Mark Roberts #24 Slide 23 Meeting Carol for Lunch. Lithgow Circa 1984

for Carol on her birthday

As a child if we came up the highway

we mostly drove through Blackheath

on the way to Orange.  The mountains

were something to get over and we tried

not to stop until Lithgow.

But now priorities were different 

and I was spending a week away 

with friends in the decaying mountain home

of an early Australian communist journalist.

But it was cold, colder than expected

and on the second day I was instructed

to bring back more brandy when I walked Gina

down to the train. We could of driven but we

both wanted to climb down the track

at the back of the house to the Govetts Leap

track and followed it back to town. The clouds

rolled in as we walked, dark and thick - snow

clouds. In the end Gina had to run to catch

her train and I walked across the pub

and bought red wine and brandy. It was getting

dark early as I walked down Hat Hill Road

and the first snowflakes started falling

a mile from the house. By the time I arrived

I was a third through the first bottle of brandy.

That night the snow fell and I woke to a semi

circle of snow stretching out from the fireplace.

Outside the window everything was white.

Chris tried to walk to the wood pile and sunk

to her knees. She came back in and tied two

old tennis rackets to her feet and returned

with arms full of wood. We toasted her with

brandy. The police called us to check we were

ok, they were checking all the houses outside

of town. We told them we had enough alcohol

to last three days. We played table tennis, read,

ate and drank. I phoned Carol in Lithgow to arrange

a time to visit. We agreed to wait until the snow

started to melt. On Saturday morning I shovelled

the soggy grey mass from around my car and managed 

to get it started. Once I got to the road it was easy and I

parked across the train line. I called Carol from

a phone booth and then waited for the train. A teacher’s

day off we had arranged to meet for lunch. An old silver 

train and Lithgow was the end of the line. Snow still

lay deep each side of the line as we dropped from 

the mountain. As the train slowed before the station I saw
a line of small melting snowpeople lining the  track.

Carol was waiting at the station wrapped

in a woollen scarf. I hadn't seen her in years.