Tag: writing

Adelaide Markets

In my late teens, I spent most Saturday mornings at the Adelaide markets. It was where we did our weekly shopping for fruit and vegetables and met friends from other share houses. The markets were a grid of trestle tables laden with fresh produce and boxes underneath containing cauliflower leaves and silver beat stalks. The stall holders were loud middle-aged, leather faced men jostling with each other for customers.

There were only a few shops along the side, mainly delicatessens. One of my favourites was Greek and it had dozens of dried Yevani bunches of basil hanging on ceiling hooks. The shop sold vine leaves and other delicacies and I loved the smell of herbs that infused every corner of this tightly packed store.

After our weekly shopping trip, we headed to Victoria square. Most demonstrations started from this vantage point. We often took leisurely strolls through the city streets calling out slogans against uranium mining, for Aboriginal Land rights or made a general plea for peace. There was never any trouble; we marched with our vegetables, stood up for what we believed in and headed home.

I haven’t been back to Adelaide since the halcyon days of my youth when everything seemed possible, and change was in the air. It just turned out that the change that was coming was not what we had bargained for.

I felt disoriented when I walked into the markets this morning. My memory was playing tricks with me. I seemed to remember Victoria Square to my right but it is to my left. Then there is the market itself. It looks nothing like it did back then. I walked all the way around the perimeter looking for the Greek deli, but it has been replaced with trendy coffee shops ubiquitous in every Australian city.

Even the fruit and vegetable stalls look neater and have permanent signage above them. There are rows of cheese shops, coffee roasters and specialty stores selling everything from body lotions to boutique distillery gin. The rhubarb gin was delicious, although it felt very wrong to try it at 9:30 in the morning.  However, the charming salesman reminded me with a wink that it was 5pm somewhere in the world. This certainly wasn’t the markets I remembered from my youth.

I feel an odd unreciprocated nostalgia when I visit places where I have lived. It is as if the place has moved on, but I haven’t. At least not when it comes to my expectations of the familiar. I know the streets and can find my way around, yet I am disoriented. I search for a familiar building to find it has been replaced by a concrete box with offices. As I walk, I recognise that this is undisputedly Adelaide just not the way I know it. My Adelaide will always be locked away in my untrustworthy memory, made tender with age.

On the move again…

I was about to turn five and father and I were on the move again. This time, we were going to Kétegyháza, on the Southern Great Plain of south-east Hungary, near the Romanian border. Once there, my father looked for his brother-in-law, who was the director of an agricultural college. Uncle Attila lived in the caretaker’s house with his family. It must have looked like bucolic bliss.

‘Can she stay a while with you? It’s complicated right now. I’m trying to work out whether I can come home to Hungary and start afresh. There’s a lot to consider,’ my father confided to Attila.

‘Of course she can stay, Stephen,’ my uncle answered. ’She’s family and we always look after family.’

‘It’s only for a while,’ my father said and then he was gone again. I didn’t mind being left this time. I loved my time with Uncle Attila, Aunt Margot and their twelve-year-old son, Atti. My cousin and I adored each other from the moment we met. He treated me like his little sister and I saw him as the brother I’d never had. For Atti, I was a welcome distraction from his exacting parents and for me, he was nothing short of a demigod whom I idolised. For that one magic summer, we were inseparable.

It was fun to be in the country where I was allowed to play all day and make as much noise as I wanted. The house and garden seemed enormous after my time at my grandmother’s deathly quiet flat in Budapest. My stay seemed perfect in every way, and I honestly can’t remember missing my parents at all.

I followed Atti everywhere. Every morning we ran out of the house, climbed trees, played hide and seek. When we were tired, we lay down in meadows and watched clouds drift across the sky, I picked a riot of wildflowers for my aunt. There were so many that my fingers barely reached as I hugged the bunch to my chest. Everything about this summer was expansive like the soft blue sky above us.

In the evenings, I sat on the veranda and watched the colour of the sky change from pale blue to pink then orange and finally to ink. I inhaled the intense sweetness of lilac flowers and kept an eye on the light show in the sky. For hours I sat mesmerised watching uncle Attila whittle away at a piece of wood which would become a miniature blacksmith’s block with a tiny anvil on top. He also carved tiny hammers which made up the blacksmith’s set. I never tired of watching my uncle, although I did think at the time that the tools he made would be too small even for one of the seven dwarfs. Years after my uncle’s death, I would learn that he had made these intricate ornaments to supplement his income.

‘Let’s go and pick some apricots,’ Atti said, near the orchard at the back of their garden. ‘I know the best tree to climb. Catch me if you can!’

I ran after him barefoot. Knee deep in grass, I felt the soft blades brush against my calves. In the orchard dappled apricots hung heavily, ready for the taking. But then, inexplicably, agonising pain. Piercing pain shot shards up my left foot. I screamed.  Atti raced back to find me sitting in the grass, fat tears tumbling onto my cradled foot.

‘Show me,’ he said, and, ever so gently, he removed the bumblebee stinger.

I limped along beside him attuned to the drone of bees. Sure footed, Atti arrived at the orchard, reached up and picked ripe, freckled apricots. He ran back offering the sweetest antidote to a bee sting. One bite and the sting lost its power.

That summer passed far too quickly. It was almost time for Atti to return to school. I couldn’t imagine the house without the sound of his footsteps searching for me, inviting me to come and play. My aunt and uncle spoke about me in hushed tones and then, just like that, my father walked through the front door.

Fifty years later, my cousin Atti explained what had happened on that day. My aunt and uncle had desperately wanted another child and when I arrived on their doorstep, it was as if their prayers had been answered. They put their case convincingly to my father. If he allowed them to formally adopt me, I would not only stay within the wider family, but I would be assured of a secure future with excellent educational prospects and loving ‘parents’ to look after me. Uncle Attila, who was always self-assured, could also be loud and overbearing. No doubt, he clearly spelled out the advantages that my father could not provide. I think he made my father feel inadequate. Indignant, and above all proud, my father packed my few belongings and we left for the train station. In a little over three hours, we arrived in Vienna. He had a few leads to follow but besides those, he knew no-one.

In praise of adverbs

Read any advice on improving your writing and one of the first suggestions is: NEVER use adverbs! Really? Shall we go through the entire English literary canon and expunge them all? Poor Charlotte Bronte would fail this scrutiny in the first three paragraphs of Jane Eyre. Not even the Bard would pass such a stringent test. Frankly, the clarion call to delete a whole class of words from the written language is prescriptive drivel.

The reason given for avoiding adverbs at all costs is that it makes for lazy writing. A writer may use an adverb to tell us something about a situation rather than show us through elegant and descriptive writing. It may be considered lazy if that were the only strategy a writer has in their toolkit, in the same way that overused adjectives can also diminish writing.

But playing with adverbs can also be a lot of fun. Take Tom Swifties for example. I once made an 8-hour train ride pass ever so quickly as I wrote pages upon pages of Tom Swifties before the era of constant internet distraction. In case you’ve never heard of Tom, this character was Edward Stratemeyer’s invention. He was the protagonist of books written under the pen name of Victor Appleton. Tom Swift appeared in over a hundred science fiction and adventure stories for boys from the early 1900’s onwards. Characteristically, Tom would say something before a cleverly placed adverb made a pun upon his remark. One of the original examples is, ‘We must hurry,’ said Tom Swiftly. Since then, these kinds of puns have been called Tom Swifties.

I modestly offer a small selection for your enjoyment:

‘It simply isn’t true, your Honour!’ said Tom judgmentally.

‘The bottle is half full,’ said Tom optimistically.

‘The bottle is half empty,’ said Tom pessimistically.

‘That’s beside the point,’ said Tom tangentially.

‘Open wide!’ said Tom obtusely.

‘Turn the air-con on,’ said Tom heatedly.

‘That’s R rated,’ cried Tom passionately.

‘Hands up and freeze!’ said Tom coldly.

‘I’m making my first curry,’ said Tom gingerly.

‘Fire!’ yelled Tom alarmingly.

‘I love Picasso,’ said Tom abstractly.

‘I prefer Ariel to Times Roman,’ declared Tom boldly.

‘The tablet is stuck in my throat,’ said Tom bitterly.

‘Wedgie!’ cried Tom briefly.

‘Lemon, lime and bitters?’ asked Tom cordially.

‘She’s such a bitch,’ Tom insisted doggedly.

‘I don’t like seafood,’ said Tom crabbily.

‘That must be Robyn,’ said Tom chirpily.

‘I was at the Queen’s funeral,’ said Tom majestically.

‘Shaken, not stirred,’ said Tom drily.

‘I’m just not that into you,’ said Tom flaccidly.

‘Adverbs, I wouldn’t be without them,’ said Viktoria absently.

The Blue Mountains Writers’ Festival

I have wanted to attend the Blue Mountains Writers’ Festival for many years. Each year as the dates approached, I found a ‘reason’ why I couldn’t go.

What about the animals while I am away?

I can’t justify spending the money this year.

I should have gone when I was living in the mountains, now it’s too late.

It will take me at least two and a half hours to get there.

I don’t belong to a writerly crowd.

Who am I to think I can go to an event like this?

When I examined each of these thoughts in turn, I realised that I was shying away from the real reason I never went. I felt awkward attending an event on my own and I didn’t want to face discomfort. It was never about the event per se, but the intervals where people stand with their friends, chatting, laughing and having a good time.

I am not someone who can walk into a room and start a conversation. I usually stand on my own like a shag on a rock staring into a drink or trying to focus on some detail on the wall. I could distract myself with my mobile, and sometimes I do, but I am so appalled by such behaviour in others that I can’t bear resorting to it.

Yet if I have a role, I can be gregarious and helpful. I don’t even mind talking to a crowd of people over a microphone. Speaking to a group of two hundred doesn’t faze me at all, it is small groups that I find terrifying. Give me something to do and I will do it. Consequently, you often find me either at the food table or taking plates around, which legitimately allows me to approach people.

This year I decided to become savvy. The moment I saw a request for volunteers, I put up my hand. I was thrilled to be accepted. It meant I could spend some time wearing an official T-shirt and lanyard which would give me a role and I would also have time to attend events. It’s what Stephen Covey calls a Win/Win.

It turned out to be much better than that. I met wonderful volunteers with whom I could converse easily, I chatted to speakers informally in the Green Room and I contributed to an event that was an important and enriching experience for everyone. The volunteer role enabled me to start conversations and, as my confidence grew, I continued to seek out more opportunities.

The more I let my vulnerabilities show, the more others disclosed their own sensitivities. Our conversations moved from the superficial to the deeply personal and established connections which I hope will continue well past the festival weekend. It made me realise how important it is to find my own ‘tribe.’

Then there were the writers. The ones I heard spoke with honesty, often self-deprecating humour, and they were generous with their time. There were many sessions running concurrently, which meant I inevitably missed some brilliant speakers. It was a sentiment I heard echoed in the hallways wherever I went. So, although I had some trepidation about attending, by the end of the weekend, I felt energised, inspired and comfortable in my own skin.

I am grateful to Varuna for organising such an eminent event and for their staunch support of Australian writers.

Empty Nest

Ten days ago, I sent off my completed memoir for a manuscript assessment. I have been working on this project consistently since January 2019. It has, however, occupied my thoughts for many years before I was ready write the first sentence.

For someone who has devoted years to this project, the past ten days have felt like an eternity. Does it have merit? How many more edits will it require before I can approach a publisher? Where do I even begin with this next chapter of letting my manuscript go? And the most important question of all – what now?

For three years, I have conducted research, worked on individual scenes, pursued emerging patterns and themes. Several times I have read the manuscript cover to cover and have cut and polished and cut some more. Through this process I have jettisoned some 20,000 words to distil it to its essence. I don’t know whether I have succeeded.

I have put my heart and soul into writing. There were months when words dried up like ink in a misplaced pen. The less I wrote, the more arid my inner landscape became. Then I found my way to a state of flow through the London Writers’ Salon. Once I committed to writing daily, the words cascaded on the page and I completed my first, second and third drafts. I fantasised about working part-time to devote more energy to writing. I wanted a new rhythm to my days and spend happy hours in companionable silence over Zoom with writers from around the world.

But what now? As I am approaching the end of this project, I feel something akin to grief. What if I have nothing more to say? What do I do then? For someone who has the urge to write each day, this is a distressing thought. I have nursed and watched my memoir grow, but it is time to let this fledgling find its wings. When it does, I will have to let it go.

I have no idea how any of this works. Perhaps I need to have more faith. Perhaps I simply need to show up each day. Or perhaps the muse only visits those who have an empty nest to offer.

The Artist’s date

Last month I watched a live interview with Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way. I had read the book five years ago and began writing morning pages. I thought that was a good enough start and resisted putting her other tools to use. It worked for a while and then I lost my way.

After struggling for years with writing a memoir, I came across the London Writers’ Salon. Joining that supportive group of writers has enabled me to commit to daily writing and within a few short months, I have been able to finish the manuscript. I am now in the throes of editing, editing and editing. Who knows how many more edits will be required to make this little gem shine.

Listening to Julia Cameron I realised I needed to revisit the Artist’s Way and recommit to some of her principles. My morning pages were going well but as for the rest of it, I could see I was avoiding key pieces of her advice. Like the artist’s date for example.

Commit yourself to a weekly artist’s date, and then watch your killjoy side try to wriggle out of it.

She was right of course. The idea of an artist’s date is to allow yourself at least two hours a week to have a playdate with yourself, to do something that brings joy and is self-nurturing. It has to be a solitary activity, but dogs are permitted.

The first week I took Zoë to the Botanic Gardens in Orange. I found solace in walking in the rain and enjoyed finding various paths that led to different areas for me to explore. I then wanted to complete the date with lunch at their café, but I was 15 minutes late. Disappointed, I had a piece of cake I didn’t really want. Annoyed at myself, I drank my tea, ate the cake, and left. I wasn’t so sure that this had been a successful date but was willing to have another go the following week.

The next Saturday I began to wriggle and squirm. Still, I was determined to do it. I found that my local cinema was showing Ticket to Paradise with Julia Roberts and George Clooney. Why not? So, I went to see it. Surprisingly, I felt quite comfortable on my own in the cinema but was less than impressed with the movie. The plot was so predicable that I worked out the ending within the first five minutes. Ho hum.

Yesterday, I decided to go for a drive up Mt Canobolas with Zoē. We drove the potholed roads past stunning wineries and beautiful homes. Then I turned left onto the windy road up to the summit only to find that it was closed for redevelopment. I did a three-point turn and headed towards Mt Canobalas Lake instead.

I noted that the café was open, but decided to walk around the lake first. Zoë had to stay on her lead which she didn’t mind as she had plenty of interesting smells to explore. I quite liked being out on the track on my own. There were interesting cloud formations and new growth on trees which I photographed. Yet I was restless within me, even though this was exactly the kind of activity that always soothed my soul. I think I was about three quarters of the way around the lake before I stilled my mind and relaxed into the activity. Time for a cup of tea, I thought. But once again, I missed the opening hours by 15 minutes. Is this an omen?

I have no idea what I will do next week. I’m running out of ideas. There are a couple of art galleries I could visit or maybe there is a free course I can attend. A week to go and I can feel the struggle already.

You are likely to find yourself avoiding your artist dates. Recognise this resistance as a fear of intimacy – self intimacy.

Ok Julia I hear you, but let me tell you, the struggle is real.

Seppi the crocodile man

My parents were refugees from Hungary. They left their home country in 1956 with my sister who was six at the time. She still remembers running through forests with gun fire echoing around her. They made it across the border to Austria where they were placed in a refugee camp. My parents never spoke about their experiences of 1956 in the same way they hardly ever spoke about the war years unless it was some amusing anecdote. Whatever happened then was in the past and there was an invisible red line drawn across the page to separate it from the present. Everyone in my family abided by this rule. It was only when I began to search for information of these years that I discovered that Luxembourg had accepted 250 Hungarian refugees. My parents and my sister would have been part of that elite group. This had happened four short years before I was born.

By 1957, Luxembourg could boast that the refugees they had accepted had quickly found permanent employment, specialising mainly in handicrafts. My father was one of these skilled workers. He quickly established himself as a leatherworker who could make bespoke leather handbags of the finest quality. By 1960, he had his own shop which he ran with a silent partner. It was one of the finest boutiques in Luxembourg, specialising in crocodile skin handbags.

The individually crafted handbags he made were placed ever so carefully in the shop window or hung from hooks along one of the wood-panelled walls. A large crocodile skin hung on the opposite side. I loved looking at that crocodile skin and the shapes I could see and feel when I ran my fingers along the bony scutes. I felt the bumpy ridges and smoothness in between. The skin was black and shiny and didn’t look anything like the small stuffed crocodile on the gramophone cabinet in our lounge room. That crocodile was a baby crocodile with short feet and sharp teeth. Its skin was a dull grey and quite bumpy to touch. It was a present from Seppi, the crocodile man.

Seppi only came once or twice a year to sell his crocodile skins and I couldn’t wait until he bounced into the living room, full of stories of the Sahara and the Nile. He spoke of faraway lands in Africa where he saw nothing but sand for days on end. When he was in Africa, he drove a jeep and hunted crocodiles. He told captivating stories about being thirsty and constantly almost running out of water. I sat on his lap and listened to his stories until they mixed with the stories I invented for him. When Seppi was away, I came up with my own adventures for him in that mythical place called Africa. Whenever I saw him, he always chewed gum and I began to save sticks of chewing gum I sometimes found on the kitchen table. I loved Seppi with all my heart and told him that I couldn’t wait to grow up and marry him. He laughed and said,

‘You’ll have to do a lot of growing, young lady,’

and gave me a bear hug before leaving on another one of his long trips. I often thought of Seppi chewing gum as he drove his jeep over sand dunes, looking for the next oasis. At night, I saw the crocodiles he would hunt, swimming in the river of my dreams.

Adolphe Sax or why I love memoir

Photo by Molnár Bálint on Unsplash

I am fascinated by memoirs and biographies. When reading novels, we understand the need to suspend disbelief, but true stories are often stranger than fiction. Take the life of Adolphe Sax who invented the Saxophone. If an author had made him the protagonist of a novel, we would think they were prone to exaggeration.

Born in 1814 in Belgium, Sax was accident prone. It strikes me as implausible that the man could have lived to the ripe old age of 80. He was hit on the head by a cobble stone which sent him careering into a river, yet he didn’t drown. He somehow survived poisoning several times over after drinking acidic water which looked like milk. He came close to dying several times, sleeping in rooms where furniture varnish was left to dry. He fell onto a hot frying pan, burned himself again in an explosion, swallowed a pin and fell from the height of three storeys onto his head. Yet he survived them all, invented the saxophone, and for his troubles lived out his life in penury. Voltaire may have pulled off such a ridiculous plot but not many others could.

This is what I love about people’s lives. The twists and turns, sliding door moments, disasters and moments of divine intervention that are both implausible and believable at the same time. We trust in them because we have experienced something similar in our own lives. We run into an old friend thousands of kilometres from home, we meet a stranger who is destined to be the love of our life or conversely, an accident turns our life upside down. Our experiences are joyous, humbling, exhilarating, painful and unfair, but they all allow us to learn and grow.

Reading a memoir gives me a window into someone else’s struggle and the lessons they have learnt. Writing my own memoir allows me to reflect on my own experiences and try to make sense of them. We are meaning making creatures and we need our personal narrative to make sense.

Writers’ Hour by London Writers’ Salon

There are many disciplined writers, but I am not one. There have been weeks, sometimes months when all I have done is to agonise about writing but get a single word down. And then there have been times when I have found that magic state of flow. Inevitably, a busy period at work throws a spanner in the works and I fall out of the habit.

A few months ago, my friend Margaret Paton, who single-handedly organises the Central West Writers’ Group, put up a post on our Facebook page.

Writershour.com – Daily Writing Sessions. Brought to you by London Writers’ Salon.

I was intrigued. It took me a while to work out that there were in fact several writers’ hours, all held between 8 and 9 am around the world. The one in London is between 5pm and 6pm Australian Eastern time, while the New York hour comes on at 10pm to 11pm. As I am night owl, I tend to catch the New York session but sometimes I am lucky enough to be home by 5 to take part in the London session.

The concept is deceptively simple. Writers log onto Zoom at the specified hour, a host mutes the conversation and welcomes us all. There is an explanation of the process: we are to type our intention for the next 50 minutes into the chat pod and some of these are read out. We may be sitting isolated from each other yet there’s a definite feeling of community. We are all comforted by the couple of hundred people sitting in their own space, all engaged in the writing process and experiencing similar struggles and joys.

The host reads out an inspiring quote, we raise a glass of water or cup of tea and off we go, keeping our cameras on for extra accountability, or not. After fifty minutes, a voice gently invites us back into the ‘room’. We use the chat pod to say how we went, whether we reached our goal for the hour and how we felt. One or two people are randomly chosen to report back before we say goodbye. It is as simple as that.

Since coming across the London Writers’ Salon, I write every day. I am beginning to recognise faces and love the way we encourage each other. I feel part of this wonderful world-wide community and best of all, I have written many thousands of words. I only wish I had come across the London Writers’ Salon when they first went online during lock down. Since then, they have grown exponentially. There aren’t many positives I can point to when it comes to Covid, but the Writers’ Hour is definitely one. I have finally found my community and reawakened my enthusiasm for writing.

For the past three years I have struggled with writing my memoir. Within a few months of regularly attending Writers’ Hour, I have completed my first draft and I’m now using my daily writing habit for editing. I never thought I could say that I’m looking forward to when my book is published. Thanks to the London Writers’ Salon, that day is now within reach.

Scooby

My mother’s first job in Australia was at the ABC in Ripponlea back in 1972. She worked at the canteen where she served meals, made cups of tea, and cleared tables. My mother often took me to work so she could keep an eye on me. Naturally, I was bored and began chatting to the staff when they came down for their break. It was there that I met Leigh, a young university student doing a work placement over the summer holidays. She took a liking to me, and we spoke about many things that summer, including our love of dogs. Leigh lived with her parents in Ferntree Gully and owned a kelpie.

‘Kelpies are Australian dogs. They’re the best,’ she said. ‘Would you like to come and meet him?’

‘Would I ever!’ I said

‘I’ll have a talk to your mum. Maybe you could come over this weekend to meet him,’ she suggested.

Leigh kept her word and arrived the following Saturday to collect me in her Mini Minor. My parents hadn’t owned a car since I was five and I felt grown up and important sitting in the front seat. At that time, I had seen very little of Melbourne and only knew the places in my immediate environment, places I could walk to easily. We drove for what seemed like hours, down straight roads and through endless suburbs. Finally, we came to a house up on a hill. The driveway was steep and treeless. A sleek brown kelpie ran to meet us, barking and nipping at the wheels. When Leigh stepped out of the car, he could barely be contained. His tail wagged his whole body. This dog was loyal, smart and a whole lot of fun. I wanted a dog just like him.

Leigh and I hatched a plan to get a rescue pup.

‘I won’t be allowed to keep it, Leigh’

‘Leave it to me, I’ll talk to your mum.’

I wasn’t so sure. ‘What if she says no?’

She laughed. ’I’m pretty good at convincing people.’

Leigh worked her magic on my mother, and I was finally allowed to go with her to the Lort Smith animal home in North Melbourne. We drove from the ABC during one of her long breaks. Going in the car with Leigh always felt like an adventure. We drove down St Kilda Road all the way into the city, then past Queen Victoria markets and up Flemington Rd. Everything was so new to me. The modern office blocks on St Kilda Rd, Flinders Street station with its open mouth reminding me of the entrance to Luna Park on the St Kilda Esplanade and the smells wafting from Victoria markets were all new sights and sensations. I could have driven around town with Leigh for hours, but I was anxious to get my new pup.

When we finally arrived, we were taken to where dogs were kept in what looked like large cages. The sound of dogs barking, whining, and howling echoed along the concrete walls. The result was a cacophony of misery. Walking along, I felt as if I were a warden in a prison, just like I had seen on our black and white television set. It was a depressing scene to witness. Dogs came to the front of their cages and pleaded with us for their freedom. I found it hard to meet their gaze. And then there was the foul odour of too many dogs in a confined space. It smelled like wet dog, excrement, and fear. It may have been cleaned regularly but the smell crept into every corner and was impossible to eradicate.

Finally, we came to an enclosure teeming with tiny black and tan pups. The warden with the key opened the gate and we were let in.

‘Go and choose one,’ Leigh said. ’Take your time and choose the one you like best.’

There were about ten puppies in the enclosure. It was feeding time. The pups all ran towards the trough and the strong ones pushed the weaker ones aside. One small pup with a protruding belly was trying to get to the food but was not strong enough to muscle in. It looked sad and forlorn. My heart went out to that pup.

‘This is the one I want,’ I said, pointing at it.

‘Are you sure?’ Leigh asked.

‘Yes, this is the one that needs me.’

The pup was taken for a check-up at the veterinary hospital attached to the facility. The vet looked at us.

‘Are you sure you want to take this one? It looks as if he could have distemper, and he may not survive,’ he said gravely.

‘He is the one I want.’ I said with tears welling in my eyes. ‘If he dies, at least he will be loved until that time.’

The vet looked apologetically at Leigh.

‘We’ll take him,’ she said.

‘Look, if he dies in the next couple of weeks, we’ll give you another one,’ said the vet. What will you call him?’

‘Scooby,’ I said. ‘Like Scooby-do.’ It had been my favourite cartoon when I lived in England.

Leigh paid not only for the dog but also for his vet bills. It must have cost her a packet. Despite everyone’s concerns, Scooby pulled through and lived to a ripe old age.

My mother stopped working at the ABC and Leigh went back to university. After that summer, I lost contact with her. Even now, so many decades later, I wish I could express my gratitude to her for the kindness and generosity she showed to that little migrant girl in her fledgling months in Australia.

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