The women in our family

..she
was still only ninety-six this was still a source of on-going annoyance. In
her later years she had been persuaded to give up driving half the length of
the North Island to visit my mother after she revealed that she was constantly
worried that she would not be able to pick up a hitch-hiker as her eye-sight
was so poor that she could not see any road signs. She came from the Kaitoke
on New Zealand’s North Island and had married one of the multitude of
Rutherfords on the other major bit of New Zealand, namely one Norman Rutherford
a farmer, rotund, bald, astoundingly toothless and rather short-lived who either
expedited his demise by the consumption of White Heather whisky …….
or perhaps used the whisky to mask the pain of the illness that killed him.
The Rutherford’s were border cattle thieves and have the clan motto “Nec
sorte nec fato”, which means “Neither by chance nor fate” was
true of their first meeting that was apparently arranged as both had a keen
interest in horses. Norman had a couple of hapless racehorses and my grandmother
liked the odd flutter.
She lived with us for a long time in the downstairs flat which was a wonderful
balm on the seas of life as instead of running away from home I could scoot
downstairs and have a cup of tea and a good chat with my grandmother. She still
sharpened her knife on the concrete front step and gave us healthy bacon rind
to chew when she was not making teeth-rotting toffee. In her later years she
grew a trifle unsteady so my mother eventually managed to move her into assisted
Methodist accommodation. Curiously her unsteadiness improved immeasurably which
my mother attributed to the deprivation of medicinal gin the bottles of which
clogged the cupboards in her previous house.
Our mother grew up as an only child on Mendip Hills sixteen thousand acres of
high country sheep property. A fanatical and daring horsewoman she was astoundingly
attractive and, she confessed a trifle naïve, meeting, marrying and then
rapidly divorcing our equally good-looking, charming but rather caddish father.
Her next husband survived the welcoming onslaught of Michael and I who rushed
from the house and vigorously kicked him in the shins as he arrived wearing
an army kilt on his motorcycle – a cold combination in Christchurch. Despite
the severe chilling of his nether regions he sired three more children, whilst
still displaying considerable tolerance towards his obstreperous and intermittently
obnoxious stepsons. Lois, for that is our mother’s name remains a woman
of great independence and resilience; she has through necessity and disappointment
with the male of the species lived a self-sufficient life teaching way past
the general retirement age. She even briefly taught Michael and which recall
as being an excruciating experience and meant that we attended an unnatural
number of primary schools – probably one new one each year – and cheerfully
encouraged any artistic abilities by sending us off to art school weekend classes
at a tender age.
I also blame her for my liking for wine as she celebrated 1975’s International
Women’s Year by founding the Auckland Stem Club the first of its kind
in New Zealand – though I did note that she complained about having to pay up
to $2.50 for corkage. Now cosily installed in Summerset by the Park, a retirement
complex for people of over 55 she is still in full possession of her faculties,
drives with flair and a more than adequate sense of direction but no longer
golfs as her pins won’t get her between the flags. A national treasure.

The women our my father’s side also live long and well, all managing around
the magic one hundred and all indomitable to the end. I suppose if you were
born in Boxer Uprising in China you are always going to have an interesting
history. Our Great Aunt Phyl was still driving off to look after old people
eighties, roaring around the hills in her Mini Minor smoke pouring off the wheels
and clutch as she screamed around the corners like a professional rally driver.
Always a diminutive figure she had by that stage become even smaller and I am
sure that she no longer had to bend over to get into the car.
We have but the one daughter who is practically perfect in every way and about
to turn thirty which to me is vaguely inexplicable as it means that I might
be somewhat older than I thought. Every time I see her she seems both a beautiful,
assured and terribly accomplished young lady but, also, a momentary composite
of every moment that we have shared over the years. Which are many and yet now
never enough. Every father loves his daughter in a vaguely helpless and distracted
fashion and I am no exception. I feel rather privileged and lucky to know her.

I suspect that she is quite like her grandmother and that neither could do any
better than that.