Cold Tea

In the good room of our small bungalow, mum read tea leaves from china cups rescued from the Oxfam shop, her slight frame and unassuming manner a mere subterfuge for her divining skills.

There were rules - never on a Sunday and never in the company of my aunt. I don’t expect our dad much approved either, but he let it go, understanding that some things are probably best left undisturbed.

Believers came to swallow readings with the trust of any never on the Sabbath congregation and sculpted dregs of faith round porcelain curves. Prophesies of doom were subtly laid aside for Sunday sermons.

I sometimes wonder if she’d seen her future buried in the leaves. An arrow (never good news), snakes (the same), or wavy lines portending journeys unfulfilled. But if she did, it was for none of us to know, for that was not our mother’s way.

Looking back, I should have read the signs myselfcups of tea, half drunk and cold, perched on the bird table or teetering on bathroom shelves and once or twice abandoned by our father’s garden toolsthat sedge of herons she had planted by the pond.

It’s the way I like to drink it, she would say, the dare in her eyes always enough, and later, tea leaves carefully strained, I would present to her a sun, a fish, a flying bird and catch her smile, cupped in her hands the white lie of a daughter’s love.

Notes

from the jotters we used during the final year mummy lived at home 2010 – 2011

Monday: Mum – IMPORTANT – key must not be left in the door. Your home help needs to get in! There are sandwiches in the fridge for tea and nobody is staying with you tonight.

Thursday: *Keep the key out of the back door and don’t put the chain on.

Sunday: Someone coming to help mum get up. Helpline is now installed and working.

Wednesday: Tea time – mum – there is ham in the fridge, so please use it in a sandwich. Also, please eat the buns and sweets to fatten you up! Love, Lynda xo Thursday: ‘Taster’ meals arriving. These will be put in the freezer for you, mum. Money in envelope. Lynda will be back again on Sunday and George coming on Saturday.

Monday: I will come and help you get dressed, mum, and will make breakfast for you. Orovite. Lunch – heat up pie in the oven. Use can of peas (I will open these for you). Pudding in blue container.

Wednesday: Mum has a dental appointment at 12.30. Lynda wasn’t impressed by his bedside manner.

A Village Practice

I find him attractive in that young and self-assured dentist kind of way and I imagine, in my earlier life, there could have been a spark of something there. My mother waits in his chair, her brittle mouth only small. I am told to sit in the corner and I do, examining the cleanliness of the room, pondering how it cloys in the disinfectant spaces between us.

He prises apart her poor jaw, chooses a drill. The stickered soles of my mother’s shoes twitch with some invisible electric shock but the rest of her is numb, except her mouth, which is not. I am her voice and the palliative care of her crumbling teeth, yet I am reticent. It does not do to question authority, regardless of age.

And pain relief, I ask. The request an unforeseen tsunami across the room, a sudden game of Truth or Dare. She doesn’t need it. She does. She doesn’t. I cannot see my mother’s eyes but imagine them sealed, blanking out the embarrassment of my irreverence in this community where people talk. She does. And his slender fingers finally find a syringe.

In the waiting room muted exchanges churn around the lateness of the milking, or how the silage has seen two cuts already the year. We shuffle home, wordless. I want her to be proud of me for standing up for her but worry that I went too far. So, she makes the tea, her bent shoulders stiff in concentration. Good girl, she says. Good girl.

Monday 26th April 2010: Happy 86th birthday, mummy!

Lunchtime – re-heat meat from yesterday in the microwave to make sure it is piping hot. Use mashed potatoes that should have defrosted from the fridge.

Sunday: Teatime – pie, but don’t reheat please!

Monday: O on leave so M coming instead. M – could you please help mum to cook bacon and eggs at lunchtime? Many thanks, Lynda

Friday: Jean coming - YIPPEE!

Jean arrived and didn’t even get wet. The sun is shining. Lovely to see mum.

Saturday: Jean, mummy. and Lily had Denny’s sausages and Richard’s potato bread. Yummy!

Jean arranged a time for the Occupational Therapist to call next week.

Wednesday: Francis booked to come. Lynda arriving before lunch and staying to speak to the Occupational Therapist at 3 o’clock.

Friday: George is here. He will go on to Innishmore and be back by 5.30. George will get slices of roast beef for our tea together. He will check out the door-step tiles and sort out the problem with the TV.

Sunday: Lynda will take mummy and Lily for a drive. Sandwiches in the ice cream container for tea. Went to the farm and to daddy’s grave. Things should be okay for a day or so but could you have a wee look anyway please? Many thanks, O. PS Because of school reports etc I couldn’t get down last Wednesday but should be fine this week. Love, Lynda Wednesday: Farah and Lynda came – taking mum for a drive and then leaving mum to church.

Monday: O, please thank your daughter for cutting mum’s hair. Can you just check that mum has turned her electric blanket off please?

Friday: Jean and George arrived – sunshine and showers. Ham sandwiches for tea! Saturday: Jean still here. Sausages and potato bread for lunch and sandwiches for tea.

EAT UP MUMMY! Jean has put a new electric blanket and fresh bedding on the bed for mum.

Sunday: Lunch – Lynda will come and bring food for everyone. Mum – you don’t have to cook.

Wednesday: Physio booked to see mum today. Farah and Lynda came to make jam. Yummy!

Friday: George called at 10.15 am and will return about 6pm. He will make his own tea and prepare food for mum. If necessary, he will stay overnight.

Friday: Hospital appointment for mum at 10.45. Mum is with George and he will take them for lunch out afterwards.

Sunday: Lynda to stay over. Walked around the Round-O lake together.