Highly Commended -- Senior Section

Elizabeth College

Ernie, my grandfather, was a wise man, frazzled by years of loss. I never expected to understand how or why his years were so dependent on storytelling and tea drinking, but now I do. He lived to tell a story. I sat in armchairs in his living room as a young girl, listening to his recollections of life, and music, and love. From the sun-battered windows, Mt Wellington sat proud and tall, casting hues of grey and blue by the withering sun that hid behind the clouds. 

My Grandad, Ernie, wore tea-stained shirts and brown paper-boy caps and thought Escargot was a funny conversation starter. I’d like to say this recollection is mine now, an eclectic reliving of my childhood memories and his life. 

Grandad’s home was my home, a home which I grew up in. I spent the early years of my life exploring its cluttered rooms, like Egyptian catacombs, eager to find the hidden treasures beneath piles of creased cardboard boxes containing crumpled photographs and trinkets. I still find myself reminiscing on the times when I sat eagerly on the frumpy living room couch, fleece blanket in hand, watching Grandad boil the black kettle and fumble with his worn, freckly fingers between tea bags. The sunlight would hit the battered, paint-chipped windows and in would stream plentiful beams of light that shaded the outdated living room wallpaper in hues of tangerine and lemon. I knew that when I heard the ding of the kettle echo in my ears, like two silver spoons connecting and the magnetic rumbling of the water subside, he was almost done. His routine of tea brewing left the yellowed kitchen counters littered with sugar cubes; stamped with tea stains. 

Although now I can only reminisce on memories we shared, I find myself reliving moments that existed in time frames that I can no longer access from years ago. I was in Grandad’s living room, a room bordered with dusty shelves that housed Australian literature and trinkets from countries visited years ago – Hawaiian hula dolls that danced on a wire spring and Antarctic snow globes that somehow made sense in his corner of the Earth. I watched eagerly as he stammered across the weathered carpet with a steaming mug of English Breakfast tea in hand, engraved with the word ‘Ernie’ that was spotted in design like his worn, freckled skin. He sat slowly, the chair squeaking as the rusted springs bounced beneath him, and the rich aromas of Huon Pine wafted through the air from wood-wicked candles, burning until the last spark escaped from the flames’ fiery embrace. Granddad’s eyes locked with mine, cinnamon in colour and almond in shape, and his thin-lipped mouth opened like a book blabbering words; like a pastor at a church to his congregation, eager to listen. 

“So, shall we begin, my poppet?”

*    *    *

I was 53 years young when my sister Claire died. They called it breast cancer – I called it a death sentence, a life without my sister. To say her last years on earth were bountiful in mesmerising colour and joy would be a lie. Her last years were doctors’ appointments stacked upon doctors’ appointments that weighed her down like a ball and chain on a prisoner’s ankles. They weighed her down. Her last years on Earth were sterile hospital halls filled with passers-by and unempathetic doctors eagerly waiting for their weekly paycheck. They held her down. When my sister started the chemo, she was no longer Claire, but instead a stranger, a figment of my deteriorating imagination. I watched as the defining parts of her disintegrated away, melting like a candle that had been burning too long. And like the candle wax melting away, becoming a pool of piquant liquid no longer in its original form, I could no longer get my Claire back.

I was 53 years young when my sister Claire died. The day before she died, I walked around the hospital building that was lit up by the stale, white fluorescent lights that flickered rhythmically above my head. I brought her favourite English Breakfast tea in a small, white ceramic mug. I remember telling her my journey of finding tea amongst the maze of halls in the hospital, and how it seemed like the world had suddenly gone into a mega shortage of our favourite tea bag that we enjoyed together. She let me recount stories of my adolescent trips to France; tiny patisseries tucked into bustling city streets, the taboo of taking photos of the mighty Eiffel Tower at night, and the brisk, early mornings at pebbled French beaches. I remember talking about Escargot. I thought it would be a funny conversation starter, and it was. My sister Claire was hooked up to endless intertwined blue and red wires that reminded me of the telephone pole lines that stood tall outside of the hospital window. I wondered if she wished she was there outside, if she wished she could feel the cool air touch her skin rather than the stale air-conditioned air that flooded each hospital room. She knew every inch of her room like a prisoner knows his cell. I never knew what the wires were there for, I never felt it was appropriate to ask. But I knew that possibly, they were the only reason my sister Claire was still alive.

The day my sister Claire died, I had to say goodbye to part of me, but all of her. Claire’s eyes were like mine, cinnamon brown and almond in shape, and her hair before the chemo was coloured a brassy blonde that she would twist around her fingers from time to time. I always wondered which parent she got her hair colour from. I guess that doesn’t matter much now. When I think of Claire, my Claire, I don’t see her in her last moments withering away in the hospital, but rather the moments where she was here. Where she was soulful and full of her essence, light, and joy. Moments of her tending to her white-flag irises in the back garden or brewing the kettle for a spot of tea. She was a candle, fiery and warm. And then her candle went out, a light breeze blowing the flame away. That was the day my sister Claire, died.

*    *    *

I remembered this moment infinitely; a backseat memory, stained and stamped onto my brain like the tea on Grandad’s yellowed kitchen counters, that now have been repainted and repurposed, no longer his and no longer mine. It finally clicked. I remember my Grandad saying, “Let the dead bury the dead, but while I'm alive, I must live and be happy.”  I think now I know why Grandad was so consumed with tea-drinking and storytelling, why it was so important to relive the moments that slipped from our fingers, as though time was pulling away, eager to reach its next destination. I think now I find clocks and watches to be insignificant rulers of time. When I reach the end of my cup of tea, I remember my Grandpa - his life, his music, and his love. I remember to savour the tea I drink now and to savour the memories I remember before they slip away.