Tuesday 7 July 2015

Nambucca Heads

Currently in beautiful Nambucca Heads—so far glorious sunny days and very cool nights (around 7 degrees). The Foreshore Caravan Park fronts on to this beautiful area of the Nambucca River with pelicans galore and the odd dolphin. Would be ideal for kids in the summer, has a little sandy beach and plenty of shallow water. And yes! Barry even caught a fish.


View from Foreshore Caravan Park
Nambucca Heads



 Known locally as the 'fish and chips' this wonderful 30 metre long mosiac was created by Guy Crossley. While I was admiring it I began chatting to a local (now 33) who said one of her most wonderful memories was helping to create a section and how all the school children were involved and everyone in the community provided old crockery, vases, bottles and anything that could be transformed. Sadly someone had decided to leave their rubbish in one section, and there were some parts where 'vandals' had obviously been chipping away. The mosaic winds around the corner below the police station. This octopus is the centrepiece.






I've been laid a bit low with a 'lurgie'. I'm sure the sunshine and sipping lemon and Manuka honey will soon scare it away. When we were kids, Madge used to put a few drops of kerosine on a sugar cube (taken from the silver bowl only used for visitors) and give it to us to suck. I am not recommending this. Absolutely loved the notice on this shop window at Nambucca: 'Park your Husband Here'. A bit further down the road is a fantastic Red Cross shop with some of the most beautiful 'hand knitteds'—all pure wool. Couldn't resist a pair of fingerless gloves $6—might need them in Armidale.A

Monday 6 July 2015

Among My Souvenirs

We tend to forget that life can only be defined in the present tense.
Dennis Potter interviewed by Melvyn Bragg 1994

I'm a bit of a hoarder and contemplated the task I've set for those when I leave 'this mortal coil'. My own mother was not a hoarder, but I well remember the task of going through her things—finding letters from the kids and old group certificates under shelf linings and the proverbial mattress. She hadn't put in a tax return for years and didn't leave a will so it was quite a task.

At one stage I felt really guilty about leaving bursting filing cabinets, overcrowded shelves and chock-a-block book cases in all but the kitchen, but there is always the hope that one day I may have time to read and sortI have hundreds of books signed by their authors, and when I see an article about that writer I slip it inside. My favourite author is Dennis Potter—unfortunately I don't have his signature—and yes he is probably a misogynist but how eloquently he writes about memory, writing, longing, and death in Karaoke and Cold LazarusOf course if one knew 'the day' and the condition of the body at the time of departing, one could plan with some certainty. Nothing of mine is of value—but every object has memories embedded within.


Tom (who attended the Port Macquarie workshop) is in the process of publishing his autobiography and what a great read it will be. Tom (now 88) and his family travelled and worked their way around the world in a caravan—his life now enmeshed in the objects he collected on his travels. 











Every item Tom touched had a story.






In early 2004 I set a 'homework' exercise for our Kiama writing group. With a notebook in hand you start at your front gate, and quickly note what comes to mind as you slowly walk towards the house and go through room by room. After several edits I entered 'Among My Souvenirs' in the Glen Eira Short Story Award, and received a Highly Commended. 

A month or two later I was having a Saturday afternoon 'nanny nap'. Barry woke me, waving the phone handset: 'Frank Moorhouse wants to talk to you.' I'm sorry to say I told Barry in no uncertain terms to 'go to b*****y' and let me sleep. He handed over the speaker and said 'It really is Frank Moorhouse'. Frank said he'd been one of the judges and wanted the story for The Best Australian Stories 2004. Such an eye-opener to go to Melbourne for the launch and meet Morry Schwartz publisher of 'the Best' as well as The Monthly, Quarterly Essay, and Slow TV, outlets that provide in-depth and thought-provoking content relating to cultural, political, and social issues. 



The story was broadcast on ABC Radio National in 2008, and there is a CD somewhere— among my souvenirs.





My dreams are built from the things that happen to me in the waking world. And my memories can also adapt and shape the past. I can put myself in a better light than I actually was, for instance. I can work up an accidental slight from a former friend into a deliberate act of villany from a now sworn enemy. I can disown this or that piece of behaviour. My memory, Emma, is also a tool, an editor, a judge, a jury.

Dennis Potter Cold Lazarus 1996

Monday 29 June 2015

From Haiku to Haibun to Prose: Fellowship of Australian Writers, Port Macquarie-Hastings Branch


      Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life.

—Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

From back L to R
Tom, Hazel, Brian, Colleen, Ann, Debbie, Michael
Gwen, Rae, Wilma

Still bruised early Saturday I headed to the Mac Adams Centre at Port Macquarie to run a workshop organised by Colleen Parker. Each workshop is a thrill as one gets to know those attending. Participants ranged from a 'new' writer to Gwen, a delightful woman who was a foundation member of the group thirty-seven years ago. We focussed on 'writing from the senses' designed to envelop the reader in the writer's experience of the world. Using examples of Haiku from Basho to Les Murray, we explored the traditional form of Haiku then moved to Haibun—prose interspersed with an odd number of Haiku. 






Just two hours after
Eternal Life pills came out
Someone took thirty

—Les Murray


We had a productive day, plenty of writing, sharing work and laughter but also the odd tear. I was exceptionally moved by 'aha' moments from prose poetry that resulted from an exercise adapted from Graeme Kinross-Smith's book Writer



Judges 
Bruce Venables and Judy Nunn 

Colleen and I first met in 2001 at a meeting of the Partners in Crime group at the Hughenden Hotel. I was in shock after winning the 'Queen of Crime' award—Colleen and Diane Pattinson were to be the publishers of the resulting anthology. The story 'Morning News' had been originally shortlisted in the Stephen King   On Writing competition. 



It was then I realised life story could be adapted to any genre of writing. The work was 95% autobiographical—at the time there had been trials relating to a number of horrific crimes in the area including the murder of Frank Arkell, former Lord Mayor of Wollongong. The narrator in the story is a woman who has become paranoid because real life is frightening her more than Stephen King's fiction.




Diane Pattinson, Rae, and Colleen 2001
Colleen and Rae 2015





The grasshoppers' cry
Does not reveal how very
Soon they are to die

—Basho (17th century)


During the last week of school before exams, they had been reading and writing haiku in English class. Haiku was a Japanese form of poetry, brief, disciplined. A haiku, Mrs Douglas said, could be just seventeen syllables long—no more, no less. It usually concentrated on one clear image that was linked to one specific emotion: sadness, joy, nostalgia, happiness ... love. 

Ben had been utterly charmed by the concept. He enjoyed his English classes, although mild enjoyment was generally as far as it went. He could do the work, but generally there is nothing in it which gripped him. Yet there was something in the concept of haiku that fired his imagination. The idea made him feel happy ... Haiku was good poetry, Ben felt, because it was  structured poetry. There were no secret rules. Seventeen syllables, one image linked to one emotion, and you were out. Bingo. It was clean, it was utilitarian, it was entirely contained within and dependent on its own rules. He even liked the word itself, a slide of air broken as if along a dotted line by the 'k' sound at the very back of your mouth: haiku. 


Working carefully over a twenty minute period, with one break to go back and get more work-slips, striking out words that were too long, changing, deleting, Ben came up with this:



Your hair is winter fire
January embers
My heart burns there

—Stephen King It





Friday 26 June 2015

From Ipads to Icepacks

We arrived at Penrith around 8pm Monday 22 June. We're ready to take off for Hawks Nest Tuesday morning. Barry has packed the car. We hear a bit of a bump turning onto Northern Road. We pull over, but can't see anything amiss. We arrive at Col and Sandy's and I go to get the Ipad. I ring Trish in hopes we have left it at her place. She says no and I remember that noise. 'Barry, you don't think you put the Ipad on the roof of the Kia?' Tried location services (did I activate it?) rang Penrith Police. 

And now to relax with Col and Sandy. They've asked their next door neighbours in for dinner—Henry and Shirley used to live in Mudgee and our daughter Tracy and Shirley's daughter Lyndall were best friends. We talk about Mudgee wines and ageing. If only we kept getting better like a good red. Wednesday morning non-stop on mobile with Telstra, Apple, and NRMA. Yes it is password protected. Despite all the pressing buttons and holding—Telstra and NRMA were helpful and did all they could.


Barry and Col growing old disgracefully
Barry and Col were in the same class at the Police Training Centre in 1961. Later they were in charge of adjoining 'one-man' stations—Col at Howlong and Barry at Balldale. There was six months difference between our eldest Trish and theirs, Craig—we each had two daughters and a son. For years we had holidays at Hawks Nest. First we stayed at Jimmy's Beach caravan Park, then Bill Ring's flats and finally the Beachfront Motel. The ten of us went up the Myall lakes on Col's boat Martini, the older kids sometimes camping on shore.  


Sandy and Rae growing old gracefully





There were pre-sunrise walks on Hawks Nest beach and watching the kids on hobi-cats in Port Stephens—years later finding out it was shark riddled. 

We sit and natter for hours and Col takes us for a drive around our old haunting grounds.








Thursday we had crispy fish and chips overlooking the entrance to the Myall Lakes in idyllic weather—ignoring the pelicans looking for a free feed from Hook N Cook.  



Taree Rest Stop
As we drove off I was in holiday mode at last—leaving the stresses behind. We stopped near Taree for a cuppa. As we drove into Laurieton I muted the ABC and said to Barry: 'It was the worst of times and the best of times here—remember when we brought your mum (Nana) just after Pop died?' It was stinking hot on the trip from Mudgee via the old Sandy Hollow railway tunnel—and in those days no air conditioning in the mustard coloured Peugeot. 



Trish Tracy and Shane
Sandy Hollow Tunnel 1975



The caravan park pool was empty because of the drought. After we unpacked we drove miles to find a beach for the kids to swim. I was exploring the rocks when I heard Trish yelling. I swung around too quickly, slipped in my wet thongs, and cut my feet badly on oyster shells. The kids had been attacked by sea lice. Stings covered in calamine lotion, and cuts dressed, we were ready to go for fish and chips. Nana came back from her walk with a kilo of devon for us and a few slices of ham for her. ‘I don’t like devon,’ she said. 





Kids at Big Brother
At dusk we went fishing in the Camden Haven River. Barry caught a sting ray, then the propellor of a boat, but managed to cut the line with his knife before it ran out. I had visions of him belly ski-ing into the sunset. I’d never heard of sandflies—my legs responded with inflamed welts. Nana took her knitting on each exploration. To the rainforest, North Brother Mountain, and the Everglades—a kind of theme park run by the ‘little people’. ‘I’ll wait in the car. Don’t worry about me. My it’s hot isn’t it? You won’t be long, will you?’ A couple of sunburns later we arranged to visit Hec and Jan Coulston who had been transferred from the Rural Bank Mudgee to Port Macquarie. Nana was happy to stay in Laurieton, she’d found a Bingo game at the RSL. With Stewart and Shane building Leggo and the four girls colouring in, Jan and I began to pick up our friendship. Then Hec yelled, ‘Come and look at the telly’. We sat riveted, watching the unfolding Granville train disaster.





Last night at dusk, Barry and I arrived at the Jacaranda Caravan park. We'd stopped to pick up the new Ipad at Laurieton and discovered the Piggly Wiggly butcher is still there. Armed with their famous 'wissoles' and some wine for tea we begin to set up. He starts unhooking the van while I walk around the back to plug in the power. Next thing I'm yelling. My eyes focussed on the power pole looking for number 34 I didn't see the pothole. The park owners brought a pillowcase full of ice and I sobbed, leg in the air, while Barry set up. He said I'd do anything to get a story for the blog. I kept saying I'm so sorry as I knew he was exhausted. Afterwards I decided to do a Pollyanna 'glad game': it could have been so much worse than a swollen and bruised knee and elbow. In sympathy, the clouds burst open and I tossed and turned al night to the beat of the rain.


Tuesday 23 June 2015

Saturday Night

Photo Courtesy Des Riach
Saturday nights I switch from ABC Local Radio to Radio National. I just don't like Country and Western. In the wee small hours I was snapped awake when I heard Jodie and David Kilby mention the Modernaires. The program was about Jimmie Sloggett. I didn't know him but his Dad used to send shivers up my spine playing the last post at Anzac Day in Orange. I was in the same class at Orange High as Des Riach, drummer and Ray 'Butch' Lawrence, the trumpet player. I learnt Highland dancing with Beth McMaster, the sister of the pianist, Ian McMaster, and so I had already begun wallowing in memories of Orange just before Jan died. A few minutes ago without thinking I went to ring her to check Sloggett Senior's name. 


It was wonderful to 'find' Des Riach and have a chat after almost 60 years. The Modernaires played at a ball at the Palace Theatre Parkes and I can remember dragging Barry up to meet the band. Some of the best balls were at the Tichborne Hall, half way between Parkes and Forbes. The Tomkins women and others cooked their legendary suppers, finishing with pavlova and fresh real cream. The men disappeared outside to check the contents of the car boot, and the women checked their kids were still sleeping.



The history of the Modernaires appears with that of other dance bands, including those my father played in, in Bill Forrest's fabulous Saturday Night: A History of Dance Bands in Country New South Wales. One of my favourites was The Hip Replacements that featured John Hatton, a former South Coast MP. As well as the picture of my father in George Stevens Night Owls Dance Band (see Blog Preparing for Liftoff) there was one of the CWD (Central West District) Band sponsored by Radio Station 2GZ with the caption 'George Dennis—other members unknown). I instantly recognised my father playing the trumpet and contacted Bill. His book is part of my life writing teaching tool kit as it gives the music of each era, and a history of those wonderful country dance bands.





Liftoff at Last

OK we finally got away to a late start yesterday afternoon. Had lost the caravan power, turned out 'we' had the fridge on DC (or was it AC?) which drained the 'new' inverter system. Red face, won't say who. Arrived in Penrith through busy traffic travelling north at a sedate pace. No doubt other drivers behind us saying 'Bloody Caravanners'.