She tells me she and her
husband migrate from Serbia
I don’t see her much after
that: she works at a different site. When she comes to Ringwood for meetings I see
her walk across the car park from my office window, self-contained, unassuming.
Over seven years my interest grows. I hear she’s divorced and ask a friend in
her team what he thinks of her. “She’s all class,” he says. I think I agree.
The end of 2007. I plan to
resign from my job. I don’t want to die wondering so I summon all my courage one
Thursday and ask if I can see her away from work. She says no, but rings me at
my desk on Monday to say she’s changed her mind.
I’m not social, gracious, or
conventional. I ask her to pick me up because I have no car at the time. She
doesn’t seem to care. We watch the sunset from Mount Dandenong, then talk in a
café. Two weeks later we walk the beach at Edithvale, sit on her sarong and
talk. She is different, intelligent, her accent gives me goose pimples. I
want to touch her but dare not.
She is raising two children on
her own, just as I have done. She’s impressed. The first time I’m invited for
tea her kids sit in the kitchen as she prepares the meal. They’re unaffected, laugh
easily. I feel privileged.
I get a job in Bendigo, a bit
of a surprise. I set up a quiet life there. My good woman amazes me with what
she gets done each day, her focus on whatever she is doing: her work, preparing
a meal, going to the gym. When it’s time for play, she focuses on me, although
we live in different cities.
No other woman understands or
accepts me like this one. Finally I let myself love someone, this brave, smart,
funny woman I can’t keep my eyes or my hands off.
Life and human beings are
fickle. But four and a half years later we are still together.
Rock on.
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