063 Don't Forget To Go Slowly
On Aging Parents
There are two strands to this newsletter: the first is Creative Civility, which features personal essays. The second is Objects of Civility, which offers practical guides to joyfully disrupting what divides us. This is the first.
1.Going Home, Letting Go
In August I flew home to the Australian winter to accompany Mum on one of her "before I die" excursions — this time, to the Red Centre.
When I finally landed in my hometown it had been almost 30 hours since I'd left my apartment in Brooklyn. Mum usually sits right in front of the international airport's arrival doors in her bright red jumper, ready to jump up and greet me. But as the doors slid open she wasn't there.
A bit deflated, I rummaged through my carry-on and found my phone. "Oh don't worry! No rush!" I said brightly as Mum stammered that she was just in the carpark and coming up. "Stay where you are", she ordered.
I watched as Mum stepped off the travelator and took a few precarious steps before she was able to steady herself. Despite knowing all about her two operations the past year I was still stunned to see her wobbly on her feet.¹ Her torso, which now seemed to have a slight forward lean, donned a pink² jumper, not a red one. The red one having, unbeknownst to me, worn out a year or two earlier.
I took a deep breath and dived through an unexpected wave of grief. Then came up for air grinning. I ran over to mum, shrieking, and gave her a big hug. "Don't worry" I said as she flustered out apologies "I had a baggage claim miracle, that's why I'm out so early. It's a good thing."
As Mum drove us out of the carpark I watched her hand shake as she tried to put the ticket into the slot two or three times before it caught. As we finally drove past the raised boom gate I realized that this might be the last time she’d pick me up from the airport, it had become too stressful.
Again, I dove through a wave of grief. Again, I cheerfully came up for air.
“Should we go for a posh coffee on the way home?” I suggested. This is another of our fun traditions, laughing and drinking flat whites as I crack jokes loopy on jet lag.
But taking an extra stop on the way home seemed to overwhelm her now. And she was worried about her dog being left at home so early in the morning without going for a walk. Of all the people I know, Mum is the least likely to worry. Now she was almost fretting.³
Another wave. Another dive. Another gasp for air.
“I know,” I said. “Let’s go home and have a posh cup of tea and then take Frida for a walk.”
"Yes, that's a good idea," she cheered back.
¹Mum says on review of this writing: I told you you that you would be a bit shocked by the sight of me.
²Mum: It's not pink. It's a dark fuchsia, but I guess who can spell that?
³Mum: Rachel! It was a quarter past five in the morning! There would have been barely any coffee shops open!
2. Don’t Forget To Go Slowly
A week or so later we flew five hours to Alice Springs. From my window seat I gaped at the long red gashes of the MacDonnell Ranges cutting through the otherwise flat red desert that stretched to the horizon. The long thin rows of mountains looked like the Gods had dragged their fingers through the dirt.
In fact, as I would learn from the traditional owners of the land, the Arrernte people, the MacDonnell Ranges were formed by the Yeperenye (Caterpillar) Dreaming—giant caterpillars of ancient times who, after being defeated, became the mountains themselves.
A few mornings later we drove for an hour or two along the bottom of one of the ancient caterpillars to Standley Chasm. On the ground the desert wasn't just red (as it is from the air), but alive with greens and silvery grays. The Ghost Gums glowed an eery white, their trunks reflecting back the morning sun.
Then came the walking along the dirt track, cool in the morning shadows of the scrub. I offered Mum my arm when the trail sloped up, pivoted out in front of her to hold both her hands when it sloped down. By the end of our walk I could anticipate her steps, occasionally leaning down to lift her heel as we approached an unruly step. Together we moved like one of those giant kinetic beach sculptures: odd pieces shifting in unexpected unison, propelling a strange contraption forward.⁴
The 15-minute walk at Standley Chasm took us an hour and a half. We stopped at every wildflower, noticed the shifting morning light enflaming the red escarpments, and gasped as we spotted several ghost gums glowing and growing horizontally out of the rocky cliff.
People flew past us, then doubled back ten minutes later in their moisture-wicking hiking gear and lightweight daypacks. Most of them nodded their good mornings. Others gave us endearing smiles, you know the ones, heads tilted and eyes crinkled with kindness. And condescension.
We stood to the side as a young couple, their pores as smooth and glowy as the Ghost Gum trunks, bounded from boulder to boulder around us.
"Don't forget to go slowly sometimes!" I cheered after them. "You see so much more!"
"Yes!" Mum joined in. "You're missing all the flowers. You can miss everything if you go too fast."
The young man paused, and looked over his shoulder at us, his face cracked open with a moment of doubt. We smiled back at him like two loving old biddies.
Then we grinned wickedly at each other. We both loathe airs of superiority, especially people who mistake things like having a clean kitchen, or being extremely fit as an almost moral superiority. Which was not necessarily what this young man was doing. But even still we sensed we'd gotten underneath all of that and unnerved him a bit.
What was he missing by moving along the track so deftly?
What was his effectiveness costing him in life?
Perhaps it's he who should be envious of us?
I have to admit that I cackled, shot through with the pleasure of these thoughts.
It is true, Mum and I had no choice but to go slowly and tread very carefully. This meant we saw far fewer sights than most people. But we saw far more of the sights we saw. And we knew we were the luckier for it.
⁴ Mum: Oh for Goodness sakes! Me: Should I take it out? Mum: No, no, write what you want.
3. Video Appendix
At one point on another walk, we wedged Mum's backpack into the fork of a tree so she could kind of lean-hang there while I did a quick recce (Australian for reconnaissance):
Mum wanted to visit Uluru before she died. But I also have some things on my own "before she dies" list. One of them is learning how to make her Christmas cake. Here's a hilarious video of me trying to do that:
And here is the cake she sent me in the post (at great expense) last year. You’ll be pleased to know we made one together while I was home and I brought it back in my suitcase and am occasionally adding more rum to it via the pin sized shafts we made.
Until next time!
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Lovely!!
xx
Ahh, this is next level with your mum’s comments as footnotes ♥️♥️♥️