Grey Nomads

Growing up in the 1960’s I recall all the historic events of the day played to the sound track of a monotonous click clack, click clack, click clack; knitting needles a blur, as my mother’s nibble fingers wove their magic.

“This is Brian Henderson, live from the studios of TCN Nine” click clack, click clack… “President Kennedy has been shot”, click clack, click clack… “The Beatles have touched down in Australia”, click clack, click clack… “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah”, click clack, click clack… “I have a dream!”, click clack, click clack… “Choppers flying into Nui Dat” click clack, click clack, “Harold Holt is missing” click clack, click clack…. “One small step for a man”, click clack, click clack… “one giant leap for mankind” click clack, click clack.

I can still picture my mum perched on our very modern black and white sofa, beneath her version of a Kandinski abstract that she had artistically rendered on the base of our old playpen, surrounded by balls of wool.

As a young child I would spent hours at her knees observing her knit until, at the age of four, I nagged her into casting a few stitches onto a pair of knitting needles for me and so I learnt to knit. With my little fat fingers I was no match for her agility but still I managed, in my awkward style, though my first endeavours more resembled Venetian lace than the rows of neat little chevrons my mum produced. Gradually I became more proficient and I outfitted all my dolls with leftover scraps of wool.

Money was hard to come by back in those days and my mum, who was born during the great depression, took recycling seriously. The jumpers she knitted for my elder sister were handed down to me 12 months later and when I outgrew them they were fastidiously unravelled. I remember, as a small child, sitting on a kitchen chair opposite my mother, while she wound the wool into skeins around my out stretched hands, held about 30 cm apart. I loved to watch it unfurl from its knitted form, all kinky from the years it had spent confined in a garment, washed and worn and washed again innumerable times. The skeins of limp wool were then laundered and hung out to dry on our Hill’s hoist. By the time the leaves had fallen from the trees it had all been re-knitted into new garments.

Knitting seems to have become a lost art, one which younger women, even many my age, have been reluctant to embrace. Perhaps it is considered old fashion or superfluous in this modern age of all things disposable.

For three weeks we house-sat for a lovely couple, Paul and Deb, who had gone sailing off the coast of Turkey (tough life for some). During that time the curbs of Melbourne’s charming south-east suburbs groaned under the mounds of redundant household cast-offs as the council collection day drew near. Outside most homes the amount of wares disposed of was more than some African villages would see in a lifetime. Apart from old couches, computers, prams, wardrobes and mattresses, the growing number of bulky old CRT TV’s signify the enthusiasm with which Australians have embraced the wide-screen, digital television phenomenon. I would never have imagined, the day we brought home our very first colour TV, that one day they would end up as litter on the footpath, free for the taking. Any thief, worth his salt, could easily calculate which homes would be likely to have a new flat screen TV sitting in their living room, ripe for the picking.

Since leaving Sydney 4 months ago I have rekindled my passion for knitting and even though I still knit in a ham-fisted, fat-fingered, four year old fashion I have still managed to produced a veritable hoard of cardigans, bootees and bonnets. They are now all coming to good use since 30 April at 2:15am, when we were presented with our first grandchild. A son and heir to our son and heir. The dynasty continues with Charlie Ray and though I may be a tad biased, he is indeed perfection personified.

Our daughter-in-law’s parents were over here from Wales for the birth of their first grandchild too. When we all got together it was amazing to watch these six mature, well educated, intelligent adults all going completely ga-ga over this tiny bundle of joy.

The transformation in our elder son, the father of our grandson, is nothing short of miraculous. Overnight he has morphed from a self-interested, generation ‘x’er into a doting daddy. He fusses over Charlie and doesn’t even mind changing dirty nappies. He has become emotional and affectionate, even his daggy old parents are suddenly acknowledged as being human after all.

Tomorrow we will be departing Melbourne and leaving our 4 week old grandson in the loving care of his doting parents. It will be the hardest thing, to leave him, knowing it could be months before we see him again. I will miss breathing in his sweet, baby smell, and feeling is gentle breaths upon my skin as he slumbers peacefully, snuggled up against me, all soft and….. Oh damn, the tears are welling up already, excuse me while I run to fetch a tissue before I short circuit the keyboard.

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