Long-time readers will by now be well acquainted with the rather strained relationship I have with the city of Adelaide. New readers can catch up here. And non-readers can go and… yeah I really don’t know where I was going with that.

It’s full of my father’s side of the extended family, and more recently my own immediate family and I love them all dearly. But the city itself, its culture and its attitude really rub me the wrong way. So every time I go there, which is usually once about every eighteen months or so depending on what family occasions are coming up, I always come away with some experiences which are great, some which are rubbish, and some which are just plain weird.

My most recent trip was no exception. Ostensibly I was there to help prepare for and celebrate my sister’s wedding, which would have been a surreal enough experience on its own. However, just a week before the wedding my grandmother passed away after a long battle with … just about everything. It was a release for her and a sad relief for everyone else, but not really on anyone’s list of top ten wedding preparations.

So there we were, in a house full of aunties attempting to facilitate both joy and grief in the same week. In Adelaide. This is the story of one man’s journey through the strangest week in other people’s lives.

Garry with 2 Rs

P.S. As an extra nugget of CTC trivia, this is my 200th Far From Home/Cum Tacent Clament post. It seems somehow appropriate that I have spent it whinging about Adelaide. Make of that what you will.

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