The dying swan!

With Christmas Day over and unruly hordes invading the shopping malls looking for specials I thought I would remain with the Pavlova for a-while. ‘How was your Christmas day and how was the pavlova?’  This would have been a question thousands of times repeated around the suburban landscapes of Australia. I thought of giving you a photo of our pavlova. As written before, the pavlova base was a commercial one from Aldi. I found two trolleys with their two dollars still in its little pockets. It was a good omen. People’s need for frugal shopping seems to go overboard at Christmas time when the deposited coins on the trolleys are so recklessly abandoned.

Here the Oosterman pavlova.

As I wrote before, our daughter thought the cream should have been a but more fluffy. It did not matter because the cream got covered up. One less sin to worry about. I like cooking rather roughly and am the last one to follow a recipe to the last letter or exact gram. Not that whipping cream involves much cooking.

The prawns have been eaten but Helvi was most annoyed with my suggestion of leaving the shells in the letter box of the cyclamen thief. She said; “you are just as bad as the woman cyclamen thief, and… worse, to contemplate such an evil act on the day of Christmas when the new borne Jesus was in its little crib being warmed by Mary and a kind ox’s steamy breath.” This, she followed up by; “And you are a Catholic as well!”  Helvi stated,”We  Lutherans live by our main credo and that is to be good, and not just PRETEND.”  That hurt!

I answered, “if I put the redolent prawn shells in the letter box and then ask for forgiveness afterwards, would that be OK?  I was always forgiven before, especially if I did a good repenting and a couple of Holy Marys.” Helvi just ignored this. My guilt went into automatic. I am not going to do anything with the prawn shells now. Mind you, the cyclamen thief gave us  really hell apart from stealing cyclamen. Not all old ladies are benign and kind.

The platter the pavlova is resting on is part of a ceramic colection given to us by a very good friend dating back when our children were small, and together with other couples  used to babysit each other.  It was known as the Balmain Babysitting club. It had some kind of point system to keep balance on the hours we sat in each others houses. They were great times.

But now for the real Pavlova. It brought tear to my eyes, the beauty of this dance.

 

Tags: Anna Pavlova, Babysitting, Balmain, Catholic, Jesus, Lutheran, Mary, Ox