Midge

Contents

The North

Back South

Six Months of Salt

The Big Smoke

The North

I was born in the middle of winter in Wondai, Queensland, on the 19th of July, 1952. My mother was born in the nearby town of Kingaroy and had grown up at Memerambi and then Durong. Dad was teaching at Gooroolbah when I was due to be born, so Mum went to Wondai because her sister lived there.

My birth had far reaching effects on my life. My older brother had been born when Mum and Dad were still living on the farm with Mum’s parents. Her married brother and his family also lived on the farm, so all in all, Ross was cossetted in love and showered with attention and similarly, Mum had all the help in the world. I was the first child to be born once she had left home. You will understand this better when I tell you my mother never left home except to go to boarding school in Toowoomba for a very short time.

Mum once told me a few things about my birth. Firstly, she said it was her worst birth and there were several births that night, so the staff was busy. She said she had this wonderful feeling of floating on a cloud and she always wished she could repeat the experience. I’m assuming that feeling stemmed from a drug which had been administered to her. Secondly, it was a freezing night and finally, both my mother and my father occasionally teased me that there had been a mix up of babies in the hospital that night because of the rush and I was really a little Pigeon baby. I don’t know how that family spelled their name, but I always thought of it like that and I liked the idea of belonging to a pigeon. Whenever I felt badly done by at home, I would imagine what it would be like to be living with the Pigeons.

Things didn’t improve. Mum said that I wouldn’t breastfeed and she finally gave up on me. I had bad colic and nearly drove her insane. Apparently, at this time, she was still obsessed with keeping a clean house and generally being a good wife. Of course she also had Ross who was two years old and no support from family.

Dad applied for a transfer and so from Gooroolbah, we moved to Toobanna, in North Queensland, and it was here that Roslyn was born. I took it for granted that any baby born in the Ingham Base Hospital would be Italian so was bitterly disappointed when Roslyn was born without earrings. She was darker than both Ross and I and had brown eyes as opposed to our blue eyes, but she most definitely was not Italian. We all loved Italians. I remember the beautiful old hospital. It was cool, with doors that opened on to big verandahs which in turn looked out on lovely lawns and gardens. I don’t remember Mum’s mother coming up, but she did. It was her first flight on a plane. Like Ross, Roslyn came home to a Nana as well as a Mum and Dad.

Ali and Stella Coppo had a cane farm next to the school and sometimes I played there with their younger daughter, Arlene. They milked a cow or two and as a result had molasses to feed to them. It was stored in a 44 gallon drum down at the bales. I used to scoop up big handfuls and lick every drop off my fingers and go home with the evidence still on my face and clothes until the day Ali scooped out a dead rat.

It was with Ali and Stella and their two daughters, Laura and Arlene, that we first went to the Ingham Show. There was a merry-go-round with horses that swung out almost horizontally, and I was hooked. I don’t remember another thing about the entire night. I wanted to ride a horse. I could see myself already on its back, my head tossed back, eyes laughing, the fresh air filling my lungs and my blonde hair streaming out the back. Mum wouldn’t let me, and to make matters worse, Stella lent her moral support by recounting the story of a little boy who had fallen off. I did not believe her. I knew what she was up to and formed an opinion of her from that moment.

Stella did manage to get back into my good books. Mum gave Ross and me a combined birthday party. She made Ross a rabbit cake. It was white with coconut forming the fur and it had pink eyes. It was beautiful. Mine was a clock. The most impressive part of it was the Roman Numerals formed with lollies. I thought she was really talented. Stella’s present was a gorgeous pink jersey petticoat. In many ways I wasn’t much of a girl, but I loved clothes and I loved that petticoat and grieved for it when I had finally outgrown it and it was given away.

Mum made us some lovely clothes. Usually Roslyn and I were dressed the same, if not exactly the same, then the same style and material, but different colours. One outfit I remember was white with red cherries appliqued on it and a red yoke and scalloped hem. Mum always left plenty of room for growth and I can remember wearing the same outfit to Taronga Park Zoo years later. She did well to keep it white. I was photographed in it holding a white rabbit. I must have been sucking my thumb and twisting my hair because it is standing up in the photo.

At home, I played cars under the house with Ross. Mum said she could hear the gear changes from upstairs. Occasionally I ventured into more hazardous pursuits. Ross and I had been given some bantams for our birthdays and the hen had a brood of chickens which followed her everywhere and I in turn followed the chickens. I longed to hold the chickens. I studied their habits and noticed that sometimes the mother moved ahead while one or more chickens were still scratching around further back. I bided my time then grabbed one. The mother knew immediately and chased me. I don’t know when I dropped the chicken, but I must have been screaming because Mum flew out of the house thinking a taipan was after me. I climbed the high stairs at break neck speed.

On the southern side of us lived the Rolinnos. They couldn’t speak English, but I’ll never forget their smiles. I loved their place for the poultry. The fruit trees shaded the ground so that barely a blade of grass grew and the ducks were everywhere. Once we got unexpected visitors and next thing there was a knock on the door and there was the old man clutching a plucked and cleaned duck for Mum to cook for tea. Mum was eternally grateful for the duck but more touched by his thoughtfulness. The Rolinnos had a daughter who had left home and lived at Trebonne. At that time I believed it was a long way away because they seldom saw her, then Mum and Dad started collecting her and bringing her back to her parents place for visits and I was surprised that Trebonne was quite close. Their daughter’s name was Bruna, and because I had never come across a name like that before, I called her brooma. At least I knew about brooms.

We drove around a lot. Dad always loved cars and driving. At first we had a little Morris Minor and each Christmas we would drive south, even as far a Sydney. Some of the road was still dirt in those days and the section between Marlborough and Sarina was black soil so we needed to take care on the return trip once rain had started falling. Dad was a gadget man so always fitted our sedans with camping bodies. On these trips he would sleep outside in his army hammock slung between a couple of trees while the rest of us slept in the car. I was jealous of him. I wanted to sleep in a hammock. Sometimes when the rivers came up we would be stranded, along with other families returning to their homes in the north. Everyone shared food. Some people had nothing while others had heaps of the same thing like a load of bread. It was all very exciting, but the most exciting event was when Dad paid ten pound to have our car ferried across a river on the tray of a truck. The Burdekin River needed to be crossed no matter which way we travelled and the bridges across it were very low. This time we were returning through Charters Towers. The truck was probably an old Blitz with bucket seats where Mum could only hold one kid. Whatever the reason, I found myself on the tray with Dad and Ross. Dad was never as careful as Mum, so I could exercise my independence by standing alone. It was exhilarating. Those are the joys I wish I could bottle.

Once home, we would be inundated with stranded travellers waiting for the waters to recede. Schools were always good emergency camping spots as they were built on stilts so you were under cover. They had bitumen floors, rain water tanks and a dunny down the back paddock. We often camped at schools in our travels even when it wasn’t raining and Dad, being a teacher, always had a look through the windows into the classroom. Once he found a swaggie camped on the verandah upstairs. Mum wanted to move on straight away, but Dad reckoned he was a nice old codger and perfectly harmless so we stayed.

After the Morris Minor, we bought a Zephyr. I loved the drives up Mount Fox. The timber industry was big and we would meet trucks loaded with logs. If we were following them, we wouldn’t be able to pass as the dirt road was too narrow. We would wind slowly down the mountain and I would be fixated on the red rag tied to the longest log. The logs were stacked up in a triangular shape with one final log on top and then huge chains were tied over them. The chains were tightened with a lever. I would imagine the chains snapping and the logs rolling off the trailer. I loved those old trucks. They smelled of good hard work.

Dad played on Mum’s fears. Once he had planned to go fishing with some blokes overnight. At the time, a prisoner had escaped from the prison farm at Stone River, so Mum didn’t want him to go. He went anyway, but as luck would have it, the weather was too bad and they couldn’t take the boat out so he had to come home. As he was checking on us kids in bed, he noticed a big green frog with its tongue stuck in the mosquito net over one of our beds. He was trying to release it when he heard Mum approaching, so he slid under the bed and as she came over to the bed, he grabbed her ankle. Naturally she screamed. She thought the escaped prisoner had her.

Every so often if Dad was out late at a meeting, he would phone Mum and pretend to be the school inspector announcing a visit the next day. He knew what a worrier Mum was and sure enough, she would be beside herself with worry knowing that there would be things to do before the inspector arrived. Workbooks had to be written up and if an inspector arrived with little warning, Mum would be there frantically writing up the new workbook directly from the old one. Inspectors were definitely to be feared. I remember years later being asked by an inspector if the work I was showing him was my best. Naturally I said no, to which he angrily chided me because all my work should be my best. All my work was most definitely my best effort, but I always knew I could do better.

I started school at Toobanna in 1957. I was four years old, but in those days you were allowed to start younger. I remember Dad saying that not many if any of the other students who were starting with me could speak English. It was a strange day. I was very very happy to be at school, but I was most definitely in the minority. There were crying kids everywhere. One very strong mother left her bellowing offspring at school and bravely headed home only to be met by the child at home. He had run across country and beaten her. I liked the big kids and they all knew me. I knew the routine. I liked writing on my slate with my slate pencil. It was a very poor second to pencils and paper, but it was writing. The greatest setback I suffered on that memorable day was when Dad smacked my hand when I sucked my thumb. I loved school, but I also loved my thumb.

The big kids were heroes. The Grade eight boys seemed like men and were so brave. They could kill a taipan at school when Dad was home having lunch. It was everyday stuff for them. Mind you, some of them preferred those types of activities to those of a more academic nature. Dad always liked each kid for his or her individual strengths. Some of the big boys even went bushwalking with Dad and it saddened my mother greatly to learn that one of them, Greg Mitchell, had died around the same time as Dad in 1983.

Dad did a great deal of bushwalking. He was very interested in wildlife and a fanatic on plants. Before Tinaroo Falls Dam was built, he had taught at a little school called Gadgarra which is now under the waters of the dam. He boarded with a family on a dairy farm so helped them get the cows in for milking before walking through the rainforest to school. He told us magical stories of huge pythons but when in later years I related these stories, people laughed at me. Now I know the stories were true and I have seen enormous pythons in the rainforests of North Queensland.

At this time, as it was war years, the troops were camped at the lakes, Barrine and Eacham, so Dad socialised with them and acquired some army gear, among which was that wonderful hammock and an army greatcoat which I equally loved. I guess the backpack and gaiters were also army issue. They weren’t as exciting, but never-the-less, the gaiters saved Dad’s life at least once when he was bitten by a death adder. Dad had started teaching school when he was fifteen, so couldn’t have been very old at this stage.

Dad’s love of plants meant we also got to go to the beach and while he scoured the surrounding countryside, we madly played and I guess Mum relaxed. We dug up what we called pennies or money shells and the culmination of each visit was a bonfire, which I always called a bombfire, on the beach. There