Old School Ties

I may as well write to you, my other scheme is not working. I love to nap on Saturday evenings after my fill of fish and wine at the View. Sometimes I drift in and out of sleep for two to three hours before waking properly from dreams sponsored by ABC Classical FM, well after the sun has set. Perhaps the air-cond was on too high this afternoon, anyway here I am able to compose and it's not yet 6:15.

I received a call on Wednesday morning from John McMillan who claimed to have gone to school with me and was organising a class reunion. I couldn't place him till eventually the penny dropped that he was talking about Marist Bros. Lismore not St. Pats Strathfield as I had thought. My interest was piqued even more when he confessed that he was a relative not so distant and in contact with Mary Boyle. At this point in our conversation I had no less than three potential Bunnings customers trying to catch my eye, ear or toe if that's what it took to get attention and I had to postpone our interesting conversation, begging his pardon and asking for an email with pertinent details.

With no further word or email by Thursday night my curiosity overcame me enough to retrieved his number from my clever phone and call him. During this conversation it evolved that his career had been in school teaching and he was now retired on the central coast. He inquired as to where I worked and asked which Bunnings. When I replied Mascot, centre of the universe, he exclaimed, without the experlitives I would probably have accompanied such an exclamation with, that he was one of our classic customers and had been in not less than three times that month repairing his Coogee dwelling daughters fly screens and cabinet catches. "I'll be down tomorrow" he exclaimed, "I'll drop by".

I remembered the old school photo mum had graciously saved for me and retrieved it from 'my photos', where three to four times its original size it was remarkably clear. I tried to find a face that I could call John McMillan and drew only blanks. Mick Davis and Sore Toe Sonego were obvious. Cerones, Muldoons and Warnes were all there in their ill fitting blazers but none could I see was a McMillan.

At about three the next afternoon in a quiet moment I was discussing with Wolfie, who has a keen interested in photography, the talent of those old professionals and the quality of their film stock when a likely lad inquired of us did we know of Robert O'Keefe. Here then was John McMillan who was no less nonplussed with the Robert O'Keefe he encountered. Of course we had not seen one another for fifty years and that is a great deal longer than our grandfathers or those who came before ever contemplated living. He carried, for authenticity, a class photo, earlier than mine with fifty six classmates, so I refrained from asking for ID. He identified himself therein minus fifty years of depredation and pointed out that he had already been able to identify me just as all those who view it do despite my Kim Jong-Il disguise.

In the ensuing conversation he elaborated on our relationship but left me with little more concrete information other than that his ancestor was Mary Boyle as was my grandmother and the cousin he promised to produce, at the Lord Dudley can you believe, within weeks. So many Mary Boyles.

I couldn't wait to pass this on to Hugh who a family fable had linked to Mary Boyle though in what direction I was never sure. He didn't answer his phone but called back some hours later and told me that he and I would meet with Mary Boyle at the now familiar Kirribilli Club next Sunday where Mary and her husband would reserve a table after mass. Today John McMillan called me to confirm these arrangements and I sensed that he just as I felt gazumped by some greater force

You all recognise me, John McMillan is two to my right with the serious widow's peak in what I expect may have been red hair