It started becoming one of those buzzwordy thingummies (although I’ve never heard a single sound whenever the word is invariably said) a little while ago – in Whacker time anyhoo.
I’m talking about multitasking.
Not the trendy speak either, because my old grandma, who was born back in the 1800s, was multitasking long before some marketing moron decided to coin the term as a radical new approach.
No, my grandma had her own word for multitasking – she called it life.
A life no one would comprehend today.
Growing up on the west coast of South Australia, her baby brother would be the first white man born in the Hundred of Goode.
Old(er) age, I am discovering, is a time for recollections – and regrets.
And in my approaching dotage, I am reliably informed by the women in my life, from the missus to that cheeky Zoe, my eldest female grandling, I am now considered a slightly unreliable performer of any task, let alone one preceded by multi.
But enough of me, and let’s have more of grandma, who played such an important part in my life (which I should point out for any of you acid-tongued know-alls, began reasonably well into the 1900s, not the same century as grandma).
And in my mind, to which I tend to retreat more often, grandma is one of those parts which is indelibly (get your Macquarie out) written into my old memory bank.
With nearly every bit of it, in some way, about her ubiquitous apron.
I can hardly recall ever seeing grandma without one on.
And that pinny, as she was wont to call it, was the prototype multitasker. From protecting her dresses (she had to do that because she didn’t have too many of those to start with) to the following:
1. Good for picking up hot things from the oven.
2. Great for wiping hands – and the occasional grandchild’s tears.
3. She could fill it with apricots from the gnarled old tree in her backyard, and apples and lemons.
4. Or wooden pegs for the clothesline.
5. Or bits of kindling for the oven or the fireplace in the lounge.
6. And eggs when her ancient hens got around to laying.
7. Vegies from her garden patch.
8. It was a duster or dryer as the occasion demanded.
9. And when we dropped in, she always seemed to be able to find a couple of wrapped lollies deep in its front pocket.
My mum wore one as well, but not as much and not with as many vital responsibilities.
The missus hardly ever wore one; crikey, our daughters don’t even own one.
The grandchildren have never even heard of them.
Today, in this ridiculously sterile world, Canberra would probably legislate against them anyway, out of fear for the multitude of possible germs adhered to the apron before it went into the copper boiler at the end of the week.
But as someone emailed me the other day – which prompted this warm memory – they never caught anything from an apron except love.
And it’s true. Without one my good old grandma would not have been complete.
Certainly my memories would not have been so rich.
