OLIVE’S FUNERAL AND WHAT I’D PREPARED .
THE SEVENTY THIRD POST
Mike
Before I tell you about her funeral, for those discovering Olive for the first time, I have a suggestion.
On the left under the Recent Posts column, you’ll find our Archives. (May take a while to load these columns)
Go to February, 2007, to the first post, Swims and Shandies, and get to know Ollie from the beginning of her “blob” .
………………..
……………..
Thursday , July 17th, was a bright sunny day on the Central Coast, NSW.
That’s where we live, my wife Katya and I. Eric too, and where Olive used to live too.
The winter chill had lifted in the wash of bright sun as we drove into the lovely park-like grounds of
the crematorium
In the car were Katya and friend, Eric who’d begged a lift from Ettalong
At 89, his driving permit restricts him to a 15 km radius from his home and the crematorium was much further than that.
We were very early as we pulled into the car park. I hate not having loads of time when going to a place I don’t know and I’ve yet to get one of those GPS things.
Hopping out, a large man in black lumbered towards us wearing a sad smile. “Do we know each other?” I asked. I knew the face but not the name.
“Ross Davey, Bonnie’s son.” Oh, yes I had a photo of Ross in Ollie’s room, crouching beside her, his family there too, all grinning as much as Olive in the middle.
………………..
………………….
She really was a good looker, wasn’t she, Ollie at 108? Don’t you think so?
………………….
…………………
I remembered too that Ross was a fan of the blog, unlike other members of the family for reasons
I’ll never fathom.
Well, I do have a theory about that.
Before the blog came along, Olive belonged just to them. Now she belongs to the world as well, and that can be threatening.
Today, they wanted it as a goodbye to the family Olive, not to the global blogger, which was fair enough
We found that the crematorium had a rather nice rustic coffee shop and so, with an hour to go before the service in the Hillside chapel, we repaired there for cappuccinos and Katya’s never-fail hot chocolate.
I was somewhat depressed both because the reality of Ollie’s death, and some suspicion in the air.
The chapel was visible through bare trees across a sparkling creek. I wish I’d ducked over there and spent some time with Olive
………………
………………
During the service there was a moment one could go up to the coffin, but I didn’t.
I wish I had. I did want to put my hand on her coffin and to look at the strong image of her they’d placed there, a photo I’d never seen before.
…………………….
……………………..
A crowd was gathering, very few members of the general public it seemed.
……………………
…………………….
I saw many sad hugs.
…………………
…………………
I recognized Barnie’s son, Terry, said hello and promised him a photo of his grandfather
That was Olive’s first husband, Bernard Johnson. I’d managed to find one, the only one in existence I think.
………………….
………………….
……………….
Finding old photos has been one of my roles these last few years. Terry was pleased.
Two young women from two sides of the family, discovered a resemblance, or rather, others did .
………………..
………………..
Evelyn, Olive’s eldest was there with her daughter, Suellen.
………………….
…………………..
Evelyn’s one line of dialogue in the movie we made, All About Olive, echoed in my head.
“Was your mum a good cook?” she says, “I’ll say she was! She was a station cook. You don’t get any better than that, Luv!”
Then I spotted a face you must meet.
This is the very special Danielle Notara. You and I know about Olive today because of Danielle.
………………….
……………….
Five years ago she was a student who wanted to find out about film making. I gave her a job as a researcher.
“I want to make a film about centenarians.” I said. “Find all those that you can in our area.”
One of those she found was Olive. Indeed, I first saw Olive on a tape Danielle shot with the help of my friend, Henion Han, who you should also know.
Henion, my editor, originally suggested the film about centenarians to me.
I must look at that tape again. All I remember is that Ollie was rouged and had lips bright red.
What a long journey from then it seemed to today.
Eric was lost in his own thoughts and Katya looked at me lovingly as usual
…………………..
……………………
………………….
…………………….
What webs we weave as we live our lives as best we can.
We filed into the chapel.
…………….
…………..
The service is a blur though I do remember it was nicely conducted by Olive’s pastor, Penny.
Since cameras were not wanted inside, here’s Penny taken later, outside.
………………….
………………
They read the 23rd psalm, I know, and someone reminisced about Olive’s life but she was very hard to hear.
On a screen, Ollie sang, Pack Up Your Troubles, wearing the large white hat which makes her look a fisherman on a trawler.
Towards the end of the service, a great great grand daughter spoke her personal goodbye. That was a touching and brave moment.
I later snapped her outside, giving everyone flowers
………………..
…………………..
I think this little girl was one of the kids we meet in the first post, the Stone family in Brisbane.
Less than two years ago, Ollie was their house guest, drinking shandies and swimming in the pool.
Ollie joked that her every move was watched for safety. They even put a bell on her walker, as if she was a cat.
Ding , Ding. “Mum, come quick, Ollie’s going to the toilet by herself!” they cried in alarm, following the old lady.
Ollie soon took off “the bloody bell”, she told me.
Then, we stood in prayer as a glass shield rose around the coffin. The glass went milky white and it was over. Her small physical self was gone forever to the flames.
And yet it was not over. Someone had the nice idea that we would release red and white balloons, the colours of Ollie’s beloved Sydney Swans football team.
………………..
………………..
……………………
………………….
And as they rose, they seemed to be forming patterns it the sky. It was a beautiful ending to the service.
……………….
……………………..
…………………
………………
………………..
…………………
………………….
…………………..
…………………….
Now, more cheerfully, here’s some news I prepared for Ollie about our trip.
She herself had only been overseas once to New Guinea where the husband of Pat, her grand daughter, had a job with a mine. She spent 6 weeks around Wewak.
We often talked about her going to other places, but we’d left it too late.
Next time, I’ll play a clip of her describing her journey to New Guinea.
…………….
Olive was often on my mind during our two months in Europe but never more then when in Bruges.
Bruges, in northern Belgium, is a city of bikes and leafiness so much so that sometimes you feel you are in a salad.
………………………..
…………………….
My daughter, Ellen was off at a 4 day rock concert and so I was exploring Bruges alone.
it was Sunday. Suddenly I came upon a colorful fair of some sort on the canal banks
…………….
…………….
………………….
There was Bric-a-brac everywhere. Superior bric-a-brac, I might add.
It was an antiques fair that happens only 3 times a year. What luck!
…………………
…………………
As, I enjoyed the clutter, I thought, what better place…
…………………
………………..
…to buy a present for an antique friend…
…………………..
……………………
…than at an antique fair? It was so obvious!
………………..
…………………
Moreover, it was quickly apparent that not only were these better antiques than we generally see down under……….
…………..
………………..
…. but that the show was like an Olive Riley theme park.
Everywhere I looked I saw echoes of her story.
…………………
…………………..
All that china, for example, reminded me of the time she left Bernard, her cheating husband.
………………
…………………
The story goes that she’d snuck out of Broken Hill with her three kids and all her worldlys in cases like these….
……………..
………………
…..leaving Bernard just a knife, a fork and a spoon, as the law required.
She’d left town the same day on a steam train for Adelaide and behold, here was a toy engine of the same type.
………………………….
……………….
This happened in the late 20s.
………………..
………………………….
On a chair, a distraught looking doll to remind me of Olive’s own doll story, of the time her doll was broken by the boyfriend of one of her sisters.
…………………..
………………………
He was just back from the Boer war and into tossing things around. It was the only doll she ever had, she said.
……………….
……………….
Here you see the sort of flat iron she used and in front if it, a miner’s lamp.
Such a safety lamp her hubby, the bad Bernard, and also her Dad would have brought back from the mine each evening.
……………..
………………
A little wagon! I remembered her stories about how she and her girlfriends would head off to dances in the local hall, dragging along their babies in wooden wagons like this one.
Once inside, they’d tuck the babies under the long wooden benches which ran down each side of the hall.
Soon, tiny faces with big eyes would be peering out at the forest of legs and swirling skirts.
……………….
………………
In those Broken Hill days, Ollie walked everywhere or used a bike.
No car transportation for her, though she would have recognised these skinny tyres, possibly from a model T. Ford.
……………….
……………….
She was skinny too, she lamented, and said that that was why Bernard went off with the girl next door, her former best friend, Vera Crispin
That Vera was another person Ollie punched out.
Ah, Shoe lasts. Her Dad repaired all the family footwear, Ollie told me. That must have been before he lost an arm. He would have used shoe lasts like these.
How self sufficient they were in those days! Much more able to deal with hard times when they came, than we would be today, I suspect.
………………..
……………….
Most of her sisters were working as dressmakers. That came to me as this man walked past with his shapely purchase.
Ollie was put to dressmaking but hated it and left.
…………………..
…………………….
Soon she was serving meals in the pub. I wonder if she wore a cute apron like these as she lost track of who’d ordered what.
……………..
……………
Ollie was reluctant to talk about her love life but did tell me that all the men in her life, except for Bing her second husband and Barnie of course, were no good.
No prince charming like these for her, or if there was, the charm wore off fast.
…………………..
……………………
But what about the travelling salesman who brought her the china horses. And were his horses as fine as the little figures above?
Her men went to war. Barnie was wounded three times and Bing, who was actually Barnie’s soldier mate, came back to marry Olive.
Did the boys bring back souvenirs like this helmet?
…………………
…………………
I forgot to ask her if she liked the races. Horse racing, and betting thereon, were an all consuming passion in Australia after the 2nd World War
Our Saturday afternoons were filled with a drone of men on radio, calling horse races across the country.
“And they’re racing at Caulfield, Happy Daze is off to a strong start……… Two furlongs to go as Bright Desire comes to the fore….”
………………..
I was very taken with this race game carousel, not having a clue how it worked, though.
My guess is that the cup on top held counters or bets.
…………..
………………
……………..
Ollie would have liked this thing, she running her hands over the tiny steeds.
………………..
…………………….
We took her to Australia’s Powerhouse Discovery Centre about a year ago, the idea being that she’d handle old objects from their collection and tell us what memories they sparked.
Here she’s looking into a stereo viewer, very popular in the early 20th century.
…………………
………………………
That visit was fascinating and is in the blog.
From the thatched cottage, Long Thurlow rd. Suffolk, comes a man in his van with coins, rings, glass vials, many of his treasures several thousands year old
First to catch my eye were two teapots with strange extra patterning. Not so old but what story!
They were from a 17th century shipwreck, I was told, a tea ship off the china coast.
…………………….
…………………….
I looked closer and saw that the patterns which’d caught my eye were remnants of oyster attaching themselves.
What thrilling objects they were. I had goose bumps.
…………………..
……………………
While these teapots are out of reach, being 300 Euros each. I’m chained to this stall, rummaging for more than an hour.
………….
…………….
Frugality thrown aside, I’m picking out a very old ring
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…………………..
My ring is from Amlash, ancient Persia, I’m told. It was made with the lost wax process and dates from 1200 BC, approximately.
“Want to try in on, Ollie? ” I’m thinking to say as I put it aside. “It’s only about 3100 years older than you, kid”
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……………..
Next, I need a coin. Well, I don’t need one at all but I want one. One that’s old and has a good story attached
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………………..
My coin is a sestertius, which denotes its value, a quarter of a Denarius. It was struck in Rome in 225 AD and found in Tunisia, part of the Roman Empire I guess.
On the front we see Julia Mamaea.
There can be no doubt, surely, that my coin is Julia. I found this confirmation on an ancient coin site.
Julia Mamaea was the highly intelligent and capable mother of Severus Alexander.
After the death of her mother Julia Maesa, Julia Mamaea was the power behind the throne and largely responsible for the impressive recovery of the Roman state that took place during her son’s rule.
Though popular with the population of the empire, the military was deeply offended at being controlled by a woman.
In 235 A.D., Julia Mamaea and Severus Alexander were both murdered by mutinous soldiers led by the thug, Maximinus I..
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……………………….
Ollie would have loved Julia’s story. Though she was not a feminist, Ollie was interested, for instance, in Hilliary’s chances. We both liked Bill better, though.
But these trinkets were not for Ollie. They were my treasures, my precious finds!.
A bit drunk with the distant past, I next splurged on a flint arrowhead found in Afghanistan, dating from around 4000 BC. That is, before I found it in Bruges.
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……………..
Lastly, I chose the iron point from a crossbow shaft, found in SW Germany (Swabia) on a 12 century battlefield, one of thousands.
The tip is damaged. The expert said that maybe it had penetrated armor or perhaps missed and impacted on a stone.
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……………………..
………………………
Do I believe my treasures are genuine? The man in pink was the dealer’s expert. We had a beer together. He wrote me out a paper, detailing my pieces. Yes, I do, believe they’re genuine.
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Famished by finds, I broke for a Bratwurst, or as they call them here in Belgium, a Braadworst.
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I’d forgotten Ollie’s present. The light was fading and it began to rain. Stall holders were racing to cover their goods.
…………….
……………
Under this plastic, I glimpsed something interesting.
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……………….
And what a color it was!
I remembered how much Ollie loved gramaphones. When she finally got herself one in the mid twenties, it was to share records with friends, she said.
They had one record each, she insisted, these they shared and pooled for dances.
It hardly seems believable but that’s what she told me.
But a gramaphone with a horn, how would I carry that back? It was impossible.
……………..
…………………..
It rained harder. I took shelter under the red tent and my eye lit on something amazing. Thank God for that shower!
…………………….
…………………….
There it was, a tiny portable wind-up gramaphone, made in Belgium in the mid 20’s by Colibri. I’ve never seen one before, no idea they existed!
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……………..
The stall owner showed me how it all packed into its own case
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…………………..
I had to have it. A deal was done.
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……………………..
I had it all planned, how I would present it to Ollie.
I’d say; “You know, Ollie all these new gadgets we have these days. Mobile phones, you’re comfortable with those of course , but now there’s Ipods.
They are portable music players. All the kids have them.
At this point she’d interrupt, I’m sure. “Get on with it, Mike!”
She was not partial to my long slow build ups.
“Well, when I was in Europe I picked up an Ipod from your time, made in the 20s.”
” Your pulling me leg.” would be the retort.
“No, Look!
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…………………..
And look the size it packs up into.
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.
…………………
“It comes in black or if you prefer, black.”
“Fancy that!”
“Do you? ….Do you really fancy it, Ollie?
“Well, it was just a manner of speaking. I couldn’t put it together. ”
“Cos, if you do, it’s yours.”
“You keep it love. I got nowhere to put it.”
Or so I imagine our conversation would have gone, the extremely heavy little box on her bed.
So, that’s how I went looking for antiques for my antique friend.
And here’s an interview on the BBC about Ollie.
…………………..
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/ipm/ipm_20080718-1913.mp3
Before I tell you about her funeral, for those discovering Olive for the first time, I have a suggestion.
On the left under the Recent Posts column, you’ll find our Archives. (May take a while to load these columns)
Go to February, 2007, to the first post, Swims and Shandies, and get to know Ollie from the beginning of her “blob” .
………………..
……………..
Thursday , July 17th, was a bright sunny day on the Central Coast, NSW.
That’s where we live, my wife Katya and I. Eric too, and where Olive used to live too.
The winter chill had lifted in the wash of bright sun as we drove into the lovely park-like grounds of
the crematorium
In the car were Katya and friend, Eric who’d begged a lift from Ettalong
At 89, his driving permit restricts him to a 15 km radius from his home and the crematorium was much further than that.
We were very early as we pulled into the car park. I hate not having loads of time when going to a place I don’t know and I’ve yet to get one of those GPS things.
Hopping out, a large man in black lumbered towards us wearing a sad smile. “Do we know each other?” I asked. I knew the face but not the name.
“Ross Davey, Bonnie’s son.” Oh, yes I had a photo of Ross in Ollie’s room, crouching beside her, his family there too, all grinning as much as Olive in the middle.
………………..
………………….
She really was a good looker, wasn’t she, Ollie at 108? Don’t you think so?
………………….
…………………
I remembered too that Ross was a fan of the blog, unlike other members of the family for reasons
I’ll never fathom.
Well, I do have a theory about that.
Before the blog came along, Olive belonged just to them. Now she belongs to the world as well, and that can be threatening.
Today, they wanted it as a goodbye to the family Olive, not to the global blogger, which was fair enough
We found that the crematorium had a rather nice rustic coffee shop and so, with an hour to go before the service in the Hillside chapel, we repaired there for cappuccinos and Katya’s never-fail hot chocolate.
I was somewhat depressed both because the reality of Ollie’s death, and some suspicion in the air.
The chapel was visible through bare trees across a sparkling creek. I wish I’d ducked over there and spent some time with Olive
………………
………………
During the service there was a moment one could go up to the coffin, but I didn’t.
I wish I had. I did want to put my hand on her coffin and to look at the strong image of her they’d placed there, a photo I’d never seen before.
…………………….
……………………..
A crowd was gathering, very few members of the general public it seemed.
……………………
…………………….
I saw many sad hugs.
…………………
…………………
I recognized Barnie’s son, Terry, said hello and promised him a photo of his grandfather
That was Olive’s first husband, Bernard Johnson. I’d managed to find one, the only one in existence I think.
………………….
………………….
……………….
Finding old photos has been one of my roles these last few years. Terry was pleased.
Two young women from two sides of the family, discovered a resemblance, or rather, others did .
………………..
………………..
Evelyn, Olive’s eldest was there with her daughter, Suellen.
………………….
…………………..
Evelyn’s one line of dialogue in the movie we made, All About Olive, echoed in my head.
“Was your mum a good cook?” she says, “I’ll say she was! She was a station cook. You don’t get any better than that, Luv!”
Then I spotted a face you must meet.
This is the very special Danielle Notara. You and I know about Olive today because of Danielle.
………………….
……………….
Five years ago she was a student who wanted to find out about film making. I gave her a job as a researcher.
“I want to make a film about centenarians.” I said. “Find all those that you can in our area.”
One of those she found was Olive. Indeed, I first saw Olive on a tape Danielle shot with the help of my friend, Henion Han, who you should also know.
Henion, my editor, originally suggested the film about centenarians to me.
I must look at that tape again. All I remember is that Ollie was rouged and had lips bright red.
What a long journey from then it seemed to today.
Eric was lost in his own thoughts and Katya looked at me lovingly as usual
…………………..
……………………
………………….
…………………….
What webs we weave as we live our lives as best we can.
We filed into the chapel.
…………….
…………..
The service is a blur though I do remember it was nicely conducted by Olive’s pastor, Penny.
Since cameras were not wanted inside, here’s Penny taken later, outside.
………………….
………………
They read the 23rd psalm, I know, and someone reminisced about Olive’s life but she was very hard to hear.
On a screen, Ollie sang, Pack Up Your Troubles, wearing the large white hat which makes her look a fisherman on a trawler.
Towards the end of the service, a great great grand daughter spoke her personal goodbye. That was a touching and brave moment.
I later snapped her outside, giving everyone flowers
………………..
…………………..
I think this little girl was one of the kids we meet in the first post, the Stone family in Brisbane.
Less than two years ago, Ollie was their house guest, drinking shandies and swimming in the pool.
Ollie joked that her every move was watched for safety. They even put a bell on her walker, as if she was a cat.
Ding , Ding. “Mum, come quick, Ollie’s going to the toilet by herself!” they cried in alarm, following the old lady.
Ollie soon took off “the bloody bell”, she told me.
Then, we stood in prayer as a glass shield rose around the coffin. The glass went milky white and it was over. Her small physical self was gone forever to the flames.
And yet it was not over. Someone had the nice idea that we would release red and white balloons, the colours of Ollie’s beloved Sydney Swans football team.
………………..
………………..
……………………
………………….
And as they rose, they seemed to be forming patterns it the sky. It was a beautiful ending to the service.
……………….
……………………..
…………………
………………
………………..
…………………
………………….
…………………..
…………………….
Now, more cheerfully, here’s some news I prepared for Ollie about our trip.
She herself had only been overseas once to New Guinea where the husband of Pat, her grand daughter, had a job with a mine. She spent 6 weeks around Wewak.
We often talked about her going to other places, but we’d left it too late.
Next time, I’ll play a clip of her describing her journey to New Guinea.
…………….
Olive was often on my mind during our two months in Europe but never more then when in Bruges.
Bruges, in northern Belgium, is a city of bikes and leafiness so much so that sometimes you feel you are in a salad.
………………………..
…………………….
My daughter, Ellen was off at a 4 day rock concert and so I was exploring Bruges alone.
it was Sunday. Suddenly I came upon a colorful fair of some sort on the canal banks
…………….
…………….
………………….
There was Bric-a-brac everywhere. Superior bric-a-brac, I might add.
It was an antiques fair that happens only 3 times a year. What luck!
…………………
…………………
As, I enjoyed the clutter, I thought, what better place…
…………………
………………..
…to buy a present for an antique friend…
…………………..
……………………
…than at an antique fair? It was so obvious!
………………..
…………………
Moreover, it was quickly apparent that not only were these better antiques than we generally see down under……….
…………..
………………..
…. but that the show was like an Olive Riley theme park.
Everywhere I looked I saw echoes of her story.
…………………
…………………..
All that china, for example, reminded me of the time she left Bernard, her cheating husband.
………………
…………………
The story goes that she’d snuck out of Broken Hill with her three kids and all her worldlys in cases like these….
……………..
………………
…..leaving Bernard just a knife, a fork and a spoon, as the law required.
She’d left town the same day on a steam train for Adelaide and behold, here was a toy engine of the same type.
………………………….
……………….
This happened in the late 20s.
………………..
………………………….
On a chair, a distraught looking doll to remind me of Olive’s own doll story, of the time her doll was broken by the boyfriend of one of her sisters.
…………………..
………………………
He was just back from the Boer war and into tossing things around. It was the only doll she ever had, she said.
……………….
……………….
Here you see the sort of flat iron she used and in front if it, a miner’s lamp.
Such a safety lamp her hubby, the bad Bernard, and also her Dad would have brought back from the mine each evening.
……………..
………………
A little wagon! I remembered her stories about how she and her girlfriends would head off to dances in the local hall, dragging along their babies in wooden wagons like this one.
Once inside, they’d tuck the babies under the long wooden benches which ran down each side of the hall.
Soon, tiny faces with big eyes would be peering out at the forest of legs and swirling skirts.
……………….
………………
In those Broken Hill days, Ollie walked everywhere or used a bike.
No car transportation for her, though she would have recognised these skinny tyres, possibly from a model T. Ford.
……………….
……………….
She was skinny too, she lamented, and said that that was why Bernard went off with the girl next door, her former best friend, Vera Crispin
That Vera was another person Ollie punched out.
Ah, Shoe lasts. Her Dad repaired all the family footwear, Ollie told me. That must have been before he lost an arm. He would have used shoe lasts like these.
How self sufficient they were in those days! Much more able to deal with hard times when they came, than we would be today, I suspect.
………………..
……………….
Most of her sisters were working as dressmakers. That came to me as this man walked past with his shapely purchase.
Ollie was put to dressmaking but hated it and left.
…………………..
…………………….
Soon she was serving meals in the pub. I wonder if she wore a cute apron like these as she lost track of who’d ordered what.
……………..
……………
Ollie was reluctant to talk about her love life but did tell me that all the men in her life, except for Bing her second husband and Barnie of course, were no good.
No prince charming like these for her, or if there was, the charm wore off fast.
…………………..
……………………
But what about the travelling salesman who brought her the china horses. And were his horses as fine as the little figures above?
Her men went to war. Barnie was wounded three times and Bing, who was actually Barnie’s soldier mate, came back to marry Olive.
Did the boys bring back souvenirs like this helmet?
…………………
…………………
I forgot to ask her if she liked the races. Horse racing, and betting thereon, were an all consuming passion in Australia after the 2nd World War
Our Saturday afternoons were filled with a drone of men on radio, calling horse races across the country.
“And they’re racing at Caulfield, Happy Daze is off to a strong start……… Two furlongs to go as Bright Desire comes to the fore….”
………………..
I was very taken with this race game carousel, not having a clue how it worked, though.
My guess is that the cup on top held counters or bets.
…………..
………………
……………..
Ollie would have liked this thing, she running her hands over the tiny steeds.
………………..
…………………….
We took her to Australia’s Powerhouse Discovery Centre about a year ago, the idea being that she’d handle old objects from their collection and tell us what memories they sparked.
Here she’s looking into a stereo viewer, very popular in the early 20th century.
…………………
………………………
That visit was fascinating and is in the blog.
From the thatched cottage, Long Thurlow rd. Suffolk, comes a man in his van with coins, rings, glass vials, many of his treasures several thousands year old
First to catch my eye were two teapots with strange extra patterning. Not so old but what story!
They were from a 17th century shipwreck, I was told, a tea ship off the china coast.
…………………….
…………………….
I looked closer and saw that the patterns which’d caught my eye were remnants of oyster attaching themselves.
What thrilling objects they were. I had goose bumps.
…………………..
……………………
While these teapots are out of reach, being 300 Euros each. I’m chained to this stall, rummaging for more than an hour.
………….
…………….
Frugality thrown aside, I’m picking out a very old ring
………………….
………………
…………………..
My ring is from Amlash, ancient Persia, I’m told. It was made with the lost wax process and dates from 1200 BC, approximately.
“Want to try in on, Ollie? ” I’m thinking to say as I put it aside. “It’s only about 3100 years older than you, kid”
…………………
……………..
Next, I need a coin. Well, I don’t need one at all but I want one. One that’s old and has a good story attached
…………….
………………….
………………..
My coin is a sestertius, which denotes its value, a quarter of a Denarius. It was struck in Rome in 225 AD and found in Tunisia, part of the Roman Empire I guess.
On the front we see Julia Mamaea.
There can be no doubt, surely, that my coin is Julia. I found this confirmation on an ancient coin site.
Julia Mamaea was the highly intelligent and capable mother of Severus Alexander.
After the death of her mother Julia Maesa, Julia Mamaea was the power behind the throne and largely responsible for the impressive recovery of the Roman state that took place during her son’s rule.
Though popular with the population of the empire, the military was deeply offended at being controlled by a woman.
In 235 A.D., Julia Mamaea and Severus Alexander were both murdered by mutinous soldiers led by the thug, Maximinus I..
………………………..
……………………….
Ollie would have loved Julia’s story. Though she was not a feminist, Ollie was interested, for instance, in Hilliary’s chances. We both liked Bill better, though.
But these trinkets were not for Ollie. They were my treasures, my precious finds!.
A bit drunk with the distant past, I next splurged on a flint arrowhead found in Afghanistan, dating from around 4000 BC. That is, before I found it in Bruges.
……………………..
……………..
Lastly, I chose the iron point from a crossbow shaft, found in SW Germany (Swabia) on a 12 century battlefield, one of thousands.
The tip is damaged. The expert said that maybe it had penetrated armor or perhaps missed and impacted on a stone.
…………………..
……………………..
………………………
Do I believe my treasures are genuine? The man in pink was the dealer’s expert. We had a beer together. He wrote me out a paper, detailing my pieces. Yes, I do, believe they’re genuine.
………………
…………………..
Famished by finds, I broke for a Bratwurst, or as they call them here in Belgium, a Braadworst.
……………….
…………………..
……………………
………………….
I’d forgotten Ollie’s present. The light was fading and it began to rain. Stall holders were racing to cover their goods.
…………….
……………
Under this plastic, I glimpsed something interesting.
…………………
……………….
And what a color it was!
I remembered how much Ollie loved gramaphones. When she finally got herself one in the mid twenties, it was to share records with friends, she said.
They had one record each, she insisted, these they shared and pooled for dances.
It hardly seems believable but that’s what she told me.
But a gramaphone with a horn, how would I carry that back? It was impossible.
……………..
…………………..
It rained harder. I took shelter under the red tent and my eye lit on something amazing. Thank God for that shower!
…………………….
…………………….
There it was, a tiny portable wind-up gramaphone, made in Belgium in the mid 20’s by Colibri. I’ve never seen one before, no idea they existed!
……………..
……………..
The stall owner showed me how it all packed into its own case
……………….
…………………..
I had to have it. A deal was done.
……………………..
……………………..
I had it all planned, how I would present it to Ollie.
I’d say; “You know, Ollie all these new gadgets we have these days. Mobile phones, you’re comfortable with those of course , but now there’s Ipods.
They are portable music players. All the kids have them.
At this point she’d interrupt, I’m sure. “Get on with it, Mike!”
She was not partial to my long slow build ups.
“Well, when I was in Europe I picked up an Ipod from your time, made in the 20s.”
” Your pulling me leg.” would be the retort.
“No, Look!
…………………….
…………………..
And look the size it packs up into.
………………..
.…………………
“It comes in black or if you prefer, black.”
“Fancy that!”
“Do you? ….Do you really fancy it, Ollie?
“Well, it was just a manner of speaking. I couldn’t put it together. ”
“Cos, if you do, it’s yours.”
“You keep it love. I got nowhere to put it.”
Or so I imagine our conversation would have gone, the extremely heavy little box on her bed.
So, that’s how I went looking for antiques for my antique friend.
And here’s an interview on the BBC about Ollie.
…………………..
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/ipm/ipm_20080718-1913.mp3
She’s gone
THE SEVENTY SECOND POST
Mike
It’s happened, friends. Ollie left us last Saturday morning (July 12th.) at around six am.
We’d seen her just the day before, Katya and I, and, as I worked on post 71 earlier today, I did not know she had already gone.
I don’t know the details yet, but I imagine it was a very peaceful passing. She’d seemed to asleep when we saw her and I guess that sleep just kept going on till the final moment.
Even so Katya and I are stunned, not because her death was unexpected, but because she was such a large part of our lives.
……………
………………
It’s funny to say this, but doing the blog with her, doing all the typing, the photographs, the movies, has been a big part of my life this last year, something that many friends couldn’t quite understand.
“Why all this effort for an old lady? they’d ask, “Are you in a hurry to age yourself?” (Me being 70 this year)
Quite the contrary. Olive Riley’s been keeping me young.
Her example says; if a woman who left school in 1914, can embrace the internet in her 106th year, what is there you can’t do, friend?
John McCain should take note. He’s not Internet literate yet, apparently
My parents both died tragically young, Dad at 59, and Mum at 65.
As I passed their death dates, I had the feeling of having reached the family age limit, of being on the downward slope. That is till I met Ollie.
I’d talked to thirty other centenarians before I came across this amazing person, the encounters all part of research for a documentary on why so many people now live to one hundred. None came close to Olive.
…………….
………………..
I was gob smacked by this dame with a memory like a hard drive. At 104, Olive was able to remember conversations she’d had in 1908 and bring them to life. Amazing!
I knew I’d not only found my film star, but I that I’d been given a reprieve from worries about following my parents.
Post Olive, there’d be no sense of having an age limit, no downward slope for me!
I mean, how could there be when your friends with a woman who dances the Can Can on her 108th, birthday!
………………..
………………….
Many others, have been energized in their own ways by Olive’s story.
There was one day in January 2008 when the blog had 350,000 visitors. That’s a lot of curiosity!
These last few days this blog has crashed, unable to carry the load. The news of her death, a world wide story.
Looking back over the last eventful year, I know it’s been mighty strange for her, this blogging or blobbing as she often called it.
Ollie was a straight forward soul. She had her football team, the Swans. She loved dogs…. That’s our Tosca. Her own Mitzie, never forgotten
……………………
…………………..
She liked Aussie pies
………………
………………
and usually she tolerated me, fed up with blobbing only rarely.
……………..
………………
Ollie was also a good friend to others in her nursing home, especially if they were going through roughs spots as was P…. .
……………
……………
All of that was normal but then came fame.
Who can blame her for never fully understanding why people around the world came to think of her as family?
………………
…………….
Here’s a woman who’d lived a rather quiet life. For her first 100 years, no one paid her much attention beyond her family, and then suddenly she’s a hero, suddenly she’s loved all over.
How strange it was for her, thrilling and scary too
She became a hero not just for other oldies struggling to understand the internet, but for their children too, folks who dearly want their own parents to stay as alert and interested as Ollie.
Many hope that keeping active with a blog as Ollie’s done, might be the answer to their old people avoiding becoming Alzeihmers victims, and maybe they’re right.
Almost to the very end Olive was sound in memory, even as her children, 20 years younger, were not so lucky
If you look back through the thousands of comments we’ve had, you’ll see that her power to inspire comes up again and again.
“Thanks so much Ollie, for inspiring my parents to get active,” says a typical comment, ” You’ve helped them overcome their fear of computers., dear Olive.” is a typical comment.
The irony is that in the 15 months the blog was going, Ollie never actually worked at the computer, never actually posted a blog story herself.
We took shots of her at my computer but she was faking it. Doesn’t she look naughty?
…………………..
…………………
“I have got vision,” she used to say, when asked how much she could see, meaning she could see something out of one eye.
But it was not much, this vision, and there was no way she could type, select photos, or do any of the things a hands-on blogger must do.
That’s where I came in.
It was Eric Shackle’s idea that Olive blog. He’d discovered Maria Amelia doing the same at 95 in Spain. (Maria is now back enthroned as the world’s oldest blogger, and very pleased she is too!)
Eric convinced me it was possible for Olive to blog if she wanted to. So I explained as best I could what a blog was.
“It’s a sort of diary that people around the world can read.” I said. She was doubtful but prepared to be the story teller if I did the work.
At first, we used up stories left over from the film I’d made with her, the ABC doc. All about Olive.
Some we told again to our new audience, our favorites like the ink flick story.
Apparently being naughty in class, Olive was made to sit in the front row of the Broken Hill primary school. A big mistake on the part of the teacher, Mrs Gillings.
“Oh, Old mother Gillings, I got square with her,” said Olive with relish.
“When she came past, I’d dip me pen in the inkwell, and I’d flip a drop on the back of her dress. I did too, many times! She had black dots all up and down her dress.”
…………….
………………………
Soon, the blog evolved and became more of a conversation between us, and not just about the past but about what interested us today.
We got into some local causes Ollie cared about, like the fate of Jonnie Bosco, the hydroponic lettuce grower, his business unfairly shut down by Gosford Council.
They said he could grow lettuces in the ground, not on frames above the ground. “What nonsense,” growled Olive.
…………………
…………………..
We thought Johnnie might win his battle with the bureaucrats, as you can see from Ollie’s triumphant pose….
But he lost even though, I suspect, Ollie spun Nina’s wishing wheel for him.
It was a good wishing wheel. It should have worked especially since Nina’s shop was just next door and sold Johnnie’s lettuces.
………………..
………………….
We used the blog as a search engine too, finding the Queensland cattle station, Culloden, on which Ollie had worked in the thirties as the station cook. Here’s an old photo of the homestead we found
…………………….
And then, what a thrill. We found a picture of Olive herself with her kids, Barnie and Evelyn, on the Culloden property.
The kids worked too. Barnie was a rouse about and Evelyn served at table. It was a rather posh cattle station, apparently
……………….
………………….
Mid 2007, Katya, my wife, came into the picture, becoming Olive’s friend and a story sparker, bringing her Russian background, her interest in music and Matrioshka dolls to the blog
……………….
………………..
Olive’s fame spread, and whilst the Australian broadsheet press never warmed to her, put off I suspect by the fact that she didn’t type herself, the foreign press loved her and made her a blogsphere star.
Good morning America, The BBC, AP, the Spanish press and the Italians, all did stories on her blog, usually tagging her as the world’s oldest blogger.
Jay Leno wanted her on his LA show, thinking she’d fly over for the taping. We had to regretfully explain her situation.
With 80 million blogs in the world, Olive’s was ranking 7000th. as 2008 began.
The thing built and built. We always knew when a story had been published because there’d be a rash of comments from that country in the days following.
Iceland was hot for a few weeks, then Argentina, then Croatia, Ollie’s fame was jumping round the globe like a bush fire.
The US was always her biggest fan base probably because there are professional blog boosters there who pick up and promote the blogs they like.
A blog arbiter called Kim Komando took a shine to Olive’s stories and the American readership jumped astronomically as a result of Kit’s comments.
The same happened when Ronnie Bennett with her famous blog, Time goes by, discovered Olive and enthused..
Ronnie has recently done a piece for the Wall St. Journal on the elder blogger phenomenon, mentioning Olive’s blog.
Considering how Olive disliked Rupert Murdoch, whose room at a Sydney hotel she once cleaned (”He was very polite, then. A nice man, then.“) perhaps I shouldn’t mention this.
Then again, Mr Murdoch might read this and become the man of peace Ollie said he should be.
(Murdoch promoted the Iraq war in his papers, predicting that oil would drop to $20 a barrel. He got right, didn’t he? )
With our mix of past and present, there was never a lack for the next post even though the main attraction, Olive herself, was confined to a chair in Woy Woy.
That coastal suburb, an hour north of Sydney, is the place funny man Spike Milligan ungraciously dubbed; the biggest above ground cemetery in the world.
What I wonder would Spike make of graveyard Ollie being invited to the launch of YouTube Australia?
Yes, YouTube wanted Ollie at their opening bash because by that time, late 2007, her blog had become a sort of a blog-amentary, bursting will film clips.
We ran clips of her singing, clips of her story telling, and even a clip of her eating oysters at the local pub, all of which were hosted by YouTube. of course.
Sadly, she could not travel to their Sydney launch, but I filmed her greetings and took the clip along for projection.
Her message thrilled the young media types at the launch, even though it showed she was struggling to understand what this “tube thing” was.
“The best of luck with your tube,” was the nub of her message. “I hope it gives you great satisfaction”
You can find her greetings on the blog or youTube itself.
Its all been quite fun, given that this is a lady who never used a telephone till she was twenty, and saw her first plane at Broken Hill when already a mother. Some confusion about tubes is to be expected, surely!
As Eric likes to point out, when Olive was born, Queen Victoria was still on the throne of England, and and Australia was not yet a federation.
Olive had no great philosophical thoughts on life to offer the blog. She was stumped on the secret of her longevity, though we tried quite hard for clues.
She was a devout person, though, and her Christian beliefs gave her strength and comfort.
She was lucky in having wonderful ministers of her church nearby. They’d come to her room to give her communion.
……………….
…………………….
katya is Russian Orthodox and one day we took Olive to Katya’s Russian church which she enjoyed, as did Father James.. That went into the blog of course.
………………….
What we have not touched on in the blog, a her political beliefs. Olive was a staunch Labor supporter, and believed fervently in trade unions.
She never tired of telling me how the Mine workers Union, in Broken Hill, not only struck for better working conditions (and won), but kept the peace, disciplining violent or errant husbands, not to mention handing out food and blankets in times of need.
Son Barnie was born the day the long general strike of 1920 ended.
She almost had him on a steam tram resulting not only in a healthy baby, but one of her best blob stories. (On the Steam tram)
As for unions, ” Fair go, mate” could have been her slogan though I never heard her use those words.
Olive always rooted for the underdog.
For the pit ponies from the mines who came up each weekend for a rest, eagerly awaited by Olive and friends, and, years later for Jack Lang, the 30’s labor politician who took on the big British banks. Jack, she loved with a passion.
……………….
…………………
Lang was a polarizing figure, but Ollie would have done anything for the man, for the big fella as they called him.
All of this was not surprising since, all her life, she was a working class girl.
Born in Broken Hill on Oct. 20th 1899, she was the youngest of twelve children, someone forgotten in the large family, cursed with a mother who was fed up with having kids and who hated her, or so Ollie said.
…………….
……………
At 15, Ollie was working in local pubs, serving meals and getting hopelessly mixed up, she told me, always confused as who had ordered what.
She’d be spinning around the room yelling, “Ey! ‘oo ordered the steak ‘n mash?….Goodo! Now, ‘oo do these snags belong to, then?”
(See her blog story about the horse who turned up at side window of the pub every afternoon for his beer. )
Later, fleeing an abusive husband with three kids in tow, Olive went to Adelaide and became a cook, a cleaner and later an egg candler.
She was one of those forgotten women who daily held thousands of eggs up the the light, searching for imperfections in the white globes, cancers and other nasties. (Brown eggs were a rarity then, she told me)
Most of her later working life she spent as a barmaid, and we have not even begun to tell the stories of the curious customers she dealt with, of how she handled foul language, or the drunks at the six O’clock swill.
Recently, I showed her parts of the film, Caddie., based on the book of the same name, which tells the story of a Sydney barmaid in the 20’s nicknamed Caddie.
“It was just like that,” she said, though she claimed she had no fancy man like Caddie.
There was one traveling salesman who brought her a china horse each trip, she told me, passing them over the bar to her, galloping his porcelain ‘prezzies’ through the spilled suds.
But he was just a nice man, she said, but not a boyfriend. Her love life was a subject that was somewhat taboo.
Hers, was a view from the footpaths of the 20th. century, not from high places. She wasat Jack Lang’s rallies but never joined any push.
She was on the Sydney Harbour bridge when Simon De Groote cut the ribbon, pre empting the opening of that famous bridge, but she took no part
Life did not sweep her up into great events. Nor did she feel she was living in epic times, though the end of the Second World War, and son Barnie coming home from that war, wounded three times, were thrilling moments.
Barnie’s death, six months ago, rocked her. Here are Barnie and Bonnie, the youngest, in uniform.
……………..
……………
Here’s a photo she especially loved, Barnie rolling up to her 105th birthday. “Ullo Luv,” he growled.
……………………..
………………………
Now she’s gone. We still can’t quite take it in, Katya and I.
Nor can Eric either, Olive filling an empty place in his life, I suspect.
They’ve been very good friends this last year, Ollie and Eric, he reading her the comments each Friday, a session that she so much looked forward to.
……………….
……………….
Oh, I forgot to mention that Ollie loved her native Broken Hill . Filled with a fierce pride for her home town, she was.
When we took this Pic. of her looking down on the town, it was of a person who’d come home.
……………………….
………………..
When we took this one, she was at the fun fair, arguing for a ride on the dodgems, God love ‘er!
………………
……………………..
And when I took this sunset snap in nearby hills, she said; “Ah, communing with nature. How nice”
………………….
…………………..
Earlier this year Ollie heard something big was afoot near Broken Hill . I was dispatched to find out what was going on.
I discovered that there were plans, well advanced, to build Australia’s biggest wind farm not far from Broken Hill.
Olive got quite excited, wanting to know all about windmills, a technology in which we lag far behind Europe.
……………..
……………..
Wouldn’t it be great, I thought if Ollie was to become a patroness of this project?
They could even put her on the payroll for a nominal amount, making her the world’s oldest wage earner. That’d make a blog story!!!
I contacted Epuron, the company building the giant complex (Two billion it’ll cost) and they were intrigued, indeed ready to give her a role.
But then my trip to Europe with my daughter took me away for two months, and the chance was lost. I arrived back just one day before she died.
What a pity. Ollie would have loved to help put wind farms on the map, and last year she could have done it, not moving around of course, but from her room, she could have beaten the drum and rallied the troops.
But it was not to be. Our scheming days are over.
…………….
………………….
It will be sad to stop this blog.
I may do another post or two, news of interesting things found on my trip, things I was planning to tell Ollie about.
What do you think? Do you want that?
Anyway, both Olive and I are happy that you enjoyed her blob so much.
You showed us you did, day after day, with your comments.
So, from both of us, I thank you.
Right, Ollie?
……………….
……………..
Mike Rubbo, Sunday night, July 13th 2008, Avoca Beach.
rubbo@aapt.net.au
It’s happened, friends. Ollie left us last Saturday morning (July 12th.) at around six am.
We’d seen her just the day before, Katya and I, and, as I worked on post 71 earlier today, I did not know she had already gone.
I don’t know the details yet, but I imagine it was a very peaceful passing. She’d seemed to asleep when we saw her and I guess that sleep just kept going on till the final moment.
Even so Katya and I are stunned, not because her death was unexpected, but because she was such a large part of our lives.
……………
………………
It’s funny to say this, but doing the blog with her, doing all the typing, the photographs, the movies, has been a big part of my life this last year, something that many friends couldn’t quite understand.
“Why all this effort for an old lady? they’d ask, “Are you in a hurry to age yourself?” (Me being 70 this year)
Quite the contrary. Olive Riley’s been keeping me young.
Her example says; if a woman who left school in 1914, can embrace the internet in her 106th year, what is there you can’t do, friend?
John McCain should take note. He’s not Internet literate yet, apparently
My parents both died tragically young, Dad at 59, and Mum at 65.
As I passed their death dates, I had the feeling of having reached the family age limit, of being on the downward slope. That is till I met Ollie.
I’d talked to thirty other centenarians before I came across this amazing person, the encounters all part of research for a documentary on why so many people now live to one hundred. None came close to Olive.
…………….
………………..
I was gob smacked by this dame with a memory like a hard drive. At 104, Olive was able to remember conversations she’d had in 1908 and bring them to life. Amazing!
I knew I’d not only found my film star, but I that I’d been given a reprieve from worries about following my parents.
Post Olive, there’d be no sense of having an age limit, no downward slope for me!
I mean, how could there be when your friends with a woman who dances the Can Can on her 108th, birthday!
………………..
………………….
Many others, have been energized in their own ways by Olive’s story.
There was one day in January 2008 when the blog had 350,000 visitors. That’s a lot of curiosity!
These last few days this blog has crashed, unable to carry the load. The news of her death, a world wide story.
Looking back over the last eventful year, I know it’s been mighty strange for her, this blogging or blobbing as she often called it.
Ollie was a straight forward soul. She had her football team, the Swans. She loved dogs…. That’s our Tosca. Her own Mitzie, never forgotten
……………………
…………………..
She liked Aussie pies
………………
………………
and usually she tolerated me, fed up with blobbing only rarely.
……………..
………………
Ollie was also a good friend to others in her nursing home, especially if they were going through roughs spots as was P…. .
……………
……………
All of that was normal but then came fame.
Who can blame her for never fully understanding why people around the world came to think of her as family?
………………
…………….
Here’s a woman who’d lived a rather quiet life. For her first 100 years, no one paid her much attention beyond her family, and then suddenly she’s a hero, suddenly she’s loved all over.
How strange it was for her, thrilling and scary too
She became a hero not just for other oldies struggling to understand the internet, but for their children too, folks who dearly want their own parents to stay as alert and interested as Ollie.
Many hope that keeping active with a blog as Ollie’s done, might be the answer to their old people avoiding becoming Alzeihmers victims, and maybe they’re right.
Almost to the very end Olive was sound in memory, even as her children, 20 years younger, were not so lucky
If you look back through the thousands of comments we’ve had, you’ll see that her power to inspire comes up again and again.
“Thanks so much Ollie, for inspiring my parents to get active,” says a typical comment, ” You’ve helped them overcome their fear of computers., dear Olive.” is a typical comment.
The irony is that in the 15 months the blog was going, Ollie never actually worked at the computer, never actually posted a blog story herself.
We took shots of her at my computer but she was faking it. Doesn’t she look naughty?
…………………..
…………………
“I have got vision,” she used to say, when asked how much she could see, meaning she could see something out of one eye.
But it was not much, this vision, and there was no way she could type, select photos, or do any of the things a hands-on blogger must do.
That’s where I came in.
It was Eric Shackle’s idea that Olive blog. He’d discovered Maria Amelia doing the same at 95 in Spain. (Maria is now back enthroned as the world’s oldest blogger, and very pleased she is too!)
Eric convinced me it was possible for Olive to blog if she wanted to. So I explained as best I could what a blog was.
“It’s a sort of diary that people around the world can read.” I said. She was doubtful but prepared to be the story teller if I did the work.
At first, we used up stories left over from the film I’d made with her, the ABC doc. All about Olive.
Some we told again to our new audience, our favorites like the ink flick story.
Apparently being naughty in class, Olive was made to sit in the front row of the Broken Hill primary school. A big mistake on the part of the teacher, Mrs Gillings.
“Oh, Old mother Gillings, I got square with her,” said Olive with relish.
“When she came past, I’d dip me pen in the inkwell, and I’d flip a drop on the back of her dress. I did too, many times! She had black dots all up and down her dress.”
…………….
………………………
Soon, the blog evolved and became more of a conversation between us, and not just about the past but about what interested us today.
We got into some local causes Ollie cared about, like the fate of Jonnie Bosco, the hydroponic lettuce grower, his business unfairly shut down by Gosford Council.
They said he could grow lettuces in the ground, not on frames above the ground. “What nonsense,” growled Olive.
…………………
…………………..
We thought Johnnie might win his battle with the bureaucrats, as you can see from Ollie’s triumphant pose….
But he lost even though, I suspect, Ollie spun Nina’s wishing wheel for him.
It was a good wishing wheel. It should have worked especially since Nina’s shop was just next door and sold Johnnie’s lettuces.
………………..
………………….
We used the blog as a search engine too, finding the Queensland cattle station, Culloden, on which Ollie had worked in the thirties as the station cook. Here’s an old photo of the homestead we found
…………………….
And then, what a thrill. We found a picture of Olive herself with her kids, Barnie and Evelyn, on the Culloden property.
The kids worked too. Barnie was a rouse about and Evelyn served at table. It was a rather posh cattle station, apparently
……………….
………………….
Mid 2007, Katya, my wife, came into the picture, becoming Olive’s friend and a story sparker, bringing her Russian background, her interest in music and Matrioshka dolls to the blog
……………….
………………..
Olive’s fame spread, and whilst the Australian broadsheet press never warmed to her, put off I suspect by the fact that she didn’t type herself, the foreign press loved her and made her a blogsphere star.
Good morning America, The BBC, AP, the Spanish press and the Italians, all did stories on her blog, usually tagging her as the world’s oldest blogger.
Jay Leno wanted her on his LA show, thinking she’d fly over for the taping. We had to regretfully explain her situation.
With 80 million blogs in the world, Olive’s was ranking 7000th. as 2008 began.
The thing built and built. We always knew when a story had been published because there’d be a rash of comments from that country in the days following.
Iceland was hot for a few weeks, then Argentina, then Croatia, Ollie’s fame was jumping round the globe like a bush fire.
The US was always her biggest fan base probably because there are professional blog boosters there who pick up and promote the blogs they like.
A blog arbiter called Kim Komando took a shine to Olive’s stories and the American readership jumped astronomically as a result of Kit’s comments.
The same happened when Ronnie Bennett with her famous blog, Time goes by, discovered Olive and enthused..
Ronnie has recently done a piece for the Wall St. Journal on the elder blogger phenomenon, mentioning Olive’s blog.
Considering how Olive disliked Rupert Murdoch, whose room at a Sydney hotel she once cleaned (”He was very polite, then. A nice man, then.“) perhaps I shouldn’t mention this.
Then again, Mr Murdoch might read this and become the man of peace Ollie said he should be.
(Murdoch promoted the Iraq war in his papers, predicting that oil would drop to $20 a barrel. He got right, didn’t he? )
With our mix of past and present, there was never a lack for the next post even though the main attraction, Olive herself, was confined to a chair in Woy Woy.
That coastal suburb, an hour north of Sydney, is the place funny man Spike Milligan ungraciously dubbed; the biggest above ground cemetery in the world.
What I wonder would Spike make of graveyard Ollie being invited to the launch of YouTube Australia?
Yes, YouTube wanted Ollie at their opening bash because by that time, late 2007, her blog had become a sort of a blog-amentary, bursting will film clips.
We ran clips of her singing, clips of her story telling, and even a clip of her eating oysters at the local pub, all of which were hosted by YouTube. of course.
Sadly, she could not travel to their Sydney launch, but I filmed her greetings and took the clip along for projection.
Her message thrilled the young media types at the launch, even though it showed she was struggling to understand what this “tube thing” was.
“The best of luck with your tube,” was the nub of her message. “I hope it gives you great satisfaction”
You can find her greetings on the blog or youTube itself.
Its all been quite fun, given that this is a lady who never used a telephone till she was twenty, and saw her first plane at Broken Hill when already a mother. Some confusion about tubes is to be expected, surely!
As Eric likes to point out, when Olive was born, Queen Victoria was still on the throne of England, and and Australia was not yet a federation.
Olive had no great philosophical thoughts on life to offer the blog. She was stumped on the secret of her longevity, though we tried quite hard for clues.
She was a devout person, though, and her Christian beliefs gave her strength and comfort.
She was lucky in having wonderful ministers of her church nearby. They’d come to her room to give her communion.
……………….
…………………….
katya is Russian Orthodox and one day we took Olive to Katya’s Russian church which she enjoyed, as did Father James.. That went into the blog of course.
………………….
What we have not touched on in the blog, a her political beliefs. Olive was a staunch Labor supporter, and believed fervently in trade unions.
She never tired of telling me how the Mine workers Union, in Broken Hill, not only struck for better working conditions (and won), but kept the peace, disciplining violent or errant husbands, not to mention handing out food and blankets in times of need.
Son Barnie was born the day the long general strike of 1920 ended.
She almost had him on a steam tram resulting not only in a healthy baby, but one of her best blob stories. (On the Steam tram)
As for unions, ” Fair go, mate” could have been her slogan though I never heard her use those words.
Olive always rooted for the underdog.
For the pit ponies from the mines who came up each weekend for a rest, eagerly awaited by Olive and friends, and, years later for Jack Lang, the 30’s labor politician who took on the big British banks. Jack, she loved with a passion.
……………….
…………………
Lang was a polarizing figure, but Ollie would have done anything for the man, for the big fella as they called him.
All of this was not surprising since, all her life, she was a working class girl.
Born in Broken Hill on Oct. 20th 1899, she was the youngest of twelve children, someone forgotten in the large family, cursed with a mother who was fed up with having kids and who hated her, or so Ollie said.
…………….
……………
At 15, Ollie was working in local pubs, serving meals and getting hopelessly mixed up, she told me, always confused as who had ordered what.
She’d be spinning around the room yelling, “Ey! ‘oo ordered the steak ‘n mash?….Goodo! Now, ‘oo do these snags belong to, then?”
(See her blog story about the horse who turned up at side window of the pub every afternoon for his beer. )
Later, fleeing an abusive husband with three kids in tow, Olive went to Adelaide and became a cook, a cleaner and later an egg candler.
She was one of those forgotten women who daily held thousands of eggs up the the light, searching for imperfections in the white globes, cancers and other nasties. (Brown eggs were a rarity then, she told me)
Most of her later working life she spent as a barmaid, and we have not even begun to tell the stories of the curious customers she dealt with, of how she handled foul language, or the drunks at the six O’clock swill.
Recently, I showed her parts of the film, Caddie., based on the book of the same name, which tells the story of a Sydney barmaid in the 20’s nicknamed Caddie.
“It was just like that,” she said, though she claimed she had no fancy man like Caddie.
There was one traveling salesman who brought her a china horse each trip, she told me, passing them over the bar to her, galloping his porcelain ‘prezzies’ through the spilled suds.
But he was just a nice man, she said, but not a boyfriend. Her love life was a subject that was somewhat taboo.
Hers, was a view from the footpaths of the 20th. century, not from high places. She wasat Jack Lang’s rallies but never joined any push.
She was on the Sydney Harbour bridge when Simon De Groote cut the ribbon, pre empting the opening of that famous bridge, but she took no part
Life did not sweep her up into great events. Nor did she feel she was living in epic times, though the end of the Second World War, and son Barnie coming home from that war, wounded three times, were thrilling moments.
Barnie’s death, six months ago, rocked her. Here are Barnie and Bonnie, the youngest, in uniform.
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……………
Here’s a photo she especially loved, Barnie rolling up to her 105th birthday. “Ullo Luv,” he growled.
……………………..
………………………
Now she’s gone. We still can’t quite take it in, Katya and I.
Nor can Eric either, Olive filling an empty place in his life, I suspect.
They’ve been very good friends this last year, Ollie and Eric, he reading her the comments each Friday, a session that she so much looked forward to.
……………….
……………….
Oh, I forgot to mention that Ollie loved her native Broken Hill . Filled with a fierce pride for her home town, she was.
When we took this Pic. of her looking down on the town, it was of a person who’d come home.
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When we took this one, she was at the fun fair, arguing for a ride on the dodgems, God love ‘er!
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And when I took this sunset snap in nearby hills, she said; “Ah, communing with nature. How nice”
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…………………..
Earlier this year Ollie heard something big was afoot near Broken Hill . I was dispatched to find out what was going on.
I discovered that there were plans, well advanced, to build Australia’s biggest wind farm not far from Broken Hill.
Olive got quite excited, wanting to know all about windmills, a technology in which we lag far behind Europe.
……………..
……………..
Wouldn’t it be great, I thought if Ollie was to become a patroness of this project?
They could even put her on the payroll for a nominal amount, making her the world’s oldest wage earner. That’d make a blog story!!!
I contacted Epuron, the company building the giant complex (Two billion it’ll cost) and they were intrigued, indeed ready to give her a role.
But then my trip to Europe with my daughter took me away for two months, and the chance was lost. I arrived back just one day before she died.
What a pity. Ollie would have loved to help put wind farms on the map, and last year she could have done it, not moving around of course, but from her room, she could have beaten the drum and rallied the troops.
But it was not to be. Our scheming days are over.
…………….
………………….
It will be sad to stop this blog.
I may do another post or two, news of interesting things found on my trip, things I was planning to tell Ollie about.
What do you think? Do you want that?
Anyway, both Olive and I are happy that you enjoyed her blob so much.
You showed us you did, day after day, with your comments.
So, from both of us, I thank you.
Right, Ollie?
……………….
……………..
Mike Rubbo, Sunday night, July 13th 2008, Avoca Beach.
rubbo@aapt.net.au
IT’S SO SO SAD
OLIVE’S SEVENTY FIRST POST
Mike
Dear friends of Olive, I’ve just come back from the trip to Europe to find Olive almost faded away, alive but only just.
Eric, who has been blogging for her in my absence, had warned me that our dear friend was sinking. She has developed a chest infection that could easily spell the end any day now.
Katya and I went to visit her yesterday, Friday July 11th.
I had phoned Amber, to see if a visit was possible. You might remember Amber, the young carer to whom Ollie is so attached.
It was Amber who came with us as carer when we all went off to Broken Hill to make Olive’s movie, which some of you have seen.
All about Olive, we called the documentary, and so it was, all about this amazing person who became not just a movie topic, but our dear friend
Olive had insisted she wanted no one but Amber on location and since then I’ve always relied on Amber for news.
She confirmed the sad situation and suspected that we might not be able to see Olive , and that if we did, there might be no recognition.
“She’s hardly eating now,” Amber said, “and often not talking at all. Also, her relatives visited from Queensland last week and found much of her memory gone.”
Hearing this, I knew Katya had to come with me.
Olive adores Katya (go back in the blog and see Katya explaining Russian dolls to Olive in not so distant days. You’ll see the great rapport between them. See post 57. Marvelous Matrioskas )
So we arrived at the nursing home Friday at 10.30 am sharp, following Amber’s suggestion, and checked at the front desk.
They knew we were coming but were very hesitant to let us go in. Last time they’d asked, Olive had said she wanted to see no one.
“We just want to sit with her briefly,” we explained, “hold her hand perhaps.”
Permission given, but where was she?
In the last few weeks Olive has been moved from her private room, her little kingdom with her own phone, bathroom, to a small ward for the very frail.
Katya was one of the last to get through to Olive before that phone was cut.
In her own room, Ollie’d reigned like the queen of the home, holding court with her admirers. There, I filmed her singing, there I did many interviews.
There too, Eric read her your comments each week which she so enjoyed. There her blog was born and thrived, no computer in sight.
Now she had no phone and just a cupboard for her knicknacks it seemed
So into an unfamiliar part of the nursing home we went, looking for another desk, another control point which could tell us where she now was.
We caught glimpses of the much frailer oldies, women mostly, small cranes hoisting them in and out of bed.
Surely this was not her place to be, our feisty Olive?
I thought of her charging down such a hall, waving to the stay-at-homes in their doorways, promising to be in touch, to bring them back Sturt peas, as she left for her big adventure in her home town, Broken Hill.
That was all just yesterday it seemed.
In my mind, I had her still with that flashing smile, that twinkling eye, and I felt somehow her happy-to-see-us grin would miraculously light up the room as we came in. But it wasn’t to be.
…………
……………..
I’d phoned her from Europe two weeks ago, found her well enough, eager to hear the news of our travels, curious as to how the exercise of me bonding with my 15 year old daughter, Ellen, had worked out.
Olive had been full of advice about how to handle Ellen before the trip.
“Now, don’t you take no nonsense.” she’d finger wagged me.
But she’d heartily approved of our unusual move, me taking Ellen out of school with the idea that a sweep through Europe with her aging dad would open the girl’s eyes to a whole world beyond the hedonistic beach culture in which, for better or worse, we live.
“In there to the right,” said the staff at the second desk.
We came into a room, bathed in greenish light from the filtering curtains and saw in the far corner, a little lump, lost in a crumple of coverlets.
As Katya’s sweet voice called; ” Olive, Olive, we’ve come to see you,” the tiny head moved slightly and watery eyes blinked twice before closing slowly.
We were both shocked. She’d become very tiny in both head and body. “She lost so much weight,” Katya whispered, before calling to her again, calling to someone almost not there, it seemed.
The tiny head sunk further, the eyes closed, the jaw crumpled, as if her whole body had sighed away.
Then I realized the reason for her head seeming so small. She did not have her teeth in and thus did her mouth purse on nothing.
Sitting there awkwardly as Katya spoke softly, telling news, I remembered the many talks we’d had about those teeth of hers.
If you go back to the beginning of her blog over a year ago, you’ll find the story of how she got rid of her real teeth and got her “pearlies.” as she called them. (See the third post. War and teeth)
……………..
……………….
It’s an outrageous story actually, but so typical of Olive. She had all her teeth out one lunch time, she claims, (this was some time in 1930) and all because one of them was bothering her, and well; “why wait for the others to play up?”
I remembered more recently we’d talked about death and how she said she had no fear of dying except for one thing, that she’d go without her teeth.
“I want to look like a decent corpse,” she said with a laugh. “I gotta have me teeth in, Mike.”
“But how will you manage that?” I asked her.
“Well, I keep em under me bed,” she confided, “and if I feel I’m dying, I’ll just whip ‘em in and be pretty as a picture!”
I’d refrained from observing that the moment might not be conducive to a swift ” whipping in” of dentures.
My mind was wandering like this over our happy times together as Katya kept trying to get a reaction , but Olive’s eyes stayed closed and her breathing rattled. The cold was deep in her chest.
But she’s done this to us before, been on the brink and bounced right back to life and it’s adventures.
“Off we go to Buffalo,” was a favorite expression of hers as you’ll remember from the film, and off to Buffalo, we’ve gone many times.
I thought too of her cheery wave that we see at the end of same film.
She’d been at the Westmead Childrens Hospital for the day, volunteering to cheer up some sick kids, and as she left, mission accomplished, she’d given her brave wave and called to the nurses; “She ya later, Girls. And if you need my services again, don’t hesitate to ask!”
All delivered with such style and verve, a queen forever.
Earlier that same day when hospital staff were hanging her carer accreditation around her neck, she’s said. “And you can rest assured, girls, I’ve got no criminal record.” What prompted that, I’m still wondering.
I came back to the sleeping person before us, her body hardly lifting the bed clothes with its shape.
How strange to be remembering a 105 year old as a force larger than life, and now to see this 108 year old, so faded away.
Her hair was strange too I noticed. She’s always, since I’ve known her, been very particular about her hair which she’s proudly dyed from the age of 30 onwards, she claims.
Many times I was sent out for her favorite coloring, Revlon No 7, dark golden blonde and sometimes I’ve come back with medium golden blonde, 6.5. all I could find, but which she insisted would not do at all.
Back I’d go to search further for the elusive shade.
It was not always so. When she began coloring her hair, it was a flaming red she went for, having been a redhead as a child and teen.
You remember perhaps the chant; “Red for danger, danger on the field,”
That was the taunt of a classmate who teased because Olive of her dazzling mop and because her maiden name was Dangerfield
You remember too how Olive socked that tease, a solid punch to the jaw, laid her low and left her on a railway line or in a dam, depending on the version of the event Ollie chose to tell.
I remembered how nervous I was, loving this tale, but fearing it would keep our film out of the schools, punching bullies being a “no no” these days.
Now, on the pillow, her hair was a strange very dark red, shooting up in a clump
What had happened, I wondered? Had she lost control these last weeks? The wrong hair color, the missing teeth, the lost private room, all seemed to say so.
Was it just possible that she wasn’t responding to us because she did not want to talk without her teeth in, knowing she’d slur words and not look nice. A girl has her pride after all.
What did Katya think? Not sure either. Ollie was so frail, so different, it was true.
Thus we grasped as straws at the bedside, and asked no one if it could be true about the teeth.
Eric arrived and was sad too. We agreed the staff had done what they could to make her tiny corner homely.
A “Go the Swans” poster was on the cupboard door beside her. You know perhaps that Ollie is an avid Swans fan.
I wonder if we ever told the story of the time we got free tickets to a final Swans game at the Homebush stadium.
We’d driven underground, into a labyrinth of concrete roads under the stadium, feeling very special.
We’d been were waved into a VIP parking place, been whisked up in a VIP lift to the VIP stands, been ushered into a VIP box.
We sat like royalty indeed, the Swans playing their best on the intense green astro turf, way below us.
Though we three cheered ourselves hoarse that night, (Katya was with us, her first football game in Australia) the Swans lost and Ollie got no chance to shake hands with the team as she done on occasions past, she being a mascot for the players.
“They must be too depressed about losing” I remember she opined.
On the same cupboard as the poster was also a small painting Katya had given her, a peaceful landscape, and higher up, a photo of her Mum and Billy.
What had happened to the large collection we’d put together for her, I wondered, all those family photos I’d blown up to A4 and mounted in the book for her?
There’d been twenty photos at least of her beloved son, Barnie, who passed way 6 months ago. Missing Barnie is part of the deterioration, I’m sure.
Photos too of Evelyn the eldest of her three kids. ” Was Mum a good cook?” says Evelyn in the film, “You better believe it! She was a station cook. You cant get any better than that, Luv”
And snaps of the youngest too, Bonnie, who nurses some grudge and doesn’t want to see Olive, even now.
It was strange that the only family photo in the new room was of her mother who she didn’t like.
Olive says that her Mum was always cold and cruel, and, worst of all, would not let the young Olive become the nurse she had her heart set on being.
Why was that pic. on display? . But then in the same photo I noticed Billy, the young giant who’d been adopted, and was Ollie’s favorite, apart from sister Emma who died young of course.
You may remember Ollie telling the story of how she rescued Billy from the adoption people. (See 32nd post. Olive steals a baby)
Billy was the illegitimate child of someone the family knew well. (To this day Olive wont tell who the mother was) and being unwanted, was put up for adoption in a distant town.
But when the adoption agent came for the baby to take him off by train, Ollie, then about 7, ran off with the bundled baby and hid him in the bush till the man was gone.
She did this twice. At last her Dad had said, “We’ll it looks like we’ll have to adopt him ourselves.”
Another photo, even more important, had made the move from her private room to this ward. It was a color photo of the stone we put on Emma’s grave. You see it at the end of the movie, the last shot.
Emma, you remember was the older sister Olive loved so much but who died of an ear infection when Olive was about 9. Olive never got over that.
While filming in Broken Hill, we found Emma’s unmarked grave and arranged for the stone in the photo to be placed on the gravelly earth, decorated with a poem Ollie wrote for her sister.
The text is somewhere in the blog. You may be able to find it if you look hard.
This was such an important closure for her and I was glad to see the photo was still with her.
Indeed, the staff has done a good job of keeping her precious thing near her.
On the highest shelf was a yellow animated doll someone had given her. She loved to turn it on and let it strut its stuff, singing and whirring and twisting…..
“Singin’ in the rain, Singing in the rain.
What a beautiful feeling, I’m happy again.”
But that of course is not the song you remember when you think of Olive, is it?
It’s, Pack Up Your Troubles, surely. Here she is again
……………………
Dear friends of Olive, I’ve just come back from the trip to Europe to find Olive almost faded away, alive but only just.
Eric, who has been blogging for her in my absence, had warned me that our dear friend was sinking. She has developed a chest infection that could easily spell the end any day now.
Katya and I went to visit her yesterday, Friday July 11th.
I had phoned Amber, to see if a visit was possible. You might remember Amber, the young carer to whom Ollie is so attached.
It was Amber who came with us as carer when we all went off to Broken Hill to make Olive’s movie, which some of you have seen.
All about Olive, we called the documentary, and so it was, all about this amazing person who became not just a movie topic, but our dear friend
Olive had insisted she wanted no one but Amber on location and since then I’ve always relied on Amber for news.
She confirmed the sad situation and suspected that we might not be able to see Olive , and that if we did, there might be no recognition.
“She’s hardly eating now,” Amber said, “and often not talking at all. Also, her relatives visited from Queensland last week and found much of her memory gone.”
Hearing this, I knew Katya had to come with me.
Olive adores Katya (go back in the blog and see Katya explaining Russian dolls to Olive in not so distant days. You’ll see the great rapport between them. See post 57. Marvelous Matrioskas )
So we arrived at the nursing home Friday at 10.30 am sharp, following Amber’s suggestion, and checked at the front desk.
They knew we were coming but were very hesitant to let us go in. Last time they’d asked, Olive had said she wanted to see no one.
“We just want to sit with her briefly,” we explained, “hold her hand perhaps.”
Permission given, but where was she?
In the last few weeks Olive has been moved from her private room, her little kingdom with her own phone, bathroom, to a small ward for the very frail.
Katya was one of the last to get through to Olive before that phone was cut.
In her own room, Ollie’d reigned like the queen of the home, holding court with her admirers. There, I filmed her singing, there I did many interviews.
There too, Eric read her your comments each week which she so enjoyed. There her blog was born and thrived, no computer in sight.
Now she had no phone and just a cupboard for her knicknacks it seemed
So into an unfamiliar part of the nursing home we went, looking for another desk, another control point which could tell us where she now was.
We caught glimpses of the much frailer oldies, women mostly, small cranes hoisting them in and out of bed.
Surely this was not her place to be, our feisty Olive?
I thought of her charging down such a hall, waving to the stay-at-homes in their doorways, promising to be in touch, to bring them back Sturt peas, as she left for her big adventure in her home town, Broken Hill.
That was all just yesterday it seemed.
In my mind, I had her still with that flashing smile, that twinkling eye, and I felt somehow her happy-to-see-us grin would miraculously light up the room as we came in. But it wasn’t to be.
…………
……………..
I’d phoned her from Europe two weeks ago, found her well enough, eager to hear the news of our travels, curious as to how the exercise of me bonding with my 15 year old daughter, Ellen, had worked out.
Olive had been full of advice about how to handle Ellen before the trip.
“Now, don’t you take no nonsense.” she’d finger wagged me.
But she’d heartily approved of our unusual move, me taking Ellen out of school with the idea that a sweep through Europe with her aging dad would open the girl’s eyes to a whole world beyond the hedonistic beach culture in which, for better or worse, we live.
“In there to the right,” said the staff at the second desk.
We came into a room, bathed in greenish light from the filtering curtains and saw in the far corner, a little lump, lost in a crumple of coverlets.
As Katya’s sweet voice called; ” Olive, Olive, we’ve come to see you,” the tiny head moved slightly and watery eyes blinked twice before closing slowly.
We were both shocked. She’d become very tiny in both head and body. “She lost so much weight,” Katya whispered, before calling to her again, calling to someone almost not there, it seemed.
The tiny head sunk further, the eyes closed, the jaw crumpled, as if her whole body had sighed away.
Then I realized the reason for her head seeming so small. She did not have her teeth in and thus did her mouth purse on nothing.
Sitting there awkwardly as Katya spoke softly, telling news, I remembered the many talks we’d had about those teeth of hers.
If you go back to the beginning of her blog over a year ago, you’ll find the story of how she got rid of her real teeth and got her “pearlies.” as she called them. (See the third post. War and teeth)
……………..
……………….
It’s an outrageous story actually, but so typical of Olive. She had all her teeth out one lunch time, she claims, (this was some time in 1930) and all because one of them was bothering her, and well; “why wait for the others to play up?”
I remembered more recently we’d talked about death and how she said she had no fear of dying except for one thing, that she’d go without her teeth.
“I want to look like a decent corpse,” she said with a laugh. “I gotta have me teeth in, Mike.”
“But how will you manage that?” I asked her.
“Well, I keep em under me bed,” she confided, “and if I feel I’m dying, I’ll just whip ‘em in and be pretty as a picture!”
I’d refrained from observing that the moment might not be conducive to a swift ” whipping in” of dentures.
My mind was wandering like this over our happy times together as Katya kept trying to get a reaction , but Olive’s eyes stayed closed and her breathing rattled. The cold was deep in her chest.
But she’s done this to us before, been on the brink and bounced right back to life and it’s adventures.
“Off we go to Buffalo,” was a favorite expression of hers as you’ll remember from the film, and off to Buffalo, we’ve gone many times.
I thought too of her cheery wave that we see at the end of same film.
She’d been at the Westmead Childrens Hospital for the day, volunteering to cheer up some sick kids, and as she left, mission accomplished, she’d given her brave wave and called to the nurses; “She ya later, Girls. And if you need my services again, don’t hesitate to ask!”
All delivered with such style and verve, a queen forever.
Earlier that same day when hospital staff were hanging her carer accreditation around her neck, she’s said. “And you can rest assured, girls, I’ve got no criminal record.” What prompted that, I’m still wondering.
I came back to the sleeping person before us, her body hardly lifting the bed clothes with its shape.
How strange to be remembering a 105 year old as a force larger than life, and now to see this 108 year old, so faded away.
Her hair was strange too I noticed. She’s always, since I’ve known her, been very particular about her hair which she’s proudly dyed from the age of 30 onwards, she claims.
Many times I was sent out for her favorite coloring, Revlon No 7, dark golden blonde and sometimes I’ve come back with medium golden blonde, 6.5. all I could find, but which she insisted would not do at all.
Back I’d go to search further for the elusive shade.
It was not always so. When she began coloring her hair, it was a flaming red she went for, having been a redhead as a child and teen.
You remember perhaps the chant; “Red for danger, danger on the field,”
That was the taunt of a classmate who teased because Olive of her dazzling mop and because her maiden name was Dangerfield
You remember too how Olive socked that tease, a solid punch to the jaw, laid her low and left her on a railway line or in a dam, depending on the version of the event Ollie chose to tell.
I remembered how nervous I was, loving this tale, but fearing it would keep our film out of the schools, punching bullies being a “no no” these days.
Now, on the pillow, her hair was a strange very dark red, shooting up in a clump
What had happened, I wondered? Had she lost control these last weeks? The wrong hair color, the missing teeth, the lost private room, all seemed to say so.
Was it just possible that she wasn’t responding to us because she did not want to talk without her teeth in, knowing she’d slur words and not look nice. A girl has her pride after all.
What did Katya think? Not sure either. Ollie was so frail, so different, it was true.
Thus we grasped as straws at the bedside, and asked no one if it could be true about the teeth.
Eric arrived and was sad too. We agreed the staff had done what they could to make her tiny corner homely.
A “Go the Swans” poster was on the cupboard door beside her. You know perhaps that Ollie is an avid Swans fan.
I wonder if we ever told the story of the time we got free tickets to a final Swans game at the Homebush stadium.
We’d driven underground, into a labyrinth of concrete roads under the stadium, feeling very special.
We’d been were waved into a VIP parking place, been whisked up in a VIP lift to the VIP stands, been ushered into a VIP box.
We sat like royalty indeed, the Swans playing their best on the intense green astro turf, way below us.
Though we three cheered ourselves hoarse that night, (Katya was with us, her first football game in Australia) the Swans lost and Ollie got no chance to shake hands with the team as she done on occasions past, she being a mascot for the players.
“They must be too depressed about losing” I remember she opined.
On the same cupboard as the poster was also a small painting Katya had given her, a peaceful landscape, and higher up, a photo of her Mum and Billy.
What had happened to the large collection we’d put together for her, I wondered, all those family photos I’d blown up to A4 and mounted in the book for her?
There’d been twenty photos at least of her beloved son, Barnie, who passed way 6 months ago. Missing Barnie is part of the deterioration, I’m sure.
Photos too of Evelyn the eldest of her three kids. ” Was Mum a good cook?” says Evelyn in the film, “You better believe it! She was a station cook. You cant get any better than that, Luv”
And snaps of the youngest too, Bonnie, who nurses some grudge and doesn’t want to see Olive, even now.
It was strange that the only family photo in the new room was of her mother who she didn’t like.
Olive says that her Mum was always cold and cruel, and, worst of all, would not let the young Olive become the nurse she had her heart set on being.
Why was that pic. on display? . But then in the same photo I noticed Billy, the young giant who’d been adopted, and was Ollie’s favorite, apart from sister Emma who died young of course.
You may remember Ollie telling the story of how she rescued Billy from the adoption people. (See 32nd post. Olive steals a baby)
Billy was the illegitimate child of someone the family knew well. (To this day Olive wont tell who the mother was) and being unwanted, was put up for adoption in a distant town.
But when the adoption agent came for the baby to take him off by train, Ollie, then about 7, ran off with the bundled baby and hid him in the bush till the man was gone.
She did this twice. At last her Dad had said, “We’ll it looks like we’ll have to adopt him ourselves.”
Another photo, even more important, had made the move from her private room to this ward. It was a color photo of the stone we put on Emma’s grave. You see it at the end of the movie, the last shot.
Emma, you remember was the older sister Olive loved so much but who died of an ear infection when Olive was about 9. Olive never got over that.
While filming in Broken Hill, we found Emma’s unmarked grave and arranged for the stone in the photo to be placed on the gravelly earth, decorated with a poem Ollie wrote for her sister.
The text is somewhere in the blog. You may be able to find it if you look hard.
This was such an important closure for her and I was glad to see the photo was still with her.
Indeed, the staff has done a good job of keeping her precious thing near her.
On the highest shelf was a yellow animated doll someone had given her. She loved to turn it on and let it strut its stuff, singing and whirring and twisting…..
“Singin’ in the rain, Singing in the rain.
What a beautiful feeling, I’m happy again.”
But that of course is not the song you remember when you think of Olive, is it?
It’s, Pack Up Your Troubles, surely. Here she is again
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