Conversations at the kitchen table, mothers day 2006.

I sit at the kitchen table after the mothers day lunch clutter has been cleared, mum is as per usual busying herself in the kitchen, Dad is also comfortable in his particular role of being sprawled out on the couch in some state of sleep. Mum produces a platter, a large cake considering there are only four of us and several small meringues.

“What did you get your mother for mothers day?” My father asks,
“Chocolates..” i reply after a slightly too long pause.
“Chocolates..” he says with a well prepared tone of disappointment “chocolates, she gave birth to you, grew you into a man and you get her chocolates? you should be ashamed of yourself”.

My dad is right I should be, but not because of the mothers day gift, more likely due to the fact that I spent as much on a bag of chocolate coated raspberries to eat on the tram ride over to mum’s as i did on the gift i gave her. And please dont think i was buying provisions for a long train ride, i caught the tram from camberwell junction to warrigal road… it’s about 12 stops. I thought it best to conceal my shame by making something up.

“I baked her this cake” I added winking across the table at my mother, who had probably sensed that this conversation although pleasant at the moment could turn into a slug fest of worthiness as it has so many times before.

“what.. the cake i baked this morning?” my sister adds from the next room. I smile to myself, trapped at every turn. “Well i was going to take her photo!”, carrying around a camera everywhere all of a sudden becomes a real positive. A smile explodes across my mother’s face, “really? let me get changed” she dashes off and seconds later i hear the creak of her hand me down wardrobe door, one of the sounds i used to hear when my parents were trying not to wake me during those early morning starts.

“a photograph, wow” dad tosses at me, “careful you dont spend any money or anything” and as predicted i reply with “wel i’ve been trained well”. Normally this would launch us into a dont talk to me about values contest, but we let it slide,.. happy mothers day.

Mum emerges having done herself up and stands somewhere where she believes is a good place for a photo, i wait at the kitchen table until she has sufficiently lost interest in her pose to come back and start doing normal stuff. She eventually complies, sits back down and looks at me in the “you aren’t really going to take my photo are you” kind of way.

I’m holding the camera in a way that people who know how to use cameras do when they are adjusted technical things like ap-er-ture and shu-tter speed, once i remove the lens cap my technical prowess tank is dry. Whilst this faux pro move is being performed, my mother actually starts to resemble herself, i lift the camera aim and shoot.

no, really, what did you get me

“what .. is that it?” she says, “here? .. like this?”
“why not”
“take a proper photo of your mum, with the flowers and things” dad suggests, firmly.
“so.. what did you really get me” mum asks
” 2 kilos of okra” I mutter, she replies in the traditional manner which has been used in response to this comment since i was first taught of its hilarity.