by Today is Mum’s 75th birthday. A genuine milestone. When I called her last night (it was already her birthday in New Zealand) she was unbothered by the whole thing. She’s had tummy troubles this week which haven’t put her in a celebratory mood.
Mum is five foot two and a half. Or at least she was; I’m sure the half has gone now. She grew up on a farm in South Canterbury with five brothers (three older, two younger) and an older sister. Growing up with all those boys might be why she punches above her weight. She went to teacher training college in Dunedin and began her teaching career at Portobello, just down the road. In 1972 she got engaged but that all fell through – I have no idea of the ins and outs of that; Mum never even mentioned it to me. She made the six-week boat trip to Southampton the following year and would spend the next three decades in the UK.
In those 30 years New Zealand never stopped being home; at no point did Britain hold an emotional attachment to her. I think in the early days she was at least content with being there. She and Dad lived on a street where many other residents were born outside the UK; it had a strong sense of community. Mum had hobbies and interests which she continued to pursue when I was little. She was a keen runner and spent a lot of time spinning and knitting. My brother’s and my health and education were always top priorities for her; she showed incredible perseverance when it came to teaching my brother to read. I always marvel at the energy she had. In 1981 they bought a derelict house that was frankly wrong when you have two tiny kids (when they moved in I was 18 months old and my brother just three months), then a couple of months later she flew to New Zealand with us two tots, leaving Dad to contend with the notably harsh British winter of 1981-82.
My memories of home as a little boy involve cement mixers and insulating foam and two builders named Jack and Jim. They extended the house and transformed it beyond recognition into an asset of great value. Mum had done supply teaching when we were small, but in 1988 she went full-time and that was the beginning of the end. Her interests dried up; I suppose she no longer had the time and energy for them. While she was excellent in the classroom and very conscientious outside it, from the early nineties teaching became a means to an end. Save up enough money to get me out of here. By about ’95 school had become a chore. Dad realised that Mum would be unhappy if she carried on living and teaching in the UK. In 2000 they had a dummy run when Mum did a teaching exchange in Cairns, then in 2003 they upped sticks permanently to New Zealand.
In the meantime Mum made what I regard as a weird decision about our education. Dad would have sent us both to the big secondary school in town, but Mum had other ideas. My brother ended up at a comprehensive church school in Cambridge (a pretty good school, truth be told) while she thought I could benefit from something more academic and competitive. At eleven I sat an extrance exam for a private school on the off-chance that I won a scholarship. Though I was accepted along with about a third of those who sat the exam, I didn’t win one of the handful of scholarships. I wasn’t too disappointed. Normal school for me. Then Mum decided that the expense – vast, it seemed to me – would be worth it. It wasn’t. I stuck it out for five years in a 400-year-old school that had classes on Saturday mornings in exchange for longer holidays. My brother often took the mick: “He goes to snob school.” Now I don’t feel I ever went to private school; it didn’t make much of an impact on me apart from to dent my confidence.
Dad hoped that emigrating to NZ might make Mum eternally happy. No stress, no hassle, no enemies. Though I’m sure she has been happier than if she’d in the UK, it hasn’t quite worked out that way. She has enemies at the golf club; she would have them if she beached on an uninhabited island. When I went out to NZ last year, Mum’s stress levels often shot off the scale. I’d hear that sigh and that was it. Category 4 hurricane. Batten down the hatches, you’re in for a rough ride. Apart from Dad (poor thing) and I, nobody ever gets caught up in the storm. My brother and sister-in-law certainly won’t when they go over in August.
Over time Mum and I have drifted apart in some ways. I’ve suffered from anxiety and depression since my early twenties, and Mum hasn’t known what (if anything) to do about that. She wanted her son to have a wife and kids and earn plenty of money and play rugby with his mates and for everything to be simple. Mental health was (and mostly still is) a foreign language to her. Eventually she acknowledged the existence of my problems, but her “solutions” for me were way off base. I took that job in Wellington largely because of her, and that damn near killed me. I was 31 by then, but she still didn’t “get” me. It took my move to Romania for the penny to drop.
Much of the “drift” has been a case of her inhabiting the world of money in a way that I just don’t. Not anymore, at least. If anything, her wealth has only helped to increase her stress levels. It has also made her more shallow – it saddens me that her success, as she sees it, is defined by her wealth (I was born at the right time; aren’t I clever?) rather than shaping thousands of children’s lives over 40 years. One time I stayed at my parents’ in 2015, I found her behaviour embarrassing.
When I spent time with Mum last year, I realised she’s a more complex (and knowledgeable) person than I gave her credit for. Her views on subjects aren’t as black and white as I thought. She’s happiest being outside in nature, many miles from her biggest financial asset. (Last year she particularly enjoyed visiting her old stomping grounds in Otago.) She’s genuinely happy for me despite my meagre earnings and lack of a family. Since I moved to Romania, we’ve got on pretty well most of the time. She’s always just wanted the best for me; she hasn’t always known what the best is, but I can hardly blame her for that.
