Cousin John's Inheritance Chapter 3. 38 Baker St Enfield, 1935.

She was surprised to see his hand, usually so steady, shaking as he pulled on the hand brake outside Number thirty-eight.

‘What’s the matter?’

Hovee looked down at his hand, then followed it as she lifted, then pressed it to her face to kiss his palm. He drew a deep breath and opened the door. ‘I’ll be all right, let’s go in.’

They came together again on the tiled pathway to his father’s Federation cottage. He would usually go up the side driveway past the arum lilies and the gas meter, to the back door, but the front door seemed appropriate on this occasion.

She giggled, squeezing his hand. ‘Hovee Ray! I do believe you are frightened to tell them.’

‘Call me Bill in the house. They all call me Bill.’

‘I know, but I like your name.’ She said it slowly, her voice quavering with laughter: ‘Hoveeeee.’

As they approached the heavy cedar door, its upper half inlaid with lead-light parrots and green eucalyptus leaves, it was opened by eight-year old Mary, her older sister Clarissa close behind. Mary turned back and called into the dark house. “Mum, it’s Bill and he’s with a lady!’

Clarissa nodded to Violet and held the door wider for her to enter. ‘Is this your ladyfriend, Bill? Won’t you introduce us?’

Hovee was flustered. ‘Um, sorry. Clissy, this is my um… this is Violet Dupond.’

Clarissa held out her hand to be shaken, but Violet moved in and hugged her. ‘Bill has told me so much about you.’ Clarissa was released from Violet’s embraces as her mother Mary approached, drying her hands on a kitchen apron. She hugged Hovee, stood back to look at Violet then turned back to Hovee. ‘She’s lovely Bill, can we keep her?’ She laughed then took Violet’s hand. I heard Bill tell Clissy your name’s Violet. Can I call you Vi?’

Violet was dragged through a lounge room of dark cedar furniture and drawn Venetian blinds by this short jolly woman whose brown skin and huge dark eyes hinted at ancestry that was most likely Aboriginal. She looked hard at Hovee, seeking any racial hint but there was no sign to confirm her suspicion. She had little time to wonder, as she was hustled down a dark hallway, past several closed doors she guessed to be bedrooms, past a kitchen on her right and out into an airy space, long and narrow, one side whitewashed and the other lit by clear glass louvered windows that had once been a verandah. Slanting July sun warmed the white wall and reflected its cheeriness.

Sitting in a heavy leather chair, was a bald man who did not stand, but smiled nevertheless when introduced. He paused a moment to assess her as she continued to smile for him, then waved Hovee and Violet to a two-seater opposite. ‘I’m the father of this rascal, so you can tell me what trouble he had gotten you into.’ He laughed then and held up his hand to forestall a reply. ‘Don’t worry, I brought up my boys to be gentlemen and my girls to be ladies. I am sure he has done nothing untoward.’ He raised one eyebrow in question, but did not wait for an answer before addressing Hovee as if they had already been talking about his engagement. ‘Where did you find this delightful creature?’

‘Um… we met on a building site… she was driving a truck for her father and um…’

The old man laughed, cutting him off, then looked up at Mary in time to catch her puzzled frown. Truck driving was not an occupation that would be considered suitable for a Brethren woman, but his continued direct gaze indicated that he was interested more than he was judgemental.

‘And is that what you do for a job?’

She laughed. ‘Oh no, I was helping Dad on a day off. I’m a nurse’s aide at Fairfield Hospital.’

‘And what does your father do, Violet?’

She cast a glance at Hovee and back to the old man. ‘He is a carrier mainly, but there’s not much work to be had, so he does odd jobs.’

She had told Hovee that her father had been too hung-over to drive the truck that day, but she was not about to tell the old man. She took Hovee’s hand in warning that her revelation to him was privileged information.

Her movement was noted by the old man but he chose to ignore it.

Mary senior reappeared beside her. ‘Will you take tea, my dear?’

Violet nodded, relieved. ‘Yes please, tea would be nice.’

Escorted by daughters Clarissa and Mary, she left the room. They could be heard whispering as they crowded into the kitchen. Hovee Senior glanced their way then reached for an enamelled tin box and opened it to offer Violet its contents. ‘I hope you like caramel.’ She took one but kept it in her hand. He noticed, nodding. ‘It’s nice. Stafford gets them at Rawleigh’s.’

‘Thank you,’ she smiled gently, ‘I’ll have it in a minute.’

She noted his continued attention on the hand holding onto Hovee and decided she should make the announcement that was the purpose of their visit. ‘As you might have guessed, Bill and I are engaged to be married.’

He snapped the Rawleigh’s sweets lid closed. ‘But you’re not in the Meeting, are you?’

Violet’s questioning eyes sought Hovee’s as he squirmed in his seat as the old man turned to him. ‘You can’t marry her unless she’s in the Meeting.’

‘She’ll join the meeting, Dad.’

His father turned back to Violet. ‘I take it your family is not in the Meeting?’

Hovee’s face registered such desolation that she needed to take charge. ‘No, none of my family is in the Meeting,’ “whatever that is,” she thought to herself. ‘But I’ll join, if that’s what I must do before we are married. What do I need to do?’

‘It’s not quite that simple,’ the old man replied. ‘You need to accept the teachings of our church as the only way to the One True God.’ He observed her confusion, looked to Hovee and barked. ‘She’s not a Catholic, is she?’

Hovee opened his mouth to speak but Violet was quicker. ‘My mother was Irish Catholic, my father is a heathen, but I am my own person and I can be whatever I want to be.’ She popped the sweet into her mouth. ‘Delicious!’ she exclaimed, then continued. ‘And I want to marry your son and join the Brethren.’

Hovee watched with amazement. No woman had ever talked to his father like that. He expected a blaze of wrath but instead, the old man laughed, shaking his head, also in amazement.

Just then, Clarissa entered with a tray of tea, milk and sugar with his wife Mary right behind carrying scones, jam and cream. Clarissa slid the Rawleigh’s tin aside and placed the tray in front of her father as Violet leant against Hovee and patted his hand.

The old man was watching, so she smiled. ‘Can I pour your tea, Mr Ray?’

She took the tea pot and held it over his cup. ‘How do you like it?’

‘White and strong.’ He poured milk into his cup then glanced up at his wife’s concerned face, smiling at what seemed a private joke, but she was not interested in responding to his standing joke about her skin colour and continued to look worried. He turned back to Violet. ‘Yes. White and strong. Come to the Meeting at Ashfield tomorrow night and hear my sermon.’

Her eyes were on his face, inviting him to continue. ‘It’s about Jezebel, a woman who led her husband away from God to worship false gods.’ He sat back and folded his hands over his generous abdomen. ‘She came to a sticky end. Her own servants threw her out of a high window and her corpse was left in the street to be eaten by dogs.’

Violet looked at him steadily, amusement curling her lips as she paused to pour his tea. ‘I’m sure she deserved everything that came her way.’ Hovee shook his head in wonder at how this young woman, who had claimed his heart and body, had so effortlessly tamed his formidable father. He also knew the old man was an intelligent judge of people and if she stepped over a line that seemed to have been moved just for her, his anger would be all the greater for a perceived deception.

Cousin John's Inheritance, Chapter 2. Violet.

22.  Fairfield 1935.

‘I’ll have to ask Dad.’

Violet Enid Dupond was behind the wheel of Hovee’s 1926 Rugby that she had steered into the lane, to come to a stop out of sight of passers-by.

She pushed the gear stick forward as he slid across the seat to kiss her again. ‘You’re twenty-one, we can elope?’

She pushed him back. ‘I want a wedding like Madge, white dress, flowers, bridesmaid, wine…’

He moved away as she pushed to lean his arm on the door. ‘I don’t think I could afford any of that and I don’t think George could either.’ He looked over the windowless door to stare across paddocks where shadows lengthened, mist rising from meadow grass through cooling air. She said nothing, watching and waiting for her big man to think it through.

She smiled to herself while he turned to her, his face crumpling as it might have done when he found his Christmas stocking lacked what he had hoped for. She turned away then flopped backward, her head resting on his thighs. His big face was now looking down at her laughing eyes. She smiled, inviting. ‘I can ask Marge to lend me her dress. Mary can be bridesmaid.’

‘Dad won’t allow wine, you know.’ He was smiling too now, love filling his heart, warming his stomach, energising his penis, a pressing, pleasant discomfort. They had played this game before and his body warmed in anticipation.

He moved to ease himself. She laughed as she rolled over to bite him through thick moleskin work trousers, then reached up to slip suspenders from his shoulders and with help, worked the waistband down until he was free and in her mouth. His left hand cradled her head as his right slipped inside her pants to find her clitoris.

Hovee’s cry of release was more than that. Pleasure was moderated by fear. His father’s presence was with them in their cramped space and although he could no longer feel the razor strop, he felt the dread, and there was God.

But even his God was not enough to overcome his love at that moment. He lifted her face to kiss her again, tasting his own saltiness, then pulled up his trousers, walked around the ute to take its crank handle and through exertion, leave less head space for “knowledge of good and evil”, spinning the cranky old engine until it spluttered to life.

Violet had moved behind the wheel to adjust spark timing and mixture, so it soon settled into a clunky idle.

With the engine ticking over, now ready to move off, he felt calmer, as if he had turned a page on something in his life. It was not the first time she had done that. When he first spoke to her, a woman not from the Meeting, he had broken a seal on his church imposed morality and knew he would follow this woman, wherever she might lead.

But as much as he wanted… needed to love her completely, he was afraid she might become pregnant. It was a fear that joined others, pumped into his growing mind over the years by froth-mouthed preachers and his father, who added a physical reality through regular thrashing, lest the rod be spared and the child be spoilt.

He needed her so much. But he also needed to be able to provide. His own father seemed to find enough work to keep the adult sons employed; building cottages for wealthy Exclusive Brethren clients, and there was just enough to feed his wife and six children still at home. But there never seemed to be enough to pay wages. He pressed the button to kill the engine and turned back to her.

‘Do you want to try that again?’

For a moment she was confused, but as he slipped his trousers off and moved over to kiss her again, she pushed her pants to the floor and lifted herself onto him.

This time it was Violet who climaxed first, crying in joy that her man loved her enough to overcome his demons and if only for a short time, defy his family, his church and his god.

She came again with him, this time deeper, profound. She felt they had sealed a compact that would hold for their lifetimes.

And the compact held. On the way it would be bent and battered, but would endure to the end.

‘I’m getting married!’

Her announcement stopped the conversation as surely as if she had said ‘fuck!’

Brother George Osterley, going on seventeen, already in trouble with the police for driving without a licence, but with his father’s permission, broke the silence. ‘What desperate flamin’ idiot’d marry you, dog face?’ He laughed but was slapped by his father who glared at her from across the table.

‘You’re not marrying that wowser from the bloody Brethren? Not that bastard Hovee Ray! ’ He turned to his wife’s shocked face. ‘Martha, tell her she can’t marry that idiot.’

Martha turned away from Gorge and placed her cutlery carefully on the Irish linen tablecloth. Her daughter’s face lost its excitement as she watched and it hurt her more than George could ever do.

But Violet was the only one of the family in regular work as a nurse’s aide and they needed the money. In that few seconds of silence, her thoughts raced over their lives; the struggle to get food onto the table, George’s drinking, his fighting and the fines. Martha was suddenly aware of the stink of tobacco smoke wafting over her and wondered what it would be like to be married to a non-smoking teetotaller, who never swore, who spoke respectfully and addressed her “Mrs Dupond”.

At that moment she despised her husband. She knew she would pay with a beating later, and if he was able, rape. But she reached out to lay her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. ‘That’s nice Dear, when’s the wedding?’

George lifted himself out of his chair and leaned across the table. ‘She’s not marrying that bloody poofter while she lives here!’ 

Martha sat back but stared him in the eye. ‘She’s twenty-one, George. She can marry who she likes.’

In the space created by George’s surprise, Violet smiled at him. ‘Dad, I want it to be a nice wedding.’

‘Nice wedding be buggered!’ he yelled. ‘If you marry that ponce, you can go find somewhere else to bloody live.’

Violet stood to face her father. He frightened her still, but she was more frightened for her mother.

‘I am twenty-one and can marry without your permission, but I would like you to give me away and all that.’

‘And what is bloody “all that”? I hope you don’t expect me to pay for any flamin’ wedding. Bugger that! Let the wowsers pay for the bloody thing. I’m not!’ He sat and poured another glass of beer while she stared at him. He took a swig then went back to his sausages and mash.

Violet looked to her mother who was quietly weeping into her apron. ‘Don’t worry Dad. I don’t expect you to do anything. I’ll do it myself.’

‘And what about your pay packet, my girl? We need it here. You’re not going anywhere!’ He slammed his glass down, some beer sloshing over the edge. ‘If you go near that bastard again, I’ll smash his face in. Then you’ll see what he’s really like. He just wants your money, the slimy bastard.’

Eleven year old Louis, sitting on the other side of his mother, feared his father’s temper more than most. He had inherited his mother’s more petite features and so was often beaten as his mother’s surrogate. He was whimpering in the presence of his father’s anger. Martha glared at George and stood, lifting Louis to his feet. ‘Come on Darling, let’s wash your face.’

George sneered as he took the now almost empty beer bottle and upended it into his glass. ‘That’s right Martha, spoil the bloody kid.’

Martha left the room with Louis and Violet following her out. George turned to sixteen-year old Margaret. ‘Get me another beer from the ice chest will you Love, there’s a good girl.’

New novel; Cousin John's Inheritance. Prologue and chapter 1.

Hello any wonderful reader who chances upon this post.

For those who know me, they might welcome this, the beginning of my next novel, I have provisionally titled 'Cousin John's Inheritance'.

This story was one of many I found while reading my grandmother, Eusebia's diaries. It is the story of a brave woman from an abusive home who married a good man, who unfortunately could not father children.

How my aunt Violet navigated her marriage and her life almost defies belief, but as they say, 'truth is stranger'.

I have posted the the prologue and the first chapter for your perusal and hope you can find time to follow her story as she tries so hard to make a home for her husband and then to create a family with his (probably) reluctant cooperation. But as you will see, he loved her enough to go to lengths that few men would, to keep her and help her fulfill her dearest wish, that is, to become a mother. 

I do hope you can stick with me to follow her story as I post chapter s as they are written. I do know how it all ends, but you will have to wait. I have a wager running with my Sister-in-law Cate that it will be finished by the end of June. I do expect to win and hope you enjoy reading this story.

Cousin John’s Inheritance.

Prologue:

Eusebia’s diary.  Sunday, October 12 1924, “Ella and Owen went to Orangeville. Father, Marjorie and Eric walked over to the melon patch”, until April 21 1959. “I have to go to hospital tomorrow to be operated on for a cyst”,

Every day for these thirty-five years, Eusebia Turnbull entered her day’s events into a diary.

For several days from the 5^th of June 1971, her elder daughter and trusted keeper of her legacy, sat inside a locked room, anxiously reading her mother’s account of family history.

Ella Turnbull Jones was a student of literature and had a degree to prove it, so one could have presumed that her mother’s legacy was her interest. But on this occasion, she was searching for clues to specific events.

Her brother Owen had unburdened himself of a secret, so profound that it threatened to destroy much of what she had sacrificed so many years to achieve. Although she could be reasonably sure the secret would die with his passing, she was equally sure her mother knew and could not have resisted recording at least a hint of it in her diary.

On the first count she was wrong, but on the second, her frantic search revealed the information she sought and she would attempt to remove all traces of it from the record.

So, she concentrated on certain years, tearing out pages and half pages that could have been used in a court of law to challenge her brother’s will, and so undo the years she had slaved to ensure her son’s inheritance of the family property, "Coromandel".

At the death of his father Irwin, Owen Turnbull inherited Coromandel, and although the farm had passed to him free of debt, it had never managed to create enough wealth to take advantage of the agricultural revolution sweeping across the world. It needed a capital injection and Ella Jones offered to lend him enough to build dams and buy machinery that would provide irrigation water and transform the property.

But there were conditions. One condition was that: should he die before the loan had been repaid, “Coromandel would be bequeathed to Ella’s only child, Walter Turnbull Jones”, proud member of the Turnbull clan, nice guy and congenital incompetent.

But the secret did not die with the passing of Owen, and although Ella’s vandalism had successfully prevented a challenge to Owen’s will, she failed to destroy the facts, clues to which still remained in her mother’s writing in Esperanto, a language in which Eusebia was expert, but not known to Ella. There was also the memory of Owen’s own confession to his other sister, Marjorie, that had been passed on to her elder son, the teller of this story.

1. Ella.

For a woman of letters, to tear out a page of history, rip it up and burn it, was an impelling indication of her anguish. Here, a few words in Eusebia’s diary could destroy what she had strived for all her life. Of course, the conditions of the loan were weighted in her favour. Of course, she had grabbed with both hands the opportunity to control Coromandel. For goodness sake, none of those ignorant bumpkins was capable of even contemplating her vision, much less realising it. If she had her way, the Turnbull family would once again be in control of the family estate, or what was left of it, and none of it would be broken up and sold as were surrounding properties. “Owen with children? My God!”

As she watched the paper burn in the sink, guilt hit her as if she had been struck. Her breath laboured as she fought for control. The injured book was still as she had left it, thrown into the corner of the room, pages awry and open on the floor.

A cooler head would have read more, but the offensive words were gone and she could not bear to look at the book again. She picked it up and placed it carefully in the old butter box with the other diaries. Fifty years of family history, every day of every year reported faithfully in that stylish hand, oddly unchanging over the years from young bride to great-grandmother. Her mother. What had she done? She looked again at the ashes in the sink. Grey and black. They shouted their accusation.

Ella Turnbull Jones bent over the sink and bawled like a child. What a shit of a life. So much ambition, so much struggle, so many mistakes.

“Oh my God,” she whispered, “Oh my God, why are you punishing me still. Haven’t I suffered enough for my mistakes? My God, where will it end?”

Her tears fell on the ashes until she looked again, turned on the tap and let it run. As if to wash away the sin she rinsed her hands in the running stream. When the tears had abated enough for her to see, she turned off the water. A swell of emotion rose again threatening to gag as the stain was revealed. Was it really there or was it the negative after image of the desecration.

She reached for the kettle and lit the gas. A cup of tea. As the hands moved automatically to measure out the little black flakes of dried leaf, a modicum of calm began to overlay the pain. By the time the kettle boiled and the scalding water hissed into the pot she was again in control and that is where she had to be. If she had learned one thing in this life, it was to stay in control.

It had been a hard school. She cast off the morality of her religious home at a cost. With natural arrogance, she levered herself from the constraints of its conventions. But that same tool destroyed her humility, and what keeps most people grounded; the gift of self-doubt. But in the early years, life was there for the taking and she took it. Of all Eusebia’s children Ella was the only one to seek to exercise all her appetites. She ignored the tacit disapproval of her mother as she fell in love with, and married her first cousin, Edgar who was also her mother’s first cousin.

History was being repeated but with a difference. The abandon with which she had conducted that relationship died with the discovery that her son, her beautiful boy with the curly hair and calm eyes was already where he would always be; a man with a child’s mind. He would live without ambition, without pretension, without, without. His easy nature and confidence that the world would never hurt him were not enough for her. He would not be the one to complete the dream for himself. But she had gone too far to abandon her plans for him. She soon realised that if her plan was to succeed, she would have to do it all herself.

The words from the diary were gone but that act of destruction created a lie and that lie had its reflection in the destruction of her dream. Her guilt, knowing that what was left of the dream depended on maintaining a lie, killed her. Not right away, but the process started then and it would not take long.

1         2.     Fairfield 1935.

‘I’ll have to ask Dad.’

Violet Enid Dupond was behind the wheel of Hovee’s 1926 Rugby that she had steered into the lane, to come to a stop out of sight of passers-by.

She pushed the gear stick forward as he slid across the seat to kiss her again. ‘You’re twenty-one, we can elope?’

She pushed him back. ‘I want a wedding like Madge, white dress, flowers, bridesmaid, wine…’

He moved away as she pushed, to lean his arm on the door. ‘I don’t think I could afford any of that and I don’t think George could either.’ He looked over the windowless door to stare across paddocks where shadows lengthened, mist rising from meadow grass through cooling air. She said nothing, watching and waiting for her big man to think it through.

She smiled to herself while he turned to her, his face crumpling as it might have when he found his Christmas stocking lacked what he had hoped for. She turned away then flopped backward, her head resting on his thighs. His big face was now looking down at her laughing eyes. She smiled, inviting. ‘I can ask Marge to lend me her dress. Mary can be bridesmaid.’

‘Dad won’t allow wine, you know.’ He was smiling too now, love filling his heart, warming his stomach, energising his penis, a pressing, pleasant discomfort. They had played this game before and his body warmed in anticipation.

He moved to ease himself. She laughed as she rolled over to bite him through thick moleskin work trousers, then reached up to slip suspenders from his shoulders and with help, worked the waistband down until he was free and in her mouth. His left hand cradled her head as his right slipped inside her pants to find her clitoris.

Hovee’s cry of release was more than that. Pleasure was moderated by fear. His father’s presence was with them in their cramped space and although he could no longer feel the razor strop, he felt the dread, and there was God.

But even his God was not enough to overcome his love at that moment. He lifted her face to kiss her again, tasting his own saltiness, then pulled up his trousers, walked around the ute to take its crank handle and through exertion, leave less head space for “knowledge of good and evil”, spinning the cranky old engine until it spluttered to life.

Violet had moved behind the wheel to adjust spark timing and mixture, so it soon settled into a clunky idle.

With the engine ticking over, now ready to move off, he felt calmer, as if he had turned a page on something in his life. It was not the first time she had done that. When he first spoke to her, a woman not from the Meeting, he had broken a seal on his church imposed morality and knew he would follow this woman, wherever she might lead.

But as much as he wanted… needed to love her completely, he was afraid she might become pregnant. It was a fear that joined others, pumped into his growing mind over the years by froth-mouthed preachers and his father, who added a physical reality through regular thrashing, lest the rod be spared and the child be spoilt.

He needed her so much. But he also needed to be able to provide. His own father seemed to find enough work to keep the adult sons employed; building cottages for wealthy Exclusive Brethren clients, and there was just enough to feed his wife and six children still at home. But there never seemed to be enough to pay wages. He pressed the button to kill the engine and turned back to her.

‘Do you want to try that again?’

For a moment she was confused, but as he slipped his trousers off and moved over to kiss her again, she pushed her pants to the floor and lifted herself onto him.

This time it was Violet who climaxed first, crying in joy that her man loved her enough to overcome his demons and if only for a short time, defy his family, his church and his god.

She came again with him, this time deeper, profound. She felt they had sealed a compact that would hold for their lifetimes.

And the compact held. On the way it would be bent and battered, but would endure to the end.

‘I’m getting married!’

Her announcement stopped the conversation as surely as if she had said ‘fuck!’

Brother George Osterley, going on seventeen, already in trouble with the police for driving without a licence, but with his father’s permission, broke the silence. ‘What desperate flamin’ idiot’d marry you, dog face?’ He laughed but was slapped by his father who glared at her from across the table.

‘You’re not marrying that wowser from the bloody Brethren? Not that bastard Hovee Ray! ’ He turned to his wife’s shocked face. ‘Martha, tell her she can’t marry that idiot.’

Martha turned away from Gorge and placed her cutlery carefully on the Irish linen tablecloth. Her daughter’s face lost its excitement as she watched and it hurt her more than George could ever do.

But Violet was the only one of the family in regular work as a nurse’s aide and they needed the money. In that few seconds of silence, her thoughts raced over their lives; the struggle to get food onto the table, George’s drinking, his fighting and the fines. Martha was suddenly aware of the stink of tobacco smoke wafting over her and wondered what it would be like to be married to a non-smoking teetotaller, who never swore, who spoke respectfully and addressed her “Mrs Dupond”.

At that moment she despised her husband. She knew she would pay with a beating later, and if he was able, rape. But she reached out to lay her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. ‘That’s nice Dear, when’s the wedding?’

George lifted himself out of his chair and leaned across the table. ‘She’s not marrying that bloody poofter while she lives here!’ 

Martha sat back but stared him in the eye. ‘She’s twenty-one, George. She can marry who she likes.’

In the space created by George’s surprise, Violet smiled at him. ‘Dad, I want it to be a nice wedding.’

‘Nice wedding be buggered!’ he yelled. ‘If you marry that ponce, you can go find somewhere else to bloody live.’

Violet stood to face her father. He frightened her still, but she was more frightened for her mother.

‘I am twenty-one and can marry without your permission, but I would like you to give me away and all that.’

‘And what is bloody “all that”? I hope you don’t expect me to pay for any flamin’ wedding. Bugger that! Let the wowsers pay for the bloody thing. I’m not!’ He sat and poured another glass of beer while she stared at him. He took a swig then went back to his sausages and mash.

Violet looked to her mother who was quietly weeping into her apron. ‘Don’t worry Dad. I don’t expect you to do anything. I’ll do it myself.’

‘And what about your pay packet, my girl? We need it here. You’re not going anywhere!’ He slammed his glass down, some beer sloshing over the edge. ‘If you go near that bastard again, I’ll smash his face in. Then you’ll see what he’s really like. He just wants your money, the slimy bastard.’

Eleven year old Louis, sitting on the other side of his mother, feared his father’s temper more than most. He had inherited his mother’s more petite features and so was often beaten as his mother’s surrogate. He was whimpering in the presence of his father’s anger. Martha glared at George and stood, lifting Louis to his feet. ‘Come on Darling, let’s wash your face.’

George sneered as he took the now almost empty beer bottle and upended it into his glass. ‘That’s right Martha, spoil the bloody kid.’

Martha left the room with Louis and Violet following her out. George turned to sixteen-year old Margaret. ‘Get me another beer from the ice chest will you Love, there’s a good girl.’

Natures Hazardous Waste Dumps

lately, thinking about the economic and ecological balance sheet, I had an idea that is old hat for some, but it really shocked me. We have been willfully turning our back on what has been patently obvious for about half my lifetime.

We as a species have chosen to exhume what was secreted away by nature, so our environment could take advantage of our planet's Goldilocks Zone. We evolved in it, because of it, and to fit it exactly. It was as perfect as a planet could be.

But the planet started with an atmosphere of  mainly carbon dioxide and nitrogen. Then, that CO2 was sequestered away over millions of years, by plants and seaweeds as oil, coal, peat, natural gas and trees, leaving our atmosphere in a balance that allowed us and all modern life to flourish and be in balance.

In this sense, coal and oil etc are Nature's Hazardous Waste Dumps and there they stayed, untouched through the whole evolution of modern plants and animals. So what have we done with those hazardous wasted dumps? Surely we would not be dumb enough to dig exhume them?

Would you believe, that  for a few years' worth of wealth for some, we have been willing to sacrifice it all. Big miners, and the politician recipients of their campaign funds, took that attitude that their wealth was more important than the sustainability of life on Planet Earth. Through their mouthpieces in the media and in politics, they have confused us into thinking there might be an easier choice. They tell us that what science tells us is a conspiracy and it is OK to keep digging into the hazardous waste dumps. "Listen to the grown-ups and trust us!"

The very wealthy can pay any price for anything, while the rest of us have to deal with their mess. For a few years of cheap electricity and fuel, we are trading away: Clean air, uncontaminated water, a consistent sea level, a benign atmosphere, plankton and the fisheries that rely on them, coral reefs,  and the list goes on.

Do we really want to wait until river deltas, that feed perhaps three billion people, are ruined by salt water ingress? Do we wait until so many cities that have taken a thousand years to build, become awash and empty out? Do we want to watch the whole of Bangladesh become uninhabitable?
Many Island states are already going nderwater.  Do we really need to keep breeding ourselves into poverty and conflict?


We know what we have to do,we have the technology to do it, but we do not have the wisdom to go that last mile and fix it. And it has to be done now!

Am I being alarmist? Not for a moment. But I believe in democracy and am searching for a political party that GETS IT?

Frozen out?

Is this censorship or just a little power play?
We have been booking libraries and bookshops for the upcoming promotion tour since February, with expected success, generally achieving one appearance in each town.

But today, we find that Robinsons and QBD bookshops do not allow branches to accept even free author visits. All author visits are booked through HQ, after the book has been (my interpretation) discovered somehow, then vetted.

But wait, there is more. Then HQ approaches the Publisher who then informs the author that the above bookstore at wherever, has invited the author to appear at an event.  Who pays to get someone to an event hundreds of K's away unless they are a celebrity? My offer was free.

If one examines the minutiae of that for a minute, one can glean this very important message: "No author that is not already famous need apply to visit any of our bookshops!"
Luckily, the above retailers are now a relatively small player in book retail, and anyhow, Gulag is available at Booktopia (Australia) and Book Repository UK as paperback and I expect as an e-book at all the usuals and when Woodslane gets them out, in most retail bookshops except some who do not know what they missed. :-)

You just know my characters will get themselves into a heap of shit and this pair, Merpati and Tom McKinnon do not let us down.
Ask at your local bookstore too. It's good for me if a lot of people keep saying my name.

Cut to the chase.

 
Just yesterday I had a new thought. Well, it was for me. It was so profound, that it must have been through thousands of minds since we realised we had minds. However, as I have heard nobody say it in this way before, here it is. But first a preamble.

I was listening to our ABC Radio RN, as experts on Israeli-Palestinian relations were holding forth on the two-state solution that has evaded peace makers since the late 1940's, when Palestinians were displaced to make way for European Jews, decimated by the Nazi's and not really welcome to stay in Europe.

Even after Europe learned the extent of the evil visited upon the Jews, they were still not welcome en-masse, to stay in Europe.

So, how could the British fire upon them as they dragged their mad and sad families shore on the beaches of Palestine, to reclaim the land they were told God gave to Moses three thousand years before. I too read Leon Uris and was on their side.

Arafat and Rabin went close to coming to an agreement before the assassination of Rabin and the mysterious death of Arafat stopped the process. Despite efforts by many statesmen since, there seems to have been little to celebrate. Now I come to the radio story.

Opinion seems to be, that there is now no prospect of a two state solution. Israeli settlements creep further into the West Bank, walls have gone up, mistrust has become absolute and violence from outside and inside Israel is an everyday occurrence. Both groups have moved to a stage were peace is impossible and the only outcome will be an all-out war. Of course the Palestinians could never defeat the might of Israel alone, but if Iran also declared war on Israel and had the bomb....

Now, here is the thought: Anyone who has witnessed the before and afters of all the wars in their lifetime knows that the afters leave everyone much worse off than the befores. So much is destroyed, as destruction seems to pass unnoticed by the combatants in the pressure to not lose.

Then, often suddenly, as both sides stagger toward exhaustion, and there is no longer appetite for it and peace negotiations begin. Agreements are signed and everyone goes back to face the destruction.
Restoring the built environment sucks up vast amount of wealth and energy. Some economies never recover and even those that do could have used those resources to build onto, rather than replace. Then there is the human cost of lives lost, maimed to care for and even a gap in education of those who come next. All that is known and irrefutable.

So, what madness is it that prevents us from cutting out the middle bit? We are in the 'before', we know the issues. We know solutions are found after every war. But, historically, they have been found only after both sides have exhausted their economies and sacrificed their youth. So why must we always go straight to the violence?

My thoughts go to the idea that perhaps, most of us are still children. When it comes to dealing with a threat, we do not have negotiating skills. When a sibling wrests away a toy, we run to Daddy, and wonder be! We do the same when we are all grown up. And there always seems to be a Daddy ready to 'Shirtfront Mr Putin', 'Make America strong again','establish and Islamic state' - in other words: 'Leave it to me. Give me control of your freedom, your money, your youth and I'll take care of it.'

How's it been working so far?

Images googled from the web.

Being conned

I feel I have been conned.

It seems we are expected to all take for granted the wisdom of Economic Growth and not look at the cost. The Conservative parties are running their current election campaign on the mantra: 'Jobs and growth' and we are expected to not question its deeper implications.

Dick Smith, said it on One Plus One (ABC TV program): "We are already using one and a half times the resources of the planet and every step toward growth increases the environmental debt."
Then I read, and I wish I could claim this as mine: "I used to live in a community, but I now live in an economy".

It does not take a lot of deductive power to work out who benefits from 'Economic Growth'. The whole economy is wealthier in money term, as we whittle away at our sustainability, but it is corporations that really benefit. A corporation needs to grow so that its shares rise in value. That is what investors are looking for, and the game is set up to benefit them, offering tax breaks for the gamblers but not for those in it for the dividend.Gamblers are the wasted spaces who steal value from our enterprises and add nothing. It might be instructive to ask why we are shown the stock market report every TV news bulletin, but there is no corresponding index of CO2 rise, or sustainability index to give is the full picture, that is, real costs to the global community of Growth.

Of course, living in Australia, we tend to presume that our standard of living,with good public schools, medical facilities, power that rarely fails, water we can drink from the tap, sewerage systems, adequate pensions for all, public transport that might be tight in the cities, but compared with just about anywhere else, is reliable and safe, is deserved.

But we are in for a bit of a shock. Well, we are already in the shock, but are being shielded by governments that have not produced men or women that can be both brave and truthful enough to tell it like it is and really lead.

When I read Brave New World and '1984' in 1956, we all thought automation would reduce our working hours and our main problem would be finding something to do. I am still waiting.
It seems that those who have jobs of consequence work longer hours than ever, while others, for many reasons, are struggling to find any work at all while we try to create new industries to absorb them.

Yesterday at the bank, which I rarely visit, this time to deposit a cheque, I was advised that I can deposit cheques at any ATM. My insistence on seeing a real person was received with the sort of smile one reserves for the village idiot and maybe that is what it deserved in our Brave New World..

Anyway, back to Economic Growth. I admit we need it if we are to 'remain competitive' and we need it to create more jobs to replace those lost as we automate banks, supermarket checkouts, railway ticketing, train driving, create music, art and literature with computers, have university lecture halls where five hundred students watch a video of a lecture. We are told these create 'efficiencies' in the economy and are therefor automatically good, but are they?

Maybe I am wrong, but it seems to me that having a meaningful job, supporting oneself and family, comes naturally and is necessary for for human health. So, solving problems for oneself,even if that means doing things the hard way,making mistakes and learning, leads us to a better place than surrendering totally to the economic mantra of never-ending growth, that is leading us to where extinction is probable.

This week or the next, we reach 400PPM of CO2. We have known this was coming at least forty years ago, but as I said in CULL: 'We know the problem, we have the technology to fix it, but we lack the wisdom to apply it.'

We have an election in a few weeks but there is nobody standing that gives me confidence in their ability to at least articulate the big picture. Then again, anyone who does will not be elected. We really are still the lotus eaters and because we choose ignorance over engagement, deserve what is coming. In desperation, I will again vote Green.

Taking risks

Play equipment will never again be as much fun. We are so risk adverse these days, that I wonder why we seem to ignore the really big killers and maimers of children while we fuss over them and stop them from doing most of the things that made their grandparents resilient.
Perhaps it is because we feel we need to be able to control SOMETHING as individuals.

But what comes up when we compare the number of children who were once killed or maimed by playground equipment, with these modern maimers and killers?
Lead in gasoline.
Guns in the house.
Denial of medical facts, such as benefits of immunisation and of fluoride in water.
Domestic violence.
Climate change.
Driving dangerously.
Obesity.
Sexualisation of infants.

 If I was a kid now, I doubt I would rather play on modern (bland) playground equipment than do something a bit more daring for my adrenaline rush, like search the house for the gun we know is hidden somewhere, or watch that video Dad would not let us see, or see what happens when we take these pills.

Let kids find their limits, learn that a fall hurts, and why it happened.

PS. Well, Paris was a start. But, the language of reductions will not save us. Now we must stop talking about emission reduction and start talking about ZERO NET EMISSIONS, because every little bit of greenhouse gas we produce (above what is being removed naturally), raises greenhouse gas levels and the temperature keeps rising. Then there are hidden problems that must be factored in to get to ZERO NET, and here is one.

 In the paper this morning:
Methane from livestock produces 15% of global emissions.  
Our people in Paris are parting, 
All saying, they really are starting, 
To change their positions 
On greenhouse emissions. 
But who'll stop cattle from farting? 

If you liked this, you might also like this: http://staffordray.blogspot.com.au/2015/01/wet-dogs-kids-nazis-and-roundabouts.html 

PPS. Please visit other poets and writers at http://magpietales.blogspot.com.

There cannot be one person in the connected world who was not moved by images of that toddler dead on the beach. However, I wonder if we can imagine similar toddlers (and women and men) killed and maimed by air strikes in Syria. Nobody imagines that bombing Syria will end ISIL barbarism, so I ask would the money we spend on bombs, planes and all that goes with that, be better spent on supporting Syrian (and Iraqi) refugees in Lebanon and Jordan?
Of course, that would not help the hate and scare mongers get elected and re-elected.