There is so much I could say about this famous children's author. She has a list of publications - and a list of awards - longer than my arm. She has an inspirational life history. She has given generously of her time to children in schools over so many years. She is intelligent, forthright, imaginative, creative, unconventional...
relation to celebrity. I don't see Margaret very often but over the last seven years we have exchanged occasional greetings and passing comment, usually about her dogs (Baxter and latterly Honey), either on Merlincote Crescent or along the foreshore track. My thought has always been - this (famous) person doesn't want to have to pass the time of day with yet another member of the public. She doesn't want to have people (me) fawning on her. And she certainly wouldn't recognise me from previous brief encounters. These are entirely my thoughts. Nothing that Margaret has said or done has indicated any such reaction. Yet my hesitancy, my unwillingness to 'impose' means that I have never introduced myself, never acknowledged that I am perfectly well aware of who she is... There is an elephant in the corner of our conversational room; one entirely of my making.
Yesterday we met again, Margaret making heavy work of coming up the hill from the jetty with Honey, me with a handful of pilfered greens for the chooks, returning from feeding Rosie. I told her that the albino blackbird we had seen some months back on the foreshore track (of whose future we had been doubtful) was still there and holding its own. We parted, both pleased about the whitebird's survival. Maybe that is enough.
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