Judy Tihany 2002

On the rainy Monday 4 Feb I was visiting Mollymook (a small coastal town in New South Wales, 4 hours south of Sydney). After driving around for a while, I placed this in the letterbox of somebody who had a sign out the front of their house which said ‘Hypnotherapy and Tarot Readings’:

from THE MARZIPAN PIG

The upstairs mouse at No. 6 had watched the hibiscus plant in the front bedroom for a long time.

She had seen the showy flowers one after another bloom and shrivel and fall to the floor.

She used to sit behind the skirting board thinking how she would go about it if she were a hibiscus flower.

Sometimes when there was no one in the bedroom she would run out onto the carpet and strike hibiscus poses in front of the full-length glass.

‘Poor silly things,’ she used to say to herself. ‘They’re pretty enough but they have no grasp. One after another they make the same mistake: they let go. The thing to do is, once you've bloomed, hold on.

Just simply hold on and don’t let go.’

With happiness to have been able to participate in this strange and lovely event, and the best of wishes to Russ,

Judy Tihany