Girl on the Edge Read online

  Our “superior” aunty was tall, and she walked with a confidence that my mother did not have. Her eyes scanned my brothers and me, up and down. I saw her gazing, judging eyes, looking for fodder to feed the gossip chain later, so I deliberately avoided her gaze. But I could see through her. I knew that her newly found values were all for show and aired only in her husband’s presence. Whenever she was on her own and around her family, her true self, values and traits were displayed. She was still a townie at heart and she could never escape it, no matter how hard she tried.

  My aunty and uncle dropped into my grandmother’s home to be polite, a family duty when we were there on holidays. After greeting us, my uncle chose to remain silent and to allow his mere presence to fill the air with disapproval. He occasionally directed a derogative comment to the children, when the other adults were out of earshot. “You all look like vultures,” he sneered, as we waited excitedly for the morning tea to be laid out by the women outside. I never responded to him. I instead diverted my eyes away from his critical ones. That uncle’s arrogance and assumed sense of privilege was evident both during family visits and within his private domain. Whenever my mother phoned her sister from Coolah, I immediately knew if my aunt’s husband was at home or not. If he was, my mother’s chatter would last for about five minutes before she finished the phone call by saying, “I’ll phone you later in the week, good bye,” before returning the phone to its holder. I knew this aunty had only given “yes” and “no” responses, not shared any news or gossip. If my uncle was absent, my mother’s calls mostly consisted of listening to my aunty for a seemingly endless amount of time. I would hear my mother belly laughing with this sister. I asked a few times why that aunty was so different when her husband was around. My mother told me it was just the way it was. It seemed odd to me. That response never satisfied my curiosity about her polarised behaviour.

  My mother loved holidaying at my grandmother’s, dropping in on her relatives, but not the flipside of these visits, which was that we were at their mercy. Their eyes and ears were always on the lookout for something to judge about us, or for information that could be shared later with a relative—”Did you see?” and “Did you hear what she said?” I would hear the same kind of gossip spout from my mother’s and grandmother’s mouths soon after a relative had departed. It reminded me of “being the first to know” or “the first at the scene.” I understood then that my mother’s obsession with clean clothing, tidiness and neatness, even on our family holidays, was to avert that judging on the part of her brothers’ wives and her own sisters. It reminded me of Coolah and I didn’t like it at all. I wanted more than fussing about the small stuff. I wanted the larger things in life to come my way.

  chapter eight

  MY PARENTS’ SOCIAL LIFE

  Three Dinner Dances and one Annual Ball were the main fundraising events that were held each year in Coolah. These events took place in the freshly decorated town hall; live music would rock the main street until the early hours of the morning. Attending these events demonstrated support for the town, the wider community and often a worthy cause. I, like everyone else in Coolah, could name the people who had attended and those people who had not supported any of these events. My parents did attend and engaged a babysitter until I turned twelve, when I took charge of my three brothers. My parents loved to dance and they could dance well. We children witnessed smiling faces and glimpses of fondness for one another as they left for the night. That was an exciting rarity; on par with the day our house had arrived on two trucks. My father’s favourite songs were belted out on the stereo for two days before the event, as he sang along. He showed off his ability to twist right down to the floor without using his hands as props, grabbing me as a partner to practice the jive and the twist.

  The non-attendees at these four events were noticed. They required an excuse to quickly circulate to barricade themselves against speculation. “We were out of town,” or “Such and such was sick.” If an alibi was not forthcoming, comments such as, “They weren’t at the ball, but I saw the light on in their home,” or “Fancy not attending the ball,” or “They clearly don’t support the community,” would duly circulate. It was best to get in first. The one night that my parents chose not attend a ball for no good reason, we all had to go to bed very early, with our lights off, so that other people would assume that we were away. My mother was busy spreading her excuse days before the night of the ball. She knew how it all worked. On the day of a dinner dance or annual ball that my parents were attending, my mother was again very busy. We had to eat dinner before the babysitter arrived. She would have been in a cleaning frenzy for two days, until our home was spotless, ready for the babysitter to see. A special treat, chocolate and lollies, was left for us to eat, once our dinner had settled.

  My mother flitted from room to room, preparing for the night out. I watched her place rollers in her hair with precision, and she would have the blow dryer and hairspray ready on her dresser. She retrieved her special make-up bag from the bottom drawer and showered with a plastic hairnet to keep the rollers dry, afterward slipping a petticoat over her head. I lay on her bed and watched her during the getting-ready-for-the-ball ritual. She would begin to apply her make-up with a light tan foundation that was gently smeared all over her face, “To cover up all my splotches,” she told me. Blue eye shadow was then delicately brushed on. Mascara curled her eyelashes, emphasising darkness and length. A pink powder was gently stroked onto her cheeks to lift up her cheekbones. She sucked in her cheeks, to check that the colour was even. My mother would then ask for my help, which was the moment that I had been waiting for. I would remove a beautiful evening dress from its hanger as she lowered her chin against her neck. I would hold the dress away from her newly applied make-up and drape it over her head. She would wiggle her arms through the armholes as they slipped in. I would then zip her up, assuring her that her make-up was not altered. She removed the hair rollers one by one, as I watched for the moment when her hair would be released from the rollers. With her dress on, she then gently brushed out the curls but not too much. I would be asked to lightly spray the hairspray as one of her hands covered her eyes and her other hand directed me. I repeated this action until she was satisfied. Finally she applied her lipstick carefully. She looked so beautiful, her usual harshness and sternness nowhere to be seen. I felt unusually close to her in those moments.

  My father took ten minutes to shower and put on his suit, in contrast to the hour that my mother would take to get ready. Our parents stood before us smiling, dressed up, and anticipating a night of socialising and dancing. I once delayed them by insisting on a photograph—trying to capture the happiness forever. My father’s dance moves carried him to their car, as he danced backwards to the porch to collect the esky full of beer, orange juice, lemonade and ice.

  The next morning, the moment my mother opened her mouth, we all knew how the night had gone. It would be one of two ways and there was no in-between. My mother spoke nicely to my father if he had “pulled himself up,” or she was despising toward him if he had “crossed the line.” She snarled “the bastard” and “the alcoholic,” if my father had indulged excessively in alcohol. If so, we all kept out of her way. Confined to bed, needing to sleep longer, dad would ask me to please get some Panadol and water for his headache. He absorbed the verbal lashings for a couple of days as he nursed his giant hangover. Or if self-control had ruled the day then my mother’s pleasantries would fill the air the next morning. Only then was it safe for me to venture in and lie on their bed to quiz them. Who went to the ball? What was so-and-so wearing? Did you see so-and-so? Who was dancing? How did they dance? As my teetotal mother had her senses tuned, eyes wide open and ears pricked up she could recall all of the minute details. She would fondly talk about the waltz, rock and roll and jive dancing. My father would jump out of bed to demonstrate how he had danced the night before and to mimic others. I would be in fits of laughter.

  Tongues wagged as
the gossip-mongering women of the town woke early the next morning to relive the previous night, without hangovers. Our phone would always run hot for a week after any of these events. I would ask about my running coach and his wife, hoping the response might differ, but it never did. “Mr and Mrs Cunnings did go. They were on our table, but they didn’t dance. They just sat there all night,” my mother replied every time.

  The getting-ready-for-the-event ritual was the most intimate time that I spent with my mother at any point in my entire life. This was the only time that any softness of her voice, tenderness of her touch, or her beauty as captured in the mirror, reflected onto me. I felt it. A warm and fuzzy feeling soaked through my skin as I gamely let my barriers down to lie on her bed. The next day the barriers were back up. I had no choice in the matter. We never had a strong mother-daughter bond or relationship. We differed so greatly from one another. Learning a language, travel, and an education, became my destiny, not marriage and children.

  *

  At seventeen and a half I attended my first Coolah Ball. With a bottle of lemonade, my dress and high heels on, I sat all night watching the dynamics of the other residents. I chose not to dance, as awkwardness danced its own strange rhythm within me. I watched my father’s behaviour: he filled his beer glass when my mother’s glance was directed elsewhere and he soon became oblivious to the details of the night. He also consumed alcohol in front of her, as much as he felt that she could tolerate. The two of them danced as I watched on, smiling. My parents were at their best and the happiest on the dance floor. Intrigue filled me as I watched Mr and Mrs Cunnings from my place at their table, but out of earshot, whilst the rest of the table danced. My mind wandered as the evening progressed. Was it a physical thing, whereby he knew his legs were made for running not dancing? Maybe he had no sense of rhythm or felt awkward like me. Was dancing promiscuous to him? Did being a strict Catholic stop him from dancing and consuming alcohol? His wife sat loyally by his side all evening, rather than dance. Being a strict Catholic is about self-control, order and discipline. Dancing is about self-expression, freedom and movement. Yet I looked around and saw many Catholics dancing and drinking at the ball. My mother rattled off Catholics’ names the next morning in her list of “indulgers” from the night before. Establishing a link between being a strict Catholic, and dancing and drinking alcohol didn’t work. Mr Cunnings, if asked, replied, “I do not dance”. He simply stated the fact without judgement of others. I watched my mother and father on the dance floor, smiling, liking, and admiring each other with twinkles in their eyes. Did Mrs and Mrs Cunnings do this in the privacy of their own home? Mrs Cunnings never smiled; maybe dancing would have loosened up her facial muscles. These were the kinds of thoughts I had after my first ball.

  *

  My father loved having a good time, actually, many good times in a row. Drinking, cards, horse racing and table tennis were his vices. My father played table tennis with Dr Desmond, the chemist, and other townie folks for over two years. Only the men played. The women who were present served nibbles and washed up. The host homes were those without children so that my mother was let off the hook of preparing a supper. My father was very popular with the table tennis blokes, as he could hit a ball and hold his liquor at the same time. On his return, late at night, my mother could tell if he had exceeded his small six pack of beers that he had carried to the host’s house in his esky. The host bloke often bought out hard liquor as the night progressed, merely a night cap, two or three or four or more. My mother was more tolerant because this additional liquor was free, unlike the pub and club’s alcohol. Her supper enquiries were persistant, especially about the doctor’s and the chemist’s houses. My mother judged a good hosting on the food, rather than the table tennis, beers, or additional drinks provided by the host. My father always came home happy regardless. “I won!!” he would often sing out the next morning. We all felt proud of our father’s table tennis ability. As a drunk, he was harmless, playing records, dancing or challenging me to a game of table tennis. He was never abusive, violent or threatening, not even once. “Love you Princess!” came out of his mouth again and again, infuriating my mother. Although he was a happy drunk, the aftermath with my mother always created a disaster zone that I had to tread ever so carefully around.

  *

  I attended the two Coolah Central School dances held annually for my secondary schooling years. For me, the one dress in my wardrobe was sufficient, but my mother wanted me in a different dress for each of these functions. I knew that the dresses attracted compliments.

  “My, your daughter does look lovely. Is that a new dress?” said a townie, directly to my mother. My mother swelled with pride as the responses supported her mothering ability. Alternatively, she might get “Is that the same dress I saw her in last time?” or hear it as a critical comment circulating via a whisper, as a hand half covered a mouth. My mother, so sensitive to the possibility of gossip in this town, always tried to rise above it.

  I viewed it as completely meaningless, if a woman wore a new dress or an old dress, a previously worn dress, or no dress at all, but rather a skirt and shirt or even trousers. I thought that for women to wear flat shoes, so that walking and dancing could be achieved with ease, made more sense than wearing high heels. I noticed and admired some women’s ability to walk and dance easily in such shoes. I was resigned to the fact that my lack of ease and my height prohibited me from dancing in high-heeled shoes. High shoes, flat shoes, or no shoes at all: whatever made women comfortable and confident. I had already decided to place no value on the way that other women dressed.

  The day after a community social function, my mother always commented that so-and-so had a few drinks and took their shoes off to dance later in the evening. “A woman should always have her shoes on whilst out in public,” she said.

  “It must be easier to dance in bare feet than in high heels,” I would reply to her.

  “That’s not the point. A woman should look respectable all night,” she said. I wondered why my mother always talked about women rather than men. My mother seemed to have two different standards, one for women, and another one for men.

  At Coolah functions, the drinking women noticed the watchful gaze of the teetotal women, during the early part of the evening. As the night progressed and the alcohol gradually slipped into their bloodstreams, their senses were heightened and inhibitions lost. They danced wildly and their memory became fluid, and they ceased to notice the gaze of the other women. The shoe kicking-off women with alcohol-filled veins were intoxicated, fun, relaxed. According to the teetotal women, my mother being one, they were behaving in an unruly and uncouth way. Whispers circulated. The men’s drinking and associated behaviours attracted no comment; all judgement was reserved for the drinking women. Shortly after the last song, their husbands helped the drinking women to collect their shoes and belongings and insisted on a steadying arm to walk their wobbly wives out of the community hall. The other women proudly walked on without such assistance. I imagine the next morning these wobbly women reached for a Panadol, as regrets and paranoia seeped in and reassurance was required from their husbands about their previous night’s behaviour.

  *

  My ability to gauge my father’s alcohol consumption was skewed by my mother’s views—her teetotaller’s perception. She was belligerent in her views about anyone who did drink. She tolerated males having a couple of drinks, but had zero tolerance to women drinking. Her tolerance of my father’s alcohol consumption was lower than that which she applied to other male drinkers. “Come on, two beers will do you. We’re leaving now,” she would announce as he downed the last mouthful. My mother only ever drove to the pub to collect my father, never to socialise, believing that a pub was not a place for women. After my father had consumed two beers (or three if he could slip an extra one in) she was known to sit in the family car outside the pub and beep the horn, rest for half a minute, and then beep the horn again. Everyone in the pub heard the horn
, as did most of Binnia Street and they all knew who it was. “Princess is waiting for you!” said his mates, laughing. As his male friends often bought him one more beer, to tease him, and prolong his departure, he was known to be able to scull a schooner in a few seconds. After five minutes of beeping with breaks, my mother continually beeped the horn without a break until my father appeared. “You better go home with her, Princess has gone off again!” would be the comment from one of his male friends, laughing even harder.

  “She’s hard but fair,” he famously said every time.

  My father knew that dinner awaited him, if he got in the car. My mother was satisfied when she got him out of the pub and home for the meal she had prepared, but he still copped a mouthful.

  My father was often socialising with male friends when my mother was at home looking after the kids and preparing dinner. Yet he never drank alcohol at home and he refused to mix kids’ sports with alcohol, despite many other local fathers doing so in public. I assumed he drank a huge amount whilst out socialising with male friends away from his wife. We knew that our mother would berate him if he drank with male friends a couple of nights in a row. As the car pulled up, and my father the passenger would drunkenly stumble up the driveway to the back door, one of two things happened. He snuck in without being heard by my mother, went straight to bed and snored. Or he sang out loudly, “Where are you Princess?” and entered the house happy and wanting to play records if the back door was unlocked. If it was locked, and he had to knock, my mother would open the door and shout “Get in here you drunk bastard and be quiet!” Or she might have locked the back door early, in which case, on his arrival we all had to pretend to be asleep. Once my father realised that no-one was going to unlock the back door, he would fumble for his work keys and yell out “Goodnight, love you all.” He would then walk the fifteen minutes to his work and sleep the night on his mattress, pillow and blanket that had been stored there for these kinds of occasions.