Is It Any Wonder ?

Have you got ants in yr pants? Mum would say

When I fidgeted in bed.

Once the dentist slapped me in the face

When I wouldn’t keep still

During an extraction.

My mind would wander like Wordsworth

When I was a kid.

You’d forget yr head if it wasn’t screwed on

Was a comment

That followed me like a shadow.

You’ve always got yr head in the clouds,

Barked Brother Angus

From his pulpit

During Ancient History lessons.

Well, it’s better than having it stuck up my arse,

I wanted to say.

And now my grand-daughter has been diagnosed with ADHD.

Is it any wonder?.

Falling Short

I thought of the times I had fallen short.

Let the side down.

Not been up to scratch.

Been urged to pull my socks up,

My finger out

Take a good hard look at myself.

That I was always a few kangaroos short

Of a full paddock

a stubby short of a six pack

but I didn’t give a rats

I had the hide of an elephant

• thanks to K L Hale’s www,flannelwithfaith

wash yr mind out with soap

I like to comb my hair before I go to bed in case I meet my Maker.

I put on clean underwear before I go out in case I get hit by a truck or tram and end up in hospital. You want to look yr best.

Mum taught me these things.

Always repent to God yr sins before you go to sleep. Whiteness of soul is as important as whiteness of underwear.

An idle mind is the devil’s workshop, mum emphasised. She needn’t have worried. My mind was always busy.

But if she knew what I was thinking she would have washed my dirty little teenage mind out with soap.

 

 

Wrecks

 

Whenever my mother got in a state, she’d declare, “I feel like the wreck of the Hesperus, the Titanic and the Lusitania all rolled into one,” careful to keep things chronological. The old people they sure knew how to lay things on thick. But least they taught us the art of melodrama and not a little history.

 

* do you recall any sayings your parents or grandparents had?

What We Talk About When We Talk About Elephants

 

While on the subject of elephants , I had a friend once we all called ‘2 ply’ because he was thick-skinned; he didn’t feel like the rest of us; things had to be intense to get through that extra layer but when they did, he felt and gave out generously. Some found him a little distant.

 

My mother had a saying, “I can forgive but not forget.” She was good at grudges. My uncle, who was the recipient on more than one occasion, said she carried a chip on her shoulder big as a butcher’s block.

 

My other uncle had elephantiasis. He was always adjusting himself in the groin area. It looked like he was playing with himself in public. He and auntie never had children. Some nights in adolescence I would lie awake and think about uncle and his swollen scrotum. I had a ghoulish fascination with enlarged body parts. Doesn’t everyone?