Bonzer Words!: Parents Who Won't Stay Put
...Kids don't care about the things that bother mothers, and my favourite things that disappeared with those renovations must have been my mother's despair. Like the 'dirty' fuel stove that warmed us as we dressed for school in winter; the 'dirty' open fire in the lounge-room where I would curl up on the couch and dream in the fire's glow; the big glassed-in verandahs, one with boxes of Mum's younger, town-based finery for dress-ups, one with iron beds for sunny winter snoozing over Sunday papers; and the lino floors, so cool to lie on after the Sunday roast and pudding had filled us to immovability in summer heat...
Sharyn Munro tells of her parents who were ever-willing to try life elsewhere.
Sharyn writes for Bonzer! magazine. Please visit www.bonzer.org.au
Children, grown up or otherwise, wish their parents could remain fixed in time . . . not too young to be near their own age and not too old to be near leaving them. They would also prefer their parents to remain fixed in place as well as time, living in the family home, so they can take their own children there, rekindle the very best of memories.
Unfortunately most parents have an annoying habit of becoming people after their period of child rearing. For my parents, and thus for visiting me, this meant coming full circle from town to country and back again. We started off in a new suburb of Sydney in the late '40s, with so many vacant paddocks that we kept a milking cow, where my Dad built a fibro cottage, modest, but so modern it had a 'breakfast nook'.
Then Dad got the farming bug and we moved to the Central Coast in the mid- '50s, to a rundown fibro house on 10 acres: half orange orchard, half flood-prone creek flats, and one tiny pocket of remnant bush where we could hide and play. I loved it all.
The house itself was only tolerated by Mum because it was going to be renovated . . . soon. My dad being a builder, we all know what that means. It was 11 years before the renovations were begun, after I'd left home for university, and then only because Mum threatened to hire a builder!
Kids don't care about the things that bother mothers, and my favourite things that disappeared with those renovations must have been my mother's despair. Like the 'dirty' fuel stove that warmed us as we dressed for school in winter; the 'dirty' open fire in the lounge-room where I would curl up on the couch and dream in the fire's glow; the big glassed-in verandahs, one with boxes of Mum's younger, town-based finery for dress-ups, one with iron beds for sunny winter snoozing over Sunday papers; and the lino floors, so cool to lie on after the Sunday roast and pudding had filled us to immovability in summer heat.
But I didn't miss the outdoor loo or the chip-heated and scarily-dark old bathroom.
When the first set of traffic lights was installed in Gosford, Dad reckoned it was time to move on. He wouldn't recognise it now, truly a suburb of Sydney, joined by suburban rail trains, full of trendy types from five-acre brick veneer ranches at the 'desirable' address that was once our potholed road, with a horse for Amanda, a minibike for James and not a hayseed (or orange pip) to be seen.
Dad wanted to try cattle farming next. They moved to far northern NSW, green and lush and impossibly steamy. Another old house, but better built, of local timber, high up for the breezes and full of history, panelled charm and large spiders. Strange vines supported grey timber garden structures, greened with lichen and harbouring more snakes than the Garden of Eden. Avenues of pines gave grand entry while bunyas dropped nuts the size of pineapples on the unwary. A creek rushing clear over stones instead of the tea-brown slowness over sand as I'd grown up with . . . I would have loved my children's childhood to be based here.
But no, age crept on: cattle's a hard way to make a living, and 20kms out of town is not appropriate when, like many women of her generation, Mum had never learnt to drive. Where next but the safe harbour and gentle climes of Port Macquarie?
Back to brick and tile suburbs, but beach-ringed, rainforest-edged, country paddocks and country manners still in evidence. Friends are made, the garden's fertile, manageable, red dirt stains more a problem now than snakes. The club's close by and so's the library, the shopping's better, golf clubs and fishing rods replace plough and saddle.
Grandchildren grow big enough to gather shells and pebbles and memories. I meet old friends from all over the state on the beach or down the town . . . their parents have retired here too.
Grandchildren grow bigger, with surfboards on the racks instead of floaties in the back, girlfriends, boyfriends, great-grandchildren . . . photos proliferate, strangers drop by and claim to be relations, old friends pass on, the garden's hard to handle, fishing's too much effort, traffic's worse, they've put in all these nerve-wracking roundabouts, the hospital's good but too far out of town and now they're moving the library! They're getting anxious.
Time's passing still, I'm greyer than my mother, and for peace of mind they plan the next move, to one of Port's retirement complexes, to the safe villa or hostel room, no snakes, no steps: the one I'll like least, with the shortest tenure, where they can't stay put.
© Sharyn Munro
