A Bear Wedding - Getting into the Groove

One of the problems of being an East Anglian immigrant in Australia is that the vast majority of all the other immigrants had an Irish background, and there remains a Celtic turn of mind. What this means is that my Anglo-Saxon linear thinking continually tries to keep up with the lateral-thinking mind that ties Celtic knots in its sleep. Oh, the propensity for gathering in crowds centred around some fiercely competitive sport that has to have alcohol as its medium of choice, is welcomed. Thinking outside the box too, is understood, and admired by me, but the residual hallucinogenic humour is something I have to work hard at. For instance, I was looking around a friend’s new house and admiring big beams, glorious vistas and a very large bar fridge when he said, ‘Check the back door but watch the first step, it’s a doozie.’ I was pondering on what that actually meant, opened said door, and was confronted by a 200 metre drop! See, conversational tone vs instant death! Another was when our whole family got involved with horse-riding because our daughter was of that age – you know what I mean. I would have said I was given a white horse to try out, only to be told, ‘There’s no such thing as a white horse. They are grey.’ A forty-year-old father has no chance in an argument with his ten-year-old daughter, Celtic or not. I asked the name of the horse and was told it was called ‘Fingers.’ To explain, they said he was float-shy, and in trying to get him into a float, one of the helpers had his finger bitten off by said horse. ‘Good grief,’ I exclaimed. ‘Did they manage to re-attach it?’ ‘No, the dog ate it,’ was the reply. See, sandbagged by sideways thinking. The horse turned out to have the personality of a cardboard box.

My geese, Honk and Pip, with Crash, Bang, Tinkle and Wallop, all with imaginary Jamaican accents, had settled in. Their admonishments of tail-wagging and eyeballing had modified to occasional complaints to the Management. Honk, the Patriarch, or Ganderarch maybe, and I had had some good conversations, about families. About the kids, ‘Dey know not’in’ Man, and dey t’ink dey know everyt’ing!’ About wives, ‘dey know everyt’ing Man, an’ t’ink I know not’in’! But I know what I know, Man!’ One morning, I was woken before dawn by a hell of a racket coming from the goose pen. I looked out of the window to see two dogs in the pen harassing the geese. I was out of the bedroom, along the veranda, across the lawn and won an Olympic ‘gold’ for fence-jumping. As if a whistle sounded, both dogs ran away at 180 o leaving me like a lighthouse on steroids. I checked on Honk. ‘Me good, Man! De missus do a good job wi’ de kids. You came to ‘elp. Me appreciate it, Man. T’ank you.’ ‘S’oright. You are de Goose, nah?’ I can give as good as I can get. At which point, I realized the sun was coming up and I was naked except for the mud from the creek, and the milkman was due. No ordinary milkman, I have to say! She had won prizes in beauty contests and had a voice like Fenella Fielding. When she said, ‘Good morning, Chris,’ full colour images of 1001 Arabian nights were projected on the screen in my head, and the depths and cadences would massage my spine without fingers.  I reached the outdoor shower in the nick of time and was indoors before she arrived - and my wife woke up. Tricky thing – timing! Sometimes.