Beyond alice, p.7
Beyond Alice, page 7
She drove fast, her rage burning. Dammit, she would take on the mantle and grow the Alice Springs ICPA branch; she would push to expand its remit from focusing only on ensuring kids received a good education in remote regions to also supporting those kids sent away to boarding school. Surely it was not right, in any way, that once those children had gone, their parents had no further say in their lives, and that their children were fair game for whatever—and whoever—came their way.
Well, this was her chance to fix it, and she was going to take it.
A stab of guilt also hit her. She knew she couldn’t share this with Dad. He would not have approved of her going to Alice Springs and interfering with the new life he believed I had to learn to endure myself. He’d gone through it, and so could I.
Mum could never tell him about that phone call. She could only tell Barb, one day, when Barb was next in town—and who knew when that would be? The life of a woman in the bush was a lonely one.
Right now, though, there was no time for the luxury of tears. The homestead loomed, and she had no choice but to dry her eyes, wash her face and return to being the capable woman who kept the homestead going and its many occupants fed.
But one thought rampaged around and around in her brain: if she—the mother, the parent of a child at the school—couldn’t get the Headmistress’s ear, then I, the child, didn’t stand a chance.
Mum cried at home, and I cried at school, but there was nothing to be done.
7
Song and Dance
April 1975
March dragged into April and eventually I realised I wasn’t going home. Nor, despite her best efforts, was Lea.
Mum continued to write to me once a week, long letters overflowing with details of daily events on the station. The new governess was going well; Benny was now in the schoolroom and that wasn’t going very well. In every letter she said she was so sorry that I couldn’t be with them. M’Lis wrote and told me all about training her horse Mr Pip for the next gymkhana and how lonely our bedroom was at night. Brett wrote and told me he was keeping Nero well trained for me while I was away, and asked if he could borrow my saddle. Benny drew me funny pictures and Mum helped him sign his name at the bottom.
I would rush back from school to my pigeonhole every day to see if there was a letter with her cursive writing on it; if there was, I’d rip it open and devour it, then sleep with it under my pillow at night. It was the closest thing to being with her.
I wondered if anyone else here missed home like I did. Felt as out of their depth as I did. But even if I’d known exactly how to explain my confused feelings, I didn’t have the skills or words to discuss sensitive topics like missing my family and the land, or my aching sadness, loneliness and shyness. Probably no one else did, either.
We were like a small family of skittish and clumsy young fillies, struggling to find our feet and our legs, and trying in our own ways to adapt to our new world.
We started to create our own fun by doing ridiculous things, hoping all the while we wouldn’t get caught. Sliding down the banister rails in our pyjamas and wearing shower caps for effect was one of our favourite pre-bedtime activities. The rails were wide, and the post at the bottom was topped by a big wooden ball, so we didn’t go too fast.
We had water fights, pillow fights and pillow races down the stairs. We shortsheeted each other’s beds and jammed crushed biscuits into the bottom (or toenail clippings, as someone did once). The aim was to ensure the mistresses didn’t see or know or hear what we were up to. Getting away with mischief became our main form of entertainment. Not that I was brave enough to do anything too naughty, but one day a dusty book changed all that.
On the weekends we were allowed to take our travel rugs from the bottom of our beds outside. We’d lie on them on the lawn, just off the verandah outside Patchell Library, near the big loquat tree and read and write our letters home. One Sunday Leona rushed out, her eyes wide.
‘Look what I found in Patchell Library,’ she breathed, and handed me a dusty old book. It was called The World of Suzie Wong. ‘It’s very risqué, and set in Hong Kong!’
‘What’s risqué?’
Leona handed me her new dictionary. As I then flicked through the book, I had to look up lots more new words, like ‘prostitute’ and ‘brothel’.
The First Years sat there, open mouthed.
‘What would the mistresses think about this?’ I wondered, then added, dramatically: ‘I’ll read it aloud to you.’
And so I began to read the book aloud to the First Years in instalments. We soon discovered that Suzie was a very adventurous girl.
‘The hero, Robert, thinks she is “a hooker with a heart of gold”,’ I pronounced. ‘What’s a hooker?’
Quick flick of the new dictionary: ‘Same as a prostitute.’
‘Opposite to a virgin,’ someone else proffered.
No one wanted to miss out. We all learnt a lot. Leona described it as ‘sooo saucy.’
Reading the book aloud was a remarkable act of defiance on my part. It would have been confiscated immediately had we been caught (even though it had been in the library). Perhaps I’d then be expelled and really would go home. That happy thought kept me going as I turned one toe-curling page after another.
One day I also learnt about the ‘sister system’, where I could select an older boarder to become my ‘boarding sister’.
‘It’s someone you can share concerns with,’ Denise explained. She knew these things because, like Jill, she had older sisters at the school. I thought I might pluck up the courage and find one. I wouldn’t dob in my three tormentors but I could ask for some more survival tips. Having somebody older I could turn to would be a relief.
In the meantime, I did have a real piece of luck—my guitar. I’d brought it with me, and was glad I had.
Just holding it in my arms, stroking the frets and the body and the strings was soothing. It was the next best thing to having a piece of the outback with me.
When our Irish stockman Ray had inspired M’Lis, Brett and me to learn the guitar, we’d worn Mum down, begging for lessons, and she’d taken us to a teacher in Alice every few weeks. So impatient were we to be able to play the songs of our heroes (mostly Slim Dusty and Charley Pride), and be good enough to sing along with Ray, that we learnt faster than Mum or the teacher had thought we would.
M’Lis, Brett and I went onto play every ballad we could, ones that spoke to our bush life—of horses and cattle, of droughts and raging floodwaters, and of long, lonely droving trips through the outback. Those songs were invariably nostalgic, brimming with loss and grief, and speaking to the hard, hard outback in which we lived. Nostalgia had been hardwired into us at a very early age.
The hidden grief I felt at losing that outback land was given a pitch-perfect outlet every time I picked up my guitar. As I played each song, strumming the chords and lifting my voice to the notes, that grief was taken up, heard in real time, felt deeply in my heart, and somehow transmuted into a form of comfort.
Of course, it wasn’t the same as playing with M’Lis and Brett. M’Lis and I had always sung as one: M’Lis on the melody, me on the harmony. Singing and playing on my own was a bit like a surgeon trying to operate with only one arm. But it was better than not playing and singing at all.
‘What’s your favourite song?’ asked Margi one afternoon, as I pulled the guitar out of its case and cradled it. A group of us were sitting together in the quadrangle after school. We’d finished Suzie Wong and were looking for fresh entertainment.
‘Lots! Anything from Slim Dusty or Charley Pride …’ I paused at the blank faces looking at me. ‘You know their songs, don’t you?’
Margi smiled in her gentle way. ‘Um—I don’t actually know them.’
I stared at her in disbelief.
‘I’ve heard of the song “A Pub With No Beer”,’ said Glenys helpfully, ‘but I’ve never actually listened to Slim Dusty, or—who was the other one?’
‘Maybe only people from the bush know them,’ I said quickly. I tried again. ‘What about Olivia Newton-John, John Denver or Kris Kristofferson?’
This time there were some encouraging nods. ‘I don’t really know their songs but I know of them,’ said Margi, smiling helpfully.
‘I’ll play “Take Me Home, Country Roads”,’ I offered, and started strumming.
When I got to the chorus, my heart soared along with the words. It was hard to sing without choking up. But by the end I felt happy, in a way I hadn’t for a long time, especially as the girls joined in as I played the last chorus over and over again, not wanting to stop.
‘Can you do any pop songs?’ Denise asked, when we’d finished.
‘Er … no.’ I put down my guitar.
‘There’s this super new group on Countdown,’ she said. ‘They’re called ABBA. We’ll have to watch them Saturday night.’
Every Saturday night we were allowed to watch what I thought was a wild pop-music show on the television in the common room. It was called Countdown, and it was repeated from the Sunday before in a timeslot that we were allowed to watch. The mistresses didn’t really approve of Countdown, but it was our one treat, unless we’d done something wrong. Girls would ‘bags’ their chairs in the afternoon, with everyone wanting to sit in the front row. Because I was so small, I’d sit on the floor wherever I could, often on the side.
To be honest, I didn’t think I’d much like the show, because I didn’t like pop music. But I didn’t want to disappoint Denise. Besides, there was nothing else to do on Saturday evening, so we snuggled up in front of the television.
Bang! My life was forever changed. Completely and utterly.
First of all, there was Molly Meldrum. He swaggered onto the screen with a huge hat, turned up at the sides, and big grin. Then he introduced the two most beautiful girls I’d ever seen, who sang with the most beautiful voices I’d ever heard. All the while the camera switched backwards and forwards and to the sides of their exquisite faces, as they sang catchy songs like ‘Mamma Mia’ and ‘Waterloo’. Soon we were all on our feet in the common room, dancing and clapping and singing along to the choruses.
From that night on, I was totally and utterly in love with Agnetha and Frida.
In bed, Denise called out to me after lights out. ‘What did you think? Do y’reckon you could play those ABBA songs?’
I was still buzzing with excitement, and whispered back, ‘Don’t think my guitar playing is up to that—not yet anyway!’
We giggled loudly.
‘I’m warning you, girls,’ came a disembodied voice from the door.
But I didn’t care, and when Denise said, ‘ABBA have more songs. Another one is coming, and it’ll be on Countdown next week,’ I could hardly contain my shriek.
‘I’ve warned you!’ came the voice again and the lights snapped on. ‘Denise and Tanya, you will both clean everyone’s shoes after school on Monday.’
I burrowed furiously down into bed. That was a lot of shoes.
But there was something comforting, comrade-like, in us being punished together.
I was one of the gang now.
Nothing, however, took away the pain of the bands on my teeth. Steel bits and pieces stuck out of my swollen mouth. When I tried to smile, which hurt, I looked like a fully fledged steel monster.
The only thing that helped were the other boarders who also had bands. They all assured me the terrible pain would ease, eventually, and that I would recover.
Those of us similarly afflicted would stand together to clean our teeth slowly and carefully to remove food from the bands, and change the little rubber bands in our mouths, sharing whatever cream we had to wipe on to our lips to ease the agony.
So, I had a small heart attack when Miss Wadley made ‘a special announcement’ at the next Friday night meeting.
‘Girls, next Saturday night we will have a social with our brother college, here in Gillingham Hall. It will go from seven until eight-thirty. You can all help decorate with balloons and streamers. You can also work with the music teacher to organise records to play.’
While girls shrieked excitedly around me, I sat still, frozen. Our brother college was Prince Alfred College—PAC for short—and there was no way I could appear in front of those boys with my horrible bruised mouth. I started planning how to get out of it. Perhaps I’d leave Suzie Wong on my desk at prep. Then, if I wasn’t expelled, I’d at least be forbidden from attending the social.
‘Don’t worry, you’ll have fun,’ said my older cousin Penny, coming up to me after breakfast the next morning. She was with her friend Mary-Jane, who had a mop of brown curls and a mischievous grin. I knew Mary-Jane was from a farm in the mid-north too, not far from Penny’s home.
Mary-Jane leant against the wall and said, casually, ‘My younger brother, Hugo, is going to your social. He’s also in First Year. He’d be a perfect boyfriend for you. And he’s got bands too.’
I wanted to sink through the floor.
‘We’re all connected,’ Penny said, reassuringly. ‘Mary-Jane and Hugo’s mum and dad are old friends of your mum and dad. They all grew up together in the mid-north. And their Aunty Sue did her Correspondence lessons with your dad. Lots of connections!’
Mary-Jane grinned again, as though that settled everything.
‘I’ve told him about you,’ she added. ‘Look out for him. See ya, shorty!’
On the day of the social, the First Years went into a frenzy. As soon as lunch was over, everyone gathered in Gillingham Hall to start blowing up balloons, pulling streamers from end to end and, with the help of the school handyman, even putting a mirrorball in place, which the girls told me would send coloured lights and sparkles all over the Hall. The music teacher had lots of records, and he practised playing them while we worked. That cheered me up, even if the music sounded strange to my ears. One of the latest hits on Countdown was Skyhook’s ‘Horror Movie’, which I thought aptly described my own life. But then he played ABBA’s ‘Waterloo’, and we all started shrieking and dancing in the Hall; for the second time since my bands went on, I felt happy.
Once everything was ready we were given permission to go upstairs early to start our own preparations. There was a flurry of leg shaving, eyebrow plucking, hair primping and frock ironing. Treena had plucked my eyebrows the night before, telling me that mine needed a little ‘shaping’ and I’d howled in anguish as she ripped out hair after hair.
‘You’ll be glad,’ she’d said, putting away her tweezers once the torture session was over. ‘Thick eyebrows are out.’ But worse was to follow.
I didn’t know what to wear.
I’d been to dances before, but they had all been part of outback bush race meetings and campdrafts and gymkhanas. Normally the host of the event would pour a concrete slab onto the middle of the flat ground, a country band would set up, and after the day’s events kids and adults alike would swarm onto the slab, dancing all night under the stars or inside a corrugated iron shed with one side open. We kids would wear our smartest jodhpurs, boots and press-stud shirts. They were our best clothes.
Eventually, I decided that’s what I would do here too. I pulled out my jodhpurs and boots from the bottom cupboard and laid them proudly on my bed. As I was wondering which of my two shirts would go best, Treena and Denise arrived. They looked at me with strangled expressions, and then both spoke at once.
‘No, Tanya. It’s a social. You have to wear a dress.’
I screwed up my lips and crossed my arms.
‘We’re in the city.’ Denise spread out her hands as though that explained everything.
‘Why can’t I wear what I want?’ I almost stomped on the spot. I couldn’t understand what the city had to do with it.
‘Because you need a dress for a social in the city. Why don’t you look at what everyone else is going to wear, and then we’ll help you pick something?’
‘Why do I have to wear the same outfit as everyone else?’ I asked, incredulous.
‘Because …’ Denise and Treena looked at me helplessly. ‘Just because.’
My options weren’t extensive anyway. Like everyone else, I had two mufti dresses; Mum had sewn them for me. I pulled them out, and Treena and Denise selected the best of the two. It was a short green dress with puffed sleeves, and they told me I’d look great in it.
Scowling, I shoved it on with my sandals, and angrily put my favourite boots and jodhpurs away.
Next came the ‘make-up application’, which I discovered was another lengthy process. Again, I didn’t quite know what to do, but a couple of the Second Years, including my cousin Loulou, came in to watch proceedings and help out.
‘Here, Tanya,’ said Loulou, thoughtfully. ‘I’ve got some green eye shadow. That would go nicely with your dress.’
‘Thank you, Loulou!’ I said, having barely recovered from the trauma of not wearing my best-ever bush dance outfit. Taking the palette of eye shadow from her, I headed to the mirror. Then, with great care, I smeared layers of thick, bright green from the top to the bottom of my eyelids. Feeling proud and grown-up—especially now my eyebrows were almost non-existent—I pranced back to show her.
Silence filled the room.
Loulou coughed and said, ‘I think we might tone this down a bit, Tanya. Can you bring me a tissue?’
The removal of the caked-on green layers took some time. Loulou scrubbed and wiped and scrubbed some more, muttering things like, ‘Can’t believe how hard this gear is to get off when it’s so easy to get on.’ By the time she’d finished there was as much red eyelid as green. Along with my swollen, split lips and splotchy face, I now really wanted to run and hide. But that wasn’t happening on Loulou’s watch.
‘Goodo,’ she pronounced with a smile, and led me downstairs to join the others.
It was too late to escape now. Inside, the mirrorball light was on, transforming Gillingham Hall into a disco; it looked just like the Countdown studio. Through the outside door we heard a commotion, boisterous laughter and loud footsteps.
