See what she can see

It was strange as I grew older and became more aware of my mothers ‘influences’. As I mentioned she never seemed to get the family things right, but perhaps that was for the best. I remember one day she had someone, a ‘client’ (she never took names) coming to the house for a reading. We were always banned from the lounge on those occasions. This could be a little rough on us, as there was no real predetermined time for the session (if mother was in the ‘zone’), which meant, that, if we wanted to eat dinner on time, we had to cook dinner ourselves.  This wasn’t a bad thing either, and it is something that has stood me in good stead all through my life. The ability to cook has led to interesting meetings, conversations and is sometimes wonderful ground-breaking skills in some of the cultures I have visited elsewhere. In this instance we were preparing dinner (quietly) in the kitchen. As quietly as can be, when several people are involved and those people are children. When pans, cutlery and chopping of vegetables are involved. Ever been into a Chinese restaurant with several woks going at the same time (a great system for cooking)? Noisy and productive. We had to be much, much, quieter than that of course.

Things were very quiet in the lounge for some time, as normally occurred when my mother was conducting a reading. We could hear the soft murmurs and comments, the subdued sounds of occasional questions and responses, before suddenly there was a loud burst of laughter. A very, loud burst, of very happy, laughter. This was unusual. Someone was very happy with what they were hearing. Which was good, but normally there was not such a vociferous response. We continued preparing dinner, but all of us were curious with such a reaction. It was some time later that as we were sitting down at the table to serve dinner, our mother came out the lounge and escorted the ‘client’ to the front door (oh, yes, ‘clients’ got to use the front door).

She then came down to the kitchen and still had tears in the corner of her eyes from laughing so much earlier (and whatever else may have been discussed after that). We looked up as she sat down at her seat at the end of the table. We waited. She smiled at us and we said grace (we still practiced some of those Roman catholic rituals). Although was what my mother did in conflict with those concepts? The church had been suspicious of such ‘arts’ over the years. And many women and a few men, had gone to their deaths, victims of the fear believed of such powers and rituals. We did say grace and as the rest of us joined in, following in a distracted way. As soon as grace was finished and we began reaching for the various bowls of vegetables and whatever the meat may have been, my sister raised the question. “Well?”

(Continued tomorrow)