Reader's Digest

14 | July• 2018

One Mother

to Another

Emptyroomsareevenmorekeenly

felt when a phone goes missing

STRESS LEVELS WERE RIDING HIGHin our house during

the last week of January this year. But above all a sadness

enveloped the empty rooms of our farm house west of

Goondiwindi Queensland and I physically ached to

have my daughters in its fold again. But our hand was

forced by the distance of this vast land as four days

earlier we had left our two eldest girls Georgie 13 and

Annabel 11 at a boarding school over 500 kilometres

away. hank goodness we still had our youngest nine-

year-old Lily at home for a couple more years.

ItwasAustraliaDayandwehadspenttheafternoon

celebratingwithfriends.Whenwearrivedhome

themessagebankonmymobilephonewaslashing.

Annabel’sconcernedvoicegreetedus:“HiMumand

Dadyou’llneverguesswhat–I’velostmyphone!”

Afterjustfourdaysatschoolhermainmeansof

communicationbetweenus–avery‘old’phone–had

been lost ‘while doing cartwheels’ at an Australia Day

KINDNESS OF STRANGERS

Emma Montgomery

lives ive hours

south-west of

Brisbane on the

family beef and

grain property.

Originally from

Somerset England

she met her

husbandBillinthe

UKandmadeher

waytothe‘land

of plenty’ for an

adventure.

EMMA MONTGOMERY

ILLUSTRATION: GETTY IMAGES