“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity…”
Charles Dickens – A Tale of Two Cities
That line, written over 160 years ago, is still so very potent. The big picture of life in the Twenty First Century (the future is nigh!) has been a frenzy of weirdness. Fanatical belief in things that are demonstrably absurd. In the midst of these sweeps of history, my little life has been an echo of the big movements.
The year 2019 opened in hope. I was booked in to what I hoped would be a milestone workshop in April. This was my dream, to build momentum in my writing and publishing. This workshop promised a look behind the veil of Australian publishing. Five days of focus on the craft of writing, the business of publishing and a precious opportunity to network with other authors and even (*squee*) that rare breed, commissioning editors.
My father had been in hospital throughout December 18 and released to spend Christmas with the family. It was fractious. Hot weather, worry, money troubles, wayward children – our family had our share of them all that Christmas. We did our best to celebrate, to savour the time together in busy lives that are spread far and wide. My mum and dad made plans for more travel, for their retirement together in their 51st year of marriage. We all got on with life, working in jobs that drained us but meant we could pay the bills, all the normal things. But Dad wasn’t normal, his cancer was now silently beginning to outrun the treatments. None of us knew.
The workshop in April was inspiring. Started by Bryce Courtenay and then passed to Fiona McIntosh it is focussed on ‘commercial fiction’. That’s trade lingo for books that normal people like reading (i.e. books that make money) as distinct to ‘literary fiction’ which might win an award and be on a reading list for a class but isn’t necessarily going to earn the writer a living. Sometimes people call them Airport Books – things you grab because you know what you’re getting and you know you’ll enjoy it. My only published work is poetry, my blog for years has been philosophical, occasionally spiritual. I overthink things. Chronically. I wanted, no *needed* a reset. I didn’t do very well at the workshop, my sample chapter was cliched and eye-rollingly bad, I made a poor impression on the editor. I was inspired to try again. I’d work harder, I’d juggle the ambitions and the job and my relationship and as to my health, well I’d get to that when I could, and maybe some housework. There was to be a conference in October – I’d be ready for it. Double down.
Dear reader, you know how this story goes, don’t you? My proud father, frail and belittled by the cancer, collapsed one day in May and couldn’t get up. Back to the hospital he went, we all visited, we worried, we bickered and bargained. If this – then that. Cancer ignored us. Let’s give it the name. Melanoma was the leader, although he had a couple of others vying for their foothold. Red hair, pale skin, his is Scottish ancestry, vulnerable here in the antipodes. His was a life outdoors doing manual labour and from an era where hats were old fashioned and tans cool. He never tanned. Like him, I just turn an ever-deeper shade of angry red. Since his death, I’ve been almost obsessed with staying out of the sun. I’m indoors, nocturnal if possible, but I jump ahead. Not by much.
May to July is a blur. I started staying with my parents for three and four days a week to help with the hospital, the housework, the information that never seems to be enough. Being there to hold mum in the nights. Telling dad whenever I could that I loved him, didn’t want him to worry about us. Seeing the weekly and then daily diminishments in him. August came and by then we knew the names of the team in the Palliative Care Ward (thank you 4G). We put banners and posters up in his room for his birthday and he and mum had their 51st anniversary in amongst the bustle of the ward. By Father’s Day he couldn’t open his food packets without help, he was on the wait list now for the hospice. We’d given up on the idea of him coming home. He’d wanted it desperately for a while, and so did mum but the physical reality of his organ failure and incapacity meant we depended on the infrastructure of the ward, the skills of the staff, the kind-hearted and professional strangers who understood our horror, grief and fear, and could hold us through it. Watching him fight and fade anyway was a sobering privilege, a burden and gift. My sisters and I bore witness to him and his fight. We each spent hours with him, holding his hand, having the conversations we could. Each of us, our own journey tied closely to his. Cousins, friends, neighbours, people came to say goodbye if they could. Bittersweet connections.
September 13th 2019 he was gone. It is four months later now and as I write that I cry all over again. HIs room in the hospice has over taken my memory – there was the sound of the traffic outside, afternoon light that came in through the blinds and that nightingale floor that we worried so much about but that never disturbed him. The shutdown sped up, we had a few days after he could no longer speak when we were confident he could still hear us. Over and over I told him I loved him, tried not to cry where he could hear. In hindsight, you note the lasts. The last drive we had together, the last time we played our ukuleles together and sang his favourite songs. Oh Dad. My sister was there that last night. She felt the change. Knew. The funeral company they let us know that he was “in their care.” It was a comfort that they used that expression. Words, so powerful. I generally avoid euphemisms, but people were just being respectful of our pain, and I’m grateful for that, especially for my mum. The funeral on the 20th, a huge crowd, and we toasted him farewell. Closed casket. Dad had hated how gaunt the cancer had made him and the melanoma had targeted him visibly. We all wanted to remember him alive, cheeky, happy.
Watching him die it felt like an eternity of suffering. Then I might take in the date and wonder how could this happen so fast? There’s a week, then two, after the funeral, a weird temporal anomaly where we all relived the last week or two of his life. Checking in with each other. Is it real? How are you? By this time it was a code. ‘One day at a time’ meant okayish. ‘One meal at a time’ was much less okay.
October, the conference I’d been so excited about, my hopes. It all felt a long way away, a dream I’d mostly forgotten. Prepaid, the deadline for cancelling had been early September. I’d been busy elsewhere. I was exhausted, completely depleted and now back in Adelaide driving strange roads into the unknown. I didn’t dare feel hopeful. I didn’t know if there could be a win in this for me. Maybe just going was the win. Getting out of pyjamas. Leaving the house. Of course, it was great. The first of its kind in Australia and jam packed with thoughtful, kind, creative people all eager to share their ideas, their paths to success and the tools and tips they used. More editors, more booksellers, a gathering of the industry. Compassionate people, ready to encourage. It was inspiring. I pitched a new idea and the premise was well received. It was a win.
November and surely that’s long enough I thought. I can get back into it all. Kick off my new novel, get some work done. I got the overdue paperback of the poetry book finished and out. I started a draft and got about 18 000 words done. The anniversaries started. A year since my dog had died. A year since dad went into hospital and we found out the truth of his cancer. I lost my sh*t. Back into the pyjamas. Bouts of productivity, and then grief, guilt, tears. A weird, almost schizophrenic lifestyle. Binging alternately on creative bursts and then zombie time in front of the tv or social media.
I was quietly dreading Christmas, another anniversary, that last one so emotionally wrenching at the time and still echoing. Dad was cremated wearing the shirt he wore last Christmas day. That kept popping into my mind. Did I think that like Scrooge he might reappear to haunt us? Did I think the shirt was a talisman? No. It was just the kind of thing an anxious mind will worry at until it hurts. Like those nervy dogs that lick their leg until a sore appears and then lick it more hoping it will go away. I made myself focus on thanking the people who had been supportive through the year, cards or notes, emails, messages. Focus on the kindness, so many people were so incredibly wonderful. I noticed the outside world, again full of weirdness and hardship. Fires began here in Australia that were mindbogglingly ferocious. On Christmas day, in our corner of the country, we got rain. Soothing, soaking rain. The best gift we could have received. It let us all be quiet, grateful for what we have and for being together. Even a little bit hopeful.
And then, in an act of faith and hope, I went to one more writer’s conference. Just one day. Monday 30th December, about 130 people. The prerequisite preparation was hours of presentations via you tube. Doing the homework in time to attend took planning and diligence. It grounded me. This was a publishing and business education, there were specific actions that I needed to do, and a lot of them needed to be done in order. I didn’t know anybody there, but I felt like I belonged. I’m a beginner in their eyes, not quite underway, and I was welcomed and encouraged. We talked tax. We talked spreadsheets and how to minimise international transfer fees. Beautiful, boring details about how to make advertising return your investment. Glorious specifics on split-testing blurb conversions. This was the other side of the industry. Indie publishers are amazing, talented people and they’re generous too. A rising tide lifts all boats. Well I am boat ready for the tide to come in. I’ve got my oars out, rowing towards my destination. Blisters are sweet when you’re confident the work to earn them meant something.
If you read to here, to January, then thank you. You’re my people. Please give me a follow or sign up for my newsletter so we can stay in touch. This is an unusually personal (and possibly self-indulgent) post but it stands in for an otherwise silent year. I felt you deserved something other than the aging promise I’d made that ‘there’s something new on the way’. We use the phrase ‘life happened’ as a password for things that take priority over plans we’d made. Well in 2019, it was death that happened, and the plans got put to one side.
In 2020 I want to make things for you. I want to give you stories that entertain, that make you feel, that you’ll want to share with friends. Maybe stories that help you face your own life or weird times, stories you might read during your pyjama days. That’s my intention. I hope you have a healthy, wealthy and wise 2020 filled with meaningful connection. Thanks for reading. xx
