Perfectly imperfect. Why we should celebrate our flaws.
Perfection is actually achieved in celebrating our imperfections.
My Nanny taught me that.
It’s been five years since she left this earth and I still feel her presence every day.
She was the most authentic person I knew.
She was sassy, funny, determined, resilient and hardworking. She was bound by duty, honour and lived according to her values. She laughed and joked, she berated and humbled. She was cheeky and irreverent but lived valiantly by her code. Always opinionated, she was freed even further by societal conventions by a stroke in her 70’s. Any inhibitions she had before then, (and there weren’t many), disappeared. Her tongue, always sharp, could cut deep, but she picked her targets. My gentle older daughter never felt her wrath, my kind sister was often spared it, whereas tough old me, I was the target for all she had to say. She did it with love though and our banter is what I miss most. It is certainly not her crap cooking!
My Nanny ate three Tim tams for breakfast each day, caked everything in salt, drank at least 15 highly sugared cups of tea a day and used so much lard in her cooking you wondered how she could get out the front door. She was tiny though. Tiny with a huge personality. She was a terrible cook – it was all about lard and fatty meat and sugar. So much sugar – its only now I understand that was a response to the rationing in the war years. Modern medicine and their theories on sugar are not corroborated when looking at my Nanny’s diet and life. She lived on her own accord until 92, a deep and rich life full of love and experience.
She had a deep capacity for love and loyalty, but she could hold a grudge like no one I’ve ever met. Piss her off and God help you! Her wrath was inflicted with the sharpest tongue, but her hugs were warm and deep, and she never let go first. I have a photo of her cuddling my toddler daughter that shows one of those hugs. She had a special bond with my youngest daughter and that photo holds pride of place on my mantle. I often call it my memory corner, but it looks like an altar or an offering. It holds the cup and saucer that I brought her back from Buckingham Palace. I’d been invited to the Queen’s Garden party and joked with her that I stole it for her. That story became legendary in our family to the point that I even question it now. (I actually bought it at the Buckingham Palace gift shop but let’s not ruin a good story with the truth right.)
When I was in year seven and not quite old enough to go out by myself, my Nanny took me and seventeen (yes seventeen) of my friends on the train to the Sydney Easter Show. All the parents loved Nanny Rigby and all the girls adored her too. We were only allowed to go with a grown up, so Nanny became our chaperone. All girls made sure Nanny got her pick of sweeties from the show bags and she had her tea in a thermos. I think back and I realise she loved it as much as we did.
My Grandad had a debilitating stroke in his 50’s and after a lifetime at home and raising children, Nanny ventured to work and cleaned at the local Psychiatric hospital (where she proudly watched her daughter train as a nurse) and then at the local RSL club. She never complained. She stoically got on with it and raised her family and became the bread winner. She took what life offered without questioning.
Born on the eve of the Great Depression, achieving puberty in the war years, marrying during the giddy closing days of World War two and immigrating to Australia with her young family in the 1960s, my Nanny’s life was rich with experience. She embraced new experiences but often after a period of stubbornness. My Filipino auntie was the most loved of daughters-in-law but it took time and testing. Nanny didn’t give her love and adoration easily but once given, it could be relied on for life.
She was a feminist living the old ways. Duty, honour and family came first – but no bloke was going to walk all over her, and she strongly encouraged education, especially for the girls in the family. My Mother went on to do multiple degrees and I think the proudest day of Nanny’s life was when she saw her daughter get her master’s degree. When she died, we started a scholarship in her name for underprivileged girls. We know she would have been chuffed.
The five years since she left have passed in a haze. I used to speak to her every day. It took a couple of years for me to stop picking up the phone. I talk to her picture every morning when I meditate. I think of her everytime I see a Tim Tam or excessive salt, or I see a sassy older lady giving someone what for. I see her in my dreams but mostly I hear her voice when I find myself dimming my light or stepping into the shadows. ”Just be yourself Donna,” she used to say. ”You’re the only one who can be you.” She berated me, humbled me and loved me, but she taught me that the best course was to be your authentic self. To follow your path, you need to embrace all shades of yourself.
You do not have to eat lard or Tim Tams though.
