PAMELA BRADLEY

‘The train rolls slowly into the platform, and there he is – the man who for over four decades I have thought of as tough and critical, a man who could impale me with a few carefully chosen words. As I alight and walk towards him, I wonder what the hell the next few days will bring’.

 

When I stepped off the train in Murwillumbah to visit my father, who at seventy-eight had chosen to live a solitary life Up North far from his family and friends after the death of my mother, I had no idea that I was at the beginning of an intensely emotional journey. Faced with his slow decline, and the agonising decision of finding a suitable nursing home for him Down South, I set out to delve into his past to find those influences that might have shaped his character and helped to define my own, discovering much along the way that came as a complete surprise. Faced with putting aside old hurts, and addressing some of the vital issues about ageing, death and loss that affect every one of us eventually, I began to see my father through completely different lenses.

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Review of Maybe I’ll be Cleverer Tomorrow

by Ali Whitelock, author of the memoir Poking Seaweed With a Stick and Running Away From the Smell and the highly-praised anthologies of poetry: And my heart crumples like a coke can and The lactic acid in the calves of your despair.

 

While reading Pamela Bradley’s latest memoir, I was reminded of the poet, Sharon Olds known for the ordinariness of her subject matter and yet her writing of these subjects renders them extraordinary. And so it is with this book; the story of a father and daughter told with insight, hilarity and tenderness. There are so many intensely emotional moments within it, conveyed with the most delicate of brush strokes, that I was often moved to tears. These moments have embedded themselves in discreet alcoves of my heart. I doubt they will ever disappear.

 

Pamela’s reflection on her relationship with her dad, told in her distinctive voice, made me reflect on the recent death of my own father, the agonising journey we take as adult children treading the final days of a parent’s life, and how we find ourselves examining our past, seeking answers to questions such as: How did we become who we are? How much of our parents’ beliefs and values did we take on? And how much of what we appear to be is our pure authentic self? Pamela’ story is my story. It is all our stories.

 

Maybe I’ll Be Cleverer Tomorrow reflects her dry wit, her intellect, her insatiable need to question, and what one of her friends described as her ‘withering’ honesty. To my mind such honesty is refreshing for without it we would not have gone on this rich, often hilarious and heartbreaking journey told with a depth of insight that can only be gained by reaching into the darkest recesses of our souls.

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