Teresa’s Daughter
It was not always an easy thing being Teresa’s daughter, but one thing for sure is that its never been boring. This is a story about growing up, and about my mum, Teresa Irene Tse.
One of my earliest memories is foggy, i can’t remember if i remember or if its the photos that i’m remembering but we were on a cruise. My brother Steven who is 18 months older than me, my mum and my dad and me. It was a dress up night and mum, creative as always fashioned together an outfit from pyjamas and crepe paper to make me into some kind of a western cowboy geisha. I remember having a little brown waist coat on and winning fuzzy felt as my prize. I remember stacking the suitcases up on top of each other to reach the bunk bed. I loved following my mum around like her side kick. She was always talking to someone, making friends with strangers and i thought she was some kind of celebrity. In some ways she was.
My parents both always worked hard, but they made their work fit our family lifestyle. It was always drummed into us that family was the most important thing and that my parents chose to have a big family. They were the first of their friends to have kids and, they didn’t stop at two, they didn’t stop at three. But they stopped at four. Lucky for us that meant we got Trevor! I’ll talk more about him later. This story is about my mum and me and through this story, its about our family. I grew up as the only daughter with three brothers, i never wished for a sister because i had my mum, she was a dentist but in another life she may have been an artist.
In the early years of my life we lived at 74 Francis Ave Brighton Le Sands, Sydney NSW 2216. I went to the local catholic school and every afternoon when i got home from school either mum or dad was home. There was lots of systems - on tuesdays and thursdays mum was home and mondays, wednesdays and friday’s dad was home. Tuesdays and thursdays were my favourite. Mum was softer, funnier, more chilled out. Dad was strict, made us do chinese homework and always looked like he was angry.
As time went on and more kids joined our family, we got an extension on the house. Mum and dad got builders and we got an upstairs, mum designed it all with the builder, there was barely an architect in sight. Mum always made it clear to us kids that with intelligence and hard work you can do anything, include build a house, unblock a toilet, fix a dishwasher or drive across North America with 4 kids and a paper map. I remember walking up a ramp to see the upstairs design before any walls were up. Sitting here as a 48 years old mother of two, i can’t imagine getting a new shed let alone building an extension and a pool in a house whilst working full time with four kids.
Birthday parties were always a fun occasion, for all of our birthdays, the house was filled with kids and adults and mum would always let us choose a cake from the Woman’s Weekly birthday cake book which she would painstakingly make. It might be a train, a frog, a swimming pool or a miniature house - it was the 80s. Mum comes from a large family with lots of sisters, they would all come over and bring a dish and there would be lots of laughing, talking and eating. This would all stop as my parents became more private as the years went by.
It was always made clear to me that i was the only daughter and mum’s special side kick. Saturdays were my favourite because mum had the day off. The day would start with me going ‘down the road’ with mum, visiting the butcher, the deli, the fruit and veg shop and the chemist. My job was to hold the bags whilst my mum endlessly chatted and shop keepers and passers by would call out, ‘hi teresa!’, she would know everyone by name… Mrs this, Mr that. And then after we would walk off mum would tell me the goss about them. Like she lives in the big house on the corner, or ‘his son is an asshole who married a gold digger’ or ‘She just lost her husband and her kids used to go to your school’. The italian deli shop assistants would open the hand loops of the plastic carrier bags wide and pass them over to me to carry without giving them to my mum and always make some comment about how much i’d grown up or how helpful and beautify i was. I was always really proud to be Teresa’s daughter, because absolutely everyone in Brighton-le-sands knew her and loved her.
I remember once going in the car with her and not being sure where we were going, we pulled up at a suburban house that i didn’t recognise and went in. Inside was a room that was set up like a shop and with tiny coat hangers it was a person who made tiny dolls clothes and sold them. It could have been one of my mum or dad’s patients, i’m not sure but i remember leaving with a bag full of adorable dolls clothes for my dolls. They were checked pastel dresses with matching scrunchies and lace socks, they were full outfits made especially for a certain kid of doll that i had. This is an example of a random thing that would happen with my mum.
Saturdays were also great because when we went shopping we would be allowed to pick out a little present for ourselves. Mine were mostly erasers that i would add to my collection, and my brothers would get a matchbox car or a pencil or something like that. We would come home with all the goodies and by the time dad was finished work, we would sit at the coffee table and have an indoor picnic with bread, cold italian meats, sundried tomatoes, cheese and bread. It was at these saturday grazing lunches that i would discover exotic foods like anchovies, olives, artichoke and pesto. To this day its one of my favourite ways to eat.
I am writing this now because my mum is in hospital. She is not well and i want to remember good times and reflect on her life whilst she is still alive. I haven’t lived in the same country as my mum for well over 20 years so sadness and regret are emotions that regularly sneak into my psyche. I do know, however that mum and dad took us around the world and encouraged us to be curious, so i think they are happy and proud that i have spread my wings and live in the UK.
As i was saying, Saturdays were excellent, until they were hijacked by piano lessons and chinese school, at which time they went from my favourite to my most dreaded day of the week. However there were still short moments of fun, shopping trips and mezze lunches in between. When i was about 10 years old my dad thought it would be a good idea to send me and my brother Steven to chinese school. It went from 1pm - 5pm ish and i absolutely hated it. I struggled with learning chinese by endlessly repeating phrases, the classrooms were cold, i had no friends there and i spent a lot of time in the toilet hiding. Piano lessons were also a struggle, i was never a natural musician, but i tried hard to practice and go through the classical music grades. It was drummed into us that success was a result of hard work and discipline. There would be a lot more discipline going on in our house over the next few years.
When i was about 10 we also moved house. Dr Henry who was an old doctor who lived in a house on the main street died. My mum went to pay her condolences to Mrs Henry, his widow. When she came home she told dad that she had just bought a house. She had struck up a deal with Mrs Henry to buy their house before it went to market. They both must have thought this was a good idea and before long we moved house less than 1km away. This house was preferable because it had a surgery at the front. It was on a corner on the main road with a large house at the back. Mum and dad must have dreamed of a more efficient lifestyle where their surgery was part of the house. It did end up working well. It was the mid 1980s and they were early adoptors of the work life balance / working from home philosophy.
I will publish following chapters of this work in progress book here on this blog. I am not sure where this will lead. But i want to share these thoughts publicly for my family to find as and when they do. I want to make clear that i only have positive intensions by writing this story and i hope no one takes offence to what i am writing. Please comment with any questions or comments as this project takes shape.
Jacqui