A home in the suburbs
My father chose the equivalent of a "new estate" in which to bring
his family up. In those days that equated to lots of land and paddocks,
dirt roads and mostly 3 or 4 room bungalows.
In our case, two bedrooms, a general purpose room and a kitchen. The
bath was in one corner of the garage, and the toilet was a little room
built on the back of the garage.
My sister and I shared one bedroom until my father started (but never
finished) building an extension to make the bungalow into a house. I
remember a bed being set up in that bedroom and my sister moving out of
the cot and me into it. Whilst I was grateful to be able to see out of
the sides on my bed (by comparison to the crib I was in), I still didn't
understand why I needed to be caged. |
The beginnings of an escape artist?
I hated being locked in my cot and remember watching with interest how
the latches which held the side of it up worked. I found that I was
clever enough to work them, but not strong enough to lift the cot side
and operate the latch too. A few months later when I was strong enough,
I was still not big enough to operate both latches at the same time. I
figured out that I could lay on my side and undo one latch with a foot
and the other latch with a hand. |
A day at the beach
 We
didn't go out too often, so going to the beach was a special treat. I'm
four here, and when I enlarged the photo to look at the detail, it looks
like I am freezing! I think this is the time that I found a little crab
(without knowing what it was) and peeled the shell off to save the life
of the creature that was stuck inside the shell. I was horrified when I
put it back in the water and it wasn't moving any more! |
A day at the beach (with a mate's family)
 I
was fascinated by the different family dynamics that my closest friend's
family had. When they had a day out at the beach it was totally
different from when my own family went. They actually had fun and
nothing seemed like too much trouble. I don't know that my mate ever got
into fishing, but at least he had a rod and could give it a go. (If you
concentrate really hard, you can see it over his shoulder as we try a
spot of "surf" fishing! |
State School photos
How many people do you remember from your first years at school? I
quite amazed myself with how many I have memories of. I've left the link
in for the full sized scan if you want to look at the little cherub
faces in more detail. Also if you hover your mouse over the above
picture, it will show the names of everyone I remember.
More school photos... |
Visiting the Cousins
My father rarely had a car that was operational, so visits with
cousins in another suburb of Melbourne became an outing which lasted the
whole day. I seem to recall this was the occasion that I took a fancy to
my cousin Jo. My aunty decided to walk us back to the station and I
showed off and found Jo flowers all the way there.
The next time our cousins visited our place, Jo was friendly toward
me much like where we had left off, but I'd heard from someone else in
the meantime that cousins don't act that way with each other, so I was
mean to her! |
I
wasn't old enough to get a learner's permit, but I got myself an XL250
and taught myself how to ride it