..she was still only ninety-six this was still a source of on-going annoyance. In her later years she had been persuaded to give up driving half the length of the North Island to visit my mother after she revealed that she was constantly worried that she would not be able to pick up a hitch-hiker as her eye-sight was so poor that she could not see any road signs. She came from the Kaitoke on New Zealand’s North Island and had married one of the multitude of Rutherfords on the other major bit of New Zealand, namely one Norman Rutherford a farmer, rotund, bald, astoundingly toothless and rather short-lived who either expedited his demise by the consumption of White Heather whisky ……. or perhaps used the whisky to mask the pain of the illness that killed him. The Rutherford’s were border cattle thieves and have the clan motto "Nec sorte nec fato", which means "Neither by chance nor fate" was true of their first meeting that was apparently arranged as both had a keen interest in horses. Norman had a couple of hapless racehorses and my grandmother liked the odd flutter.
She lived with us for a long time in the downstairs flat which was a wonderful balm on the seas of life as instead of running away from home I could scoot downstairs and have a cup of tea and a good chat with my grandmother. She still sharpened her knife on the concrete front step and gave us healthy bacon rind to chew when she was not making teeth-rotting toffee. In her later years she grew a trifle unsteady so my mother eventually managed to move her into assisted Methodist accommodation. Curiously her unsteadiness improved immeasurably which my mother attributed to the deprivation of medicinal gin the bottles of which clogged the cupboards in her previous house.
Our mother grew up as an only child on Mendip Hills sixteen thousand acres of high country sheep property. A fanatical and daring horsewoman she was astoundingly attractive and, she confessed a trifle naïve, meeting, marrying and then rapidly divorcing our equally good-looking, charming but rather caddish father. Her next husband survived the welcoming onslaught of Michael and I who rushed from the house and vigorously kicked him in the shins as he arrived wearing an army kilt on his motorcycle - a cold combination in Christchurch. Despite the severe chilling of his nether regions he sired three more children, whilst still displaying considerable tolerance towards his obstreperous and intermittently obnoxious stepsons. Lois, for that is our mother’s name remains a woman of great independence and resilience; she has through necessity and disappointment with the male of the species lived a self-sufficient life teaching way past the general retirement age. She even briefly taught Michael and which recall as being an excruciating experience and meant that we attended an unnatural number of primary schools – probably one new one each year - and cheerfully encouraged any artistic abilities by sending us off to art school weekend classes at a tender age.
I also blame her for my liking for wine as she celebrated 1975’s International Women’s Year by founding the Auckland Stem Club the first of its kind in New Zealand - though I did note that she complained about having to pay up to $2.50 for corkage. Now cosily installed in Summerset by the Park, a retirement complex for people of over 55 she is still in full possession of her faculties, drives with flair and a more than adequate sense of direction but no longer golfs as her pins won’t get her between the flags. A national treasure.
The women our my father’s side also live long and well, all managing around the magic one hundred and all indomitable to the end. I suppose if you were born in Boxer Uprising in China you are always going to have an interesting history. Our Great Aunt Phyl was still driving off to look after old people eighties, roaring around the hills in her Mini Minor smoke pouring off the wheels and clutch as she screamed around the corners like a professional rally driver. Always a diminutive figure she had by that stage become even smaller and I am sure that she no longer had to bend over to get into the car.
We have but the one daughter who is practically perfect in every way and about to turn thirty which to me is vaguely inexplicable as it means that I might be somewhat older than I thought. Every time I see her she seems both a beautiful, assured and terribly accomplished young lady but, also, a momentary composite of every moment that we have shared over the years. Which are many and yet now never enough. Every father loves his daughter in a vaguely helpless and distracted fashion and I am no exception. I feel rather privileged and lucky to know her.
I suspect that she is quite like her grandmother and that neither could do any better than that.