I'm not much good in crowds any more. Probably never was. And yet some very significant things have happened to me in the middle of a crowd. That indefinite stretch. Of bodies. Of faces. Of voices going on and on. Forever. Merging into the muted them.
The grey they. The aunts. The nuns. The nurses. The mothers outside the school gates. The women at the rally. And Aunt Maud.
Aunt Maud was turn of the century - an original k.d. An Idgy Threadgoode of Fried Green Tomato fame. Outside the crowd.
From the time she was sixteen Maud wore trousers and boots. Men's boots. Had her hair cut by the local barber with a flick fringe. Bossed us all around, even my mother. Her one slip was the child to her sister's husband when he came back from the war. Helping on the farm in the absence of young hired help. Her sister died leaving Maud with the farm and the kids to look after. And a child and a man she never wanted.
You don't often meet a k.d. She was so special she was scary to me as a kid. Sometimes she visited the city and one day had to meet me outside the school gates. Wear a red ribbon she said. I don't wear ribbons I replied. I need you to wear a ribbon so I can pick you out. With all those school uniforms you all look the same. Just a big crowd of girls.
Aunt Maud was Father's second cousin once removed. She didn't have much to do with Father's sisters. hey tended to ignore her existence. Even Nessa who looked like Maud.
I looked for another k.d. over the years but they were in short supply. Great groups of girls. Groups of young women. Groups of feminists. Post modern feminists. And aunts on mass. Daughters and sisters and the C.W.A. Peace makers and conservationists. Mothers and sisters and friends and lovers. Grand daughters and their Mas. Holding society together.
I first met Sal at a party. In a crowd. A crowd of women and a couple of men. She flicked her fringe at me. Hello pussy cat she said. Big pussy cat. I started rattling on about politics. And women. And the great divide. I made no sense. I moved behind a curtain of women and when she moved closer I left by a garden door and got lost finding my way home.
I thought about her on and off. She was a bit like Aunt Maud. And a bit like my sister Maggie. It was the flick of her fringe over short short hair. The eyes that traced me. And my body. She just reached my shoulder like Nessa. And Maud and Maggie. She would not fit into the parade. Kept jumping out like a Jill in a box. In my head I kept saying to myself. In my head.
The next time I found Sal I was on the edge of a rally. A rally of women fighting for the rights of someone or something. The rally moved and merged. Sound and sight waving around the park. A few kids and straggly men on the edge.
And there was Sal. Singing to me. Like Maud. Like Maggie. The daily songs by letter, by phone, by fax. By thought. Closer and closer now. Like Virginia and Vanessa. And k.d. and Jo-anne. Singing what's new pussy cat. But I had never heard of k.d.
Never heard of k.d. she sang at me? Looking at me through her flick of a fringe. I'll take you to her concert tonight. It's on SBS she said.
After the concert she talked of her childhood. Growing up with foster parents. Not knowing- her biological roots.
Down the river at Patches Bay. Going to the church on Sunday. Being forced out of trousers into a dress. Like Maud I said. And Maggie.
And your other aunt she said.
I looked at her again. Yes she said. I remember you staying with your Aunt Nessa when I was a little girl. And you were tall with long blonde plaits and played the piano. And I took my Granny for a walk I said. I can't remember your Granny but I can remember Nessa and Miss Turnbull she told me.
Miss Turnbull lived over the back of Nessa's place. I can remember Auntie Ruby, soft and warm and pretty, ignoring Miss Turnbull. Ruby lived in the cottage out the back of Nessa's under a magnificent flowering peach. In September the dark tiles of her cottage and the paths around it were covered in pink polka dots. Softly. Softly. In the school holidays when I went to stay.
Everyone talked about them Sal said. I looked at her. She was an original k.d. your Aunt Nessa. Yes I said. I can remember. My father and mother taking her into the city and buying her a dress. For church. And she wore it for years. But only on Sunday we both agreed.
As for Miss Turnbull. She always wore gumboots and overalls and a big floral pinny. Brought buckets of plums that she dumped over the back fence in the summer holidays. And looked after her mother. Who sighed and lay in bed. And visited Nessa after dark Sal said.
You look like Nessa I said. And Maggie. And Maud.
And k.d. Lang said Sal. I'm just a long line of women with a flick fringe.
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