Dear Baby Me, Child Me, “mini me” Part 3.
My therapist told me to write my young self a letter. here is part 3 of possible several.
*Other readers*
I do not care about your judgments, or maybe I will, but still, here goes.
WARNING POSSIBLE EXPLICIT LANGUAGE BELOW!
ONE LAST WARNING, THIS IS NOT FOR THE FAINT-HEARTED!
We were in Sydney very briefly. I think it was 3-4 weeks; then we went “home” Home to Robinvale, a town with about 2000 people at the time. There were white people, Italian people, Aboriginal people, a few Greeks then Tongans. It was strange, but it was fun,
We lived on a farm, a fruit farm. The farm had 80-90% fresh fruit grapes with a little citrus. There was miles and miles of grapes and nothing else, we lived in a place called Tol Tol, we lived on Dad’s bosses farm in a pickers hut, and as it sounds, it was a hut, something thrown together that had some walls and some bedrooms, it had three rooms, one for me and Josh, one for Nanna and Lisa and one for Dad.
We had fresh rainwater but no heated water, we had a semi-solid roof above our heads, and we had a father; that rain, hail, or shine (45C Celsius and above, pouring rain, frosts no matter what) every day he went to work. It was an impressive feat to witness what he did.
Dad was, wait, Dad is a worker! He has worked himself into the ground for as long as I can remember, for one thing, and one thing only, to make sure his kids are Ok and for that, I am forever grateful.
Dad was made supervisor of the property; it was his responsibility to ensure all other staff fell in line. Likely because we lived there, but also Dad spoke the magical language of Tongan. “The workers/staff language”
We lived on that farm for a few years, We even had a visit from our Aunty Sharon from NZ and her two daughters Womble (she now hates this nickname, but it is what it is) and Lynette they stayed for a semester at school, then went back to NZ. It was amazing to have a little bit of home (New Zealand) with us for a while.
The sound of the kiwi accent. The color of their skin. The fact that Aunty Sharon looked a bit like Mum (Mum’s older sister) was amazing; it helped me settle in, to be honest. They came to school with us, and we walked through all the grapevines to the bus stop, went to school, had a call, and came home again.
It was really sad to see them leave.
Sometime later, I remember Dad loaded us onto the car and us to town to meet a lady, he told us in the car that he wanted to marry her, and he wanted us to meet her.
We all went out to one of her family members’ houses for dinner.
The Wedding.
We all went up to Sydney, the 12-hour drive to Aunty Pepe’s house, and a few days later, Dad did marry her, a lady we had only met once or twice. She seemed kind. She seemed nice. But we had a disagreement on the wedding day; I remember she told me off for something. I have no idea what now, but my response wasn’t very nice. I believe it went something like, “You’re not my Mum. You cant tell me what to do!”
Wow, did I get a whooping that day? Maybe that’s why I remember the wedding. I don’t remember the service. I remember parts of the reception and, more importantly, the flogging I got for expressing my teenage feelings to my new mother, the family’s new matriarch.
A mistake that took me several years to learn from.
After the wedding we went back to the farm, we visited Sydney often, maybe every second month, it was amazing, we got to see Aunty Pepe, our cousins Lita, Lilly, Junior, and Naomi,
Junior is only a few years younger than me, but we bonded well (we are still very close).
We lived on the farm until Dad’s boss on the farm offered to pay for our fuel to head up to Sydney and see Nana, Nana was living with Aunty Pepe, and of course, we all jumped at that idea, and off we went for the weekend.
When we came home on Monday the big farm shed had burnt down, all the tractors were inside the shed and the motorbikes too, (they normally weren’t)
They built a new shed. It was fun to watch the men come and do this. I even got to in a machine and go up onto the roof of the new shed and help. It was so high up.
The new tractors arrived once the new shed was built, and work started again.
Mum and Dad moved from the farm into town when I started high school. They moved to a three-bedroom house across from the foot oval and behind the local ford dealership.
I remember that the school called me to the office at the end of the day and told me not to take the bus home but rather collect my brother from primary school and go to an uncle’s house.
This is how I learned that we had moved house, the belongings that were still around we packed and taken to the new house for me.
Josh and I shared a room we had bunk beds in the first room as soon as you walked in the back door on the right-hand side of the house.
By then, I had met Tony. Tony was and still is a church leader in Robinvale and an “upstanding” member of the local community.
He was nice to me; he used to take me on trips to collect bottles for recycling. The glass would be broken up into barrels and then taken away on a truck to be cashed for money for the church youth groups.
Sometimes if you were at the bakery and getting bottles out of their rubbish for the recycling, the owner of the baker, Mr. Nooy, would come out with and give us a meat pie and a coke.
Once all the bottles were collected for the day, Tony would drive the big truck back to his house, and we would wash up. I always had to shower at his house and be cleaned before I went home. This went on for about four years.
At the time, I didn’t understand why the other boys didn’t do it, they always told me not to, but I didn’t have a choice. Mum and Dad said I had to help.
Anyway, after I was all washed and cleaned after digging in rubbish bins all day, Tony would have a shower, sometimes a bath, and I would have to help clean him as he wasn’t able to do it himself, I had to wash everything sometimes some parts several times.
It didn’t occur to me again until several years later what I had been doing. Or what he was doing to me “cleaning me” I was so oblivious to all, it happened until I was about 16 years old, and suddenly, he didn’t need my help.
Before that, I had to help him wash, massage his sore and tired body be the good, faithful Christian boy, and help one of our church leaders.
Once I had turned 16, I had no reason for church anymore. I felt a little abandoned. I also realized or maybe got educated on what the fuck had happened to me.
All I had left was school, work (I worked at the local supermarket), and a church that made me feel sick inside, made me feel dirty,
So I went searching for something else, it was a Tuesday night, I walked down towards the river and found the SES (State Emergency Services) shed they were next to the rowing club that our school used and I was a part of, but I could join them as I wasn’t old enough.
I started walking towards home, and on the way past the fire station, I noticed they were all there too, so I went in and had a chat. About an hour later, I joined the volunteer fire brigade. I became a firefighter.
This is where I grew up. I was treated like a man, not a child. I was treated like an equal. I had found purpose in my life
More to come – 23:33 16/12/2021 AEST