When Nana wouldn't kiss it better.

When I was about seven or eight years old, my stepfather moved our family to the small country town of Kaeo (KY-oh), on the North Island of New Zealand. He was, at that time, earning a living as a farm manager; movement and upheaval were regular visitors.

One of the better aspects of this constant re-location was there was always a new "land" to be discovered. A lot of my free time was spent exploring, discovering which trees were best for climbing, finding the best blackberry patches, getting to know the new farm animals, and scouting out a good hiding place.

Kaeo had something extra which stirred a little boy's imagination no end; on the other side of the dirt road that ran past the front of the farm house was a river. This river was prone to flooding during the Winter and, because of this, the house was built on stilts a good three metres off the ground. I remember waking up on at least two occasions, looking out my bedroom window and seeing the land under water. The house was surrounded by a wide verandah and to reach that from the ground, we had to climb a set of wide wooden steps which at times, could be pretty slippery.

One Summer, my grandmother (my mother's mother) was visiting us. She and my mother were sitting on the verandah at one end of the house. I was sitting at the top of the steps with my crayons and colouring book, studiously trying to keep inside the lines. I dropped one of my crayons and it landed on the next step down. I got up to retrieve it, lost my footing, and ended up bouncing all the way to the bottom of the steps on my bum.

Naturally, this was quite painful, not to mention an affront to my dignity, so, bawling my eyes out, I climbed back up and went looking for my mother. I found her sitting with Nana and told them what had happened.

Nana then carried out her duty for which all grandmothers are pre-ordained; she held out her arms and said, "There, there. Let me kiss it better." At which I promptly turned around, pulled down my pants and bent over.

Understandably, Nana qualified her offer rather rapidly by saying she meant my head. I acceded to her request and accepted the kiss, but I have to say I was greatly confused. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how a kiss on my head was going to make my sore bum better.

It just didn't make sense.