At least the birds are happy now. No longer any risk of being stalked by a furry, grey and white, four‑legged predator. I can hear them chirping away as I type, flitting around in the feijoa trees outside the window on this first sunny day since (it seems like) forever.
Sixteen years is a big chunk of my life. And it feels like she was always there. Peel Street, Wernham Place, Otitori Bay Road… here. Mornington to Birkenhead to French Bay to South Head. Of course I understand that it’s natural to feel these knives of grief in my chest. And I know she was merely a cat, not a child, or a parent, or a friend, or a lover. But the pain is sharper than I’d expected.
Just now, when I was outside checking the garden, with the bright sunlight and a gentle breeze, and the sweet smell of macadamia flowers in the air, I realised that I’m also going to physically miss her actually ‘being around’, not just miss her as my pet.
I don’t mind being alone here; in fact I like it. But up until now, Molly’s always been nearby. Often following me around. Finding me when I’m hanging out the washing, or jumping over the gate to join me when I’m in the vegetable garden, or setting herself down in a sunny spot not far from where I’m weeding. Because of this, I’ve never felt particularly alone out here, even when it’s been just me. And in the evenings, god knows she’d exasperate me by always trying to jump on my lap if I ever sat still for long enough. I’d be wanting to get up and do something and there she’d be. Purring away. Settled.
For the past week or so, she’d gotten back into the habit of sleeping pressed up against the backs of my legs at night. Being a night owl, I’m always the last to muck around and ready myself for bed. I’d turn off all the lights and see Molly, seemingly sound asleep on a dining chair, or on the sofa, or in front of the wood burner when it was cold. But the minute I’d settle into bed with a book, I’d hear a gruff “miaow”, and again, there she’d be. Ready to sleep on whatever item of clothing I’d left on the floor, or to settle herself down beside me. When I couldn’t sleep at night, I’d hear either her loud purr or the sound of her continually cleaning herself. It didn’t help.
And now she’s gone. She was alive at 7.45 am on Tuesday morning when we bundled her into her cat carrier and drove to the vet in Helensville. By 9.00 am she was dead. I didn’t expect it and I wasn’t prepared for it.
Goodbye Molly. If I’d only known, I’d have made such a fuss of you these past few weeks.
Queen Street Wharf, Auckland, by Daniel Manders Beere, 29 February 1864. (Alexander Turnbull Library, 1/2-096102-G)
Newell Gascoyne
One of the family stories I’d heard, was that my great-great-great-grandfather, Newell Gascoyne, had been murdered. This seemed a somewhat significant way to die, so when I first moved to Auckland in 2006, I decided to fill in time by checking out some early newspapers. I took myself off to the Auckland Public Library to peruse their archives. Surely there’d be something written somewhere?
It was remarkably easy, I’m sure helped by the fact that he had an uncommon name.
The report transcribed below was published on page 5 of The New Zealand Herald of Saturday 16th April, 1864. It provides a somewhat different version of events. A less memorable version, but no less devastating for his wife Isabella and their 3 children. My great-great-grandmother, also named Isabella, was 16 and newly-married; her younger brothers, Newell and Daniel, would have been 14 and 11 respectively.
Coroner’s Inquest
An inquest was held yesterday, at the Clanricarde Hotel, on the body of Newell Gascoigne, who died on the 13th inst., through injuries received by falling down a cellar, in Queen-street, on the 7th inst., while in a state of intoxication.
Frederick Sims, stated: I keep the Wheat-sheaf Inn, Queen-street. I knew deceased, who came to my house about 9 o’clock, a.m., on the 7th inst., and asked for some grog, which I refused to give him, and put him outside the door. Some one coming in soon after, I heard there was a man in the cellar, and went to the door. I saw some policemen and others engaged in lifting the deceased out of the cellar of Mr. Kemp’s house, next door to mine. Deceased appeared then only dead drunk, and made no noise. Deceased was then taken away in a truck. The depth of the cellar is about four feet, and the floor is covered with bran. There was nothing in the cellar that deceased could have struck against.
James Jackson, police constable, said, that on Thursday, the 7th inst., he heard there was a man hurt, and went and found deceased lying on his back on the pathway, outside the cellar of Mr. Kemp’s house, in Queen-street. The man was insensibly drunk. I got a truck, with two other policemen, and removed him to the lock-up. He did not appear in any pain, and I did not think there was anything wrong except being drunk.
Francis Jones, stated: I am a carter. I was employed by Mr. Kemp, carting some bran from his cellar, the day before the accident, and I came early on the morning of the 7th inst., to get another load. I had put one bag into the cart, and coming back for another, I saw a man in the cellar, who must have fallen in. He was lying on his back just below the grating. On getting him out of the cellar, he appeared drunk, but I could not see that he was hurt. The cellar was between three and four feet deep.
Thomas B. Kenderdine, stated: I am a legally qualified medical practitioner. I was called in to see the deceased on Friday, the 8th inst. He was in his own house. I found him in bed, lying on his back, with the lower half of his body paralysed. He complained of a great pain in his back. He was sensible and able to speak and swallow. He lived until the 13th inst. I consider the cause of death to have been injury to the spinal marrow, producing paralysis. I did not make a post mortem examination.
The Sergeant-Major of the Police stated he had given up the deceased to his wife on the night of the 7th inst., about 9 o’clock. He was then sober, and complained of pain in his back, and being unable to get up. He was taken to his house on a stretcher.
The jury, having consulted, returned a verdict – That deceased died from the effects of a fall received while in a state of intoxication.
Nothing is as new as something that’s been long forgotten (German Proverb)
Stories from the past are interesting. Especially when they’re about our own families. But the problem is that so little is passed down. You are handed the bare bones without the flesh. Even the Coroner’s Report leaves me with more questions than answers. The records are merely black print on faded paper; they don’t fill in the details I’m curious about.
I have a copy of Newell Gascoyne’s Death Certificate. It succinctly states: Newell Gascoygne, Mariner, Male 35, Paralysis caused by injury of the spine. 13 April 1864, Auckland.
Did he stumble and fall into the cellar? Is that what his family believed? Or did they suspect he’d been the victim of foul play, hence the story about being ‘murdered’? Or was it that they were ashamed that he’d been ‘insensibly drunk’ at 9.00 o’clock in the morning, and subsequently passed on a different version to their children?
The past holds its secrets close to its chest.
View of Auckland 1864, ‘Sir George Grey Special Collections’ Auckland Libraries, 5-2624
Family Tree
Newell Gascoyne (c.1829-1864) & Isabella Barr (c.1825-1880)
↓
Isabella Gascoyne (1847-1916) & Antonio Jose de Freitas (1843-c.1898) (Married: 7 January 1864, St Patrick’s Catholic Church, Auckland)
↓
John Antonio de Freitas (1872-1937) & Jane Eliza Manderson (1880-1949)
↓
William Peter Joseph (1900-1969) & Nina Geary (1895-1972)
↓
My Mum
↓ Me
Additional Information
In the old records, Gascoyne is variously spelled Gascon, Gasgoine, Gascoigne, Gascoyne and Gaskong. Newell Gascoyne’s occupation is first noted as mariner, and later as sawyer. They also show that his children Isabella, Newell and Daniel were all born in Auckland, and that when younger Isabella applied to get married in January 1864, she was resident at Mills Lane, Auckland (and had lived there for 4 years).
The Mills Lane address is also supported by a report in The New Zealander, Vol. XIX, Issue 1879, where in a report about ‘A Determined Thief’, Isabella (senior) is referred to as the ‘wife of Newell Gascoigne, Mill’s Lane’. She was giving evidence about the movements of a Thomas Hill, who had been ‘lodging for two weeks at her house’. (27 May 1863)
Molly’s curled up by the fire. A rounded hummock not unlike the curved mound of a hill, although grey and white, not green. The kind of hill that catches the eye while driving past. Something about the shape so pleasing that you have to look back.
Oh Molly! You’re growing old and I wonder that you still look the same. Or almost. No tail of course. That fluffy appendage dislocated from your body (we think) by a dog, eighteen months ago. The nub of your spine still twitches when I pat you.
Your life has run alongside mine for so many years. Through relationship changes, children turning to adults, and the rotation of the seasons. From the bracing frosts of Dunedin, to the humid summers up here on The Kaipara.
We began our journey in Mornington and ended up at South Head, with brief stints in Birkenhead and Titirangi. From hilltop to suburbia, from dense kauri to verdant farmland. We’ve negotiated roosters and toddlers (each has its challenges), and been together ‘through thick and thin’, as the saying goes.
I know that you’ll be my last moggy… we both love the birds around here too much and actually, I don’t think you’re replaceable. But for now, I like the way you curl up close to me each night, and talk to me with gruff miaows.
Outside, the lawn is mottled with smashed leaves
from the cottonwood.
Flax pods heavy with rain thud against each other.
A tui clings for dear life, and is whisked away.
The Northeasterly is not kind to my garden.
Branches snap, flowers shred,
hens scatter.
It passes through the mosquito mesh.
Invisible fingers lift the tapa cloth off the wall
then let if fall.
I’m reminded of Nalauaki.
Torrential rain is its companion.
Waves break against the stainless steel flue.
A million tiny coral flecks rattling with shells.
It’s been so long since it’s been windy.
I’d almost forgotten.
The maize along the fenceline is ready for harvest. It’s a visual reminder that summer is over. The days are slow to lighten and early to darken, and the grass is thick with dew when I make my way to the barn in the early morning. The gravel road is dry and whenever a large truck rattles by, great dusty clouds drift across to settle on our solar panels.
It’s been several weeks since I’ve written about South Head. Or about anything, for that matter. It’s been difficult to knuckle down to writing after taking time off over the Christmas/New Year period.
While it’s been a very long and hot summer, we’ve also had a decent amount of rain, which of course has meant that everything has just kept on growing. We’ve created enough gardens here to keep us busy every daytime hour, and for the first time I’ve been wondering if it’s too much. What with the dead-heading, the trimming, the watering, the sowing, the harvesting… not to mention the tying, the squashing (caterpillars), the sampling, the digging and the weeding, always the weeding. (It’s making me exhausted all over again, writing about it.)
Kumeu A & P Show: curious alpaca & disinterested rooster
So… we’ve mostly been home over the weekends slaving away in an attempt to keep everything under control, with a couple of diversionary breaks visiting the local A & P Shows – I like to check out the poultry while Ben looks longingly at the tractors. 🙂
Bounty from the Garden
A selection of home preserves, from left to right: Beetroot; ‘Look Alike’ Lemon Curd; Spicy Tomato Sauce; Zucchini Pickle; Greek Tomato Paste
Since I last blogged we’ve harvested a parade of fresh produce, including grapes, lettuces, carrots, rhubarb, cannellino beans, sweet basil, garlic, cucumbers, peas, beans (green, yellow, purple), main crop potatoes (Agria), beetroot, silver beet, shallots, buttercup squash, tomatoes, butternut pumpkins and LOTS of of zucchini.
A selection of produce, from left to right: white table grapes; cannellino beans; Rhubarb Tarte Tartin
To use up the rhubarb and zucchini I’ve made several Rhubarb Tarte Tartin and a few jars of Lemon Curd Look-Alike, as well as some zucchini pickle. But the neat thing about this year is that we haven’t had too much of one particular vegetable. Everything we’ve grown we’ve either eaten fresh, or I’ve cooked up, preserved, frozen or baked into something.
Tomatoes and Zucchinis
Left to right: tomatoes & onions ready to be cooked for Tomato Relish; red and yellow habanero slices, arranged for drying
The tomatoes have been great, but I picked the last one yesterday and I know I’ll miss having them on hand at meal times. I’m glad that I preserved a good amount this season (Spicy Tomato Sauce, Tomato Relish, Greek Tomato Paste) and that I also froze about a dozen packs of frozen skinless tomato flesh for use during the cooler months.
Recipes
One of the easiest salads to throw together involves mixing chopped tomatoes with a handful of fresh basil (made into a paste), a generous squirt of extra virgin olive oil and finely sliced or diced zucchini or cucumber. I read somewhere that raw zucchini helps you feel ‘more full’ than some of our other salad vegetables, and it’s lovely and light when sliced thinly.
I love cooked zucchini, too. It’s such a versatile vegetable. My favourite quick recipe involves slicing the zucchinis thickly, then sautéing them in a small amount of olive oil along with crushed garlic and sage leaves. The sage leaves turn crispy and add a delightfully fragrant ‘crunch’ to the dish.
Habanero
3 stages of habanero peppers – fresh to dry
Our habanero chiles are ripening as I type, so I’m picking them each day, drying them, then nuking them in a small food processor. We’ll use the chile powder all through the year to jazz up our meals. One of my favourite uses is to sprinkle a liberal amount into cheese toasted sandwiches. Yum!! (It’s very hot, though – not for the chile uninitiated.)
I’ve also raised a pink variety of habanero this year. It’s currently at the flowering stage, so, no fruit, but I can’t wait to see what they look like!
Pears
Autumn pears & the finished product
March in New Zealand is the month for pears and melons. Our old pear tree has produced a good amount of sound fruit this year and yesterday I bottled a small sample in a light syrup. Not sure why I haven’t processed our pears this way before – I usually freeze them for desserts – but I do like to see the finished product in our pantry. And it’s so easy to preserve them using the water-bath method.
I didn’t remember until after I’d finished that you’re supposed to pack the fruit tightly into the jars to avoid having them float to the top of the syrup… oh well… next time!
Melons
Melon, ‘Collective Farm Woman’ (Cucumis melo)
I sowed seeds for a different melon this year,Collective Farm Woman. It’s a small Ukrainian melon from the Black Sea area, about the size of a honeydew, with pale flesh, the flavour delicately sweet and slightly evocative of bananas.
Bantams!
Our new bantam hens (left) and Charlie
We picked up a trio of Bantams at the recent Helensville A & P Show. They’ve settled in well and having Charlie (the rooster) crow loudly at 5.15 am hasn’t been too much of a shock.
When we first let the bantams join the rest of the flock, they kept to themselves, but they’re now walking around alongside the others. They choose to sleep outside – the rooster up high in a branch of one of the feijoa trees, and the two girls on the fence below. Not sure if they’ll ever voluntarily join the hens in the barn. Perhaps we’ll have to manually move them there in Winter when it gets cold at night.
That reminds me… feijoas! They’re growing plump on the trees. And just now I can see two fat kereru perched up on the yellow guava, eating the first of the golden yellow fruit. The kereru started visiting again a couple of weeks back – I guess our garden is part of their seasonal food cycle, too.
This time of year I have more basil than I know what to do with. And who doesn’t love pesto? This time I decided to make a batch that could also be consumed by the vegans in our family.
Vegan Basil Pesto
Makes approximately 300 grams
109 Calories per tablespoon (15 grams)
I substituted miso paste for the traditional Parmesan cheese. You can use either red or white miso, whichever is your preference. If you like your pesto saltier, add a little more miso to taste.
Throw everything except for the olive oil into a food processor and blend thoroughly. Then with the machine still running, gradually add the olive oil until the required consistency is reached.
If you like your basil chunkier, I’d suggest making it the conventional way, using a pestle and mortar.
Pesto can be kept in the fridge for several weeks. Spoon it into a decent-sized jar and pour on a thin film of olive oil. This will prevent the top discolouring – you can just stir it in each time you use it. It’s pretty yummy though… can’t see my batch lasting long.
You can also freeze small portions of pesto in an ice-cube tray then keep free-flow in your freezer for those winter months when you don’t have the luxury of fresh basil in your garden. It’s great with pasta, or as an addition to just about anything. 🙂
We have so many macadamia nuts that we forget to use them. I’ve been meaning to experiment with making Macadamia Nut Cream for some time – not just for the vegans in the family but also as an alternative to dairy creams. Up until now I kept forgetting about it! (This is very typical of me… bright ideas, best intentions, etc…)
Last night we duly cracked some of our nuts and ended up with about 1 3/4 cups (230 grams) which I soaked overnight in cold water.
I had previously looked up a couple of recipes. The first I decided to adapt is for a regular nut cream, using cashews. Cashews, either alone or combined with almonds, appear to be the most commonly used nuts for nut creams and I can imagine why – they are so creamy and have such a lovely flavour. I’m not sure if our macadamia nuts will be ‘flavoursome’ enough.
The second recipe I’ll try is a recipe for Macadamia Nut Cream Topping. This combines macadamia nuts and coconut milk (among other things). But just now, I’ve tried the first recipe.
For Experiment #1 I replaced the cashews with macadamia nuts.
Ingredients
1 3/4 cups raw macadamia nuts, soaked overnight in water
200 mls water
2 tablespoons real maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon natural vanilla extract
a pinch of sea salt
Process
I nuked all the ingredients in one of our blenders until it was smooth, keeping an eye on the amount of water to add. It was that easy!
The Finished Product
Vanilla Macadamia Cream – the finished product
We’re pretty pleased with the result. The macadamia nut cream has a different texture from dairy cream – you can tell it’s nuts, I guess. It’s noticeably whiter and the taste is creamy and slightly sweet, not overly vanilla or maple syrup. Ben reckons it will taste great on French Toast. And it would be an excellent topping for a sweet pie or shortcake. I could easily eat it like ice-cream.
Calories
This yummy nut cream does come at a price, however.
One tablespoon (approximately 10 grams) equals 42 calories.
A dollop of yummy macadamia nut cream on a dessert spoon.
I’ll post about the second recipe, once we’ve finished this lot! It will be interesting to compare this adapted recipe with one written specifically for macadamia nuts.
The usual nesting choices. Top left: The new nest in the kindling pile (preferred by Honey, and the older hens, i.e., Lottie, Lulu or Leila); Top right: Pompom’s choice is under the edge of the barbecue cover; Bottom left: Francesca, Pearl (in situ) and Hannah use the nesting boxes in the hen house. Bottom Right: Fatima always lays in a nest box in the barn.
As much as I love our hens dearly, sometimes they can be very annoying. This particular tale concerns a couple of our ‘saved’ hens, Honey and Perky.
Honey
Our saved hen, Honey.
In mid-September, Honey went missing for almost a week. Then on two mornings in a row, Ben spotted her eating pellets in the barn with the other hens – as if she’d never been away. Then she’d disappear again.
After some sleuth work (which involved spying and following), we found her in a grassy hollow in the back paddock, sitting on a mountain of warm eggs. She’d been sneaking back to eat at intervals, then returning to the (impossible) task of waiting for the eggs to hatch.
She was well into broody mode, so we had to remove all the eggs and separate her into the back hen enclosure for a few days. When we tested the eggs using the ‘does it float or not?’ test, they all looked a bit borderline so we disposed of them. (Ben later remarked that they didn’t look good when he broke them, so I’m glad I wasn’t involved with that process.)
Honey has stayed around since then, and has built a new nest in amongst the pile of dry kindling in the barn. And for a time, Perky, and our older hens started laying there as well. So there were generally 3 or 4 eggs in that particular nest when I’d check them each day.
Hens don’t usually lay an egg on every day of the week, so when the number of eggs in that nest dropped down to 2 or 3 on most days, I didn’t think too much of it.
Perky
Our saved hen, Perky.
Yesterday, I was deliberating on the fact that our total daily egg tally still looked a little low. I’d still have expected to see 4 eggs in that nest every so often. And we remembered that the week before last, we’d had to rescue Perky when she got herself stranded between two fences along the edge of the back paddock. (I still have no idea how she got there. It was raining and she was as wet as a shag.)
Missing eggs + Perky behaving suspiciously in the back paddock = one conclusion.
Testing the Theory
Last night, Ben shut the gate to the hen enclosure and let the girls out early this morning so that he could see if any of them ran off somewhere.
Believe it or not, there are 19 eggs in this pile!
Sure enough, Perky headed out (the long way) to the back paddock and settled herself down amongst the long grass. Ben found one egg all by itself nearby and left her there to finish laying. When he went back an hour or so later, he found a nest with an additional 19 eggs! Not again! So he brought all the eggs inside and left a fake egg in their place.
At least we know to look there now, and at least Perky hasn’t shown any signs of broodiness. It seems she’s been content to lay an egg on that huge pile, then join her sisters for the rest of the day.
Eggs in a bucket.
I’m going to check the 20 eggs for freshness, and I may end up discarding a few of them, just to be on the safe side. And if I do… well, that will be the annoying part. The waste of all those beautiful big eggs.
Molly is generally oblivious to the goings-on of the hens.
Three days of rain have drenched the land
forming rippling mirrors in the grass
and a flock of dishevelled, wet hens.
A river of caramel water
runs at the edge of the gravel road
then ducks beneath the concrete pipe
at the end of our driveway.
Bright green leaves are freshly washed.
A song thrush calls from high up in the silver poplar
and Molly is perched on a chunk of concrete,
keeping her paws dry.
This morning I stomped around in my gumboots
hoping to capture memories of the water
but the thirsty earth had already swallowed
most of them.
The land at South Head imitates a sponge.
Formed from ancient dunes
it doesn’t allow water to rest here for long.
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