You can't go home again

We arrive in Melbourne.

After Sheila not getting any better we call the hotel doctor who naturally blames it on something she must have picked up in Delhi. We don’t care as he hands over s script for something stronger. Much, much stronger. Whatever it is, it takes the nasty gastrointestinal beasties in hand and slaps them about hard. Which is good as it means she’s well enough just in time for the road trip - the maternal road trip. The fun never stops.

But first we do the family catch-ups. Mother, Sister + her husband, Grandfather, Uncle + Aunt.

It’s good to see them all over the next few days. My sister does a one woman marketing effort on behalf of Melbourne telling me how it’s really developed in the last few years. “Do they have an Opera House yet?” I ask. That shuts her up. The weather holds up reasonably well after the flash flood rain of Sydney, It all goes swimmingly, even my Uncles really atrocious jokes which haven’t gotten any better in 20 years (which is good as I had promised Sheila they were bad).

We even manage to see on old friend of mine who is now shockingly a mother with a grown up job and everything. Luckily she brings her husband and daughters along to dinner where I get the chance to tell her young girls about their mothers’ days in the circus as the low clown on the totem pole (meaning she was the last one out of the tiny car and got hand-me-down putty for her nose). It’s good for them to know these things. They are the future after all.