Accidental Rebel

Aunty Verve here. I generally (& genuinely) always try to do the right thing, play by the rules, be the diplomat and peacekeeper but sometimes things happen outside of your control, no matter how hard you try.

After scoring tickets into the Makybe Diva marquis for Derby Day at Flemington Racecourse, of course I felt I should have something new to wear – a nice new frock!   That’s the thing to do!

With some intrepidation, not being an avid shopper, I headed off.  Not very long into the journey I found a fabulous bright orange and red dress that was a dream to wear.  It was so comfortable and I already had bag and shoes that matched – so it was perfect.  I couldn’t believe my luck.

My husband and I were guests, and, not knowing anybody, I was really happy and proud that I had made an impression right up front.

“You look great” one woman said. “What a terrific colour that is on you” said another.

“Yes” I explained “I even had enough time this morning to pop into the city and pick up an orange fascinator and wrap.  We all took photos and, very excited, we headed off to the races.

Amongst the thousands of racegoers, I remarked on the number of woman wearing black and white outfits and that I was so glad I had worn bright colours.

To my horror, one of the women replied “Yes, I guess people still like to stick to tradition on Derby Day”. My cheeks suddenly matched my new frock…

Aunty Lush asks a favour

This was sent to me from the long-suffering Uncle Stephen, the ever patient Aunty Lush hubby. And since Lush is abraod currently I thought it safe to post. May the goddess keep us safe from her. Love The Valet.

“It’s gotta be one of the most unusual SMS requests I have had ( and get some doozies). Finally locate the shop after being forced to park 1 km away. I walk in and I am greeted with, “You must be Stephen”. Just a quick look for cameras, fearing I am starring in the latest “Candid Camera” episode.

I take delivery of 1 Hula Hoop and explain that my previous efforts to locate a hoop in Bendigo failed as I could only get a crappy kids one, which apparently only kids can make work. I explain to the staff that I know where to come to if my wife decides to get seriously involved in the Burlesque scene and I need 20 more hoops.

Apparently I am welcome at “The Singing Whale” anytime….good name for a pub that!……would have been a better chore to have an ale at the Whale!

Regards Stephen”

What was I thinking?

So here I am at the airport. It’s 1.31am and my flight leaves at 3.35am. And I’ve got no-one to play with. Figure a drink is in order. I’m flying to Dubai, what fun. However I am reminded of my first trip. What horror. Talk about learning the customs real fast.

Picture this: alone, first time in a strange country, Dubai, 46c and the nightie.

I had been working long hours and knew that I needed sleep before the hot sun rose once again. So into bed I crawled and snuggled into beautiful cuddly pillows, welcome relief from a hectic day.

I fell into a deep sleep quickly. Sometime in the middle of the night nature called. Half asleep I got out of bed and shuffled to where a light beckoned under the door.  I opened the door, walked through and then I heard the sound – a large click. I turned around and, to my horror, saw that I had walked not into the bathroom, but out of my hotel room and into the corridor.

Inside I screamed. Where the hell am I ? I turned to knock on my door to waken Steve. In that moment I realized he’s not here. I’m all alone! I dare to look down. Please please don’t let me be naked.  I saw the ‘nightie’, a soft pink number. Oh why had I chosen this one? It clinged to every part of my body.  At least I had something on, trying to be brave now!

I looked down the corridor and all was quiet. It must have been very early in the morning.  How was I going to get back into my room ?  I paced, what I should do? There was only one option, I must get to reception before anyone saw me.  Go now… don’t think. I pressed the lift button I was on the 15th floor.

‘DING’  the doors started to open and my heart was beating so loud, I could hardly breathe –  my heart skipped a beat, phew the lift was empty – 14th, 13th, 12th, 11th, 10th floor, so far so good.

Then ‘DING’, oh no we were stopping on the 8th floor. I felt sick and moved to the corner of the lift, lovely mirrors on all  sides!  The doors opened with a sickening thud and in he walked, checking me from head to toe! Turnaround will you?? Please stop looking at me, my eyes plead. He turned and faced the door. I needed the ground floor NOW!!

‘DING’ – ground floor it is. My lift guest turned to me and said “After you Madame!” “‘No thanks – after you please sir.” There is only so much politeness a girl in a nightie can bear.

He walked out of the lift and turned around only once more with a wry smile on his face! I stood in the doorway of the lift and yell-whispered to reception, “Please please give me a key card for room 1515. I’ve locked myself out….”

The supervisor walked over and gave me a key and I quickly pressed 15th floor.  I’ve never felt so scared or helpless in my life; strange country, different customs and just me and my nightie.

I made it back to the room unscathed, but very embarrassed. After that I check the door every night before bed to make sure the lock was on. Then barricaded with a chair and hoped that this never happens to me again. I’m fine though if it happens to one of the other Aunties.

The airport announcements call me to my flight, and I walk proudly, secure in the knowledge that my case holds my full thickness, winter pajamas, covered from neck to ankle, no clinging, not for me, this time. Toot toot girls.

Love Aunty Lush (once more abroad)

Niki’s Tantes

The Aunties love hearing stories about Aunties, good, bad or indifferent. Here is one from Aunty Niki who was prompted to think about her aunties when she attended ‘Tiddling Tales with The Aunties’. Thanks Niki, love The Valet.

“Stories of my Aunties, or Tantes, isn’t something I often give great consideration. Our family is spread around the globe and being of great dysfunction we aren’t especially close. I haven’t enjoyed the experiences so many others may have had. However I was surprised as I looked back through life at how much my Aunties have impacted on who I am today.

Aunties, I have a few, ones I love, ones not so much, some by birth, some by marriage, and one honorary Aunt. One thing that is true for them all is that I have learnt something from them, both good and bad. They are all survivors, or not, of something profound.

As a child I watched as my family from Holland came and went. Big family gatherings where two cultures met, the Dutch and the Australian. When my aunts visited they found their voice, when the uncles visited the women lost their voices in a shroud of chauvinism and arrogance. I felt despair and confusion watching people change, but most of all I learnt.

I have four Aunts by family. My mother had four sisters, my eldest Aunt was Johanna, she was a full spirited feisty and stunning woman whose name I inherited and I imagine some spirit. I have been assured she could beat just about any bloke in Ballarat in a fight that thankfully isn’t a hobby of mine. It is also thought that Johanna may have like me had Aspergers syndrome.

I never met Johanna, she survived a nasty motorcycle accident which left her without use of her legs, a life she could not bare and Johanna took her own life not long before my birth. Despite never being in my life I guess I learned more from Johanna than one might expect. I learnt to care for people with disabilities but more than that, she prepared me for the devastation I would experience when the man I had loved for thirteen years also took his own life.

I would not let his loss destroy my family as the loss of Johanna had destroyed the generation before me.

The next eldest Aunt is Marlene, Marlene and I do not see eye to eye on anything in life but during a visit with her in her home in Scotland when I was 17 did change the direction that I was taking at the time and I will always have some level of gratitude. Marlene doesn’t have the spirit of the other sisters; she is conservative and as interesting as canned soup. I never wanted to live with such arrogance so fueled by ignorance.

Then there is Bernadette, we were once good friends but the projection of her own bitterness onto my own life and those I have loved became a process that I could not endure. Bernadette struggles with bi-polar and alcohol abuse, both rife in her generation. Bernadette has always been the great disempowered. She worked in disabilities services and in child protection. All I could see was her disempowering others with her own bitterness. The bitterness she felt about her Johanna and the devastation for women raised in a post WW2 world.

I heard she recently had a break down. I would love to reconnect, show her some support, but the hurt of being let down by her when I needed her most is still a stain upon my heart.

The youngest of the sisters is Anita, who also has Aspergers Syndrome, and just for good measure a bit of ADHD.  Anita was just fifteen when she lost her mother and came from Holland to live with us. She was very troubled but she took time to share with nine year old me the best European Punk and new wave music. I would be forever changed, music, art and literature wise, after her stay.

She was sent home after trying to set fire to her room in a psychiatric ward. The curtains were thankfully fire retardant,however it just drove her crazier.

I missed her when she was gone, I was back to having no friends and my invisible life.

A couple of years ago she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had a double mastectomy and has been clear for three years now. I am so proud of her strength to overcome. She did upset the family though, by managing the financial issues during her ill health by building a hydroponic marijuana set-up in her roof. Anita’s experience with breast cancer drew us closer to some degree. It was just a couple of years earlier that, through early detection, my fate with a dreaded tumour meant that I was luckier than Anita. I wouldn’t have minded some new pert breasts like she got, but I wouldn’t wish chemotherapy upon anyone.

By marriage I have three Aunts. Meip who survived the most hideous of men and significant abuse. I have not seen Meip for twenty years but remember her kindness and generous spirit. In watching Meip when I was a seventeen year old, I was given a forewarning for the signs of abuse. It was perhaps this that allowed me to see the relationship I was in was headed down the same road and ended it.

Then there is Ali, like Meip, a beautiful kind spirit. Both Meip and Ali live in Holland. Ali, as beautiful as she is, showed me that I was never to be a simple home maker and wall flower. Our Dutch family is rife with chauvinism and I couldn’t bare watching a gorgeous intelligent woman deprived of her voice for the sake of a ‘good’ provider and family home.

The last of my Aunts to share with you is by far my favourite. Dear Rosemary. Rosemary was one of the most amazing women I have ever met. She was the strongest, most intelligent, determined, down to earth and an amazing artist. She used to lecture here in Ballarat.  When I was twenty-four Rosemary lost a long battle with Cancer. She spent her last months in Spain doing a residency. In the last conversation I had with her she laid in hospital in Spain, in agony, feeling depleted of all life and dignity, crying because she was no longer strong enough to hold her own cutlery. I think she would like to have died then but she fought long enough to return to Australia. She had planned her own funeral, five hundred people wearing various shades of pink flooded the funeral home.

A sea of vibrant beauty and colour just like Rosemary herself. The University of Queensland named an award for second year art students in her honour, thus she will continue to shape and inspire people as she has me.

Rosemary was one of those people who you meet in life that can help you make sense of just about everything. When my lack of ability to fit in with my family, even at seven, left me feeling small and voiceless, there was Rosemary glancing at me encouragingly. When I couldn’t express my thoughts, she would read me like a book. I miss having Rosemary in my life. She was the Aunt that all of my other aunts weren’t.

Me and my Aunty Rosemary.

The last of the Aunts is my honorary Aunt Helen. She gave me a place to stay when I had nowhere to go.

Helen had AIDS, she was a pioneer in both gay rights and HIV education in Australia in the nineties. She was a voice for sex workers and no matter how ill, she dedicated her time to visiting those whose days were passing quickly in the AIDS units in Sydney. She traveled far and wide teaching people how to protect themselves, and how to care for themselves.

No matter who you were Helen treated you the same. Even the junkies in the dark lane-ways of Kings Cross. All of the people everyone else seemed to forget.

Whilst I was living with Helen, she haemorrhaged. I found her lying in a pool of blood on the floor, she yelled for me not to come near but I did. I called an ambulance and held her head in my lap until they came. Like Helen I was unconcerned for myself despite her frustration, and have done so numerous times since because Helen showed me that be selfless is the greatest gift you can give to another, especially in great times of need.

Where many of my other Aunts had taught me judgementally, on both my part and theirs, Helen stripped that away. She showed me everyone matters, we are all human, our experiences are human and often shared. Few people know Helen’s name, or the work that she did, but she touched more people than anyone I know.

So I don’t have many lovely Aunties stories, nor the benefit of spending great amounts of time with my Aunts. Yet they have all done something most Aunts do, shape parts of you and impart wisdom. Because of these women who have come before me I have found strength either because of them, or inspite of them.

Through my Aunts I have gained empathy, experience, love, music, patience, and much more. Most of all I have a fire in my belly, to not allow the continuance of damaging patterns of dysfunction, as either a woman or a mother, and to my Aunties I say thank you.

Love Aunty Niki”

Thank you darling Aunty Niki for your story of pain and happiness, hard to have one without the other. We encourage all our readers to send stories of your aunties to me valet@theaunties.com.au with a pic or two and I’ll give them to the girls to read and publish.

Messages of Love

The girls would love to share with you the messages that arrived (some in time, some too late), to screen at ‘Tiddling Tales’.

Starting with darling nibling Fagyn and Jordy, to honourary Aunty Walt, Louise and Marita from Bangers (Bangkok), and beautiful cousins Paula and Sarah. Thanks for going to such an effort for The Aunties…

 

Thanks to you all for taking the time to celebrate with us.

The Sunday After

For the benefit of those you who didn’t attend “Tiddling Tales with The Aunties” this weekend gone, those present were given a clear unambiguous warning about not finding yourself alone with Aunty Lush. Not for any reason! Not for any purpose! Not if you want to maintain your decorum.

This is a tale of warning that should ring loud and clear for all you you!

The day after Tiddling Tales, all the aunties, and a few nibling, met at Aunty Shaz’s house. To celebrate, to wrap up, to plan and to strategise for next events of fabulousness. Inevitably the champagne was produced from the fridge and the gargle began.

Sounds great yeah? Rookie mistake!

After throwing our zon Josh into the pool, most aunties made their excuses and backed slowly out the door… leaving Aunty Shaz wide eyed and unsuspecting. I should point out that is unusual. Aunty Shaz has been caught numerous times before, her naivety is so breathtakingly beautiful!

What follows is the tale of a fall..

Her first mistake was finding her self alone with Aunty Lush, and then agreeing to the second glass. Note the look of glee on Aunty Lush’s face.

Oh yes it’s all fun, at the start…

Hats are not all that slip! We discovered later darling nibling Zoe was enlisted as photographer! So sad that at this point Aunty Shaz is still unaware of the danger.

Onto new hats and props, only danger lies ahead. Poor Aunty Shaz, her fall is almost complete despite her looking so sprightly.

And so it is done. Still Aunty Lush is looking for fresh meat.

Next day Aunty Beads checked on her. You believe?

It appears our Shaz may be in training? Aunty Lush has been know to gather anyone who might vaguely keep up with her! The training though is hard and arduous.

Our final warning remains: Never find yourself alone with Aunty Lush, there is no coming back!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our Aunty Philomenia

Aunty Phil is a funny thing. She has been known to dance on tables, drink a crowd under the table, and more, just usually not at once. Though no one knew until a visit from nibling Fagyn resulted in these pictures of a woman insanely playing the tin whistle while hula hooping….