I am from summers spent by the swimming pool, from Vegemite and family games of Monopoly that always ended in tears.
I am from the house on the hill, ruddy red bricks, lush green lawns, the crunching gravel driveway sharp under bare feet.
I am from sweet jasmine circling the verandah posts, the front paddock, the back paddock, tall grass yellowed in the summer sun.
I am from coins in the Christmas pudding and reading several books at a time, from Tina and Geoff, and a woman I have never met.
I am from screaming fights and the best cuddles in the world.
From ‘you couldn’t be more mine if I’d given birth to you’ and ‘I love you up to the moon and back.’
I am from lapsed Catholicism and skepticism and the belief in a higher power who will take care of you always.
I am from Melbourne and Holland, from sliced potato barbequed to crunchy perfection and the best lamb roasts in the universe, swear to God.
From the frightened eighteen year-old who believed she was doing what was right, the grandmother who was ashamed and the family whose arms were finally full when they held aloft this baby girl for the first time.
I am from fading photos of 1970’s babies, albums jumbled from years of pilfering favourites, from a lock of golden hair cling-wrapped for safe-keeping, a tiny handprint in hardened clay and the mysteries of ancestry contained on a single sheet of creased paper, read and folded, reread and folded again by the girl who knew exactly who she was and almost nothing about how she began.
This piece was inspired by a writing prompt from Mama's Losin' It. See the original template here.
