Resurrection!

Helloooo! I’m ba-a-a-a-ck! Since December 2009, as a few of my benevolent readers may have observed, my ‘Hot’ News has turned ice-cold. I’ve been a disgrace to cyberspace for four whole months and really ought to be apologising, but you know what? A life lived is more fun than a life written down. If we have time to write about life, to lay ourselves bare in a daily blog, or on Facebook or endlessly on Twitter, what kind of life are we actually living, I ask myself.

Enough of the essay and on with the news…

On January 4th this year I became a grandmother, Malcolm became a grandfather, Chloe became a mother and Theo became a star! I have been living and breathing Theo ever since. Surprise, surprise! (Something tells me that you, kind reader, will now forgive me for my slack behaviour in not updating the website). Chloe is understandably keen for Theo to live a private life so there won’t be a constant array of photos as he grows ever more adored and adorable, but this one of him and Chloe was in our local newspaper, The Adelaide Advertiser, on March 29th so the whole world is allowed to share, just this once.

The photo was taken by Calum Robertson from the Adelaide Advertiser the day after Chloe won back her seat as a Labor Party MP in the South Australian parliament for a second term, in a nail-biting election which she won by a mere 167 votes. The counting of votes in her electorate took eight excruciating days during which our spirits swooped and soared. We gave everything up for lost and then had reason to hope again, only to have those hopes dashed yet again, until the final numbers gave her the victory. My heart goes out to her similarly hard-working opponent who hoped and despaired in equal proportions and then lost.

The icing on the cake of Chloe’s win was that she was elected a week later to be the first woman to hold the position of Deputy-Speaker of the House on the same day as another woman MP became the first female to be elected as the Speaker. It was certainly a celebratory day for the other half of the human race. Three cheers for our state, South Australia, for being the first to reach this milestone. Our state was also the first in the world to give woman the vote: imagine that! It makes me proud to live in Adelaide even though I can’t claim an ounce of credit for the trail-blazing.

Back to me now…

Crazy news but great, and you can see it on YouTube: Ellen DeGeneres’s mother, Betty, read TEN LITTLE FINGERS AND TEN LITTLE TOES at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll. Amazing. I don’t think President Obama was in the audience. He was probably rather busy creating a decent US health system. Three cheers for him, too!

Even better than the White House news, however, is the sensational news that the Italian edition of TEN LITTLE FINGERS AND TEN LITTLE TOES has won the prize for the best book for children aged 0-3 at the Turin International Book Fair and I’m going to Turin to receive the award on May 17th. And best of all I get to see my Italian sister, Jan, only three months after she visited Australia for her 60th birthday. When she went back home I had no idea when I’d see her again. I was much too sad to take her to the airport so Malcolm took her instead. See what life turns up! It’s wild. I am beside myself over this news. Jan will be with me at the awards ceremony.

Jan’s birthday is on Valentine’s Day so she’s felt a little cheated all her life at not having that special day all to her self. This year my little sister Alison (Lailu to me) and I decided to bring Jan to Australia; and for her entire birthday weekend we had a cousin reunion in three seaside apartments in the one building. 13 of the 15 cousins came, a few of whom had never even met. No spouses were invited as we knew they’d be bored blind by the recollections of our various Methodist missionary backgrounds. We laughed so much over two and a half days, and sang (a family trait), that I came home with very little voice left. I rarely see members of my extended family so it was an uplifting time. Family keeps you safe when shadows fall. And the shadows of 2009, though lifting slowly, still exist.

Last news is that my newest book is out, but only in Australia: A GIRAFFE IN THE BATH, co-written with an ex-student, Olivia Rawson and illustrated by Kerry Argent and published by Penguin. We start our Australian book next weekend, April 18th. It should be fun and noisy. Olivia is so excited that I don’t think she’s completed a single spoken sentence in the last year. Our first joint media interview happened at her place and when Sarah Reed, the photographer from the Advertiser said, ‘Hmm, I love the light in this house. Where should I shoot the photos?’, I foolishly said, ‘In the bath!’ Darn. It was meant as a joke. Into the bath we went. And the next day we were on the front page of the paper. Dear readers, I am now 64 and ought to be showing some dignity but there is no dignity to be had in a bath! As you see…

Eventually I’ll be reading A GIRAFFE IN THE BATH to Theo whose first favourite book is MIFFY GOES FLYING. He sometimes hears it five times in one day. And it’s not even a Mem Fox book! It’s by Dick Bruna. What happened to family loyalty, people?!

On which very happy note, goodbye once again, and all the best, and I promise not to leave it so long next time.

Mem Fox