tales and tails

Well here I am yet again trying to catch up - it feels like so much has happened lately...

Last Saturday William and I were all set (Elizabeth having headed south for a staff hui and visiting family) to head into town on Saturday morning, go to the market, pick up Marie-Claire who was staying the night and head out to my colleague's to collect a kitten...

However an early phonecall from Mat turned our day topsy-turvy somewhat, there had been a fire in Phyllis' (William's mother) garage during the night. Well we all mucked in trying to make sense of what was damaged, much of which had been in the roof of the garage probably about 25yrs... As is the way of such things family mementos, assorted medals, photographs, an extensive kauri gum collection and several paintings were damaged or destroyed by fire and or water whereas the suitcases full of '70's recycled wrapping paper, Scout posters and bundles of old newspapers survived unscathed... the family sense of humour has been suitably rising to the occasion. The same garage copped it a couple of years ago during the big floods, rather drastic ways to ensure a clear out!

Marie-Claire was totally unfazed and joined in the sifting and even managed to make it on to the front page of The Northland Age with Phyllis and Dylan (who'd successfully avoided being in any photos I'd taken that day!). Well it made a change from WWOOFing I guess! She'd just been helping someone else move house that week and it reminded me of my own travels back in 2004, especially my week in Sydney which included attending a funeral and helping with a house move. There's something incredibly grounding amid all the transience about slotting into family life and just getting on with what needs to be done, I know I really appreciated mucking in with gardening, cooking and housework at various places as well as the more eventful occassions - it kept me in touch with 'normal life'.

Several times during the day I reflected on how grateful I was not only that the fire was in the garage not the house and Phyllis was ok, but that my parents had cleared out their attic, cupboards and outhouses of accumulated cumber when they moved up to Scotland... sorting that lot out at some point was not a task to be relished, I'm so glad they've done the worst of it already. I think several resolutions were made that day about timely clearouts of various homes, sheds and garages.

Well with still blackened fingers we eventually headed off to find my kitten. How to choose? The black ones all looked so alike it was really hard to know who you'd already had a go at getting to know, so it was back to the old faithful... take a deep breath and let the universe decide. I picked up the nearest kitten, it didn't struggle and snuggled up - done! I wanted a friendly cuddley moggy and that is what I got =) Well friendly to humans anway; dog and kitten are still trying to work out of they are friend or foe...