by Ted Dawe
After a while the counsellor and community police officer talked to me. They talked to me about causes and consequences. Mrs Larkin the counsellor sat next to me on the couch. She smiled sweetly at me and then said in this soft purry voice, “Why do we do silly things?” I said nothing so she began a long talk about my mum and dad, and love and tolerance, and how we were all part of a big family at school. I leaned back on the couch and closed my eyes, I could tell that sleep was near, but it was not to be. The door opened and it was the familiar shape of Constable Keith, our bulky Community Constable. He had spoken to us the previous year about shoplifting. I imagined him like a cartoon character who ran around whacking people on the head with a stick. His mission was to explain to me “the pathways” I would take if I ever repeated this behaviour in the community. I was lucky that this happened in a school because if it happened in the community (he used that expression a lot) there were no prizes for guessing where that would lead to.
Yep, it was a pathway that led straight to the slammer.
I remembered thinking that I was getting some good practice for that anyway, with Ada looking after me.
Then Dad was called in. It seemed funny having him in the school, he looked out of place, like seeing a giraffe in your toilet. He’d never been there before. Hated schools he said. Looked really uncomfortable, kept trying to loosen his tie, like he was choking. But it was no good. All the talk came to nothing. Our final positions on the matter were these.
They called it “unprovoked assault”.
I called it “takin’ out the trash”.
Which version’s correct? Who cares? The month’s suspension brought Dad to his senses though. It took this to make him sit up and take notice.
He thought he would leave me at home with Ada. Just sort of wait the period out and then send me back, but I made it clear that I was not going to stay in the house with that woman, and that was that. If he tried that one I would be gone. You wouldn’t see me for dust. I guess I must have looked pretty determined because he didn’t do it.
For a day or two he took me into work with him. I would read my book or play on the computer while he did his deals. Then we would get into the car and visit some guy and it was more of the same. I didn’t mind this but it was starting to cramp Dad’s style. I could tell it wasn’t going to last.
Then one night after tea, there he was, on the phone, desperate now, begging his younger brother to take me on.
“I’ve tried everything … the kid’s in a bad way … I’m at my wit’s end … ever since … ever since it’s been just the two of us nothing has worked out for him … aggressive, violent, untrustworthy … there’s a gun at my head … space, time to reflect, fresh air, animals, family life … they’re scared of him, scared of what he might do… That would be great … that would be amazing … just a short spell … Yeah, I owe you big time … regards to Lorna … yeah … yeah … I know … okay … yeah … promise … a couple of days, see ya …”
That’s where Uncle Frank comes into the picture.
MY VIEW OF THE COUNTRY …
AND ITS INHABITANTS
I’VE always had this thing about the country. Not a bad place but full of thickos. Big friendly types but in the barnyard animal sort of way. Your brain, which usually operates at about 100 ks in the town has to do a steady 20–30 ks in the country otherwise you’ve got all these country types standing around saying “Eh? Eh? What’s that again?” It’s like living life in slow motion.
I’m not one-eyed about this, though. There are good points to living in the country. There’s no law out there, so you get to drive things way before you’re fifteen. The Landrover. The tractor. The quad-bike. As well as getting to drive anything with a motor you get to ride quite a few things without motors; horses, goats and if you’re a bit on the weedy side (and I suspect that you are) sheep. Yeah you didn’t know that did you? Most farm kids ride sheep. You don’t see much of that on Country Calendar. You can bet it’s frowned on by the “be nice to our four-legged friends” brigade.
I might mention at this point that you get to shoot guns too. Try doing that around your neighbourhood, they’d call out the armed offenders squad before you can say Kalashnikov.
But the country has a down side too. It’s called work. Unlike city kids, farm kids have to work all the time. Being brought up on a farm means that adults get you working. Long hours too. Hard work, for no pay. That’s why I believe most farm kids are a bit slow. You know, dim. They don’t know their rights. Any city kid would strike if faced with a deal as bad as this.
As everyone knows, another drawback about farms is that they are always far from anywhere civilised. That’s what makes them a farm, right? As a result a trip to town is a big deal. Our woolly farming friends become filled with excitement and fear at the thought of it. First they always get dressed up in their best clothes so they won’t look like country hicks having a trip to town. But it doesn’t fool anyone. Anyone knows you can spot a farm family fifty yards away for just this reason. The men wear these tweedy sports coats, with a shirt and tie of course, finished off with brown trousers which won’t show the you-know-what. They wear these ankle boots with elastic on the sides. Your average farmer can’t handle laces, his fingers are too thick.
The women wear a bigger range of garments but you can spot them easily enough if you know what to look for. They are at least two styles out of date and you can bet the brand name Swanndri will feature somewhere.
The kids? It’s not the clothes with them, it’s the haircuts. All I will say about the haircuts is this; their mums are responsible for the crime and a pudding bowl and sheep shears are the weapons of choice.
However it is not just dressing up and going in. That’s the fun part. There is the fear side too. The hayseed is terrified of all those people. Even if the town – like say, Eketahuna – has only about a thousand people in it. The sort of one-horse dump you flash through in the car so quickly it’s gone before you’ve finished getting your mouth around the name. However to farm folk … whooa! To them it’s still downtown Tokyo on Friday night. Crazy huh?
So where was I? Oh yeah, the country. I was being sent to stay with Uncle Frank, Aunty Lorna and the five freckled terrors, my cousins. As I said it was not like I had any choice in the matter.
MEETIN’ TH’ KIN FOLKS
IT’S a long way from Auckland to Taranaki, especially on an Intercity bus. I had plenty of time to think over my options as we droned our way to my uncle and aunt’s place. Underneath it all I knew what this was all about. Back home it seemed that I was turning into something that couldn’t be controlled. A bit like those dogs that come running up. Sometimes they wag their tails, sometimes they bite you. I was like that. People found me a bit unpredictable. I’m not surprised, I found me a bit unpredictable too. I guess out in the country, out amongst all the wierdos, I would sort of fit in, or at least not be noticed.
The school agreed; they had said I “needed space”.
The counsellor said I had to “work through issues”.
Constable Keith said that I needed to “see where I was headed on life’s road map”.
Dad thought “I needed to be amongst my own blood”.
There you have it. What all these statements have in common was that no one wanted me around any more. I may not be too bright, but I knew that much.
I could have flown down to Taranaki but for some reason Dad couldn’t make it happen. Maybe it wasn’t his fault, there could have been some local problem, like cows on the runway. Maybe he wanted me to think through things as we rolled through the endless muddy paddocks and small towns. People climbed off and on this smelly old bus and most of them seemed to think they were the driver’s best friend. What this meant for everybody else was that they stood around the sort of flap thing where the bags were stowed, and yakked for ages before the driver climbed back in and headed on down the road.
Dad had given me ten dollars to spend on the way and an envelope for Uncl
e Frank. I blew most of my money on chocolate and Coke, so by the time we began to thread our way through the Awakino gorge I was ready to chuck. Never had I felt such an evil feeling in my gut. The road followed the dirty river and the bus lunged in and out of all these blind corners throwing my chocolate-filled stomach all over the place. Just as I was sure I was about to douse the grey head in front of me, we came out by the sea. The driver stopped at some tea rooms and suggested it was time for us to “stretch our legs”. That’s country talk for “have a pee”. I know this because we all stood around in a bunch outside the only toilet. I imagined everyone in there before me stretching their legs. I wished they would get on with it.
There were thirty minutes to kill so I walked down to the sea while everyone else queued for their scone and cuppa. The beach was black and covered in shells and bits of old wood. There was a cold wind whipping along the sand and the waves were huge. I waited on the edge of the wet zone while each wave stood up and roared at me like an angry bear in the distance. I couldn’t take my eyes off them. For a moment I had this freaky feeling. You know when you are in a high spot and you feel some invisible hand trying to push you over? Well I felt that same invisible hand trying to push me into that cold sea. Those huge waves. I imagined walking along the bottom of the ocean and never coming back. I could almost feel the water swirling around me and then hear the silence beneath the waves. It was a powerful feeling, both frightening and exciting at the same time. It swallowed me up.
After a time (was it a minute or was it twenty?) I became aware of a noise and when I looked around I saw the bus flashing its lights at me in the distance. The driver had been tooting at me. I ran back and clambered aboard, trying to duck under the staring eyes of all the other passengers. The driver said something about it being a bit cold for a dip and I slumped lower in the first available seat.
For the rest of the trip I watched us heading towards this angry mass of cloud heaped over what I was sure must be Mount Taranaki. The farms changed from being mostly sheep to being wall to wall cows. And then we came to the outskirts of this little town. I took a deep breath. We were there.
As we slowed down, the twins, Ewan and Dougal, burst into view, running alongside the bus, waving and jumping. What a shrink! They were like those dogs that chase cars. Totally crazy, but impressively fast. Especially as they were both wearing gumboots. The moment I stepped down they grabbed an arm each and dragged me over to where Jamie and Iain, the older two, waited quietly by Aunty Lorna. She stood leaning against the door of this battered old Landrover with the baby, Wee Jock, in her arms. She was really pretty and wore a sort of head scarf that covered most of her neck too. It looked a bit like what Indian women wear. That and the big gold earring in her left ear made her look a bit like a gypsy. They all stood around for a while in a sort of circle. You could tell they were a family, they all had the same smile, a sort of simple, wide-eyed one. I had to fight my city nature which told me it was my duty to mock them.
The two older boys stuck their hands out to shake. I was impressed: people my age in the city never shook hands. Aunty Lorna leaned forward and gave me a kiss. I gave a jerk and a bit of a yelp. I didn’t see it coming and I got a fright. It had been a while since anyone had kissed me. The twins roared with laughter and the older boys grinned and looked away. I felt a bit of a dick. There was a moment of embarrassment as we all stood around staring at each other, then we all thawed and it was like “no problems”.
Iain was about my age, and Jamie a year younger. They were both stocky: little muscley dudes. Scotty types. Short legs, sandy hair. The twins were like a matching salt and pepper set. Difficult to tell apart unless you knew what to look for. There was one way I remembered. I’d heard about it in a letter. Only Dougal talked. Ewan could but wouldn’t, except in extreme emergencies. Dougal talked for both of them. Then there was Wee Jock, which is Scottish for what’s-his-name. He was at the crawling and gnawing stage.
Aunty Lorna was the first to talk. “I suppose I shouldn’t say this, Sandy, but you’ve grown a foot since I saw you last.”
“Hey, I’ve always had two.”
They all paused for a moment trying to work out where I was coming from, then realising it was one of my witty one-liners, all laughed on cue.
She gave my shoulder a shove the way that boys do when you get one past them. “You know what I mean, last time I saw you, it must have been a few years ago now, you were smaller than the twins.” She had a sweet, sing-song voice with a bit of an accent, maybe Aussie, maybe Irish, I don’t do accents.
“How was the trip? We all thought you’d fly down.”
“I tried but my arms were too weak.” They laughed, they were ready this time. “It was long. I tell ya, you can fly to Fiji in half the time.”
“You been to Fiji?” Dougal asked his eyes round with excitement..
“Oh yeah lots.”
“Where else?”
“Oh Bali, Vanuatu … we used to travel a lot once…” then I couldn’t carry on. There were always these little dead ends I came up against.
“Well, you are going to find our place a bit different from Fiji, no coconut palms, no ‘Isa Lei’.”
“You’ve been there, Aunty Lorna?”
“Oh yes, Frank and I had our jet-setter phase. Then we stood still for a while and when we went to move, we found that we had put down roots.”
“When you bought the farm?”
She smiled and opened the door to the Landrover. “No. It was when we had this little posse.”
Everyone piled into – and onto – the dented old beast. Dad used to bring home 4X4s but they were nothing like this. They were thick carpets, sat-nav and CD stackers; this was primitive. The seats were just squabs covered in this really prickly nylon, the dashboard tray was full of tools and strange farm-type equipment. The big tyres made a lot of noise on the road and cold air leaked through gaps in the floor.
There were four of us squashed into the cab; Aunty Lorna driving, Iain holding Jock in the middle and me crammed up against the window. The rest of them bounced around on the back. Aunty Lorna drove like there was no tomorrow; you could tell the boys liked it. She hooned this crate around corners really fast and bashed the gear stick back and forth to keep the revs up. We all flew around a bit in the cab because there was nothing to hold on to. It must have been even harder for the twins and Jamie who were on the back. Every now and then I caught glimpses of them shooting past the back window as we rocketed around corners.
After about ten minutes we got off the sealed road and headed for the wild farms tucked into the ranges below Mount Taranaki. I could see the mountain, looming up before me, shrouded in white and gleaming in the early evening light. It was simple and impressive, like those mountains you draw when you’re a young fulla. A real upside down “V”. But it was more than this, the snow seemed to drape over its shoulders like a cape or a wedding dress. Against the pale pink and blue sky this huge shining pyramid made me feel that I was an ant crawling on an elephant. That I didn’t account for much.
I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
By the time we reached the farm gates it was getting dark. The sky was now brighter than the road which threaded darkly through endless hedge-rimmed paddocks. It was hard to talk over the noise and Aunty Lorna’s Formula 1 style driving. I felt a bit nervy about what was going to happen. How was I going to get by? I had never been away from my home by myself before. Maybe the farm would be real backwards, you know, water out of a well in a bucket, everyone riding a horse. I didn’t know what to expect.
After a while we began to slow down. Aunty Lorna didn’t seem to like using the brakes, she just flicked down through the gears. As we slowed to walking pace I could see some white gates up ahead and this sign which said Jerusalem. The next moment I was amazed to see the twins both leap off the moving truck in an attempt to be first to get to the gates. They both rode the gate open and we drove on past without them. It was obviously some family tradition.
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br /> We pulled up at the tractor shed and I spotted the house up on top of a small hill. In front of us was another gate and a road which led to the milking shed and then on to the back of the farm. It was hard to see much but I guessed the silhouette in the paddock next to the house belonged to Uncle Frank’s house truck.
Next thing I see is a pack of huge dogs bounding towards us. They must have been down at the milking shed with Uncle Frank – and smelled the new guy arriving. I have always been a bit nervous around dogs, and the sight of four black dogs leaping the gate at the same time was enough to get me back inside the cab of the Landrover quick-smart. They were eager to check me out, see if I was edible. They jumped up on the truck door, their shaggy faces dribbling on the window and blocking the view. First one would be leering at me, then another would jump up and biff it out of the way to get its five cents worth.
Iain came over to the truck and said, “What’s the matter?” He seemed puzzled, like he didn’t have a clue why I had climbed back in.
Jamie picked up one of these huge black wolves and carried it over like it was an enormous baby. “They’re harmless,” he said.
The twins grabbed a dog each and tried to lift them off the ground but they could only get their front legs clear before it turned into a sort of wrestling match. Aunty Lorna, who was halfway up the hill to the house, stopped to see what was going on. Even she seemed puzzled.
Iain opened the door. “Honest man they’re big but they’re harmless … watch this.” He turned to one of the twins. “Ewan, take down Tine.”
Ewan dropped his dog and did a sort of rugby tackle on the biggest dog with the white flash on its chest. I had never seen anything like it. One moment the dog was standing staring at me in the cab, the next it went flying wrapped in the arms of this little kid. It was so fearless and funny I thought it best to put on a brave face and get out. I didn’t want them to think I was some sort of city wuss, which I probably was.