Years later, my old boss Meg at the club asked me why I never told her I was a singer. Too shy, I guess. Frank was always telling me that I wasn’t a real singer—not like those guys. I also think, maybe, I was just taking my time. It felt like such a privilege, being paid to sit on a door and watch masters at work. Maybe I was just doing what I’d done from the beginning—watching, learning, mimicking, reading the room.
As we began to furnish our nest, Marty helped me to put up an enormous corkboard on a wall in the kitchen, so I could start pinning up any picture or object I could think of that might help my brain and heart catch up with the transformation we were going through. I had never heard of a vision board, and I’m loathe to call it that (because it felt so like an original idea at the time!), but I suppose that’s what it was. On the board I pinned photographs of Marty and I from when we first met, and photos of us now. I pinned the first ultrasound of our baby, who we thought looked just like Marty in profile. Martin Junior, we called it. Then Marju, which was based on a Simpsons joke about Homer Junior (Hoju). Then Jessie started calling the bump Moodju. Then Moodjala. Then, eventually, we settled on just plain old Moodge. We pinned paintings of families we liked, drawings I’d doodled, and dreams and wishes and love hearts and angels and heroes. There were pictures of the Madonna and child, painted angels with baby angels, a Robert Mapplethorpe photograph of Patti Smith in her white shirt looking strong and confident. Sometimes it was hard to take in how much our lives had changed in only a few months. These pictures on a pinboard was one of the ways I helped my brain play catch-up. Whenever doubt crept in, all I had to do was look at that board and remind myself where we had come from, and where we were headed and, all of a sudden, I felt brave again.
Although I was still worried about money. This was the year Marty and I had planned to record my first solo CD. We decided there was no reason we couldn’t still do that; he could set up one of the spare bedrooms as a recording studio, and we could just work at it bit by bit until the baby came. We would have to save a little first—there were a few pieces of equipment we would need to hire along the way and, although he could record and mix, we would still need money for the mastering and production.
Around our fourth month of pregnancy, we found ourselves with something very special to pin up on the corkboard: a letter and cheque from the Victorian government. Marty and I have been awarded a ‘Victoria Rocks’ grant from Arts Victoria worth $7500! Seven thousand five hundred dollars! Marty and I jumped for joy in our kitchen and I squealed with happiness. I couldn’t believe it! We were going to do this! Marty said he could believe it—he knew we’d get the grant. ‘We’re just too good to ignore,’ he said. I loved his confidence; it was so foreign to me but I was learning, slowly, that there was power in holding things lightly, in assuming they were going to work out right. There was a peace to be found in that. Whatever happened, we would be okay. We were in this together.
You might be wondering about my mum and dad, and how they took the news of our unplanned pregnancy? You’re probably aware that Catholics generally have certain expectations about the order of things: marriage then babies?
I told Marty that perhaps it would be best if I broke the news to my parents by myself. There was a chance they’d be a little shocked, I warned him. But he wouldn’t hear of it. He said he wanted to be there, by my side. So, I called Dad and Mum and organised to bring Marty over for dinner the next night, then I lay awake all night trying to work out how I was going to deliver the bombshell.
The first problem was that they didn’t really know Marty. They’d come to some of our Red Raku gigs and had been introduced, but as far as I knew they’d never had a conversation with him, and they certainly didn’t know about our love story.
But it was okay, people, because I had a plan. I figured we’d arrive, I’d introduce Marty again, and we’d lead up to it slowly: the story of our friendship, how we’d started dating, then written each other letters when I was in Canada, how this had been a long time coming and we were serious about each other, and then, after dessert, when they’d had a glass of wine, I’d tell them we were having a baby.
On the way to Sandy the following evening, Marty and I stopped by a florist and I chose a huge bunch of white lilies, which I knew Mum would love. Back in the car again, I suddenly remembered my teacher Maryanne from Preshil telling us that in Renaissance times lilies signified purity and chastity, but they were also a traditional symbol of condolence in times of grief. Oh goodness me—I’d picked the wrong flowers. Well, stuff it, there was nothing I could do now. And, in a way, perhaps this would be a small grieving for them; I mean, I wasn’t married, you know? Let’s just say I thought this
