Two days before my fiftieth birthday I received a confidential fax, first thing on arrival at work, to be a contributor to Living Generously. I was feeling furious, feisty and feral as I prepared to trudge – but not begrudge – my next half century. Not that I was worried about turning fifty. Hell no. You can’t ‘live generously’ if you don’t honour your god-given age.
I was heavily laden with a cold (in mid-summer), when the temperature in Adelaide had remained static and stganated in the high thirties for the past few days and there was a ‘big mamma’ full moon that night (sure to have an effect on ‘lunar-tics’ like me). My star sign Aquarius was heavily aligned with my companion sign, neurosis. I was in a mood to run with wild wolves and soar with the eagles whilst simultaneously catering to, and contemptuous of, the pervading presence of the partriarchal pygmies who’steer’ the stultifying ship called the ‘system’.
Fifteenth of February – comes the fax. A generous offer. Living Generously? Hell, I’m more fit to write about living dangerously, I reckon. Which is what I have done for the past 49 years, 364 days. Nevertheless, there is danger in generosity and generosity is danger, I thought to myself.
And most of the women who have affirmed, allowed and given and striven of their generosity, have been ‘dangerous’ as well as generous. My life has been peppered with such women. Not prominent in numbers, but most definitely in impact.
The Dollys. The Muriels. The Ritas. The Dianas. The Katies. They deserve to be honourd in an ode. Gracious, generous gals, all of them. All of them have made indelible footprints on my heart and soul, not just through love but through conflict, on occasions. Hence, the richness of the whole gamut of emotions. They steered and guided whilst I sometimes ranted and raved. All of them came along in durations of decades, just when I needed to be monitored and nurtured.
They were divining gifts, though I didn’t really recognise them as that, at the time. Some were there, all of the time, some were there most of the time. Physically we may have been apart but not mentally and emotionally. They nurtured me through dark nights of the soul, the wounds of racism, they humoured the seriousness out of me and coaxed and cajoled my talent within. Like angels watching over the mosaic of me, they were there in one form or another. When I went berserk on automatic pilot, they rectified the deviation.
My Mum deserves the first accolade. She loved me in the most wonderful way – to the core and bone and depth of her being. I knew that supremely right through my childhood and adulthood. No analysis paralysis about the tensions of dysfunctional mother/daughter relationships so prevalent in today’s era. My Mum stood bold and firm within my firmament. I loved cuddling up to her and sleeping in the same bed – even up to my late twenties – during my university days when I went home to see her! On cold, wintry nights, during my semester break, when I returned, wounded, scarred and jarred by life, I went home to Mum, cuddled up next to her and knew all would be well. Somehow the frumpiness of her bed was a little like being back in the womb. It was an old, craggy, well-used and worn bed, a bit like Mum. Dad was deceased, by then, for a couple of years. She’d weathered the storms of life and was awash with welcome that one of her daughters had returned.
Oh sure, she pissed me off at times, as she cautioned me against this and that. That I needed to relax, was still too highly strung, needed to slow down, stop impressing ‘the snows’ (which is what she called whitefells) and told me to believe in God. At the time, this was a bit too much for me, especially the remarks about God, as I was a card-carrying Marxist and hell bent on changing the world. When I did object, she’d tell me I was getting a bit too big for my boots and would cut the conversation short by saying: ‘I don’t know what they teach you at uni, Lillian, but it certainly isn’t manners!’
It was her sobriety and dignity, both reflected in her demeanour, I have come to admire. I suppose, in a sense, her world was much different from mine. But I can reap the benefits in hindsight.
I was part of her blessed brood of three – an older sister and a younger brother. She didn’t know her own birthdate nor any of her relations – including her mother and father – as she was taken from her parents in the ‘olden days’ of assimilationist policy and put on an Aboriginal settlement in Queensland.
You could call my Mum one of those older Aboriginal women of the matriarch type. I once asked her why she never touched alcohol (as my Dad did) and she philosphically replied: ‘Somebody had to be in control.’ End of matter. No whingeing, whining , moralising nor anlaysis. Just matter of fact. She loved gardening and growing our own vegetables and flowers, tilling and tending the garden in the same way with her kids. MyMum was one of those women you could ‘go home to’.
When the tough got going, Mum got going. She was a ‘flash’ dresser and once told me, when I was a teenager, that all one needed to stop the wrinkles or crowsfeet under eyes was a dose of your own saliva, run elegantly outwardly to inwardly with one of your fingers. She never wore an ounce of make-up (said it was no good for you, besides it gave her a ‘headcache’ on the one occasion she had donned lipstick and powder in her life!) She, along with my Dad, went to bed with the birds and got up with them.
One of the biggest impacts my Mum made on me along with my other many older Aboriginal relatives – including me – was never describing people in terms of being attractive, beautiful, good looking, handsome, which is such a whitefella tendency in our image-ridden society of today. It was usually a comment such as: ”They are a fine stamp of a person’ or ‘ a good/decent humanbeing’. Mum and those older relatives all judged by the inner rather than the outer. Mum encouraged me to look after my good teeth, hair and skin, which she said I had been ‘blessed with’.
Yes, she scrubbed us up as well as scrubbing floors for the local hotel and/or bank manager’s wife. She cooked, cleaned and ironed for others, to bring in a few shillings in order for us to survive and revive – all of which I didn’t appreciate when I was much, much younger …
At 17, my restlessness and risk-taking meant I was determined to see the bright lights and big cities. I did just that. Beginning with Brisbane, in the next 30 years I boomeranged all over the world: London, Denver, Rio De Janeiro, Madrid, New Delhi, Manila, Gothenburg. Ironically, at 50, I have come full circle and yearn to go back to Mum. But she isn’t there any more, the Mum I could go home to! The Mum who was generously shielded, guided, loved, cajoled, scolded, nurtured, directed and loved me. My first and generous female encounter who gave me my spiritual values of today through her homespun wisdom and plain commonsense.
At a time when White Australia rejected and made you feel dejected about your Aboriginal features, my Mum would say: ‘That’s a strong, intelligent forehead you’ve got. Use it.’ I went through life thinking I was pretty damned smart, having such a prominent Aboriginal forehead.
Lillian Holt (c) 1996
At the time of writging, Lillian Holt was principal of Tauondi (formerly Aboriginal Community College) Port Adelaide, in South Australian, where she worked for some 15 years. Born on 17 February 1945 at Cherbourg Aboriginal settlement in Queensland, Lillian Holt was educated at Aramac Primary School, Aramac, Queensland; at the University of Queensland – where she graduated with a bachelor of arts; and the University of Northern Colorado, USA, where she graduated with a master of arts. She enjoys people, reading and writing, travel.
This is an extract from ‘Soaring with Eagles’ in Living Generously – Women Mentoring Women, Jocelynne A. Scutt (ed.), Artemis Publishing, Melbourne, Australia, 1996.
