How a Foot Found fame...

How a foot found fame

(or an Aussie Sheila goes Walkabout and has a ball).

Mopping the Floors

In China, a small foot is a sign of beauty. This foot, or should I say feet, were not beautiful. While her mother was alive, Elle (“The Feet” to her friends) had custom made shoes - size 20 GG. (The blacksmith did suggest shoeing her, but she refused that hurdle). Now her mother was dead, her father remarried, and her stepmother deciding that shoes were an unnecessary expense.

*

Her bare feet slapped across the wet floor. She had been up since before dawn washing the kitchen and bathroom floors. Her feet were wrinkled red from the soap, as were her hands. Her eyes were red from crying, so you could say she was the Lady in Red.

Attack of the Fairy Godmother

Elle’s feet hurt, after the day’s work. Not only that, they were covered in ashes, the dying embers of the kitchen fire she was currently huddled towards. Her aesthetically-challenged step-sisters, had started calling her Ember-ella as a result. This name made her sound like a rain avoiding apparatus, so in honour of her feet they now called her Daffy. She hated the name, and the high squeaky voice they used when addressing her. She huddled closer to the fire, her feet chafing from the cold stone floor. She had considered using the table and chairs, which though spartan were adequate for her needs, but they weren’t as warm. Fairytale land was a cold, clammy country. Her evening routine was always this - Cursing her nickname, and hunching into the embers of the dying fire.

Her countenance darkened. At first, she thought it was because she was cross, but that didn’t explain the rattling teacups in the sink, the shuddering floor, and the overhead light swaying gently from side to side. Elle looked up. Filling the doorway was an hydroelectric dam of a person - complete with pink tutu, gold tinseled wand and wilting flowers trailing through lanky hair.

“G’day Daffy. I’m your fairy godmother.” The voice could demolish a Tasmanian rainforest, and Elle winced involuntarily.

“I’m here to grant your wish, and get you to the ball.”

Elle protested, that she did not want to go, what with being on her feet all day - all she wanted was to have a nice lie-down somewhere.

The Fairy Godmother stamped her foot. The heel broke. The strap snapped. Her feet in all their hirsute beauty were revealed. “Oh my feet” Elle thought, “Hers are bigger than mine!”

“You will go to the ball, Daffy. I want to be alone with your fa..... family."

Then in an ominous voice, "I’ll be back.” The Fairy Godmother waddled her way out of the house.

Cinderella, You shall go to the ball.

Later that evening, the Fairy Godmother came back. "Daffy its time to get dressed up in your glad rags and go to the ball". Elle was putting her feet up and having a cuppa. "But I told you, I don't want to go to a dance with poncy rich bastards - I just want to drink my tea, take a bex and have a lie-down."

The Fairy Godmother ignored her "Where's your pumpkin?" The Fairy Godmother looked around, "I can't make a limo if I don't have a pumpkin."

"It's in the scones." Elle put her feet down, and revealed the table with a pile of scones on a plate, underneath a teatowel. " I don't have any others."

"What about some mice and or rats?"

"This is Oz - we have marsupials - not that foreign rubbish…"

The Fairy Godmother sounded desparate. "How about some rags to use for the dress?"

"Nah, we use Chux supa wipes in this house - anti-bacterial, cleans up the germs." Elle sounded smug "It looks like I can't go."

"You're going to go, or I'll rip ya bloody arms off!"

*

They compromised.  The clothes were made from the Blue and white Chux - a Footy Jersey, Jeans, Footy socks,. Garn the Pies! The Red Shoes were borrowed from a Westie with an evil snicker. "Whatever you do, don't let little men with squeaky voices steal the shoes, or I'll drop a house on you!"

Instead of a Pumpkin, they took a passionfruit from the vine on the fence, out back of the kitchen. It made a beaut little Vee-Dub.

Instead of Mice for the chauffeur, they hired a foot masseuse named Sven. At least Elle could have a good time, there and back!

And of course, the car was powered by Six White Boomers,snow white boomers. Bounding down the Australian Track. (Hiding from Rolf Harris).

*

Shall we dance?

The prince was not having a good night out. All the blokes were up one end drinking around the keg. The women were up the other end, despairing of every getting a decent dance in. The parents of all the young hopefuls were in the kitchen reminiscing about the good old days, when they were young. "When I was young, we didn't bother with all this courting rubbish. You married who you were told to. Liked it or Lumped it!"  And the prince was missing the footy final. The Sea-Eagles were playing the Magpies. Nobody else in his kingdom supported the Magpies. It was hard to be Prince he thought moodily. I think I'll change my name to TAFKAP.

Elle walked in. The women looked at her and snickered. Fancy wearing Footy gear to a ball! The men didn't notice her, engrossed in conversation and beer. From across the room, She noticed the Prince. He noticed her. She noticed him coming towards her.

"Oh, Shit." She thought, "Now he'll want to dance and there's a comfy spot over there where I listen to the footy game in peace".

The Prince smiled. At last, here was someone who could talk to him about the team he loved.

"Shall we dance?",  TAFKAP held out his hand to her. Elle smiled with resignation. "Yeah. Why not?"

The Ted Mulry Gang - Why don't you jump in my car? - song filled the air. TAFKAP played his air guitar with great gusto. Elle attempted to move as little as possible. The Prince looked at her suggestively.

"I notice that you are a fan of the Magpies?" His opening Gambit. "Your shoes are a little out of place though"

"Yeah, I got them from some old witch. Look do you mind if we sit down? I've been on my feet all day - And it’s the second half of the final."

TAFKAP almost pulled her sprawling to the closest seat at the side of the dance floor.
"What's the score? Are the 'Pies winning?"

"Nah. Manly are wiping the floor with them." She said with a sigh.

Elle pulled out her pocket radio with earphone. "Do you want to listen?"

"Yeah" The Prince was grateful, and plugged himself in.

The next 45 minutes were spent in blissful silence. The Prince was plugged into the game. Elle had her feet up. She was just dozing off, and when she realised the time.

"Oh Bugger it. I've gotta go!" And off she went.

*

Exit, Pursued by a Prince

The Prince didn't notice that Elle had gone. He sat enthralled in the game - the Magpies came up from behind and in a thrilling last minute action scored the winning goal!

"That was beaut. Thanks for the loan". He looked around. "She's buggared off. And I've still got her radio." He looked down. And she's left behind her shoes." He picked them up. He'd hold onto them until he saw her again.

"Well young fella me lad. Which of these young ladies are you going to marry?" He looked up. His Dad stood over him - a stern expression covering his noble brow. The Crown tilted jauntily to the side. The white suit and handlebar moustache suggesting Cricket rather than Football was his game of choice.

"Uh, look Dad, I'll marry the woman who fits these shoes."

His Father looked at the shoes. Surely, he thought the woman who wore these shoes is a woman of refinement.

"OK.  We'll send the footman out on the 'morrow, until we find the lady who fits these shoes."

*

A Shoe session.
Elle’s feet luxuriated in their nudity. After the close confinement of footy socks and glass slippers, the tinea was playing up, and the smell that emanated was reminiscent of rotten eggs and spinach. Elle was counting on the ammonia and soap in the bucket, that she was liberally applying to the floor, to help both the sting and the smell. The sound of the doorbell interrupted her work - It was Butler, the prince’s footman. Elle could hear him talking to her step-mother.

“Madam, everyone in this house must try on the shoe - the prince will marry the one who fits the shoe.”

A silence then Butler again:

“No Madam, stuffing the shoe with newspaper does not consitute a good fit.”

Another silence.

“Nor does putting both feet in the shoe. Don’t you have any other women in the house?”

This was Elle’s cue. Her chance for fame and fortune, and getting out of the rest of the housework. She shuffled into the drawing room, where the battle of the shoes had been going on.

“Sir, may I try it on?” A pause. “Sir?.. Sir, may I?”

Butler stared at Elle’s feet. His jaw had dropped to his feet,a good 2 metres, ensuring that his dentist would be kept in business for many years.

*

In the traditional Cinderella story at the wedding, the ugly sisters have their eyes pecked out by birds. Who are we to fight tradition?

*

And they all lived happily ever after...

Except for the ugly sisters who were blind...

And the stepmother who was divorced by Elle’s father...

And Elle’s father, who moved in with the Fairy Godmother and discovered that he was a trans-sexual...

And the Fairy Godmother, who wasn't invited to the wedding. “Youth nowadays show no gratitude at all”...

And the King, who was unimpressed with his son’s choice of bride - and disinherited him...

But the prince married Elle, and changed their surname to Marcos, moved to the Phillipines, and bought a lot of shoes, but didn’t wear any of them.

Fair Dinkum!

December 24th - A story (not mine)

‘The Two Caves’ by Elizabeth Goudge

There was once a moment in time that defeated time. It was the moment when something pierced through the dark flood of the years as a crocus spear thrusts through the winter earth, to grow to a flower-like flame, die and live once more, never to die again.

It was the perfection of selfless love, the only eternal thing eternity itself, God. It burns at the heart of the world, in the heart of every living thing, in all wisdom, beauty, joy, pain and death.

The moment in history when it thrust up like this was when a man was born who would carry this perfection in his human body as a lantern carries the gold. Saint Augustus says of this moment that ”God looked at us though the lattice of our flesh and he spake us fair.”

It might have been though that when this love thrust though the whole world would have known it. But actually hardly anyone know, so quiet and humble a thing is love, our God.

The night of the coming was the night when poor people lit a lantern in their stable. They had not done the before, since the tired beasts did not need a light to go to sleep by, and they did not do it again, but that night they had to because a girl gave birth to her baby there. The inn was full and there was no other shelter.

The stable was only a cave in the rocky hillside but it held privacy and human kindness for the girl and her worried husband, and about midnight a son was born. He cried a little, but when he was put I his mother’s arms he was happy and did not cry again.

And after that there was a deep silence in the little town until very early in the morning, while it was yet dark, some poor men came running; and they ran fast in eagerness because of some news that had been told them. For a moment they halted in the light that shone through the broken wood of the stable door, too awed to go in, and the beam from a star overhead silvered the hair and the beard of the oldest of them.

And then they bent their heads and entered the cave. They were there for a short while and when they came out there was a brightness in the eastern sky and the youngest said, “This cave is the heart of the world.”

The child grew to be a man of great strength and vaster love and there was no experience known to men, joyous or appalling, peaceful or agonizing, through which he did not in some way pass, leaving the gold of his love at the heart of it to shine upon us as each in our turn we come to the happy or hard things of our life.

But the eyes of perfect love were too piercing to be met easily by evil men, and though he spake them fair in love and compassion he also spake them straight and hard in truth and anger, and so they killed him under the hot sun, and at evening buried his body in a cave in the hillside.

But very early in the morning, while it was yet dark, the feet of poor men came running; and they ran fast in eagerness because of some news that had been told them. When they came to the cave they halted for a moment in awe, because the stone that had closed it had been rolled away, and the light from the morning star silvered the head and the beard of the oldest of them. Then they bent their heads and went into the cave.

After a while they came out and the east was turning to gold. The young man said, “He is risen.” The older one said nothing, for with grief and joy he was past the power of audible speech, but in his heart he said, “An empty tomb is now at the heart of the world.”

And so there were these two caves that were really the same cave, because each was at the heart of the world, and these two great happenings, a birth and a re-birth that were the same birth. And because love lives forever in the heart, all shall be well.

My Year... Or why there's been no updates

January: Got put on time-out from job-hunting, Govt said I was incapable of working.
February : Became Homeless
March : Mother died after 2 years of illness
April: Found Home
May: Turned 49
June: Got diagnosed with Arthritis in the Spine
July: Stressed out by Govt who thinks I'm able to hold down a job. Got offered a job
August: Worked in Ireland for 6 weeks
September: Suffered Jetlag and sickness. Getting used to working at 60-75% brain-capacity.
October: Sister's mother-in-law died, got 2 cats, working from home.Getting medical tests done. Doctor thinks I have diabetes. I hope she's wrong.
November: 1st time I'm not going to try NanoWrimo in 5 years.
December: First Christmas without Mum.

I'm not a writer anymore, I'm just a person that things happen to. When they slow down and stop happening, maybe I'll start writing again.

And the Third Character Meme - this one's for Nina

10 Facts about Judith

1. When she was young she wanted to have 5 kids. Although she says she's glad she's only had one, she still pines for a larger family.

2. She wanted to go to University, but her parents said no, so she did a secretarial course instead. Later she did a diploma of education which she supported herself financially.

3. She had 4 miscarriages before Grace, and 3 afterwards. At that point Brian insisted that they stop trying. She still remembers the anniversaries of 2 of them as they miscarried near the end of  their second trimesters.

4. Brian was her first, and she waited until they were married before they had sex.

5. Her favourite music is jazz - not the modern stuff or dixieland. She wishes she could sing like Billie Holliday. Her second favourite is classical - Debussy.

6. She's never been overweight or on a diet. In fact she has trouble keeping weight on.

7. She'd prefer not to work, but her salary is what covers most of the bills. She sometimes thinks that the reason why Grace is so wild is because she wasn't at home for her.

8. Judith is an only child. Her mother was an only child and so was her maternal grandmother.

9.She is tone-deaf.

10. She loves to dance old ballroom dancing.

More of Character Memes for Van

10 Facts about Brian.
1. Brian became a christian after he finished University, before that he studied as a Mechanical Engineer, and was an agnostic with seeker tendencies. His parents were church-goers but not christians, and were horrified when he became 'born-again'. Twenty years later they still think he's going through a phase.
2. He prefers research rather than the pastoral duties of ministry. He thinks he's not much good at pastoral, but he's wrong.
3. He plays tennis left-handed because he had a left-handed tennis teacher.
4. The first time he saw Judith, he knew they were going to marry. This is regardless of the fact that he already had a fiancee and she had a boyfriend. He broke off his engagement that night. It took him two more years to sabotage her relationship and convince her to go out with him. They married within six months of officially going out together.
5. He loves cuddling and finds excuses to cuddle at every opportunity.
6. He has a son with his ex-fiancee.
7. He's been snipped. He walked bow-legged for a week afterwards because of the shoddy job the doctor did.
8. He feels things very deeply but tends to not show them. He has been known to take a shower so he can have a cry without being caught at it.
9. His favourite sport is Cricket. Summer is Cricket time, and the only thing that will stop him from watching 'The Ashes' is crises at work. He's a decent spin bowler.
10. He loves Roast Beef and Yorkshire pudding, followed by a trifle. (He's very traditionally English in his food preferences).

Character Meme - Tagged by Van

Grace Peridot - 10 Facts that no-one knows (esp. her parents and her BF)


1. When she and Adam first had sex, she hadn't had her first period yet.
2. She doesn't want her parents and Adam to meet because deep in her gut she knows that her parents will think he's not good enough for her and she's afraid they may be right.
3. Her favourite toy when she was little was Acne Boil-Lancing a Blue Bunny with a revolving carrot. She named the bunny after a story she overheard her parents laughing at. They think the bunny is named Acky. She still sleeps with it under her pillow.
4. She doesn't like chocolate.
5. Her favourite music is Australian Crawl and Air Supply . Her parents think her favourite is classical music, and her boyfriend thinks it's punk.
Australian Crawl - The Boys Light Up
Air Supply - Lost in Love
6.  She plays harmonica.
7. She won't wear Pink because it looks too girly - but privately she actually quite likes it.
8. She enjoys reading philosophy books because it gives her big ideas to confuse the other kids at church with. She has a personal goal to convert 5 different kids to 5 different philosophies. So far, she's managed 2.
9. She loves swimming naked. There's a beach out of town at Sunrise Island that no-one goes to, and she will go there regularly to skinny dip. (Book 2)
10. She has 3 friends at school, who all know about Adam. One of them has slept with him behind her back. One of them knows about the first, but hasn't told Grace. The third is completely clueless and thinks it's all terribly romantic. None of them have told their parents about it.

RAGA

This music type is called a Raga.
It doesn't tell a story - it sets a colour, a hue, describes a mood.
This short piece is called RAGA, based on the above
music.