A Portrait of True Love

Saturday, April 23, 2022, 4-5 pm
Norwood to Brighton

El

El giggled as she dodged and weaved around slow-moving and stationary traffic on Unley Road. Just can’t win, she thought. Drive in the left lane, and cars parked on the side make her swing into the right-hand lane. Stick to the right and you get some geezer that must turn right and wait for on-coming traffic. So, you’re stuck. Swing to the left. Even on a Saturday.

In her head, she reflected on the portraiture session with Lillie Edwards. The larger-than-life figure, in more ways than the obvious, kept Eloise entertained with her stories of her family and misadventures. No mention of Tasmania, however. Nor a little bundle she may have left there. But that was to be expected.
Lillie did moan about her fraught relationship with her young adult daughter, Tiffy, however. So, on the drive home, El, in her usual way of making sense of events, imagined those events running in a movie reel—especially the tale of Tiffy’s antics on the most recent Australia Day.

Australia Day, and the last vestiges of a less-than-perfect summer holiday wilt in the sweltering heat in the foothills of Adelaide. A blowfly beats against the window, in time to the droning of the radio, doom and gloom, global warming, and politics. Nine in the morning and thirty-four degrees Celsius—already!
Tiffy sits at the kitchen table. She’s the sitting-dead, the zombie of no sleep after a hot night, with no gully breeze. Sticky and sweaty, after tossing and turning with Mum’s chainsaw of snoring filling the house.

El laughed, ‘Bet Lillie does snore.’

Mum enters the family room and Tiffy recoils. ‘Ugh! Mum! How could you!’
‘It’s our family day, dear. I’m wearing my lucky golf shorts.’
‘Those legs should not be seen in public! Oh! How embarrassing!’ She covers her eyes shielding against the assault of Mum’s white legs under cotton tartan shorts. At least she wears a white T-shirt; better than nothing. Matches the legs, she guesses.

Dad drifts into the family room. He’s looking at the polished cedar floorboards while tying up his waist-length hair in a ponytail. He wears his trademark blue jeans and white t-shirt with a logo of some rusty metal band. That’s Dad. He’s a musician.

‘Something odd about the man,’ El spoke while passing the shopping centre near the “Dead Centre”, as she called the cemetery. ‘Can’t put my finger on it, though. But I sense it. He’s hiding something.’ She glanced at the blue-grey structure. Do I go in? I need more Oolong tea. They have the best…nah, I’ll wait.

Catching up with Fifi at Bathsheba’s next week. I’ll get it then.’

On with the reverie…

Tiffy looks to Dad. ‘Dad, why do we have to play golf? Why can’t we just have a barbecue by the beach like my friends?’

‘Because this is what Mum wants to do,’ Dad says. ‘We’re having a family day together before Mum gets all busy with work, and you get all busy with Uni.’
‘But, Dad, we always play golf. And it’s not family-building, it’s soul destroying.’
‘We’re doing this for Mum.’
‘That’s right, Tiffy.’ Mum strides down the hallway and lifts her red bag of golf clubs. ‘Ready?’
Dad and Tiffy follow Mum to the four-wheel drive all-terrain vehicle. The only terrain that vehicle has seen is the city, oh, and the only rough terrain, potholes.
‘The person who invented golf should be clubbed,’ Tiffy mutters.
‘Tiffy!’ Dad says. ‘Mum loves golf. We play golf on Australia Day because we love Mum, okay?’
Tiffy sighs. ‘Okay.’

‘Well, if I were Tiffy, that would be my stance,’ El said heading west to her beachside abode. She passed one of her old work places on Sturt Road and sighed with a sense of relief from the constant pressure of understaffing and increasing crime. However, a tinge of regret and longing to be in the thick of the action, solving crime, crept in.

She continued her imagining…

‘What a way to ruin a pleasant walk!’ Tiffy grumbles as she hunts for that elusive white ball in the bushes. Rolling green hills all manicured, a gentle breeze rustles the leaves of the gum trees either side. Her ball has a thing for the trees and bushes. She heads for them every time she hits the ball. And if there’s a sandbank, her ball plops in it like a magnet. And don’t get her started on the artificial lake.
Dad and Mum wait at the next tee ushering ahead multiple groups of golfers.
Tiffy’s ball doesn’t like the green and flies past it. She’s chopping away at the bushes near Mum and Dad.
Mum smiles at her and says, ‘Are you having a bad day, Tiffy?’
Understatement of the year. She swings at the pesky white ball.
‘Remember to keep your eye on the ball,’ Mum says.
Tiffy fixes her gaze on Mum and pokes her tongue at her.

Another shopping centre closer to home beckoned, but El turned at the Burger joint corner and drove ever west beach wards.

El sniggered as the reel of her over-active mind continued…
It gets worse.
Tiffy straggles to the tenth after twenty shots. Mum and Dad sit on a bench sipping cans of lemonade.
‘Well done! You’ve finally made it halfway,’ Mum says.
Her daughter stares at her. The cheek! Now she’s got white zinc cream over her nose and cheeks. ‘You look stupid, Mum. Like a clown.’

‘You look sunburnt, dear,’ Mum offers the sunscreen, ‘come and put some on. There’s a pet.’
Tiffy glances at her reddening arms. ‘Can I stop now?’
‘You may not,’ Mum says. ‘We’re only halfway. Now, come and I’ll put your sunscreen on. You don’t want to get skin cancer.’
‘I won’t if I stop.’
‘Come now, Tiff, it’s our family day,’ Dad says.
‘Oh, alright.’
Mum pastes her daughter with sunscreen. ‘Where’s your hat? Have you lost it? You need your hat.’ She finishes covering her with a bottle full of sunscreen and offers Tiffy her tartan beret. ‘Here, you can wear mine.’
Daughter jumps away. ‘No! Ee-ew!’
‘Come on!’ Mum thrusts her hat in her face.
‘No!’ Tiffy says. ‘I’m not wearing any hat! It gives me hat hair.’
Mum shakes her head, replaces the beret on her bleached bob before placing her ball on the tee. As she stands, legs apart, eyes on the ball, the wooden club raised ready to strike, Tiffy watches her mum’s behind, not a pretty sight.

Mum turns slowly, her eyes narrowing at her. ‘Would you please stand back? You’re casting a shadow. Don’t you know that it’s against golfing etiquette to cast a shadow?’
Tiffy steps aside. ‘No, I seemed to have missed that one.’
Mum swings her club back. She stops again. She rotates her body and glares at Tiffy. ‘You’re still casting a shadow.’
‘This isn’t the Australian Open and you’re not the “Shark”. Have I missed the television crews?’
‘Don’t be sarcastic,’ Mum says. She’s acting like a shark.
‘Sorry!’ Tiffy says with a bite of sarcasm and then retreats behind a nearby Morton Bay Fig tree.

Mum arches back her polished wood, then stops a third time. She marches over to Tiffy and snarls, ‘You are in my line of vision. Take that smirk off your face!’
Dad shakes his head while tossing his golf ball in the air and catching it.
‘It’s not for a sheep station,’ Tiffy says and then edges further around the thick trunk.
Mum stomps her foot and rants. ‘Now, that’s just ridiculous! Over-reacting! You haven’t changed. You always over-react. Grow up, girl!’
Tiffy slinks over to Dad and stands next to him. ‘Am I in your way, now, Mum?’
Mum shakes her club at Tiffy. ‘I’m warning you.’
Dad tosses the ball higher in the air and says, ‘Ladies, calm down.’
Mum puffs, lowers the club and strolls back to the tee. She swings.
‘She’s not in a happy place, Dad,’ Tiffy says, ‘she can’t be enjoying this family day. Next Australia Day we’re having a barbecue. And we’re using her golf sticks for firewood.’
Mum looks up. The club having shaved the top of the ball, causing it to dribble a few centimetres from the tee. Mum’s fuming.
Tiffy sniggers and then says, ‘Good shot!’
Mum points at the ball. ‘Pick it up! Pick it up, child!’
Dad hides his mouth and giggles.
‘What’s your problem, Mum? I’m the one losing here.’
‘Oh, stop being a bad sport and pick up my ball!’
‘Don’t tell me what to do.’ Tiffy strides up to the ball. ‘I’m not one of your students.’
‘Do it!’
‘Get a life!’ Tiffy says and then grinds the ball into the recently watered earth.
Dad claps.
Mum sways her head and clicks her tongue. ‘You have seriously lost it, Miss.’ Then she places another ball on the tee. ‘Oh, well, I was just practising, considering the circumstances.’ She swings and lobs the ball into the air. Shading her eyes, she watches the ball land on the green.
‘That’s cheating!’ Tiffy says.
‘It’s just a game,’ Dad says with a shrug.
‘Mum’s psycho,’ Tiffy says taking her place at the tee.
A crowd has banked up behind the family. Tiffy chips the silly white ball and watches it hook into the thick of the pine forest. Mum and Dad head down the fairway and Tiffy commences her next ball-hunting expedition.

El sits in the car while waiting for the garage roller door to oblige. The Edwards’ movie in her head continues…

Tiffy catches up with her parents on the eleventh. She’s given up forcing the ball in the hole.
Mum holds a pencil over a yellow card. ‘Score?’
‘Twenty,’ she fibs.
Mum says, ‘I don’t believe you.’
‘Thirty, then.’
‘Oh, come on!’ Her beret flops over her left eye. She looks ridiculous.
Tiffy waves. ‘Whatever!’
The Edwards family reach the circle of smooth green grass. Mum races up to the flag and lifts it. She grins at the sound of a satisfying plop. She stands still, her eyes fixed on the hole. Then she raises her arms and dances a jig on the spot. ‘I did it! I did it!’
‘Is she okay?’ Tiffy asks Dad.
‘Hole in one, Tiffy. Hole in one.’
Tiffy gazes at Mum performing a River Dance, trampling over the green in her tartan shorts and white legs. She still looks ridiculous. How embarrassing, there’s an audience gathering, watching her performance. Now she’s hopping and clapping away from them.

Tiffy sighs. ‘Just my luck! Now she’ll be gloating for the rest of the game.’
‘It has been her day,’ Dad says. He waves at Mum. ‘Well done, dear.’
‘She’s demented,’ Tiffy turns to Dad. ‘I don’t know how you put up with her.’
Dad pulls out a handkerchief and wipes his eyes. ‘It’s called love, Tiff. You put up with the good, the bad and the ugly.’
‘I say you’re putting up with ugly most of the time.’
‘Your mum’s been through heaps. She had it tough growing up. That’s what love is about. You don’t throw it away, just because it’s not perfect all the time. I mean, none of us are perfect.’
‘But Mum?’
‘You’ll see,’ Dad says and then he taps his daughter’s back. ‘Come on, it’s our family day. Better get on. I reckon Mum’s danced her way to the thirteenth already.’

El chuckled as she stepped through the garage door into her home. ‘Not exactly the way Lillie related her experience of achieving a hole-in-one, but I think my version is more amusing.’
‘What was that?’ Renard called from the kitchen.
‘Hey, Francis, dear, did you know that your old girlfriend got a hole-in-one?’
‘No, my dear,’ Renard slung a tea towel over his shoulder, ‘did you know that Sven was interviewed by the police the other day?’
‘Well, I’ll be,’ El replied and hugged her Renard, ‘Lillie made no mention of that during our portrait session.’

© Tessa Trudinger 2024
*Feature Photo: Stumped by the trees of the Golf course, Poatina Tasmania © L.M. Kling 2010]

Sometimes characters spring from real life,
Sometimes real life is stranger than fiction.
Sometimes real life is just real life.
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The T-Team with Mr. B: Central Australian Safari 1977

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