We were strangers in an overcrowded share house, lost in a world of our own. Dancing at a rooftop bar, pickup truck bed under the stars. Magnetic. He saw me when I couldn’t see myself.

 We were tourists, driving across a continent, and living out of an overpacked sedan. Expanding horizons with every highway sign. Explore. He always said yes when I was accustomed to hearing no.

 We were a first floor, shoebox apartment in a stampede city. No comfort zones or old routines. Align. He adored the Rocky Mountain air and comfortable silence. I preferred flat ground, and filling empty spaces with words that didn’t need to be said.

 We sprawled across international terminal floors, unlost between time zones and homelands. Freedom. He didn’t overthink and I considered the altitude of airplanes and the opinions of others that I could never control.

 We were a three-bedroom house in his hometown, setting down roots of our own. Two babies who looked like us, arrived before rings. Growth. He said I could be anything that I wanted, and I still didn’t believe I was enough.

 We said forever under a tree in his parents’ backyard, string lights, cold night and outfits that didn’t look like ours. Tradition. His was the only face that I could see in a sea of faces staring at me. 

 So many places held us together between then and now.

                   Here now and always Home

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The most preposterous lie we’re told is that we cannot control the weather. Sure, anyone with common sense would label me a fool for suggesting the thing, but I’m confident, Dear Reader, you will accept this statement as truth by this story’s quick end.

I spent my childhood dreaming of being a summer baby. But a hasty delivery on the coldest night had the effect of sealing my fate. The beach had no place when I celebrated another spin around the sun.

“My birthdays will always be cold and white,” I told myself, it was just the way it had to be. I had an inkling it could change if only I wanted it sufficiently. Science was advanced enough, even in those days, to believe that just about anything was possible.  But as they say, you might as well dance in the rain, or learn to ski, I supposed. But I couldn’t ski just as I simply couldn’t accept that someone, somewhere didn’t have enough wits about them to control the weather. They had flown a man to the moon, after all.

As I extinguished the candles on another cake enjoyed in the great indoors, I made a wish. It was exactly the kind of impossible dream that every kid makes in front of their cake. Mine wasn’t the return of the dinosaurs or even a puppy because my mother was allergic. Surely not too much to ask for a little bit of sunshine. There was undoubtedly some bright thinker who could turn this whiteout into a colourful masterpiece.

Another year older but always the same, I sighed. I would need to become qualified in the art of weather control. Surely there was a course of study for that.

It’s a little bit of chemistry, mixing just the right concoctions.

A healthy dose of technology, but indeed I was no engineer.

Some sense of direction, to point me on the way.

Perhaps a bit of magic, if only to lead this riddle astray. 

I knew, even then that the most pragmatic approach was to acquire the cash required to get the things one desires, even if we didn’t have much ourselves.

I digress.

Once I’d saved enough and learned a little, I booked a flight to a land-down-under, the equator. I knew from the textbooks at school.

“Watch out for drop-bears, they’re vicious indeed.”

I’ve stayed so long that my friends have become mates. I now reckon instead of just think, and my jacket is required at a chilly 23 degrees Celsius, because that is the only true measure of temperature.

The inside jokes became mine and I’ve stopped looking up. The spiders and snakes aren’t nearly as menacing as first feared.

Fair skin becomes brown, but usually starts red like the dirt that surrounds this sunburnt land.

Now, Australia offers me birthdays that are warm sandy beaches and blue waters. Proof enough that even I can control the weather, and so can you.

Imagine that.

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The roses growing near the front door were as crimson as the flags that waved on their first date. The wildflower trail was Derek’s suggestion and Anna was enticed by an online Prince Charming. She was a successful executive manager by title, and a hopeless romantic at heart.

She arrived on time at the address he provided. Derek dragged himself from the steps of his mother’s house like a reluctant child headed home from the playground. 

‘Just a bit hungover, big night with the boys,’ he grunted as he fell into her passenger seat.

No worries, of course, she liked to have fun. And paint. Not that he’d asked.

Anna had earlier lost an hour selecting the perfect outfit. She waxed all the places where hair shouldn’t be and covered the spots that no one should see. She carefully straightened her fringe, making sure the wispy runaway curls were aligned. Sometimes, suggestive under attire was required if she wanted to capture her audience completely. If only briefly.

At thirty-six, she needed to make certain accommodations. Her biological clock ticked louder these days. Better to chase down my dreams than to wait. Even if it meant lowering her expectations, a little.

Creative.

Romantic.

Funny. 

Ambitious.

‘I forgot to grab my wallet,’ he moaned as they sat down at a quaint Wheatbelt café.

‘That’s fine, I’ve got mine,’ ever prepared, indulgent Anna replied. 

He wanted a better job, but his records were as muddy as the crabs of Shark Bay. Just drink driving he indignantly proclaimed, and minor theft. His grandmother had liked the wildflowers in September, but he never had time before she died.

‘She mostly looked at brochure photos from the resource centre in town, the old hag,’ he laughed to himself.

Derek almost ticked the boxes if a bit unconventionally. Nearly handsome and I’m almost forty. Her white picket dream was escaping faster than a champion thoroughbred released from the gate. She was tall for a jockey but held tight, hoping for a win.

She wandered alone along the roadside, marveling at the magic that sprung from the dirt. A red wreath bloom, she’d read, grew best in disturbed or burnt areas. She wanted to share its drought resistant magnificence and he jumped awake when she pulled the car door open.  

‘They’re just flowers, what’s so special?’ he queried, keen to return to his nap.

She agreed in most cases, eager to please. Silly old flowers indeed.

It occurred to Anna that they grew where they wanted and were adored, simply for existing. They needn’t pursue or settle for second rate spectators. She loved them more to make up for his disinterest.

Anna stepped from the shower later that night, taking a moment to admire her wet curls. She slipped into her favourite flannel pajamas and tucked the lacy negligée into a bottom drawer. The resting place for old connection cords and broken glasses. She pondered the wisdom of wildflowers as the kettle boiled in the kitchen.

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What if Nanabush and Tiddalik sat down for tea?

Would they say ‘I’ am the only and you are not me?

Would they compare what is ‘mine,’ and whose stories are better?

Would they wonder who was stronger, more cunning, and clever?

Or would they laugh from their bellies, telling riddles aloud.

Remembering the lessons, and how water abounds.

Would they talk about Dreamtime and a vast Turtle Island.

Recalling fondly when the world wasn’t lost at its wits end.

Perhaps they would question, the way things have gone,

How landscapes have changed from the ones they called home.

They might even lament, the life they once knew,

But we all exist in cycles, they’d agree that was true.

After the spring, the summer will come,

After the rain, the rivers will run.

After the fire, the ground comes alive,

After the birth, we all must survive.

After the night, the morning shine shines,

In circles we grow and adapt to the times.

In a world caught up in catastrophe and fear,

Perhaps, just maybe, the answers are clear.

Clear to an ear and a heart and a mind,

Not looking for one truth, and just being kind.

Listening to the things that need to be said.

Not just waiting for a turn to share the words in their own heads.

Twice as much to hear, twice as much to learn.

Two truths colliding and a new corner to turn.

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