In the quiet moments following her mother's death, author Indigo Perry finds herself returning to a powerful metaphor that defined their relationship: the veranda. This in-between space, neither fully indoors nor outdoors, became a symbol of the delicate balance they maintained as mother and daughter.
The Final Request
During her mother's final hours in hospital last winter, as rain fell outside, she experienced hallucinations that led her to make a poignant request. "In a sad, faraway voice she pleaded to be taken out on to the veranda so she could look at the light," Perry recalls. This became one of the last things her mother said, though the hospital had no veranda. The ambiguity of which veranda she meant - she had lived in many houses with them - only deepened the symbolic weight of this final wish.
Summer and Winter
Perry describes their fundamental differences with seasonal metaphor. "Mum loved warm weather. I love the crisp air and diffusive light of winter," she writes. These opposing preferences made their relationship challenging at times, with unresolved differences that persisted throughout their lives. Yet they managed to create what Perry calls "a place to meet and share a quiet mutual acceptance, an in-between space not unlike a veranda."
A Photographic Memory
While preparing for her mother's funeral, Perry discovered a photograph that captured a rare moment of joy. Taken in the late 1970s or early 1980s in north-western Victoria, the image shows her mother sitting in a deck chair in front of their weatherboard house's veranda. "She's not looking at the camera, or at me, 12 years old, holding the Kodak Brownie camera I'd been given for Christmas," Perry notes. Instead, her mother is smiling and reaching out to a joey they were caring for after its mother was killed on the road.
The photograph reveals layers of family life:
- Her father, the local butcher known for his compassion, brought home the joey
- Her mother took on the care and bottle-feeding responsibilities
- The joey became so attached it once climbed into her mother's bed at night
- Perry remembers her mother's shaggy perm and green apple shampoo
- The terry-towelling dress her mother wore on hot weekends
The Complexity of Happiness
Perry acknowledges that her mother's life was difficult when that photograph was taken, and remained challenging throughout. "I'd like to say it became easier and more consistently joyful. But it didn't," she admits. Happiness appeared mostly around grandchildren or lifelong women friends, while "trauma and hardship, with all sorts of sharp and harsh textures, never ended for Mum."
The Veranda of Conversation
Despite their differences becoming more pronounced over time, mother and daughter found ways to connect. They would sit together enjoying hot drinks - coffee for her mother, tea for Perry - along with lemon slice her mother made because she knew Perry liked it, or pastries Perry brought. "We'd talk, sometimes for hours, as long as the subject matter didn't go anywhere too prickly," she remembers.
When conversations turned difficult, silence would fall, or sharp words would be exchanged. Yet Perry treasures what they managed to create: "The space we shared may not sound like much, and it was far from all we had between us, but I take solace in recalling the small portal of togetherness where for the most part we could sit and be content as mother and daughter."
Seeing Themselves in Each Other
While some people remarked on their physical resemblance, Perry never saw it herself. "Yet in that space, maybe we could see ourselves in each other for a while," she reflects. This metaphorical veranda became the place where their differences could coexist, where summer and winter could meet without conflict.
Approaching the First Summer
As the weather warms and Perry approaches her first summer without her mother, she contemplates how the season will feel different. "With Mum gone, the season will surely take on new qualities of light and dark," she observes. The veranda - both real and metaphorical - remains as a space of memory and connection, a testament to the complex, enduring bond between mother and daughter that transcends even death.
