Annie Mullarvey

            A prolonged and prickly stand-off with next-door neighbors at our previous address is probably why we weren’t in a hurry to meet our new neighbor, Dina.  Approaching ninety, mysterious and stern looking, her slightly disheveled form would emerge now and then from her front door.  Occasionally we would sight her, unnoticed, through our side window. She carefully measured each determined step down to the street, each movement requiring Herculean might.  Her body fought and resisted whilst she mouthed what looked to be curses of frustration. Then one day, about three weeks after we’d moved in, she scaled the front steps and rang the doorbell. Gripping her walking stick with the pride of an Olympian, she breathily introduced herself, and everything changed.

            We fussed around dutifully and pacified our spritely dog. She gratefully took a comfy armchair and accepted the offer of a coffee, carefully scanning the lounge. We soon realized Dina wasn’t the meek, dotty little Italian lady wanting small talk, as previously assumed. There was an air of elder entitlement about her. When we praised the beauty of the enormous weepy flowering bottle brush adorning her front nature-strip, she shook her head in disgust:

            ‘Bloody possums they shit everywhere.  I’m always sweeping that path.’

            She described watching our house being built in 1970. She then explained how soon afterwards, the wife of the previous owner-family had become her best friend of nearly fifty years. We gleaned that after Dina and her friend, Francesca, had become widows, they spent the evenings knitting together for company. Unfortunately, she had witnessed Francesca’s demise.  A few nasty falls from the outside steps had apparently hastened her departure. Dina didn’t mince words.  We thought about the installation of a lift almost instantly.  Sooner than too late.

            Dina has since become a treasure and an asset in our lives. She enjoys describing the old days of being newly arrived in Australia in the 1960s, trying to adjust to married life, factory work making clothing a few blocks away, and raising her two boys who have now entered late middle age. Attempting to somehow fit in with the local Italian community and the so-called Aussie culture, with its bravado humor, puzzling rules and frequent barbs of racial superiority. Her husband, from brief and sad description, must have been a kindly man.  He died in a nursing home. This is something Dina isn’t proud of.  he told us of an elderly Italian man further along the street who died where he wanted to die – i.e. sitting in his own back garden. She indicated that this would be a far preferable way to go. I wonder what it must have been like to find him.

            We recently learnt that Dina comes from a village not far from Venice. Over homemade crostoli and Italian liqueur she insisted we try, she described, in broken English, a feudal type of existence there. Someone like a baron owned her family’s land and the land of many others. By the sound of it, for Dina’s family of eight, there was barely enough food to go around after the landlord’s regular takings had been snatched. When we expressed our shock and sympathy, realizing how desperate and unfair this archaic imposed system was on our friend as a young girl, Dina shook her head smiling. 

            ‘Oh, but we were better off than some others. We grew silkworms.’

            Capture our imaginations she did. How could she not have?  I couldn’t wait to consult the internet about the lucrative silk trade in Venice.  From what I could glean, it was around six centuries old. So, our neighbor, who was born in 1934, had grown up beneath a repressive, ancient feudal culture, and her family had managed to get enough food to survive on because they harvested and processed silkworms from their mulberry trees as a sideline. Those poor little pale creatures, which were killed before they could emerge from their magnificently crafted silk cocoons, sacrificed their lives to allow Dina to live. And alive and kicking at nearly ninety she is!

            Wrapped up against chilly winds in old, oversized cardigans, we often observe her heading through the park to visit her elderly friends on the other side, for their weekly card game. If a little money changes hands on those excursions, we agree it would be unsurprising. A noticeable gleam in her eye and the remarkable spring in her stride must be a sure giveaway.

            Recently, I watched a short documentary on SBS about Venice’s current problem of being swamped by tourism. The diminishing population of ‘natives’ due to their inability to survive, among other things, accommodation shortages and inflated tourist prices, was heart wrenching.  By the program’s conclusion it was clear that Old Venice, the proud, age-old water bound trading capital of Europe, famous for its cultural uniqueness, breathtaking fairytale architecture and its reputed superiority in decorative glass making and silk weaving, is suffering.  

            We are unsure as to whether Dina has been made aware that the majestic historic gem she visited as a treat when young is now battling to preserve itself.  Maybe her sons and friends are loathe to burden her with the news. She certainly hasn’t broached the subject with us.

            Meeting Dina has turned out to be a pleasant gamechanger for us. Often now, when I spot her emerging from her cream brick house, I prance to the door to call out ‘Hello’ or invite her in for ‘an espresso.’ What a far cry this is from two years ago when we pondered how we would approach this elderly European lady who might turn out to be a hindrance in some way. What a relief that she decided to enlighten us that day by knocking on our front door.

THE END

About Annie Mullarvey

Annie is in her mid-60s and cannot imagine living anywhere other than the Municipality of Merri-bek.  She spent her childhood in Glenroy and now lives way up the other end in East Brunswick. 

Over the years, she has worked as an inner urban community worker, a mental health social worker for Merri Community Health, and later for another local organization as counsellor/advocate for refugees and asylum seekers.  She even married a teacher from Moreland High (now defunct), and they raised a family together in Brunswick.

She is passionate about social justice and human rights, and her short stories often reflect this. Annie has recently completed her first fiction novel, ‘No Fences for Joyce.’  The story follows Joyce O’Connor, a young woman rescuing her children and fleeing an abusive and alcoholic husband in Yarrawonga during the 1960s. They eventually settle in Broadmeadows where Joyce is hired by ‘Fenton’s Electronics’ (no relation to the Ericsson company), initially as a factory hand. There she meets her lifelong friends, Rosa from Italy and Maureen from Liverpool, England.  Joyce and her companions are horrified by the frequency at which their female co-workers are developing repetitive strain type injuries due to the unrealistic work practices set by management.  Joyce eventually becomes a shop steward with their union and helps to stage a successful lunchtime rally from the roof of the canteen. Later in the novel, Joyce reconnects with her old school friend, Suzi, and together they help to establish a women’s refuge in Yarrawonga. 

Annie’s dream is to somehow convert this novel into a community play.  To see it travel between Melbourne and Yarrawonga someday, helping to spread awareness about gender-fueled violence, is her idea of pretty darn special. 

Copyright Annie Mullarvey, September 2024. All rights reserved; this intellectual property belongs solely to Annie Mullarvey.