The Story of a dog named Olly.

Olly was a part of a fantasy I created in my own mind.  He is, however, the real world manifestation of that fantasy.  And as we all know, reality rarely beats the fantasy.

Olly in the fantasy was the family pet.  A companion for us all.  A luxury we weren't able to fit into our busy schedule and small flat whilst living in London.  A part of this new Australian life we'd come back to immerse ourselves within.  Part of the Aussie dream.  Large backyards.  Trips to the beach.  Picnics in the park.  It was going to be great.

So I became obsessed.  A dog website stalker.  Looking longingly at photos of puppies.  Imagining how this little creature would improve our lives.  Fill a space that was empty.

I should mention that my husband, the errant one, was away for a total of 7 months last year.  Our first year back in what was to be our new life in Australia.  The one we'd been pining over for years.  Boring all our friends with the incessant argument of the pros and cons of life in London vs life in Australia.

Not wanting to sever ties completely with London, B spent 4 months working back there over the European summer.  For a freelancer, your regular contracts are the bread and butter that keep you going.  The other 3 months have been contracts in other locations upon the globe, usually 6 weeks at a time.  This wasn't how our life was in London.  And certainly not how I'd imagined our life to be back home.  So perhaps the dog fantasy also took root in the loneliness the separations highlighted.

I have been living in the semi rural south coast of NSW.   A far cry from the life we knew in London.  But it was for the kids.  And they have benefited from all this fresh air and freedom.  A summer spent without shoes and with salt encrusted in their golden locks.  Aren't they the Aussie childhood memories we sought for our children?

In many ways the dog represents so much about the struggles and triumphs of this last 18 months.

I set to work researching the right dog for us.  Finally I took one of those online questionnaires.  They ask you all sorts of questions about your lifestyle and this results in a list of about 4 or 5 dog breeds to suit.  There was our dog.  A whippet.  Of course.  Why hadn't I though of that myself?

I have always loved the look of these hound type breeds.  I lived for a number of years in Ibiza, an island off the coast of Spain, and the local dog they call the Ibizan Hound.

It harks back to the ancient Egyptian hunting dogs and is considered one of the oldest breeds of dogs with hieroglyphic representations seen on tomb walls.  It is thought the dogs were brought to the island by the Phoenicians around the 8th century BC.  I always thought they were beautiful and majestic with quirky characters and elegant physiques.

So finally Olly became a reality.  Life would never be quite the same again.

On his first night with us he fractured his back leg.  On advice from the breeder she suggested we let him sleep in the laundry.  What none of us had considered was that quirky and slightly flighty nature of the hound dog.  Of course he freaked out.  Alone for the first time.  Pack instinct taking hold.  He desperately sought company and in the process attempted to leap on the dryer.  Six hundred bucks later we had our brand new puppy back from the vet in plaster cast from hip to toe.

Six weeks rehabilitation.  Strict cage rest.  No running, leaping, excitement.  Basically all the stuff puppies and indeed kids do with puppies.  The poor little bastard was sent back to the laundry and this time in a cage.  If he were a human it would probably cost a fortune in therapy later in life to recover from his fear of laundry.  As a result he now sleeps inside the main house and usually on the sofa.

There began the journey with Olly.  We named him Olly like the skateboard trick.  Maybe the name precipitated the accident prone nature.  Later whilst staying at my Fathers farm he tore about six holes in his skin leaping through a barbed wire fence.  Another six hundred bucks later he now sports what perhaps in the dog world could be seen as characteristic or charismatic scars.

Whippets can be highly strung and sensitive.  Olly is no exception.  They are also escapologists.  On one occasion having been left indoors alone he managed to find the only open window.  In order to access the window it required some serious shimmying along sideboards where priceless antique ornaments were smashed to the floor.  Further still some skillful creeping along window sills was required before the fly screen could be pushed out to freedom.  He was waiting calmly for us on the front porch when we returned.

His year with us is peppered with stories like these.  He once broke into my Father's house on a stormy night.  Escaping from the garage looking for comfort and human reassurance, he found a way in through a small window.  He nearly gave my poor Dad a heart attack when he felt the wet touch of a dog nose upon his cheek in the pitch black of night.

I took a break from dogs and children and went to Italy to visit my husband.  I had time to reflect on the year and found the courage to admit defeat.  Trying to raise three kids alone, as well as trying to engage in meaningful work is hard enough.  The dog was like the final drop in the cup that is too full.  At times I felt I teetered on the edge of a nervous break down.  Something had to give.

Those moments when we'd all be frolicking on the beach with the sun setting and gentle waves lapping at our feet or throwing the tennis ball down the empty golfing greens in the late afternoons, they were bliss.  That was the fantasy.  Happy family fun.

Perhaps the dog questionnaire got it all wrong.  We needed a more docile, less intelligent and agile animal.  Or perhaps the questionnaire ought to ask you a few more probing questions about your mental health and the other responsibilities you already have in your life before it allows you go on to the further stages of pet selection.

It's taken some time to find the right place for Olly to go.  I have finally found him, what I believe will be, a loving and spoilt rotten home.  A single stay at home Mum and her 12 year old daughter.  Previous whippet owners and lovers living in the hills north of Sydney.

Strangely I have grown really attached to him this last month.  He's matured and settled.  He's a great companion.  In fact he's pretty close to the fantasy I had imagined.  But we are going back to London now.  The grass wasn't that much greener.  There are always pros and cons in all of life's decisions.

Olly was a symbol of the life I had hoped to find back here.  A life I now accept isn't our pathway.  For now at least.

Grateful Four.

Living Here

Having them.

Loving him.

Sandy Bums!

Inspired by Maxbella Loves

The Joys of Noisy Toys.

The joys of toys that make noise.  I once thought it was only childless people who gave annoying noise making toys as gifts.  But unfortunately this theory has been disproved on more than one occasion.

I felt that just prior to Christmas it might be pertinent to dislodge my deep seated abhorrence for toys that make noise.  Party pooper that I may be.  Because making noise is what children are all about.  At least mine are certified professionals in the obstreperous.

I have had friends who have expressed concern as to whether perhaps my children might have hearing problems due to the combination of their propensity to make inappropriately loud exclamations and their inability to listen to instructions.  I have taken their concerns on board and spent many days sneaking up behind my children whispering things like ' do you want some lollies' just to see if they can hear me.  Of course they always can.  It is only when you say things like ' have you done your homework'  or ' can you please stop watching inappropriate videos on YouTube'  that they really do seem to be deaf.

My youngest, and I think because she is the youngest behind two boisterous boys, possesses possibly the most booming chords of all three.  She needed to find her voice early on and use it to get noticed.  Because I live within this clamorous environment where yelling seems to be the norm I sometimes find myself fantasising about how life could be in a quieter home.  I also wonder if it is our fault as parents.  Did we make them this way?  Could we have created a different environment?  Or was it all led by the energy and tone of our eldest?  Are we loud people?  I don't think we are.  I have seen and heard far more encroaching souls.

My Husband and I went on a child free weekend in Paris before our youngest was born.  We caught the Eurostar from London.  We spent many long peaceful hours meandering the streets of Paris, enjoying the relatively silent pursuits of photography, eating and looking at stuff.  On the way home a woman boarded the train with her three children.  She was loud.  Her kids were almost silent.  I think they had all realised early on that there was no hope of ever being heard above their Mother.  Each and every action was accompanied by a loud verbal commentary that filled the entire carriage.  "FREDDY, NOW WE ARE GOING TO GET THE PENCILS OUT OF THE BAG, THEN YOU CAN SHARE YOUR PENCILS WITH EVIE AND DRAW A PICTURE" and ON and ON it went.  It became akin to one of those irritating toys that make relentless noise, read; I wanted to gag her, take out her batteries, throw her on the floor and jump on her.  Some weeks later my sister commented about a tube journey she had made and reported the story of a woman accompanied by her three children.  It was clearly the same family.  She made reference to the overbearing larger than life attributes of this woman and her incessant need to shout each and every mundane activity in the midst of this very public space.  What were the chances of that in a big city?

So perhaps I am just not loud enough.  They all know that by notching it up a few decibels I will be defeated.  Perhaps the key to a silent home is being super loud and vivacious yourself.  I am certain my neighbors don't think I am meek and mild for the amount of yelling I have to do to get heard around here.  Alternatively it could be I am not quiet enough.  Do kids yell in Buddhist homes?  Does serenity breed serenity?  Maybe it is something altogether more spiritual.

The last thing a noisy family of five need is the addition of some noise making toys.  But we've been given our fair share of dementedly repetitive items over the years.  My eldest was recently gifted a vuvuzela.  Yep, one of those ear piercing trumpets made famous during the World Cup in South Africa earlier this year.  Of course my feeble request for the vuvuzela to not be blown inside the bowling centre, where his party was underway, was keenly ignored by the 10 ten year old boys.  The ear drum busting horn could be heard bellowing throughout the centre to the great delight and hilarity of the children and the anxious smiles of centre staff.  It was at this point that I was beginning to have evil thoughts towards the Mother of the child who had brought this gift.  How could she have approved this monstrous toy?  I imagined myself sneaking around to her house one morning and blowing the thing outside her bedroom window.  Or better still pack it in my son's sleepover bag with clear instructions to wake the entire household next time he went over.

The vuvuzela had a short life span before mysteriously disappearing, however not before the neighbors had a good belting.  It has probably gone to the same resting ground as all those other joyfully noisy toys .

I am guilty of committing the crime.  I put my hand up.  I once approved the purchase of a clanging noise making sword for a friend's child.  Of course it was a huge hit.  The clanging sword buckling joy became the soundtrack to the party.  At one point the frazzled Mother was heard through clenched teeth exclaiming, 'Who in hell brought that toy?'

I just nonchalantly shrugged my shoulders and said 'I know, isn't it annoying!'

Days of our lives.

There are mornings when you cannot wait to drop your kids off at school, every minute that creeps towards drop off is like an eternity.  Looking up at the kitchen clock I calculate the difference between the earliest permissible drop off and the time it takes to drive to the school gate.  I still have 45 minutes to go.

It's usually these mornings that you find yourself yelling till you are hoarse, well at least I do,  and at the same time being vaguely aware of just how futile and pathetic the situation has become.  I sometimes wonder what a more Buddhist approach might be.  I try a deep breath and invoke all the love and light in the world,  I repeat the mantra "this too will pass" but bloody hell, it's just not passing quick enough.

Everyone woke up loud today.  Eldest is yelling at youngest for the milk cap.  I suddenly, and unexpectedly, thump my hands down on the breakfast table in front of them and scream, in a sort of crazy women impersonation, "WHERE IS THE MILK CAP, WHO'S GOT THE MILK CAP?".  This provokes a cacophonous round of hysterical laughter, there is, however, a nervous edge to the hysteria, they're not sure whether Mum really has slipped off the edge this time.  Safer to laugh.  My throat is sore.

There is nothing quiet about this morning.  The latest game is all about putting someone in a suitcase and wheeling them around the house across the wooden floorboards.  It's sure to end in tears.  The conscious parent would get up from their attempt at a quiet cup of tea to attend to possible disaster.  However,  I prefer the unconscious parenting approach, the one where you have the the cup of tea and try to zone out of the mayhem.  I wait for the tears.  I discover youngest not only zipped in the suitcase but also zipped in the backpack which is in the suitcase.  Maybe I should pay more attention to those helicopter parenting manuals.

Talking about helicopters, I am convinced I am carrying the helicopacter pylori bacteria, a side effect of consulting far too many of those online medical diagnostic tools.  It could also just be anxiety.  Interestingly, helicopter gains its name from the Ancient Greek "helix' meaning 'spiral' or  'coil', the very same sensation anxiety provokes in the stomach.  So consequently I am bargaining with my conscious about whether I can sneak a coffee in this morning.  My latest detox has left me with the pesky residue of  questioning each and every toxic substance I crave.  This adds to my anxiety. 

Another chain of events this morning leads to youngest needing emergency hairstyling with the nail scissors, which now has her sporting a fringe shorter than a 1920's flapper.  Fortunately she can pull it off.  Eldest comes running in from the car where he had been claiming the coveted front seat for the journey to school.  With his hand held out in front and the look of horror and disgust displayed across his face, he runs to the bathroom dry retching.  I can feel the anxiety rising, those helicopter chaps in my stomach are really tripping now with all that acid producing panic.  Is it a bee sting, a spider?  Half the container of pump soap is now cupped in his palm and he begins washing furiously.  Middle child has left an apple core in the car door handle, it's been there for a while.  Added to that, the car window had been left open a few days before during a torrential downpour.  The apple core and the rain combined to make a festering pool of putrid slush in the door handle cavity.  I had briefly wondered about the origin of the odour the previous day, I figured perhaps a pair of weary school shoes, battered and bruised after a full year of service.  Whilst all this drama evolves, the youngest has wound a comb into a huge tangled knot in the front of her hair.  Like a highly trained military soldier I have to make a quick tactical decision about which dilemma to attend to first.  In this instance I make the wrong move. Whilst syphoning the fetid pond from the car door she takes the kitchen shears and cuts the comb free of her tangled locks.

A number of unspeakable childhood crimes have been committed this past week and appropriate punishments attempted to be applied.  It's no different to any other.  Whilst summing up the week to the errant husband and Father I decided to finish on a high note.  One of those little moments you could easily skip over and lose in the messy disorder and chaos of family life .

Our eldest, quite uncharacteristically, decided to make me a cup of tea one evening.  Sometimes the wisdom and depth of a child's perception is beyond comprehension.  When he brings me my cup of chamomile tea he presents it upon a note and served in the cup made by my husband as a child.  The note reads; " to remind you of Dada".  In that moment I am not counting down the minutes but wishing the moment could last just a little bit longer.

What's with the Kookaburras?

Travelling up to Sydney from the south coast of NSW, my Mother and I stopped into an antique warehouse in the charming township of Bowral in the Southern Highlands.  I share my Mother's love of old things, antique jewellery was her passion. She'd once had an antique jewellery business, Greentree Antiques,  housed in a corner of an old theatre in Windsor.  A cavernous and magical place filled to the brim with the most fascinating objects.  A place you could spend hours and still not feel like you'd seen it all.  My sister and I would get lost in that theatre during school holidays.  Upstairs there was an area which was off limits to the public to house the overflowing horde.  It was, of course, the most intruiging place of all.  There was a heavy dusty theatre curtain that drapped across the stairwell to stop customers going up.  We would sneak up there whilst nobody was looking and spend hours trawling through boxes and admiring obscure curiosities.  It was here we once happened accross a box of vintage erotic photography.  We'd never seen anything like it in our lives, little eyes popped out of their heads, we swore ourselves to secrecy and emerged unusually sheepish from our regular adventures.  That old school erotica is still so much more exciting than the modern adaptions.  It was an era when less was more, the imagination was allowed to create the fantasy.

That day, with my Mother in Bowral, was probably the last time we mooched about an antique shop together.  Some months later she was gone.  I'd been searching for little bits of Australiana to take home to London, it had been the general theme of my holiday purchases.  It was in that antique warehouse in Bowral that I came across an old painting of three kookaburras sitting on the branch of a gumtree.  A little rough and a little damaged but framed in a beautifully carved wooden frame.  I fell in love with its rustic Australian charm and had to have it to brighten the walls of my dark basement flat in London.  It would be a little reminder of our sunny roots.  Mum had always been a brilliant business woman, clever and charismatic, I called in her help to negotiate a good deal.

That painting has adorned my walls ever since.  It's a symbol of so much more to me now than my Australian heritage.  It represents family and memories, respecting the past and taking care of the future.

The kookaburra is a family orientated bird living in small units with the older generations taking care of the youngest.  The famous kookaburra laugh is both a greeting and a territorial warning, but once one group starts off it seems the whole neighborhood will join in, often just as the sun is rising or setting.  I like to think that both ends of their day are marked by this calling to one and other, a good belly laugh enjoyed with family and friends.

Where I currently live in Australia we have a family of kookaburras in our backyard, they seem so confidently assured and majestic in their domain and I feel somehow that we have become a part of their family too, so intently they keep watch over us.

So why have I called my blog Kookaburra Laugh?  I felt like life with a family of my own was constantly throwing up a variety of amusing and often challenging situations.  At the end of the day it's often a case of: if you don't laugh, you'll cry.  I prefer to take a leaf out of the kookaburra's book.