only within the context of the supermarket. There's something so soothing about hearing Kokomo playing at just the right volume over the loud speakers at Safeway while I sort through avocados trying to find a ripe but not too ripe one.

4) My great grandmother married a 75 year old man. she had 5 children to him. She was 14.

5) If it was socially acceptable to do so in public you'd usually find me with my hand down my pants - Al Bundy style. If not down my pants then on my boobs. Please believe me when I say it actually isn't a masturbatory thing. What can I say? I'm just still at the phallic psychosexual stage of development according to Freud.

6) Sometimes I will get certain tidbits from my relatives about my ancestors (see #4) however overall there are secrets that run deep in my family - so deep that I've been told in no uncertain terms that they are being kept from me ...for protection. Us cousins agree that there is a crazy gene - alive and rampant in the fam. No shit.

7) My imagination is so good that it's almost real. By almost, I really do mean by a hair. The only thing that stops it from not being real is my realisation that daydreams aren't actually real. If I was to ever lose my skills of rationalising everything that happens to me then I will become a full blown looney tune. This is true of everyone, sure - but it's especially true of me. If I could, I'd live totally within my imagination - it's nicer in there. Sometimes I hate that rational side of me, even if it does keep me clinically "sane".

I tag, yadda yadda yadda blah blah blah.

Labels: about me, blah, daydreams, dreams, family, jesus christ I'm crazy, major jones, meme, weird things

posted by M at 11:48 pm 16 comments

Where are the others? The girl says, referring to the empty spaces.


Ha. They not coming is the short answer. The lengthy story doesn't need to be told, the girl already knows the whys and wheres. It's the same old, same old.

They sit and eat, and the conversation is lively. Traditional recipes are shared in an offhand manner. The girl knows that these kinds of recipes are not written down in any book nor can they ever be. You learn them by watching and doing never by reading or measuring. She knows she needs to make the time to watch and do, but who has the time for that these days?

The courses are all handmade from scratch or bought from places where they are handmade. Biscuits and sweets from the neighbour, homegrown roasted veggies, consume that has never seen the inside of a carton on the shelves of Safeway. Dessert fresh from the oven.

Old stories are told at one end of the table and new ones are told on the other.

The fruitcake comes out. Delicately sliced, moist pieces sitting gracefully next to the coffee pot and talk turns inevitably to the missing party.

"Did you eat the Panettone (Pah-neh-toh-neh) they gave at Christmas?"

uh oh, the Panettone story.

You wouldn't think that Panettone, a non-threatening airy, light, dry, traditional christmas fruitcake that is full of yum and a favourite of the girl would cause the problems that is has..

Eat it? As soon as I see it I throw it away!

How dare they! It's disgusting!

I cut mine and inside it was like a dough!

It was rotten! What are we, not good enough for fresh Panettone?

They keep it for two years and give it away at Christmas.

The accusations are shouted clearly into the small lit room and soon everyone is shouting and howling with laughter as the matron tells her story.

One year, they give me Panettone and I put it on the shelf. I buy the good Panettone for my friend but when we go to visit I realise that I have taken the bad Panettone by mistake. You can't go inside the house with nothing so I have to give the bad Panettone. You know what? My friend, she call me the next day and she says to me "You need to be careful where you buy your Panettone because this was not good". I never felt so ashamed so I call up Y and I tell her "you need to be careful where you buy the Panettone because you made a mistake with this one!"

Every year it is the same story with the Panettone. Bad food is a grave insult. Rotten one is a death wish.

But what to do about the case of the bad Panettone?

The girl has an idea.

At Christmas, no one makes any dessert. When they come with the Panettone you serve it that night and give them the first piece. You say "This is the Panettone that Y bought! Everyone enjoy" and then you see if they ever bring a bad Panettone again.

The family screams with laughter.

Revenge is the best medicine.

Felicita - Al Bano and Romina Power



Yes, yes this is quite possibly the un-cool song ever to grace my MM buuuut, it fits.

Labels: conversations, family, story

posted by M at 6:11 pm 24 comments

Do you ever have those days where you wake up irritated or sad? Maybe it's a girl thing. Maybe it's a me thing? You know it's going to be a bad day when you first notice you're still in your pjs and in bed, hugging your pillow and groaning just a little ..and it's 3pm. Where exactly did the day go?, you wonder to yourself as you venture beyond the bed to make some brunchinner.

Then, as you peruse the paper you kick yourself after reading about the terrorist and his list of goals that involve people and places to take down. Sure, one doesn't actually aspire to terrorism but you can't help being just a little envious of his drive and determination. Your list is just a little lacking:

buy house.
get happy.
replace fish? (might be a bit too painful).

And you can't seem to get even THEM happening. What is harder, assassinating Bill Clinton or buying a house on a single teachers salary? Don't answer that.

Then you realise that you're feeling a cold coming on and while it would be nice to venture out of the house and actually DO something worth talking (blogging) about you instead decide that bad TV and can be enjoyed from the confines of that funny little haven called home.

So now you have a plan. You mull it over while creating magnetic poetry on the fridge (not as nice as this one though) and doing a little doodling. Things seem okay until you start remembering your dreams - horrid little adventures which involve indoor hallway tennis with ex-teachers and chemistry classes for convicts.

Then it comes to you - this is the weekend where you have to see that side of your family you don't especially want to see. It all makes sense.

edit: stolen from Miss Frou Frou

My Catalogue card:



taken from

Labels: doing nothing much, family, in bed with the covers pulled over, mag poetry

posted by M at 6:58 pm 29 comments

We size each other up with nervous smiles on our faces - which is what tends to happen on first meetings. The questions I want to ask are inappropriate; my, those muscles are big - how often do you work out? and of course tell me everything about this family that no one ever talks about. The thing about these kinds of gatherings for me is that this side of my family is a mystery - every time I meet someone they are completely new, on a fleeting visit and usually unable to speak English so communication apart from hand gestures are out. One side gives me nightmares. The other side is an unknown quantity. This 'other side' are the side I never met, hear about, or even know the names of. Generations past of grandmothers, grandfathers, uncles, aunts and cousins I wouldn't know how to address if I ever met them - though so many have passed on. People I wouldn't know how to contact, even, baring names I can't pronounce and speaking a language I only ever heard through screaming conversations in through the phone line, circa 1987. Long distance. Telecom.

But here is one of them - who has not seen my mother in over 50 years and I am fascinated by the strong familial traits he and my mother share, the eyes are the same, the mouth is the same the expressions are ..uncannily the same. The traits have been diluted through my brother and I though - hardly in existence anymore - like the family itself. They speak at each other in broken English interspersed with the mother tongue. Leaving me clutching to the tail end of a conversation suddenly turned confusing.

I listen to the nostalgic recollections about the old monastery that was ruined by the communists and the brothers who lived there and made handmade cheese by a secret recipe; sold to the French after the war. Funny stories about my uncle building unique wooden sleds and sending my mother hurling down a snowy hill at a high speed, causing her to break her nose from the crash at the bottom. Family wars over soccer teams, with team colours painted on the trunks of trees outside the homes of non-supporters just to test their ire, and of course the ever explosive diatribes about political life in post war Europe. Everything is still emotional and things get personal very quickly for the inhabitants when a country is ruined and torn apart.

I try to build a memory bank of these things so that one day I have a reference point as to who I am.

Labels: family, wonderings

posted by M at 9:07 am 12 comments

Last night I had a dream that I sat down to dinner with my extended family, cousins, aunts, uncles etc and they all proceeded to tell me the things they hated about me. It wasn't good. When I woke up I lay there in my bed with the covers pulled up around my chin blocking out the cold morning and thought about it for a long time. The dream was quite timely considering that there have been a few family issues lately that I've somehow gotten involved in without actually *getting* involved. Maybe that's the problem and I need to get *more* involved but to be honest, I can't see the point. It's all infighting about issues that are not going to be resolved, they haven't been for too many years already. Anyway- the family issues have made me feel a little insecure (read: feeling like shit) and while that fact was probably the starting point of the dream, it still doesn't explain the content.

Anyway, the dream felt so real and I know enough about myself to know that when I have those kinds of "real" dreams that it's something I need to take note of because there is something I need to change or that something is about to knock my world about. I was almost late for school because of it. I know that dreams are important because they are what your mind tells you without all those walls we put up during waking life - and that can be pretty terrifying. I've got to wonder whether these mean things I heard (in the dream) are the things I tell myself or whether others really think them about me. I'm pretty hard on myself - and noone has ever told me anything to my face that I haven't already told myself (but worse) in my head.

The dream has put me completely on the back foot. I can't stop thinking about it.

Do you ever feel that sometimes no matter what ever you do, or say, or be it just won't be 'good enough' for some people?

Labels: dreams, family

posted by M at 4:40 pm 24 comments

I went and saw my cousin MT and her three boys today. I thought I was going to have a nice tea and chat. Nup. 15 minutes after putting the handbag down I'm out in the back yard playing kick to kick with J (who is 5 and is better than me in that he can actually 1) kick 2) mark the ball). Yeah, I was great. Whenever I went to kick the ball I got the top of my foot (you know the bit that HURTS) instead of my toes and my shoe would fly off into the backyard and actually go further than the ball.

Okay, so I am a complete unco when it comes to ball sports (must be why I'm still a spinster. eh EH? haha err..). Anyway - there were so many things I was crap at during PE, namely catching and throwing, running, kicking, being on a team, dribbling, batting, fielding, making a goal and keeping that up while all while desperately trying not to scream and duck when a ball came near me. I'm more a point your toes step-ball-kick then lying on the oval picking out cloud animals kind of girl. We're talking Wing Defense B-Team baby. Well, we can't ALL be jocks. I had other talents like...err.. well...come back to me. In fact I was so un-jock like even I had to roll my eyes at myself. I distinctly remember, year 10 PE running for second base in softball (how the hell did I get to second base? geez, that's amazing) when someone on the opposing team was hit with a softball to the head. I started heading for second base but ended up running off course and going to see if the girl was okay and giving her a hug. Yeah, I was really hated by my team that day. Even the PE teacher was gave me the you should be in special ed look.

Anyway, the point is that my 5 year old cousin kicked my arse while playing kick to kick today. He gave me the you should be in special ed look. Ahh, memories. Apart from J there's his little brother who is not yet two and the world's biggest tearaway. His hair is white blond and he has one of those impish grins that actually means he's up to no good. He squished cheese into the foorboards. ummahhh. I have a feeling he might end up the first president of this country with this attitude. I secretly love boy children more than girls (though would rather whip self with a length of barbed wire than teach a classroom full of them). They're hilarious and sort of clueless, much like their grown up counterparts.

After that I went to look at a house I came across on a website - and I really like it. Really, really like it - even though the bathroom is crap and the kitchen is weirdo, it has no aircon or heating and the house is about 100 years old and maybe, just maybe druggies hang out around the corner. Yeah, I'm a lost cause - but at least I found something I like. I think I also fell in love with the real estate agent who, wait for it, KNEW his stuff. He was good! He had an answer for every question which made him a little too smooth, however I applaud him for being knowledgable without coming across as the world's biggest prick. Congrats Mr Blonde Highlights. You are my new favourite real estate agent in the whole of Melbourne. Go eat a cookie.

Labels: family, house, sports, unco

posted by M at 8:24 pm 15 comments

When I was a little girl my nonna lived with us. She had blue/green eyes and powdery white hair. My dad had green eyes too. Sometimes in the light my eyes go green as well - but only two people in my whole life have ever noticed it. They are both people who have bothered to really look. I think a lot about that, looking and really looking. Sometimes I am surprised by the things that people don't notice about eachother.

My nonna had these amazing fingers. They were long and spindly and she was able to twist and manipulate them to make amazing things. She could crochet anything. Mostly she used cotton to crochet little round doilies and long thin table runners. I used to sit by her side watching the needle stab its way in and out quickly and effortlessly while she told me stories of her homeland in hushed whispers. She could also knitt and used to make me little tops I could wear. Once I went to the yarn store and was told I could pick any ball of wool I wanted and she would make a top for me out of it for my birthday. I picked a bright pink one with threads of silver sparkle running through it. The top was sleeveless and scratchy (because of the sparkle) but I wore it anyway. After I got too big for it I unravelled the work and kept the wool. I still have it somewhere. I plaited a whole bunch of it together and used it as shoelaces for my docs once upon a time.

At night, before dinner she would go into her little room and get out the rosary and pray on her knees. I used to get on my knees too, but I didn't know the words so I'd look up at the portrait of my grandfather instead and wonder who he was. Then I'd slide over her bed and play with the items on her bedside table. Little trinkets from her past. Pieces of jewellery, a lamp with a silky hanging fringe that I'd run my fingers over, back and forth until my mind went numb and all I knew was the tickles of silken thread across my fingertips.

My favourite piece was this little china jewellery box in the shape of a piano. Since I was piano girl, I loved that thing so much. My nonna said I could have it, but after she died my older cousins came and took everything, Everything. My little jewellery box was gone and all I had left were my memories of it. I can hardly write this without getting sad about it, even now. It was highly unfair, children have no power.

One of my earliest childhood memories is going on long walks with her. Long sunny day walks through the back streets commenting on the houses and naughtily picking flowers from the front gardens. Picked flowers from front gardens and wildflowers are my favourites, imperfect but sweeter smelling. Flowers are for more than just looking - people are too. I loved coming up with a posey of my very own and holding it up to my nose cherishing the sweetness as I skipped along beside nonna.

She used to spend hours making fresh pasta and I would be there beside her helping make the shapes of the orecchiette. My fingers were slow and clumsy next to her fast and adept ones. There was always flour everywhere. She wore a flowery large apron that went right over the top of everything, like an art smock. I wore a little white lacey one that didn't cover anything but looked fun. My impracticality meant that I always ended up with flicks of flour all over me, not unlike now - except with paint.

She didn't get on well with my mother. They didn't fight, not really - but there was a mutal dislike under the top layer of niceness, simmering. I don't really know why they didn't like eachother - except that they were both strong women with strong ideas about how things should be done. I guess that's what I can say for a lot of things in my life - underneath the surface the bubbles are dancing. They both liked pottering in the garden though and that probably was the only thing they shared, apart from my dad and us. I was often torn between loyalty towards my mother and loyalty towards my nonna. Sometimes she would use my brother and I to manipulate situations to her favour. I knew what was happening and I hated that. I can't even imagine how my dad felt about it all - or whether he even noticed. As we've already established, not everyone notices everything they should...or could.

Later on in her life and when I was nearing the end of my primary school years - my nonna had a stroke. She wasn't allowed to go on her long walks very often because I was too young to look out for her properly and my parents were always too busy to take the time to take her. I remember her frustration at being so old and treated like a child. She used to walk along my Billie Jean hallway instead - working out her discontended resentfulness up the length of the hallway and back again. It was sad.

After she died I used to hear her slippers shuffling up and down the cold tile hallway for a long time. When I'd check, there was never anybody there. There were other things too, perfumed smells where there was no perfume around, sounds in empty corridors. After a month it stopped and everything went back to normal.

Labels: family, memories, nonna, nostalgia

posted by M at 8:25 am 14 comments