We got back from our sixth family holiday last Saturday. We are steadily working our way around Victoria, starting with our 2007 sojourn on the Mornington Peninsula, based at Blairgowrie, then 2008's trips to Phillip Island and Bendigo. 2009 was the year C was born and the year my spine was misbehaving, so we didn't get away at all that year, but it was followed by 2010's adventures in Echuca and Wangaratta. This time we went to stay at a friend's holiday house in Anglesea, a quiet little beach town near the start of the Great Ocean Road (about 40 minutes from Geelong).
There's a lot to be said for holidaying locally as a young family. G and I have enjoyed getting to discover and rediscover some of the brilliant places that our own state has to offer (neither of us had ever stayed in Wangaratta until last year, and he had never stayed in Bendigo except for work, while our experiences of Phillip Island had both been long-ago childhood ones). We've been able to take our own car, which saves a lot of expense and inconvenience. Staying in one place and voyaging out for day trips has been easier on the kids' sleep patterns (after an inevitable first night of shenanigans, they've slept well at each holiday location). All of the longer holidays (Blairgowrie, Phillip Island, Echuca and Anglesea) have involved staying at a house, which has been easier in terms of food - given that I am a Coeliac, even on holidays, I prefer to prepare most of our food so I am comfortable in the knowledge that I'm eating safely. It also means I can do laundry as we go, which might sound mundane but actually helps reduce the amount of stuff you need to take and the scale of the clean-up when you get back.
More that that, I think, not having gone a long way or spent a massive amount of money has just taken the pressure off - we can relax, chill out, have days when we do very little, without feeling like we're "wasting" an opportunity or that we need to force a peak experience out of every millisecond.
Certainly our week away in Anglesea was an example of this kind of holiday. We chilled out, a lot. The kids watched DVDs each morning before a late breakfast, and hubs and I watched movies or read novels at night. We went for walks and collected sticks for the wood heater. I read 2 Trixie Belden novels, cover to cover, to the big kids during the little one's naps. The kids did crafts and read comics they found on the bookshelves and kept holiday diaries. We played Pictionary and card games.
We did do out and about things as well - we drove down the Great Ocean Road and visited the Otway Tree Top Walk, which was a full day's outing complete with travel-sickness vomiting from both the 7-year-old and me (nonetheless, it was actually a good day).
We were lucky enough, despite the cooling weather, to get two great beach half-day water sessions in - swimming at Anglesea front beach, and exploring caves and rock-pools at Point Roadknight. The girls were enchanted with both.
We visited the National Wool Museum in Geelong and, after a lovely lunch at the restaurant there, explored the travelling Science of Toys exhibit and the museum itself (which is well worth the time if you are ever in Geelong with children).
We took several long walks through the Coongah wetlands park, a charming maze of footbridges and gravel paths along the Anglesea River, which was also possessed of a superb playground.
We took G out for a fancy lunch in Torquay for his birthday, and the kids all gave him hand-created cards and presents.
We talked and we played and we laughed and we rested, and we visibly relaxed, all of us. The big girls, who'd been flagging with the demands of the busy term, came back as full of beans as can be. G and I feel better rested and back in tune with each other. C just loved the whole thing, especially having all her family around all the time.
It was a lovely autumn beach holiday.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Home from holidays
Just back from a week away in Anglesea today. I will write up our holiday properly anon, but for now, a pic or two:
Friday, March 25, 2011
Expensive tastes
C, aged 25 months: I wanna snack, peese, Mummy!
Me: OK sweetheart. What would you like?
C: Fwoot! An' cheese an' cwackers!
Me: OK ... (Begins segmenting a mandarin and grabs sliced cheese from the fridge)
C, indignantly: NO, Mummy! Banananana!
Me: Alright, alright (muttering about $10.99 / kilo fruit and solid-gold food)
C, munching on banana, sees the sliced cheese: NO! The white cheese! I wan' the WHITE cheese! (By which she means my extremely pricey King Island Double Brie that I foolishly gave her a smidgeon of to try).
Me, sighing: OK ... (There goes *my* post-dinner indulgence!)
C, all smiles: Thank you, my Mummy! (Big kisses follow)
Me: You're welcome, poppet. What shall we have for dinner tonight, huh?
C, firmly: Sammon! (Atlantic salmon fillets, very delicious, very $$ - the family eats about $25 worth in a meal).
As I'm considering, she adds: An' choccat cweam! (My home-made chocolate mousse, which uses rather a lot of very expensive dark chocolate)
She likes the high life, does C.
Me: OK sweetheart. What would you like?
C: Fwoot! An' cheese an' cwackers!
Me: OK ... (Begins segmenting a mandarin and grabs sliced cheese from the fridge)
C, indignantly: NO, Mummy! Banananana!
Me: Alright, alright (muttering about $10.99 / kilo fruit and solid-gold food)
C, munching on banana, sees the sliced cheese: NO! The white cheese! I wan' the WHITE cheese! (By which she means my extremely pricey King Island Double Brie that I foolishly gave her a smidgeon of to try).
Me, sighing: OK ... (There goes *my* post-dinner indulgence!)
C, all smiles: Thank you, my Mummy! (Big kisses follow)
Me: You're welcome, poppet. What shall we have for dinner tonight, huh?
C, firmly: Sammon! (Atlantic salmon fillets, very delicious, very $$ - the family eats about $25 worth in a meal).
As I'm considering, she adds: An' choccat cweam! (My home-made chocolate mousse, which uses rather a lot of very expensive dark chocolate)
She likes the high life, does C.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Reading Notes - Room
Some time ago I had a look at the shortlist for the 2010 Man Booker prize. There were some damn good books on it, as usual - Andrea Levy's wonderful The Long Song, set in early 19th century Jamaica and dealing with slavery and its aftermath; the eventual winner, Howard Jacobson's The Finkler Question, which I greatly enjoyed and would concede is a worthy winner. (It also contained Peter Carey's Parrot and Olivier in America, which, due to my stubborn, inexplicable and unAustralian distaste for Carey's style and literary voice, I have not read, and am unlikely to do so).
For me, though, looking at the shortlist, the clear stand-out (and the book I would have chosen, had I been a judge) was Emma Donoghue's compelling, beautiful Room. Room is the story of 5-year-old Jack and his Ma, a loving mother-child dyad who are all the world to each other, in a completely literal sense. Jack's Ma, it transpires, is a prisoner, kidnapped and held in a locked garden shed ("Room") for seven years by a sociopathic man refered to only as Old Nick.
Donoghue's decision to tell this story in Jack's voice was absolutely the right one for creating the intimacy and sense of connection that is the book's strength. Told by an adult, or even partly in an adult voice, Room ran the risk of being prurient, sensationalist, and disgusting. (Think of the visceral reaction you had, or at least that I know I had, to the Fritzl case, or the Jaycee Lee Dugard case.) Donoghue's triumph in this book is to give us a story that is wholly about a mother and her son, about what might happen if that relationship was intensified and forced to be unmediated by the world, through no pathology of the mother's but rather by the evil acts of another.
There is without doubt a sense of menace and shudderiness (for want of a better word) in the first part of the book, where Jack and Ma are still trapped in Room. Old Nick, never directly seen by Jack and rarely heard by him, is a malevolent force who informs Ma's decisions, talk, and moods. The accommodations that Ma has to make to keep Jack safe and away from Old Nick are terrible; Faustian bargains at their most distilled. Seeing it through Jack's sensitive, intelligent but childlike eyes, the details are missing but the essence of domination, violence and the power of resistance is evident.
The ways of Ma and Jack's life, and Donoghue's surmises about how such confinement would affect mother and child's development, are fascinating and ring true to me. Jack's physical limitations (how could he develop good spatial perception when all space is known, and tiny?) make sense as does his incredibly advanced literacy and numeracy. Their deeply intimate yet matter-of-fact breastfeeding relationship is also entirely logical, and beautifully rendered. As a woman currently breastfeeding a verbal child, the dance of comfort and connection around nursing rings completely true to me. (It is an indictment of our society that when Ma and Jack are out of Room, one of the things that provokes vulgar curiosity and revulsion in the public is the fact that 5-year-old Jack is still nursing. As Ma, incredulous, says in her TV interview: After everything that happened to me over the past 7 years, THAT'S what you find shocking? REALLY?)
One of the things I loved the most in this book was the creation of Ma through Jack's eyes. Ma is all the world to him and what a person she is - fiercely loving, protective, intelligent, and human. The days she and Jack share, in their tiny Room, are filled with her commitment to nurturing and teaching her son and keeping him safe. And although both Ma and Jack exhibit unmistakeable signs of the fear, stress, anxiety and unnaturalness that shadows their lives (Jack with his obsessive counting, Ma with the days when she mentally checks out and is "Gone"), the two of them remain, to my mind, remarkably rich, well-balanced, and functional throughout. One of my favourite passages in the book comes after their escape from Room, when Ma is giving a TV interview about her captivity. Her lucidity, scorn for platitude, fierceness and strength shines through as she takes down the interviewer but good. (The fact that the interview carries a severe emotional backlash for Ma and Jack is also not disguised or minimised. Donoghue isn't about hiding the magnitude of this situation, at any time).
I think Donoghue's message here is incredibly powerful and hopeful and a testament to the character she has created in Ma - These people are strong, and they are not complicit in the subjugation and abuse they are subjected to. The fault and guilt lies with Old Nick in its entirety, at all times. And despite the trauma that will be part of Ma forever, Old Nick does not have the capacity to draw her (and Jack) into his abusive mental world; Ma stands apart, holding Jack with her on her island of connection and consent and love. This might seem an obvious message until you consider the insidious and sly tenor of commentary that always seems to creep into reportage of kidnap-and-imprisonment cases - the insistence that the kidnapee must have developed some attachment, some form of Stockholm syndrome; the notion (explicated in the Klampusch case in particular) that escape *would* have been possible, had the victim *really* wanted to get away; the unspoken idea that even these victims, the most victim-y of all possible victims if you think about it, must have in some way contributed to their abuse, or their abuser's selection of them. Donoghue, as I, calls bullshit on this egregious and especially nasty manifestation of victim blaming, through the person and dignity of Ma.
And Jack - oh, Jack. Was ever a 5 year old boy more exquisitely realised in fiction? Jack is three-dimensional, breathing through every line in this book. He is bright, loving, perceptive, wonderful - and he is a child. There is nothing adult in his way of being. This does not imply that he is simplistic or stupid, naturally. As a parent with a 5 year old currently, I recognise the speech patterns and thought trajectories with a shock of familiarity. Donoghue has said that she drew upon her experiences with her own son in creating Jack, and that shows. He is, quite simply, lovely - a joy on the earth, a wonderful boy.
So I would give Room my highest recommendation. Despite its subject matter and the potential for disgust, this book is not creepy or disgusting at all. It is powerful, moving, engaging, and one of the books that stays with you for a long, long time.
For me, though, looking at the shortlist, the clear stand-out (and the book I would have chosen, had I been a judge) was Emma Donoghue's compelling, beautiful Room. Room is the story of 5-year-old Jack and his Ma, a loving mother-child dyad who are all the world to each other, in a completely literal sense. Jack's Ma, it transpires, is a prisoner, kidnapped and held in a locked garden shed ("Room") for seven years by a sociopathic man refered to only as Old Nick.
Donoghue's decision to tell this story in Jack's voice was absolutely the right one for creating the intimacy and sense of connection that is the book's strength. Told by an adult, or even partly in an adult voice, Room ran the risk of being prurient, sensationalist, and disgusting. (Think of the visceral reaction you had, or at least that I know I had, to the Fritzl case, or the Jaycee Lee Dugard case.) Donoghue's triumph in this book is to give us a story that is wholly about a mother and her son, about what might happen if that relationship was intensified and forced to be unmediated by the world, through no pathology of the mother's but rather by the evil acts of another.
There is without doubt a sense of menace and shudderiness (for want of a better word) in the first part of the book, where Jack and Ma are still trapped in Room. Old Nick, never directly seen by Jack and rarely heard by him, is a malevolent force who informs Ma's decisions, talk, and moods. The accommodations that Ma has to make to keep Jack safe and away from Old Nick are terrible; Faustian bargains at their most distilled. Seeing it through Jack's sensitive, intelligent but childlike eyes, the details are missing but the essence of domination, violence and the power of resistance is evident.
The ways of Ma and Jack's life, and Donoghue's surmises about how such confinement would affect mother and child's development, are fascinating and ring true to me. Jack's physical limitations (how could he develop good spatial perception when all space is known, and tiny?) make sense as does his incredibly advanced literacy and numeracy. Their deeply intimate yet matter-of-fact breastfeeding relationship is also entirely logical, and beautifully rendered. As a woman currently breastfeeding a verbal child, the dance of comfort and connection around nursing rings completely true to me. (It is an indictment of our society that when Ma and Jack are out of Room, one of the things that provokes vulgar curiosity and revulsion in the public is the fact that 5-year-old Jack is still nursing. As Ma, incredulous, says in her TV interview: After everything that happened to me over the past 7 years, THAT'S what you find shocking? REALLY?)
One of the things I loved the most in this book was the creation of Ma through Jack's eyes. Ma is all the world to him and what a person she is - fiercely loving, protective, intelligent, and human. The days she and Jack share, in their tiny Room, are filled with her commitment to nurturing and teaching her son and keeping him safe. And although both Ma and Jack exhibit unmistakeable signs of the fear, stress, anxiety and unnaturalness that shadows their lives (Jack with his obsessive counting, Ma with the days when she mentally checks out and is "Gone"), the two of them remain, to my mind, remarkably rich, well-balanced, and functional throughout. One of my favourite passages in the book comes after their escape from Room, when Ma is giving a TV interview about her captivity. Her lucidity, scorn for platitude, fierceness and strength shines through as she takes down the interviewer but good. (The fact that the interview carries a severe emotional backlash for Ma and Jack is also not disguised or minimised. Donoghue isn't about hiding the magnitude of this situation, at any time).
I think Donoghue's message here is incredibly powerful and hopeful and a testament to the character she has created in Ma - These people are strong, and they are not complicit in the subjugation and abuse they are subjected to. The fault and guilt lies with Old Nick in its entirety, at all times. And despite the trauma that will be part of Ma forever, Old Nick does not have the capacity to draw her (and Jack) into his abusive mental world; Ma stands apart, holding Jack with her on her island of connection and consent and love. This might seem an obvious message until you consider the insidious and sly tenor of commentary that always seems to creep into reportage of kidnap-and-imprisonment cases - the insistence that the kidnapee must have developed some attachment, some form of Stockholm syndrome; the notion (explicated in the Klampusch case in particular) that escape *would* have been possible, had the victim *really* wanted to get away; the unspoken idea that even these victims, the most victim-y of all possible victims if you think about it, must have in some way contributed to their abuse, or their abuser's selection of them. Donoghue, as I, calls bullshit on this egregious and especially nasty manifestation of victim blaming, through the person and dignity of Ma.
And Jack - oh, Jack. Was ever a 5 year old boy more exquisitely realised in fiction? Jack is three-dimensional, breathing through every line in this book. He is bright, loving, perceptive, wonderful - and he is a child. There is nothing adult in his way of being. This does not imply that he is simplistic or stupid, naturally. As a parent with a 5 year old currently, I recognise the speech patterns and thought trajectories with a shock of familiarity. Donoghue has said that she drew upon her experiences with her own son in creating Jack, and that shows. He is, quite simply, lovely - a joy on the earth, a wonderful boy.
So I would give Room my highest recommendation. Despite its subject matter and the potential for disgust, this book is not creepy or disgusting at all. It is powerful, moving, engaging, and one of the books that stays with you for a long, long time.
Monday, March 21, 2011
This and that
Monday, Monday ...
I have a stubbornly red, itchy and weeping eye. I thought it was just allergies but now I'm wondering, as it's not terribly responsive to eye drops and has been going on for a few days. I don't think I've ever had pink-eye before but I'm a bit suss that this is it. Botheration.
Toddler has decided that she wants to wee "onna toy-yet" like her sisters, rather than on her potty. On one level this is great, as it means less porting around of potties and so forth. It also means that, with her tiny 25-month-old bum, she needs to be held every time, so goodbye independent toileting for a while. Swings and roundabouts.
It'll be hubs' birthday on Wednesday. I'm trying to decide what to cook for dinner that night that will be a treat for him, but also eaten by the kids, as I don't favour making two separate meals if at all avoidable. Given that his taste runs to seafood, I may see if I can get some nice barramundi or salmon. Maybe some pickled octopus for him for an appetizer. (Pre-kids, we always went out for birthday dinners, but these days it's sooooo much easier to eat in. Not to mention cheaper!)
The kids have a few favourite jokes at the moment. Check out these gems:
Q: What do you call a big ant?
A: A GI-ANT!
Q: Why was the sand wet?
A: Because the sea wee-ed!
Q: What do you call two robbers?
A: A pair of knickers!
A man and a giraffe walk into a bar. The giraffe is tired so he lies down on the floor. The bartender says, "What's that lyin' on the floor?"
The man says: "It's not a lion, it's a giraffe!"
Boom-tish ;-)
I have a stubbornly red, itchy and weeping eye. I thought it was just allergies but now I'm wondering, as it's not terribly responsive to eye drops and has been going on for a few days. I don't think I've ever had pink-eye before but I'm a bit suss that this is it. Botheration.
Toddler has decided that she wants to wee "onna toy-yet" like her sisters, rather than on her potty. On one level this is great, as it means less porting around of potties and so forth. It also means that, with her tiny 25-month-old bum, she needs to be held every time, so goodbye independent toileting for a while. Swings and roundabouts.
It'll be hubs' birthday on Wednesday. I'm trying to decide what to cook for dinner that night that will be a treat for him, but also eaten by the kids, as I don't favour making two separate meals if at all avoidable. Given that his taste runs to seafood, I may see if I can get some nice barramundi or salmon. Maybe some pickled octopus for him for an appetizer. (Pre-kids, we always went out for birthday dinners, but these days it's sooooo much easier to eat in. Not to mention cheaper!)
The kids have a few favourite jokes at the moment. Check out these gems:
Q: What do you call a big ant?
A: A GI-ANT!
Q: Why was the sand wet?
A: Because the sea wee-ed!
Q: What do you call two robbers?
A: A pair of knickers!
A man and a giraffe walk into a bar. The giraffe is tired so he lies down on the floor. The bartender says, "What's that lyin' on the floor?"
The man says: "It's not a lion, it's a giraffe!"
Boom-tish ;-)
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