Haveachat with Les Shipp

by Les Shipp

years of study and they were more in love than ever. John had been working in between his studies and had built up a good sized nest egg for when he and Mavis could be together.

  Nothing had changed as far as the parents were concerned, even in their early twenties they still considered them too young to be together. When Mavis graduated her parents gave her a graduation present of a six months tour of Europe. Mavis was extremely upset about this latest turn of events and as soon as she could she went to John to tell him about her parent’s latest manoeuvre to keep them apart. John had had enough of parents by this time and was prepared to put a stop to their scheming.

  He had become a strong minded young man after all the years of study and he knew exactly what to do. He said to Mavis not to give up her trip and he would work something out. As she sadly boarded the plane to Europe and found her seat her sadness turned to joy when she found that John was sitting in the seat next to her. He had decided there was only one option and that was for the lovers to run away and be damned to anyone who tried to stop them.

  BATHTUBS.

  My memory of bathtubs goes back a long way. From one year old to five years we lived in a large tin shed my father built on his twenty acre property at Castle Hill. It was a very substantial shed destined to become a packing shed later on. The rooms were divided off with tar paper and hessian. On the veranda of the shed was an enclosed room with a galvanised tin bathtub. I don’t remember ever using this facility.

  My father then built a regular house on the property and it had a very upmarket bathtub in it, all shiny and new. I don’t remember using this grand facility but I guess I must have been privileged on occasions.

  At age ten years we moved to a larger property out in the country near Penrith. There again Dad built a house with a shiny new bathtub. There wasn’t any town water out there so we had to economise on water. To have hot water you had to heat up the water in a copper and then carry the heated water into the bathtub. At this stage I found the bathtub to be rather a bore and avoided it as much as possible. I was required to get cleaned up at the end of the day and this was accomplished by the use of a tin dish in which you washed your face and hands with sunlight soap and dried them on a cloth towel. Then you dealt with your feet in a dish with carbolic soap. These parts were dried with a towel made out of sugar bags.

  When I was ten or eleven years old we moved to a very remote farm in the Blue Mountains. Here again was the tin bathtub but it had a very modern heater for the water called a chip heater. For me during those years my bath arrangements was a cake of soap and down to the river for a swim and a wash, this was my life.

  At sixteen years of age I went to work on a large sheep property at Coonamble and my accommodation was in the shearer’s quarters. In the bathroom there you had two choices, one of which was a shower and to use it you had to lug heated water in from the copper out in the back yard and put the end of the shower hose in the bucket. The water was drawn up by a pump which required the user to manually operate. If you stopped operating the pump handle then no water came forth. The other apparatus was an object called a chair bath. To use this you carried in the required amount of water, then you sat into it with your legs out one end and the other end had a high back which allowed which allowed you to lay back and enjoy the experience. One of the difficulties was when you sat into the tub you displaced most of the water and you were left with very little to work with. It did have a little soap holder on the side. If you think this was easy, try and sit down backwards into a tub of water that is on ground level.

  Years later, moving with my new wife straight out from Ireland to a cattle property where she was confronted with a chip heater over the bathtub. She was terrified of it as it made a fierce noise if you fed it too much fuel at once.

  Later when we had our own home, I made sure there was a shower as well as a bathtub. I have avoided the bathtub since preferring to use the shower but not long ago I decided to have a bath as I had stiches and wasn’t to get them wet. My wife warned that I might have trouble getting out of the bathtub, but I said,” Don’t be silly, how hard could it be to get out of.” To my dismay, when I tried to get out, the slippery demon became quite evil, especially as I was hampered with my injuries. My only escape was to slide over the side and on to the floor in an undignified manner. I promised myself never to make use of another bathtub.

  WHEN BOY MEETS GIRL.

  Christopher Reece was an only child who never knew his father as his parents had divorced when he was quite small. His mother was a doctor and she reverted to her maiden name after her ex-husband dropped completely out of her life. She also changed Christopher’s name by deed pole to her maiden name of Reece. Her ex-husband’s name was Gerard Barkley. Christopher had the best of educations and this bright lad did well at school. Well enough to win him a bursary into Oxford University where he studied literature and publishing.

  When he graduated from Oxford he had everything going for him. He was tall, handsome, and very bright and he had a pleasant disposition. He went straight from university to work in a prestigious publishing firm where he quickly climbed up the ranks. He loved his job and gave it his all, working long hours. He had his own office and staff and lived in a bachelor flat in East London. He didn’t have time to think about dating as his work demanded all of his time.

  Out in Melbourne Australia a young strikingly beautiful girl was just completing her degree in literature, and was planning a career in publishing. She hadn’t had an easy life as Christopher had. Her father had been killed in a car accident when she was quite small and her mother wasn’t able to cope. So Janice was brought up by nuns in an orphanage. She worked very hard at her school work and made the nuns very proud of her achievement’s, and even prouder when she graduated from university with honours. She worked for a while in a publishing house in Melbourne but she felt she needed more of a challenge. The firm was sorry to lose her and wrote her a glowing reference. She applied to several publishing firms in London, and was overjoyed when she received an offer to be an assistant to one of their junior partners in their leading publishing company.

  Arriving in London was very exciting for her and she was eager to start her new job. On Monday morning as Christopher arrived at his office he met his new assistant and was immediately overcome by the beauty of the girl. His heart beat faster, and he became almost speechless. Janice was a practical girl and put his strange behaviour down to the fact that she was a stranger. Down the track she hoped they could work well together.

  After the initial shock wore off Christopher they formed a great working relationship. They became a formidable team at work and after a few months Christopher had to admit to himself that his thoughts were never far away from Janice. He finally came to the conclusion that he had completely lost his heart to her. With fear of rejection he timidly asked her out on a date, and was immensely thrilled when she accepted. As their love for each other blossomed they went on many joyful picnics, and to the theatre. They became so close they decided to move in together, and planned a wedding in the near future. Life was full of joy for them as they set up house.

  Janice sent back to Melbourne for the relevant papers for their upcoming marriage. The papers duly arrived and as Janice was busy with dress fittings, Christopher decided to sort out from the papers what was needed for the wedding certificate. When he came to her birth certificate a dread went through him. Her father and his father had the same name. Looking further he found a photograph of the man who was her father. Exactly the same as the one he had kept of his father. There could be no doubt that they were brother and sister. Christopher was devastated as he realised that their dream of a life together could never be. He felt he couldn’t give this terrible news to Janice. He knew he could no longer live with her but he was just as sure he couldn’t live without her.

  Christopher quickly wrote a note to Janice saying he had been called up to Oxford to sort out a problem. As he drove up to his old university his mind was in turmoil. Wher
e to go from here. There just wasn’t any light at the end of the tunnel. As he swallowed the tablets and a good shot of whisky he drifted off into a troubled sleep never to wake.

  Boy meets girl doesn’t always have a happy ending.

  ANTIQUE VASE.

  A vase stood on Aunty Dolly’s sideboard for many years. It had seen so much of their life just sitting there. It had been placed there when Aunt Dolly had married and moved into the lovely old home.

  It shared Aunt Dolly’s joy when each of the two children were born, and all the excitement as they grew into young adults. Of course there was the odd dreaded times when the children became too boisterous and the sideboard received a bump and the vase’s position was in great danger. Several times it was knocked over but being made to last it survived. The children of course never gave it a second glance as it was always just there. The fact that Aunt Dolly really loved that vase, and the story behind it was lost on all but Aunt Dolly. Even Uncle Frank never paid much attention to it, he neither liked nor disliked it, it was something that came with Aunt Dolly when they were first married. The vase was never a topic of conversation in the