My Mother Down Under

At age forty-nine, my mother took her balls out of her handbag and moved continents. Apparently, there’s a dire shortage of chefs down under so Mam left her friends and family in Ireland to bring hearty breakfasts to hungry Australians. Christian charity runs in our family: I have an “aunty nun” who has dedicated her life to helping the homeless of London; my grandmother does rounds of a well in rural Ireland praying for the cause du jour (with twelve kids, thirty grandkids, and twelve-and-counting great-grandkids, she may as well be in Olympic training); and the other day, I forced my battered umbrella on a rained-upon old man who really didn’t want it.

Mam was supposed to immigrate to Australia with her older sister when she was seventeen. But she met the tall, pasty, and handsome Marty—my father—and got pregnant. Marty was a catch—a funny fella with wavy hair and bright eyes, and he could hold his drink. Unfortunately he held his drink a little too often so Mam soon found herself raising four kids and covering for a drunken husband.

My memories of my mother from my single-digit years are happy ones—her vacuuming with a vengeance to Like a Bat Outta Hell, hanging a poster of a life-size Rod Stewart over the couch, laughing with us at my passed-out father snoring like a cow calving, baking crusty bread and perfect apple tarts that haunt me to this day, laughing wickedly with friends, and looking gorgeous in her Clare Inn waitressing uniform. She was a young mother but a good one—as number four of twelve, she’d been raising brothers and sisters all her life.

She was tough though and was a quick draw with the wooden spoon if we stepped out of line. Once when my older brother took a bad fall and hurt his leg, she gave him the usual “a bit of fresh air and you’ll be grand.” He cried and complained and dragged his leg for two days until a neighbor suggested it was more than a bruise. He had a broken bone and had to have it re-broken in the hospital. The same brother had his first visit to the emergency room at six weeks when my mother had fed him regular rice thinking he was a hungry baby (he struggles with his weight to this day!) It was trial and error but with lots of room for humor.

I remember the late-night fights too, and with a gut twinge now that I understand what they were about.