In the last week, I started going out again during the day.

Christmas, and the week between that and New Year, was quiet and I didn’t feel like leaving home at all. I preferred to be holed up at home and spending long hours on the couch reading.

I became a hermit reading lots of books and writing in my journal, cleaning the house and watching the birds in the garden. It was quite relaxing.

My mum talked to me about wanting to go for beach or country walks so I thought it was a good idea to get off my backside, put the book down and go for a short drive with her.

We headed one day last week to Elwood Beach and to get out of the wind, we stopped by at the Elwood Kiosk for a cup of coffee.

This never happens. Usually any food or drink is brought along with us or we hold off until we get home. (Amusingly my parents believe that there’s no need to give any money to anyone anywhere when there’s plenty of food and drink at home. 🤣)

Nevertheless, we sat down and enjoyed a cappuccino delighted with the barista’s cafe art with the milk foam. This week again, I took her to Rickett’s Point in Beaumaris which is a marine sanctuary and there’s a trail along the beach that you can walk and stop to admire the views or just paddle in the water. That morning, being a week day, there were some people walking their dogs and it was a pleasant cool morning.

Afterwards once again she offered to buy us a cup of coffee at the only cafe on the beach.

“Mum, you’re making this into a habit!” I exclaimed.

She laughed. I think she enjoys going out locally and the simple pleasure of a cup of coffee and a bit of cake.

I do too.

I guess this is now something we can do together this year.

Meanwhile my brother, on the other side of the city, has been dabbling with Artificial Intelligence improving old photos of our childhood and recreating grainy photos into startlingly crisp coloured photographs and videos that astounds me every time he sends a new one to me as a message on my phone.

The photo above was taken in 1975 during his 3rd birthday.

I remember the day. My mum with her long flowing hair, wipes the table.

I remember I couldn’t wait to eat cake (given I was a large kid who loved her cake) and for mum to wipe that table so that we could start with singing Happy Birthday.

We were at my cousin’s (in blue) place seen in the photo too and still remember that table and that bench seat which we always used to push back into place as our feet underneath us dragged it out of place as we leaned on the table and banged our feet against the seat.

My brother animated the photo and I had to watch it many times to see how I felt about it.

Surprisingly it didn’t make much of a reaction on me. I reacted more to the crisp clear photo above but not the video.

Why?

Because in the video my mum sits down.That didn’t happen.

There was never any chair on that side of the table to begin with. She was standing up and wiping the table of crumbs. Besides, if anyone knows Greek mums, they’d know they never sit down at the table! They’d be fussing around the family, cleaning, wiping, directing, telling people to do this or that….never sitting down at the table with their young children. Not in 1975. 🤣

Like this 👇even Sooshi Mango guys got right what AI didn’t.

So AI failed on that front. 🤣

In some way though, I was hoping it would give me something else. Something real. Something that would have triggered the memory of the actual day.

Maybe AI could have shown her going to the sink to wash the cloth, us kids yelling “Hurry up mum!” Or starting to sing Happy Birthday too soon and one of the parents telling us to start again; or one of the kids sticking their hand into the cake and licking their fingers; or the cameraman (who was behind the camera?!) yelling at us to not lick the cream or get a slap…..stuff like what really would have happened.

Still, it made me think back to that time and place and a lot of things came back to me about that room. I remember a lot about my cousins house because I spent so much time there.

So now, I have more photos from my past that have been recreated.

I didn’t show these to my mum during our coffee catchup. For some reason, I didn’t feel it was up to me. My brother can do this as it’s his project.

Besides, the past is the past. At times, I think it’s not even me or my mum or my brother or my cousin. It’s a whole lifetime ago.

What good does bringing up the past do? It is what it is. That was my childhood. I’m now living in the present also with the same feelings about the future.

I guess it’s up to us to just be in the now – and enjoy each moment.