Steve

I re-potted my 4 maidenhair ferns. I haven't repotted them for a few years. They were really due to be repotted.

They, well, it used to belong to my mate Stevie, he had a plant that used to sit on his kitchen table. It didn't do so well, as maidenhair ferns often don't, so he gave it to me to revive/look after. I have the maidenhair green fingers so it has thrived and in the ensuing years I have divided it up 4 times. 

They make me think of Steve when I think of them.

When Stevie was 18 years old, he was getting ready to go out one Saturday night. He had the news on as he was getting dressed. He was snatching glimpses of the news as he got ready, most likely, if I knew Stevie well, for football results, Stevie was a big AFL fan.

The news came back from an ad break reporting on a car accident in the country, where a car had been hit by a train, some where near Geelong, if I remember rightly. Stevie turned to walk away from the TV to continue getting dressed, but as he headed out of the lounge room, he caught sight of the number plate in his peripheral vision which the TV channel had not pixelated. 

The number plate was of his parent's car. He came back into the lounge room to hear there were two occupants of the car, neither of them had survived.

Stevie had 3 much younger brothers. Steve effectively put his life on hold and he took on looking after his brothers, raising them and putting them through school for the next 10 years, or so. He worked and singled-handedly paid for the brothers expenses, he paid the mortgage, he raised those 3 boys until they were adults.

"I didn't want us to be split up, so I did what I did," said Steve.

I think it was something like 15 years later, his brothers were adults and had jobs and were grown up, Stevie said to them that he was going to sell the family home, which was out in the outer suburbs, a house Stevie had single-handedly paid for, and he was going to move to the inner suburbs, buy himself a house and he was going to restart his own life.

Well, I think 2 of the brothers, with the 3rd brother staying neutral, but effectively siding with the other 2 with his silence, wanted the house divided up into 4 with each of them getting an equal share. They hired lawyers who made it clear to Stevie that they were serious.

Steve was so incensed by his brother's actions that he packed up his stuff and left, saying to them, "It's all yours. And fuck you."

Steve found a lovely partner. He got a job doing something he loved, running a gym, as he was a national sports champion as a teenager, did I mention that he gave that up to look after his brothers.

In his new life, he got to party, he got to have fun, he got to live the life he'd missed out on for all those years.

He really was living his best life.

A few years into his new life, he'd been visiting a friend on the south side of Melbourne. Some time after midnight he got on his bike to ride home, quite pissed. He was riding over, or had just ridden over, one of the bridges that crossed the Monash Freeway and he couldn't remember what happened, but he woke up the next morning on the side of the road blood all over his head. He didn't know if he was hit by a car, of if he just fell from his bike.

Steve was a great guy, he was so funny, he was smart, he was one of the most delightful guys you would ever meet.

For the next few years after the accident on the bike, Steve suffered from worse and worse bouts of depression. He saw doctors who said he'd suffered brain damage from the fall from his bike that night.

Life became more and more difficult for him, until, I think it was October 13th he disappeared. His boy friend was distraught. October 15th, Steve's boy friend was going out, and as he was getting ready to leave, he saw there was some sort of commotion happening out the back of their place, where there was a creek and a kind of park land. There were police, and an ambulance. As his boyfriend left the house, he ran into a neighbour who told him someone had hanged themselves down by the creek.

Steve's funeral was packed, it was literally standing room only. People from every phase of Steve's life attended. The sports guy came and talked, saying Steve was one of the best and that he turned down an Olympic position (to look after his brothers). The things Steve had done, were amazing, and the people who spoke, spoke of someone they loved and adored.

I remember, at the end of the funeral, as we walked out, one of 'the girls' who Steve had worked with turned to me and said, "It was a life that we all could only dream of having."

The maidenhair ferns were now divided into four pots. All the pots were different, not sure why I did that? I repotted them into four matching pots this time, and they form a hedge of maidenhair out by my back door. 

I run my hands through them often and think of Steve, one of the funniest and nicest guys you were ever likely to meet.