Darling of Darlington

She first made herself known by tappings on the front door about 11 at night.

I would answer it, cautiously with a preliminary “who is it"?

Eventually we just ignored it. After a while it stopped.

We assumed local kids being playful but the regularity and the restrained nature of the knock gave one
pause.

Just why a ghost would knock on the front door of the house she haunted, her house in a sense, was
mysterious.

But such musings came later.

A supernatural origin was far from our thinking at that point.

Something out of the ordinary first suggested itself in this way.

I had obtained a nice Victorian door knob to go with our old front door. Brass and very solid.

One evening about 9pm we heard a clinking, crashing sound originating near the front door.

The three of us had been in an adjoining room watching TV.

The front door knob had fallen off in a way that defied physics and was in pieces on the floor of the front
room.

I called to my wife to come and see and we both gazed at the bits.

She (my wife ) had witnessed my installation of the thing. The careful drilling, the nuts tightened.
Washes attached. Jill even polished the thing and many an immature comment to do with knob
polishing, insertion etc was made.

All good fun. Anyway,

The knob was now in pieces. Some way from the door,and here is the kicker , inside!

A door knob facing the street on the outside of the door was now inside. In pieces. The door remained
closed. Deadlocked in fact. Deadlocked! Ha!

We looked at one another, I gathered the pieces and we repaired to the lounge room and I made a
strong cup of tea.

One of us had to say something.

Ghosts you reckon?

Maybe, but they are not very good at it are they?

The Blue Fairy perhaps?

Bit bulky for a fairy. Bit mechanical.

For a door knob (of all things)

To pass through 4 inches of solid wood was as absurd as it was, well, inexplicable.

We had been reading Pinocchio to our son Jim and had been getting quizzed on fairies. Apart from
Tinkerbell, the tooth fairy and the Pinocchio one my knowledge was limited.

But I doubted Knob Fairies.

The next day, a Saturday I re installed the knob and that was that.

I heard myself saying to Jill, must of been the work of some Darling.

Some Darling indeed!

Darling was a family type word utilised to express a certain exasperation

Jill, my wife, might say “Darling it's garbage night" This was a subtle suggestion to myself to get cracking
and put the bins out.

“Your Darling mother is coming over? On Saturday? For lunch?

Said with the smallest hint that such a state of affairs would not leave me leaping for Joy. “

“You know she is Dar ling"

Or Darling, Darling forgot to buy milk be a Darling and go to the shops.

Well, we now had a Darling in Residence.

Darling turns kleptomaniacal.

The door knocking stopped. Darling tried a new approach.

She would dematerialise the teapot, plates, mugs in classic poltergeist fashion. They would then
rematerialise in odd places.

We had a backyard dunny and were often surprised when they rematerialised within.

Armed with reading matter I would open the dunny door and see the blue teapot with ducks perched
precariously on the seat.

Darling had a sense of humour it seemed.

I think she dematerialised the cat. Tiddles was getting on in years and seldom left the couch. She
vanished for 5 days and turned up meowing loudly in the attic . This was only accessible by steep rickety
stairs far too tricky for poor old Tids. I found them a bit of an ordeal.
Our son, Jim, owned a Thomas the tank engine train set with numerous accessories and several other
engines and so forth. I loved trains so Jim served as an excuse for a set at an early age. An extensive
layout was semi permanently on the floor in the front room.

Darling took to the trains like a phantom Casey Jones. At all hours the click of Thomas and his mates
could be heard coming from the front room. This delighted me no end. She ignored all Jim’s other stuff.
The dinosaurs he loved.

Lego, puzzles and like a sensible child exclusively loved the trains.

Darling playing trains. Ghost trains!

Poor Darling! Maybe she wants to join the fun with you and Jim said Jill.

I wonder why she doesn’t I said.

She certainly makes her presence felt. She's not shy. Attention seeking if anything.

Then she did join in! The trains moved in a jerky sort of way all by themselves. Moved hesitantly as if by
a child unfamiliar with the conventions of railways.

The fat controller often road the rails on top of an engine. The trains moved painfully slowly or left the
rails completely and moved at snail pace across the floorboards. Sometimes sideways.

Occasionally they took to the air!

It made Jim laugh. I did too but on the inside. Darling's efforts were serious. She was doing her best!

“No Darling” I would say. Like this. Thomas goes on the rail. See? Darling took little notice and did things
her way.

Jim aged 5 took it all in his stride and often echoed my “No Darling" in a lispy non conjunctive way. No!
train on track Darlink .

Her non corporeal nature was no problem for Jim. No idea why.

Perhaps his parents acceptance of the invisible visitor convinced Jim everything was in order.

I asked him once if he saw “Darlink" and got ambivalent answers. One I remember was” Darlink is busy.”

We left it at that.

Diesel was her favourite and he often disappeared into the 4th dimension or wherever only to reappear
on the sink or somewhere.

At this point I must

Clarify the pronoun “she" in relation to Darling’s gender. Right from the get go both my wife and I
conceived the ghost to be feminine. In addition she seemed a child. Maybe 7 or 8?

Capricious, playful are words that came to mind. Cautiously curious. .

Darling became a family member.

A phantom daughter.

If she kept unorthodox hours so be it.

If she was making too much noise one of us, usually Jill, would gently remind her it was 4am and time
for bed.

She obeyed but occasionally we sensed strong resistance and a continuance of activity but in a more
muted way. Do ghosts sleep?

Darling broke all the ghost rules.

She was certainly not scary. Not in any way a nuisance and certainly not evil or malicious as ghosts are
meant to be.

She seemed well adjusted really. Independent. Self contained

She seemed happy in her own um skin?

Our son accepted her as a kind of intermittent sibling and Darling didn't pay him any kind of special
attention.

Naturally well supernaturally she was no problem as to meals or going to school. She didn’t need new
shoes or clothes. Brushing of teeth was not an issue.

Sometimes I felt she listened to Jill or myself reading bedtime stories to Jim.

A certain impatience with our explanations to Jim of this or that. An older child’s eagerness for us to turn
the page and get on with it.

I recall coming down with a nasty dose of flu. I was off work for over a week and felt like shit for days. Jill
fussed about keeping up my fluid intake. I had a bit of soup but for the first few days ate practically
nothing.

Jill had to go to work and Jim was off at Kindy and I slept for hours during the day.

One day about three days into the illness I woke at about 1 in the afternoon and on my bedside table
was a dinner plate with six weet bix forming a hexagon around the edge of the plate.

Darling was trying to feed me!

Later we both laughed at this touching gesture. It was so much the attempt of a child to show concern.
Six, dry, artistically arranged weet bix!
Jill and I were then in our early 30s.

Busy. Jobs, Jim, families, friends fixing up the old terrace house we lived in.

All this left little time to speculate on our household spectre.

We told no one of Darling knowing little ourselves. We had developed protective feelings towards her.
She didn’t need strangers coming in spook hunting or satisfying idle curiosity.

I must mention too that she made no um “appearance" when visitors were in the house.

That first Christmas I took Jim into town to buy mummy a present. We bought other gifts for various
relatives and visited Santa.

Over lunch while Jim and I sat and ate we tried to think of anyone we had forgot.

“Darlink”said Jim.

What do you think she would like I said?

“Diesel” said Jim.

Perfect.

So we got her one. Her own diesel.

Jim helped to wrap the presents and we put Darlings beneath the tree with the others.

Come Christmas morning the present was gone and reappeared later with the other trains but clearly
under Darling’s jurisdiction.

We toyed with the idea of turning the attic into a “girls room” but felt this might be going too far.

Bit difficult to explain.

We didn’t know if she was really a ghost that is some remnant or spirit of a dead girl who possibly had
lived here in the past.

We didn’t know or care if she knew she was dead or if that mattered or if true to ghost lore, the movies,
the books she needed to “move on" she seemed perfectly happy staying put.

The house was old, many kids died young of this or that in the late 19th century. Darlington then,
although not a slum as parts of it would later become was poor. Unsewered. Diseases of all types were
common. Nutrition poor for working class families Life hard.
Death too was common. Most families lost a member or two.

After all, as Jill would say, most people don’t know they are alive!

Eventually we moved on. The house was small, no back yard to talk of. It fronted a busy street.

We both loved it, loved its proximity to the city, its vibe as they say, the local characters, even the balmy
breezes being not far from water as the crow flies. But circumstances change.

And move on we did. The suburbs beckoned.

We found a bigger home with a bigger backyard in nearby Marrickville.

Jill was unexpectedly expecting.

I was delighted and secretly hoped for a girl. Not that I cared that much. In fact, I was surprised by this
feeling.

I had originally felt if Jill was to have another child a boy would be more suitable. A mate for Jim. Jill felt
likewise. She had a male sibling and although they got on now Jill said as kids they fought all the time.
She would have preferred a sister. A same sex sibling seemed easier all round.

We will call her Darling what do you think? That is, if it’s a girl.

I half expected a protest from Jill proclaiming a boy could be a Darling too.

Or Darling might not be quite the name she had in mind.

But no.

Yes, she said. We'll call her Darling.

And so it came to be.

Darlington Darling became a memory. At first we thought she would move with us. But no. Darling stuck
to that ghost convention. Her house was her house. Occasionally we wondered if she was still there.
Back in Darlington playing trains with a new generation. Darling was a Darlington girl.

We had attempted to explain our move to Darling.

Once again the inversion of ghost lore and convention struck us as funny.

The movies with families fleeing in horror the supernatural entity destroying their homes and sanity.
Darling had enriched our lives and each of us had become fond of her.

And here we were attempting to explain to Darling why we were moving. Where we were moving and
encouraging her to join us. We felt guilty abandoning her!

I knew though that Darling would stay put. Also that she would be fine and adjust quicker than we
would.
I remember packing the last odds and ends, taking that one last look at the home we had lived in, loved
in, bickered in. Watched Jim grow. Renovated as best we could. A sad, nostalgic, end of something
feeling.

You feel your own mortality. The end of something.

“Bye Darling” I said aloud to the echoing walls. “Take care.”

Then before I knew it.

“We love you"

Silence. I locked up and got in the car.

Five years have zapped past and memories including Darling are becoming dream like. Foggy.

Jill had a healthy girl. Darling. People remark on how old fashioned she is.

I sort of understand what they mean.

An old soul as is said.

Jill's mum bought her dolls. She was swamped with bears, soft cuddly toys of all types.

But oddly, perhaps not oddly, her favourite toy and the one she carted everywhere for a while and even
slept with was a small black locomotive known as Diesel.

Sometimes I feel like going back and knocking on the door in Abercrombie st

But I never have. Maybe one day when Darling is older. I will show her where her parents once lived.
Before she was born.

Might be interesting.
St Stephens church and boneyard, Newtown is a favourite spot of mine, in fact I plan to spend eternity
there, somewhat minimalised to be sure. My niece will cast my ashes there at midnight some time or
rather some date in the future. Of course midnight might be a bit awkward and she’ll probably want a
drink after discharging her duties so maybe ninish. On a sultry summers night puple twilight faded.
Anyhow that has little to do with this yarn beyond establishing my fondness for the place. Student years
girlfriend and I would sojurn there, smoke dope, pash or even fuck amongst the dead given half a
chance. She’d do this because that’s what crazy students could do. It was allowed. Almost expected,
later, not so much, she grew up and we grew apart. You can’t fuck in cemeteries at thirty. Not on. This
too has little to do with the yarn I’m about to relate. No, this yarn has more to do with bees and visions.
Despair and redemption, synchronicity if you will and a jigger of serendipity.

So St Steves has for me a romantic, sexual, nostalgic kind of feeling. I’ve always loved cemeteries, my
parents enjoyed the odd saunter around them and I always got quite a kick from them as a kid, kind of
scary places as a child but an increased sense of awe,sadness, peace, acceptance perspective
grounding! Cemeteries are grounding places.

I look at my darling now and still wonder. If not for the bees,that day. I would often grab some
lunchduring my hols and eat in the cemetery. Weekdays were peaceful, and apart from a few personal
ghosts associated with the place. Anyhow bitten by a bee I was, I’d grabbed some lunch and sitting
midst the greatful dead

Covid was coalescing into something big.

But not yet. It’s full impact was yet to manifest.

The news was growing progressively worse.

It was a Saturday Mardi gras2020

With 2 old friends we roamed the cemetery.

People seemed everywhere.

People dressed or undressed for Sydneys big night.

We sat and not far a group of young people passed around a joint.
Getting ready for the night. Bubbling excitement

Drifts of people in the perfect sydney mid autumn late afternoon strolled between the headstones and
crumbling monuments

Incredibly a girl walked naked not far off.

Her beauty and the sheer surprise I experienced at the vision cancelled any remotely erotic thoughts.

Just a naked girl walking amongst the dead.

Plenty of others, scantily clad were doing likewise.

March 2020 I’m not sure if lockdowns had been proposed at this point.

Most in power were in denial already setting up laying the groundwork for an absurd politicalisation of
the virus.

Classic neo liberalism non response to anything requiring a government to act. And act quickly. On
behalf of the people it was elected to protect.

Instinctively, childishly, such a government ignored

Then denied

Then blame shifted

Then panicked

Something akin to the now discredited stages of impending death acceptance of the 70s Dr keebler ross.

Anything but a measured mature fact and evidence-based response.

Do nothing mr Murdoch may disapprove of.

Do nothing the brain washed Murdoch reading yobocracy might construe

Left wing

Find someone to blame

Pretend welfare is not government business.

Wait and see. etherington.detherington.david@gmail.com

Denial.

The PM aware of a new and unknown virus which is contagious and as yet mysterious as to impact etc
attends football game. Encourages others to do same. Maybe 10000 people in close proximity.

No national coordination at a federal level is established.

States are left to regulate there own domains.

This will cause immense problems.

Bickering, blame shifting, conflicting imposition of regulations and guidelines will cause massive
confusion family dislocation, arbitrary “ boarder" closures and so forth.

Finally appropriate action is taken. Lockdowns and work from home initiatives save tens of thousands of
lives. Yet

Margot’s enchanted Guinea pig.

Margot aged 7 loved Guinea pigs

She had had several

Buster honey.

The latest was a big golden brown fellow named Buster

Big Buster.

As it happens Big Buster was a girl Guinea pig and shortly after coming to live with Margot produced
three new tiny Guinea pigs.

Margot screamed when she saw the squeal ding threesome suckling.

Her mum rushed out, peered into the cage and started to laugh.

Margot, no longer scared was staring at the little family spellbound.

Buster's a mum said her mother.

Better not touch her or the babies yet.

Margot fascinated asked her mum if she could stay home today.

No said mum. School, hurry up. Buster will be ok. She knows what to do. The babies will be fine.

Can we keep them asked Margot.

We'll see said mum.

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