trauma kid

a chpt

CHAPTER TWO-part one "trauma"

Last night old Mick, the king of the beatniks, came in a dream and asked,

"when you gonna get to the beatnik parts?"

I explained,

"First I have to show how I got to be far out. Then I promise I'll cut to the chase".

Smiling like a sage he spaketh,

"OK man, but up here in heaven we're dyin' to read about ourselves: so hurry up." I told him I would.

 

In 1951 mum and I listened to "When A Girl Marries". The radio serial began with: "dedicated to all those who are in love -- and to all who can remember". We followed the intrigue and laughed at the melodramatics, but the idea of "true love" burrowed deep in my psyche.

I loved radio and spent pocket money on the weekly "Radio Guide" newspaper, pretending I was a station owner choosing programmes. Back in 1952 radio guides were as popular as TV magazines were later.

Kids' serials came on from 4 to 6pm and I’d act out the stories as if my lounge room was a studio. They were the only thing that'd keep me inside instead of playing in the street.

At 6 pm dad listened to "racing round up" then mum tuned to "Music from The Movies". I thought that show actually came from our local theatre. I'd urge,

"Hurry up mum: 'music from the movies' is on so the picture'll be startin’ soon."

 

Later on I'd stand outside the Astra and scan coming attraction posters with their hints of what the "picture" was about.

I invented a "picture show" game and cut movie ads out of the newspaper to paste on our shed. Every three days I'd change the programme and my pal Peter "Fritz" pretended to buy tickets. Inside the shed we set up a "lolly shop". The garbos loved us because we scoured the streets collecting discarded candy wrappers to "stock" our display. Fritzy would "buy" sweets (pretending to be a customer) and talk about the movie we'd "just seen".

On Saturdays dad tuned to the races and lent me his form guide so I could pick "rides". When a race was called, I'd be a jockey. The arm of our lounge chair became a horse, my school ruler a whip. Dad folded my rain hat into a jockey's cap and watched me ride. I'd list my "results" in an exercise book.

When I was 7, Adelaide had a big rainstorm. I stood at the window pretending I was a salty sea captain struggling to hold the wheel of an old freighter. Giant waves crashed over the deck and gales lashed our cabin. I was drawing an elaborate chart of my ship's travels when I noticed mum was tugging at something.

Bashing with the heel of dad’s work boot, she had driven a 2-inch nail into our mantelpiece and another into a wall. She tied a string between them and hung washing to dry. After the clothes dried she couldn't get one of the nails out.

I thought, "I'll get it out and be a hero and mum’ll think I'm strong." Unnoticed, I wrapped the string around my hand and pulled. The nail stuck. For 20 seconds I jerked and tugged.

"Zing!". Out flew the nail attached to the string. ''Th’wop!" The nail buried itself in my eyeball. I screamed.

Mum rushed me to children's hospital.

 

A rough voiced man poured water in my smashed eye then pushed a warm velvet cloud onto my face. It hummed as it smothered me. I floated in purple cotton that throbbed. Everything stopped.

I awoke in darkness between tight cold sheets. My eye hurt. I tried to touch it but my wrists were bound to cold metal. I heard kids crying, whimpering and screaming: then something clanged as if tin pots were thrown. Kids giggled until a grownup yelled,

"Shut up you b******s!"

I'd been sobbing and moaning. An angry lady said,"Stop your crying!. You'll hurt your eye." My bandage became soggy. I didn't want the lady to be angry so I tried to stop crying. My imagination told me I was in the cold overcrowded orphanage scene in "Oliver Twist".

A nurse whispered to another about going to a dance at the Palais . I told them,

"My mum goes to the Palais."

The nurse said,

"Aw, little mummy's boy can talk can he ?." I felt sad. My eye ache returned. I wanted mum. I whispered a very sincere prayer,

"Dearest lovely God and Jesus, please let mum come and visit me. I promise to be good for ever and ever, Amen."

 

It was my first time apart from mum. Visitors were allowed only twice a week for one hour.

Mostly I whimpered in bed for mum . The nurses sounded cruel, their voices dripped scorn,

"Little sissy boy crying like a girly girl."

Some kids laughed and I felt like a sissy.

Another nurse said,

"You won't get better, if you move your eyes."

I thought,

"I'll be good and not move them. Then she won't yell."

No kid spoke to me, but I was glad of that. They sounded naughty. They made fart noises and giggled. Two of them talked about polio and how someone named Physio would be coming to hurt their legs

.

A grownup yelled,

"Shut up and be quiet!"

A nice man answered,

"Shut up everyone who yells 'shut up’". That made me laugh.

Doctors inspected my eye. They touched it until it hurt and shone a bright light in it. I cried.

Someone stuck a cold bedpan under my bottom and demanded,

"Do your business." I couldn't do any so they put nasty stuff in my mouth. Then I got a pain in the tummy.

One day mum's kind voice said,

"Doctor says you can come home tomorrow."

My misery vanished immediately. My heart soured in joyous flight and I knew the weather outside was sunny.

 

Among familiar objects at home I recuperated. A nice doctor unwrapped my bandage, gave me an eye patch to wear and said, "Now you're a pirate."

I hallucinated strange kids creeping around outside looking to steal my toy cars. It might've been withdrawal from the morphia they had given me for pain or agitation from the whole experience. Folks back then knew nothing about such things. I begged dad to spread sand on the driveway so we'd see footprints of any creeping villains. With the sand in place I calmed down.

Next night we went to the Astra to see Chaplin's "City Lights". I could see the screen only with one eye. My right eye was virtually blind. I could make out some colour and shapes but no detail only a blur. But my left eye was fine and I was glad to be able to see at all. When the statue in "City Lights "was unveiled by posh people and Charlie was found asleep in the statue's arms, I literally rolled on the floor laughing.

Mum said it was time to go back to school.

 

In grade 3 we had a man teacher. I'd never known men could be teachers! He had patches on his elbows, chalk dust on his back and caned us on the legs for talking. I began dreading the lessons I once enjoyed.

On Wednesdays we had a "religious instruction" lesson. A nervous young Protestant minister came and told bible stories. He never disciplined us: so it became a free-for-all of wise cracks and fart noises .I loved "religion" for causing such fun and the word of Jesus snuck into my vacant subconscious.

One day during religious instruction Rosemary Carter sneaked from her desk and sat next to me for 10 minutes. When the teacher’s back was turned she carved FUK into my desk with a knife and although (at age 8) I’d never heard the word before we giggled because I sensed it was a naughty thing to write.

 

Sunday nights I'd snuggle into bed freshly bathed. From the lounge room wafted the sound of 5DN's music programme "Under the Stars." I'd lie enraptured as time slowed and my bed was taken way out into the flat Aussie scrub. Above was the Southern Cross and a billion stars. The longer I lay awake the longer until I had to wake up and get ready for Monday’s school.

 

One day 2 bullying kids in my 8-year-old class pushed me into some boxthorn bushes and my mum and granny made me up some soap and sugar poultices "to draw out any hidden thorns."

Apparently, my granny was expert in the art of getting thorns out of peoples legs via the method of wrapping the limb in gigantic amounts of sugary soap. It seemed to work.

Two days later at school, the 2 kids began to tease me. I took to my heels and bolted to escape further humiliation. Keith Cridland and Trevor Blucher chased me for two blocks and it looked as if they'd soon catch me and give me my very first violence trauma. Suddenly I saw I was in my own street and three neighborhood girls were watching the drama of the chase. Instantly the fear of being caught by the villains evaporated and I became the hero of a boxing film. Knowing the girls' eyes would be on me, I stopped running, and like I'd seen Errol Flynn do in "Robin Hood". I "became" Robin Hood and swung wild jabs and hooks somewhere in their direction. The suddenness of my resistance seemed to deter them and they ran away!.The girls smiled and giggled. Later that night I lay in bed joyously reliving the incident and thinking,

"Those girls think I'm brave." But they still didn’t talk to me.

 

 

I don't recall being bullied again until I was 11. A big kid called Norman (who hung around the school dunnies a lot) grabbed my nuts every couple of days. Other times he just made the motion but it still made me flinch. I tensed up and went "on guard" whenever he was near. He stopped only after I punched him in the nuts real hard.

 

The 1952 Olympic Games marathon running race was featured in a newsreel at our local picture theater. The winner was Emil Zátopek. I sat enthralled at the drama of the event. From then on, whenever I needed to run well, I’d become Zátopek and fly like the wind.

One night my father left me in a theatre near to his Buffalo's Lodge meeting and I saw my first Marx Brothers' film "At the Circus". From then on I imitated Groucho (with wise cracks), Chico (when telling lies), Harpo (to get laughs), and Zeppo (with romance).

 

 

 

Dad took me to Cowandilla Social Club. The club met on Sundays in an old tin shed at Richmond Oval. Dad said,

"Now you know where to buy beer on Sundays."

In the '50 all pubs closed on Sundays. Every month the club had bush picnics or hired a fishing ketch and went to sea. Much beer was drunk. I joined in the kids' egg and spoon and 3-legged races, got sun burned, ate ice cream and drank "raspberry balm".

 

On Sundays Dad and I barracked for Cowandiller footy club. Their colours were blue and gold, same as West Torrens Eagles. On Saturdays I went to barrack for Torrens. I thought no.17, Lindsay Head, was the best rover in the world. They called him "a show pony" but he won 2 Magary medals. I hated Sturt's Wally May. People said he was dirty and I believed whatever the fans yelled out.

I was happy to go to the movies alone but sometimes mum and my grandparents came too. Grandpa loved Wallace Beery, granny liked Tug-boat Annie, mum liked Charlie Chaplin and I loved Elizabeth Taylor, Jane Powell, Anne Miller and Charles Starrett (The Durango Kid).

 

Dad liked June Allyson and Allan Ladd. He only took me twice and never went to our local bughouse. Instead, we went into "town" to an evening session. Going to a town theatre was a big deal.

We saw "Whispering Smith", a western. He'd seen it before and was keen that I saw it. Just before a big action scene dad whispered,

"In a minute you watch Allan Ladd draw his guns. It's called a cross-draw. They try to ambush him but Allan cross-draws and shoots in two directions! That's how I shot Rommel in the war."

Dad always joked about shooting Rommel. It was a joy to have him talk to me as an equal--instead of a "father" figure. I was allowed to go with Peter Fitzgerald to kids' matinees. Every Saturday (before TV) cinemas filled with excited children. Posh kids sat upstairs in the dress circle, rowdier kids in the front stalls. A typical matinee was:

1-15: a Heckle & Jeckle cartoon.

1-22: a "Little Rascals" short.

1-35: one chapter of a weekly serial

1-50: a B-grade Western

3-00: interval of 15 minutes (to buy lollies)

3-15: the main feature, usually an adventure (in colour)

At 4-45 we'd head home exploring water drainage creeks. There were many in our area. Some went underground for short distances and could've flooded any time: we never thought of the danger. The only parental guidance given had been,

"Make sure you're home before dark."

 

In the school library I found a book by Richmal Crompton about a kid in the 1930s called William Brown. William got into amusing scrapes with authority in his small English village and I gleefully tried the same. William was scruffy - his long school socks perpetually hanging down round his ankles, his school tie askew and his face grubby from excellent "japes" (escapades). I adopted this persona and made sure I got into mischief and looked untidy. William’s family ignored him during the day, so that became my wish too. It led to wonderful days of complete freedom in which to have schoolboy "adventures".

Grandma used to say,

"Don’t ever call me ‘granny’: I prefer ‘nana’. "

 

Up until 1955 even suburban train services were powered by steam The carriages were dusty, the seats made of real leather, and the windows actually opened so kids could stick our heads out and lean like the train drivers in western movies. A bit of soot in your eye was a small price to pay for all that fun.

Every month nana and grandpa took me to the big cavernous Adelaide railway station to catch a steam train up to the little village of Crafters. Once there we’d walk a mile until we came to a large orchard. Grandpa told me,

"We’ve got to be very quiet. These apples belong to Tom Playford, the Premier of South Australia. He’s in that big house over there and has a terrible headache so we mustn’t make noise. He’s a mate of mine and he told me to take as much as we can carry without a truck."

I never saw the generous Premier but the apples were good.

Nana told me "these apples are Granny Smith’s," but I never saw anyone else in the orchard while we were there.   ----end of chpt-----------

Reviews

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I remember matinees well. Lots of cartoons followed by a feature or two. Cheap--something like 75 cents. It got us out of the house and out of our mother's hair.

It's too bad things like that don't exist now.

Well done piece. I enjoyed all of it.

[Lola Nation]

interesting, cut and and abrupt - chopped thought through out and it zig zags occassionally pausing to make sure you'll still in the rhythm...