Albury writer Robyne Young recently introduced a group of us to the idea of the ‘zero draft,’ the brain dump that precedes any attempt to craft a narrative or sequence your material. American poet Ellen Bass says that the best writing contains only the essential and recommends you first express the whole of your idea in all its detail then ‘weed out the inessential’. I realise that the prose pieces I’ve written often recount incidents in such detail that they may bore the reader, or as my spouse says, would only be of interest to someone who knows you (i.e. tell someone who cares).
It is easier to be economical in poetry. It is by nature succinct, impressionistic. But with a story to tell I am tempted to provide information about the weather, how I know the people involved, the names of places and types of vehicle etc. While I know less is more, making more less is hard work.
I was ready
to shelve 2,000 plus words of recent prose that fell into these traps when I
encountered Bass’s advice. Then I had coffee with, Karen, who features in the
anecdote and discussed it with her. Perhaps I could redeem the piece with
weeding and capturing only what was notable about the experience we shared.
Karen was
my companion for a 500 km trip to my cousin Beryl’s funeral. We both wanted to
say goodbye, but also to put in a plea for her boxes of genealogical material. Beryl
was my first cousin once removed, Karen is distantly related to Beryl’s late
husband. We’d only met a couple of times before our road trip. It was nice to
have a seasoned traveller as a companion. Karen has lived in five states. Her
bumper sticker reads: ‘NICKINGOFFAGAIN’.
Karen instigated
most of our conversations en route. We skated from topic to topic: astrology
(she is a Libra), political corruption (she believes some of the money
disgraced MP Darryl Maguire got former NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian to ‘throw
at’ Wagga remains unaccounted for) and history, family and social (European
bees were introduced to Australia in 1822 because native bees did not produce
enough honey). Her driving style is likewise fluid (she drove because I found
out too late that her car is a manual which I can’t drive). A passenger’s
perspective can be skewed, but it felt like we almost brushed against trucks to
our left a few times and we definitely drubbed against the corrugations on the
outer edge of the road. Karen gestured extravagantly as she spoke, sometimes
leaving the gear stick and steering wheel briefly untouched then taking
skilful corrective action when she had made her point.
Our
destination was the Squid’s Ink Inn, on the shores of Lake Macquarie. On arrival the manager, a surly man
in his 30s, assigned us our rooms stating that he had already charged both to
Karen’s credit card. Karen deemed him ‘shonky’ as we had intended to pay for
our accommodation separately and he should not have processed the payment at
all until we arrived and checked in. I reimbursed Karen by paying for dinner in
the motel restaurant. Sorted, we thought.
The next morning we
strolled by the lake then set off at about 9.30 am for Beryl’s funeral which was
scheduled for 11 am at Lake Macquarie Memorial Park. Google Maps showed it as being
about twenty minutes away so we had ample time.
I pressed ‘start’ on Google Maps directions but we soon realised that we
were looping back through the same roads. Karen exclaimed ‘we’ve driven past those same trees four or five times and they haven’t
grown any’…
Then we saw tall
whirls of smoke on the horizon and hit a diversion set up by emergency
services. Time was getting tight. We lost the GPS signal and I re-entered our
destination. In minutes we found ourselves on the motorway to Sydney and our
trip time recalculated to over an hour. Turns out there is an almost
identically named funeral facility on Sydney’s north shore. Karen remained calm
and even tempered, but my vagus nerve was having none of it. Suddenly finding a
loo was more urgent than honouring my cousin’s passing. A search for
conveniences proved fruitless. We spied some secluded bushland where a
council ute was parked on a gravel turning circle. Karen pulled in, passed
me a box of Kleenex and I legged it into the vegetation. Karen engaged the driver
in conversation and obtained accurate directions to the Memorial Park.
We arrived about 40
minutes late and shuffled into a pew in the chapel behind the assembled friends
and relatives just as the minister was concluding her remarks. I had never been
to an interment. I was truly grateful that Beryl had opted for burial as it
gave us a second chance to pay respects. We followed the coffin on its gurney
down a gentle hill amongst rose bushes and immaculately trimmed hedges to the
graveside. There we exchanged hugs and handshakes, memories and stories.
Beryl’s granddaughter read Do Not Stand
At My Grave and Weep. We all stood and wept. Then we each collected a gerbera from the
funeral director to place on the coffin before it was lowered into the grave
and out of sight. The atmosphere at the wake was friendly. Karen and I had a
chance to talk genealogy with various guests and secured a promise from the
family that Beryl’s papers would find their way to Wagga.
Too weary to contemplate
the long drive home, we booked another night at the Squid’s Ink Inn specifying that we wanted to be charged separately. When we drove up all the parking
spaces were taken. The manager, with an unwarranted show of magnanimity (we
were paying guests after all) let us park in the driveway of his onsite
accommodation. Karen reiterated to me that she distrusted
him. The next morning he happily processed my room payment on my credit card
and it was not until we returned home that Karen found he had also charged her
for two more nights’ accommodation i.e. my room had been billed to both of us. It
took a six month long campaign of dispute resolution for Karen to get the money
re-credited. ‘Shonky’ indeed!
We were less chatty on
the drive home. Back in Wagga I thanked Karen for chauffeuring, for keeping
calm when we got lost and for having that box of Kleenex handy. If we
contemplate nicking off again, I hope the reason isn’t a funeral, but our next
adventure will be sorting through those boxes of family history records.
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