Middle Eastern feast

That afternoon the veggie patch got a real workout. Andrews was such a wanker. He came over all friendly with the whole I only did this to help you bullshit and then the very next thing out of his mouth is how crap I am and how I could be so much better.

I threw the weeds I was ripping out at the back fence, imagining they were sections of Andrews’s hair. How did he know? How did he know what I was and what I could be? And what the hell did that mean anyway? I was who I was, end of story.

I grabbed the fertilizer and piled it on, digging it in around the veggies that were just beginning to push their way to the top.

That’s what the difference was: with these little buggers, if you piled shit on them they actually started to grow. If they kept piling shit on me, I was just going to keep living in it.

I looked up to find Mum staring at me. I had no idea how long she’d been standing there. I couldn’t deal with another Patricia Armstrong heart-to-heart tonight.

Don’t look at me like that, Will. I called to tell you dinner was ready three times.

Dinner I could manage.

I moved into the kitchen, half expecting to see the old fancy place mats and flowers. Mum and Dad always had this thing about eating together at the table, like it was some kind of big deal. TV was definitely barred. I hated it when I was a kid because it meant I missed out on the TV shows they talked about at school. Later on I didn’t mind. Dad would carry on telling us stories from work, and considering he was an engineer and always visiting building sites, they were pretty funny, sometimes so funny that Mum would tell him they weren’t appropriate, but he’d just grin at her, say Come on, darl, and keep telling his story.

Since January we hadn’t really sat at the table together. Mum would sometimes, but I’d go and watch TV or take dinner into my room and listen to music. Mum never made a big deal of it.

I thought we might eat in here tonight.

I followed Mum’s voice to the lounge room. She was sitting on a cushion at the low table where she’d set out one of her Middle Eastern feasts she used to do on special occasions. She’d lit all the candles, put the screen in front of the TV and arranged floor cushions around the table.

I stood in the doorway. Instantly I could hear their voices carrying on at one another like they always did. The lounge room was yet another Armstrong Family Project, but it was also a constant windup for both of them. Dad wanted to have the big lounge and telly to match so he could relax and watch the Manchester United games on cable. Mum wanted no couch and no TV, only a decent stereo system and big cushions. Dad kept calling her a sad hippie and Mum kept calling him an Aussie yob. Eventually they came to a compromise. Mum dragged out the screen she had from when she was teaching English in Japan and put it in front of the TV. Dad got his big couch but Mum made sure she covered it and everywhere else with huge floor cushions. And that is exactly how they always did things. They’d keep at something until both of them were happy and then continue to give each other heaps about it while they were cuddling up together on the big couch with the big cushions. Watching the big TV.

Mum looked up at me expectantly. She was obviously thinking it was a good idea.

Come on, Will, this used to be one of your favorites.

What could I do? She was happy.

So what’s the occasion?

I was just thinking it would be nice…. It kind of reminds me of good things and I thought maybe …

She looked at me.

Yeah, Mum, it’s all good.

In fact, it was better than good. It was a feast! She’d prepared enough food for a Lebanese family, including cousins. I sat myself opposite her on the second-biggest floor cushion in the room and hooked in. Mum was obviously doing the same as I caught her putting three stuffed vine leaves in her mouth at the same time.

Hey! You go mad at me for shoveling food …

She stopped chewing for one second, and then laughed until she nearly choked. I shoved a vine leaf into my mouth, searching for something to talk about. As good as the feast was, if we were going to get through it I had to find something she could get a hold of or we’d end up exactly where I didn’t want to go.

So Andrews has given me this assignment to do during the musical.

She beamed. The tactic had worked.

I’ve got to do some sort of stupid report about stereotypes.

Mum’s brain had already started to work overtime. She loved this type of stuff.

Do you remember that time in Year Eight, Will, when you got in trouble for throwing a mandarin at someone’s head?

Actually she was wrong, it was a banana and I only pegged it at somebody because they threw an apple at me first.

That was about a racial thing, wasn’t it?

It was right at the peak of the Year 8 skip versus wog thing. The school did do something about it: we had to sit down and shut up at lunchtime for two weeks in a row. Mum was all for having a round-table conference about it. Dad fortunately settled her down.

Well, Will, in the world we live in, it’s not such a bad idea to get your head around the effect of judging before you know anything about individuals, or countries for that matter. He’s right, the more you exercise your critical thinking skills the more informed you’ll be.

I gave her one of my looks.

OK, I understand that it’s the last thing you want to be writing about. Just know you can run it by me anytime you’d like.

It was definitely time to change the subject.

So … the veggie patch is, ahh, looking good …

She looked back at me strangely and, fair enough, it was a pretty bad attempt at changing the subject.

 … don’t you think?

Mum’s face broke into a huge grin and then she cracked up laughing so hard she had tears pouring down her face. I grabbed the rest of the vine leaves and ate three more falafel wraps. Once there was no more food on the table Mum broke out the ice cream. Both of us were so full we could barely move, so I got rid of the screen and for the first time in ages we watched telly together.

And it felt good.