What can I say? A flippant email from Redhead resulted in a spike protein of love and caring and ended in hours of fun and laughter.
All because she missed her " boy ".
Let me tell you the story.
Redhead misses her " boys ". You know the sort - the ones who are about 70 years old but still get treated like they are 5. I am the daughter, the naughty lady from Shady Lane, the youngest of the pack. I live just up the road from Redhead. My brothers live in New Xiland. We ( Mum and I ) live in the Peoples Republic of Australia aka South China.
Mum sent an email to one of my brothers across the Tasman Sea, fondly referred to as " the Ditch " and lamented that he was no longer here in Oz and she misses him. She said that his pruning abilities in the garden were missed and she was looking forward to his return in about May so that he could chop a few branches, trim a few shrubs and help her out with the ice cream supplies in the freezer.
What happened next was astonishing.
Within hours, Redhead received a call from one of my brother's friends who lives down the sunny coast, announcing that he and his lady friend wanted to pop in for a cuppa. Then an email from a lovely lady who thinks my brother is the bee's knees and he feels the same. Could she come for a catchup?
Both wanted to help in the garden.
Redhead was quite surprised at this sudden outpouring of gardening gangs who wanted to spend their Sunday swooning over her soil and sweating in the sun with weeds and troublesome flora.
It seems that my brother took Mum's email about weeding and pruning seriously. He sent out an SOS.
Now, this is not to say that the two parties are strangers to Redhead's home. Quite the contrary. They are regular visitors. But to turn up with gardening gloves and pruning shears was slightly different to the normal cake and a few lamingtons.
Mind you, they still came with cakes, fresh pineapple and a large quantity of hugs. All of them gratefully and happily received by Redhead. One has a Blue Tongued Lizard and she, and her lizard, were welcomed with warm delight.
So what on earth is my point you ask?
Well, here it is.
Mum, Redhead, also known as she who must be obeyed, still lives in her own home. She has this rare thing at nearly 90 years of age. It is called INDEPENDENCE.
She has someone mow her lawn, tend her major gardening issues and climb up the ladder to clean her ceiling fans. A retirement home or care home is not in her inbox and the mere suggestion would be consigned to the junk box or treated as hate mail.
A light hearted comment in an email to my brother that said " why aren't you here to do my pruning? " did not convey the message that she intended. Which was, of course " I miss you. "
Instead, she was delighted to spend a day with friends of the family and, yes, some pruning was done. Pruning of frustration and anger. Bewilderment at what is going on.
She pruned the branches of trees of governmental deceit. She pruned the dead twigs and dying leaves of ignorance and together, they all snipped their anger at being lied to and treated as garden waste.
It was a good day.
A day to remind us all that we do not need to be 90 to need a few pruners to pop in and help out.
The trees and shrubs in our gardens could do with a bit of love and it strikes me that Redhead is a lucky woman indeed.
I will leave you with this.
By the way, Redhead and her late husband used to entertain people in Nursing Homes.
There have not been any entertainers in care homes since the pandemic began. That is beyond tragic, It is criminal.
How many people are in wreck homes, considered retarded and locked up?
Read it and then consider:
Is this funny? Or is it more true than any of us care to think.
After Christmas, a teacher asked her young pupils how they spent their holiday away from school.
One child wrote the following:
We always used to spend the holidays with Grandma and Grandpa.
They used to live in a big brick house but Grandpa got retarded and they moved to Batemans Bay where everyone lives in nice little houses, and so they don't have to mow the grass anymore!
They ride around on their bicycles and scooters and wear name tags because they don't know who they are anymore.
They go to a building called a wreck centre, but they must have got it fixed because it is all okay now. They do exercises there, but they don't do them very well.
There is a swimming pool too, but they all jump up and down in it with hats on.
At their gate, there is a doll house with a little old man sitting in it. He watches all day so nobody can escape. Sometimes they sneak out, and go cruising in their golf carts!
Nobody there cooks, they just eat out.
And, they eat the same thing every night --- early birds.
Some of the people can't get out past the man in the doll house. The ones who do get out, bring food back to the wrecked centre for pot luck.
My Grandma says that Grandpa worked all his life to earn his retardment and says I should work hard so I can be retarded someday too.
When I earn my retardment, I want to be the man in the doll house. Then I will let people out, so they can visit their grandchildren.
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