February 2005 . . .
Wombat News
New books
The February Garden
. what to plant
. keeping your cool
. how to keep flies from your eyes and mozzies from your ankles
. how to grow apples
Recipe: Wombat Muffins
StoryŠthe first day at school
Intro
My brain is marshmallow, and thunder is shaking the house and the grass growing so fast it's about to sneak in the window and strangle my computer, or maybe that's just wishful thinking.
I've spent the last fortnight on Phredde and the Runaway Ghost Train. She has finally flown off to Harper Collins, to be edited, illustrated, bounced off to the printers and then hopefully to kids next November, while I write this and hope my brain returns by tomorrow, so I can get into more research for a book of a quite different kind.
More thunder...that was enough to shake the valley. The clouds are floating down the valley, which means that the rain will ease soon, blast it. Wish it would rain for at least three days, but this has been such a good season, still drought, but a gentle one. Every time the creek stops it rains again about 48 hours later. Long showers, lots of grass, and the new trees that sat there doing nothing for the last four years have doubled in size.
Other news
We've just bought the place next door- well, us and the bank. We're in the middle of doing it up, painting, new floor coverings etc but if anyone with a particular love of wombats wants a cottage to rent in the Araluen Valley, with an optional four acre paddock, fruit trees, and a view of the cliffs, let us know.
Wombat News
Not a wombat to be seen, or a wombat dropping either. I'd think they'd been kidnapped by aliens if it wasn't for the shrieking match Mothball and Flat White had last night just as I was trying to get to sleep, about 30 cm from my pillow. That wombat can yellŠ
Not sure who won, but it was probably Mothball. The others shriek a bit, but Mothball bites. Though Flat White isn't a bad biter either.
They were probably fighting over the wombat hole under our bedroom, the one that Mothball dug years ago. Mothball does not like to share her hole, and even if she's in the one down under the avocado trees for a few nights she makes sure no one else sleeps in her other one.
We're still officially in drought, and the sub soil is still dry, but we've had lots of small falls so there is ankle high grass, pretty much a wombat paradise. When it dries up again Mothball will probably remember us...and remember it's been months since she's had a carrot ... and it's all our fault.
Garden news - the mystery fruit
We have been eating. And eating. It is hard to convince yourself in mid summer that no matter how much fruit you guzzle, you the chooks and the wallabies can't possibly eat all that fruit, and you'll go mad if you try to turn it into jam or chutney.
Peaches, plums of many kinds. and blast it, I'm not going to list all the fruit or I'll get guilt pangs about not doing anything with it.
The best has been a native fruit, and for the life of me I don't know what it is. It's one that I planted from seed about twelve years ago after a trip to north Queensland. The seed was given to me by a mob of kids as they dragged me through the bush showing me all their favourite trees and the pool where the crocodile slept.
I took the seeds home- a bit yucky in my pocket- and the tree grew waist high, with tiny leaves- a bit like lillypilly leaves.
Then nothing happened. It didn't die in frost or drought. It didn't grow any more either, or flower. Then this year it decided to give just one fruit and then three months later one more fruit and then anotherŠ..
And it is incredible- the size of a very large plum, but with a really tiny seed inside, dark purple skin, very white flesh, wonderfully sweet, fragrant, juicyŠI just wish I knew what it is! I've checked it against all the common rainforest fruits, and it doesn't match. It's one of the best fruits I have eaten.
Latest books
. 'Rocket Your Child into Reading' Šabout how to teach kids to read and overcoming reading difficulties
. 'Phredde and the Vampire Footie Team'
. 'Pete the Sheep' (with Bruce Whatley... and the rest of the team who brought you 'Diary of a Wombat')!!!!!
Plus... 'To the Moon and Back' with Bryan Sullivan (otherwise known as He Who Mutters at the Wombat), 'Tom Appleby, Convict Boy' and 'My Dad the Dragon and My Uncle Gus the Garden Gnome' also came out last year
Coming in early April:
'They Came in Viking Ships'Š. a novel featuring Freydis Ericsdaughter, the Viking explorer forgotten by history- I have a feeling the male historians didn't know what to make of her- Hekja the Scottish runner and Snarf, a dog. (Snarf is the only one not mentioned in the Sagas, but he should have been.)
'The Secret World of Wombats'Š about guess whoŠall the dirt on wombats, and the stories of a few of them
And thenŠ.
'My Uncle Wal the Werewolf'
'How to Grow your own Spaceship'
'Phredde and the Runaway Ghost Train'
Schedule this year so far:
March 10th, 11th and 12th Melville Festival, Perth
Thursday 10 March, 2005
2:00 pm - 3:00 pm Herbs and Gardening talk
AH Bracks Library, Cnr Canning Hway and Stock Rd
Contact: AH Bracks Library or Dymocks Garden City Tel: 9364 0115
Cost $3 includes afternoon tea, bookings essential
4:00 pm - 5:00 pm Wombat Reading
AH Bracks Library, Cnr Canning Hway and Stock Rd
Contact: AH Bracks Library or Dymocks Garden City Tel: 9364 0115
Free Event
6:30 pm - 7:45 pm Rocket Your Child into Reading
AH Bracks Library, Cnr Canning Hway and Stock Rd
Contact: AH Bracks Library or Dymocks Garden City Tel: 9364 0115
Cost $3 includes light supper, bookings essential
Friday 11 March, 2005
2:00 pm - 3:00 pm Rocket Your Child into Reading
Willagee Community Centre, Archibald Street, Willagee
Contact: Willagee Community Centre Tel: 9364 0848
Cost $2, bookings essential
7:00 pm - 11:00 pm George Negus and Jackie French – Literary Dinner
Bluewater Grill, Heathcote Cultural Centre, Duncraig Road, Applecross
Contact: Bluewater Grill Tel: 9315 7700
Cost $70, includes 3 course meal, wine and beer, bookings essential
Saturday 12 March, 2005
9:30 am - 11:00 am Young Booklovers' Breakfast – Wombats and other stories
Bluewater Grill, Heathcote Cultural Centre, Duncraig Road, Applecross
Contact: Bluewater Grill Tel: 9315 7700
Cost children $2, adults $5, includes light breakfast, bookings essential
March 17th, Librarians' Conference, Harrietville Victoria
March 18th, 19th and 20th, Two Fires Festival, Braidwood
March 27th (Easter Sunday), Two Open Garden Workshops here
Bookings essential – there are only forty places in each workshop. Each workshop will go for three hours and will include morning or afternoon tea. There will be a general talk for about an hour with questions, then a tour around the garden explaining how we can grow 266 types of fruit here, including tropicals like avocadoes, bananas, sapotes, coffee, cinnamon and how we use groves to protect our trees from frost, heat, drought, possums, birds and winds like the breath of hell. Kids over eight welcomeŠ but be aware that there are water hazards and machinery so it isn't suitable for kids under eight.
Contact the Open Garden Scheme for details at act@opengarden.org.au
April 8th, 9th and 10th, ASLA Conference, Canberra, including a 'Meet the Wombats and Have Lunch' tour down here. (Wombats not guaranteed, but you'll certainly see lots of wombat holes! Plus hear the true history behind the books.)
April 23rd and 24th, Conflux Sci-Fi Conference, Canberra
May 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th, Talks and workshops at Bowen, Qld. Contact Susan Conolly at Queen's Beach State School, 07 4785 1255
June 6-12 Storylines Literary Festival in New Zealand
June 22nd and 23rd, Gardening School at Toowoomba, Qld.
August 15th, 16th and 17th, Sydney Book Week talks
August 22nd, 23rd and 24th, Melbourne Book Week talks
Sept 30th - October 1st, Bega, NSW Rural Women's gathering
(Also hope to get to Brisbane a few times this year as well.)
If you'd like to book talks or workshops contact Lateral Learning (Lateral Learning, bookings@laterallearning.com) – often I can fit in other events when I'm in the area. But please don't contact them just to get a message to me!
As Lateral Learning is a booking agency they only take bookings for paid talks and charge a fee for all bookings. If your event is non-profit it's best to write to me directly at PO Box 63, Braidwood, 2622 to see if I can fit it in , or email Harper Collins.
But I'm not sure how much more voluntary work I can handle in 2005.
What to do in the February garden
. plant all the veg you want to eat this winter..if you put them in now they'll have time to grow before the cold. Many veg don't die in cold weather, but they don't grow much either
. start bunging in all the flowers you want to bloom over winter too
. hack back wisteria
. trim hedges and topiary
. feed veg and flowers, and winter and spring flowering shrubs like camellias (their new buds are forming now)
. if spitfires- clusters of grubs- gather in your gum tree, bash them down with a broom, then tread on them with boots on. The squirming mass falls easily- no need for sprays!
. put your mower on the highest setting- longer grass doesn't brown off as fast
hand pollinate pumpkins and melons with a tiny paint brush if heat or rain is preventing fruit set
. pick all ripe fruit and tomatoes- the scent not only attracts fruit flies, but the smell of fermenting fruit attracts lots of other pests too, from stink bugs to aphids.
What to plant:
Subtropical and tropical areas
Food plants: strawberries, sweet potatoes, passionfruit vines, parsley and other herbs, plant beetroot, capsicum, carrot, caulies, celery, cucumber, eggplant, lettuce seedlings (lettuce seeds may not germinate in the heat), paak tsoi, pumpkin, radish, silver beet, sweet corn, tomatoes, watermelon.
Flowering plants: flowering vines, hibiscus, bougainvilleas, tropical evergreen fruit trees, ageratum, celosia, cosmos, coleus, Iceland poppy, salvia, sunflowers.
Temperate to cold areas
Food plants: citrus, avocadoes and other evergreen trees, strawberries, passionfruit and banana passionfruit, rhubarb, blueberries, artichoke, beans, beetroot, broccoli, cabbage, carrots (try the tiny, fat, fast maturing ones in cold climates), coriander, sweet corn (fast maturing varieties only), leek, lettuce, white onions, parsley, salad greens like corn salad, mizuna, cress, red Italian chicory, silver beet, spring onions, spinach.
Flowering plants: spring flowering bulbs like iris, daffs and jonquils (look for heat tolerant ones in warmer areas, like Earlicheer jonquils) alyssum, stocks, and LOTS of flowers to give you colour and cheer through winter- pansies, violas, primulas, Iceland poppies, wallflowers, polyanthus
PS plant seedlings at night to minimise the shock; I drape shade cloth over ours for a few days
Beating the Heat!
. use a crushed rock mulch- it lasts forever, helps keeps soil moist - and cool air at night condenses around the rocks and your garden gets tiny trickle of water
. don't just water trees- hose yourself, the kids and the dog at the same time!
. vine covered pergolas give lots of shade and greenery for very little water
. if your hose keeps kinking, invest in one of the new 'non kink' varieties! They are pricier, but last longer- and save a lot of bending and unkinking!
. Take hanging baskets down on days with searing wind and heat- they'll be more sheltered at ground level! Rest their bases in bucket of water for an hour to help revive hot wilted baskets.
.Get rid of big bummed baskets!
Bored with baskets that have a host of flowers on top and big brown boring bums? Cut SMALL holes in the sides of the basket, and plant alyssum, petunias, primulas, pansies: smallish trailing sun loving plants. Feed and water the top as usual.
How to Grow Apples
Apples
Why bother?
o apples are probably the world's favourite fruit
o if you grow mid, late and early varieties you'll have home grown ones every day of the year
o an apple tree in blossom is one of the glories of spring
Crab apples
Some crab apples are grown purely for their flowers; others have small, hard but very useful fruit. They make most excellent jelly, and a few can be added to other jams to help them set - crab apples are very high in pectin. Crab apples usually linger on the tree well into autumn, and can be a most beautiful display, unless the birds eat them first. Although theoretically crab apples can be hit by fruit fly or codling moth, they usually aren't.
Floribunda is perhaps the best for massed flowers, but it has tiny useless apples. John Downie has perhaps the best 'apples' - they're reddish orange and the size of small eggs. They're also good for cider. There are at least two red leafed, red fruited crab apple varieties - good display trees, and also useful, and one with stunning purple flesh that makes the most glorious jelly you have ever seen.
PS As large fruited crab apples are harder and sourer than ordinary apples, birds prefer them. They can be a useful decoy fruit, keeping birds away from a more valuable crop.
Where to grow apples:
In fertile, moist soil. They tolerate lots of neglect once fully grown. There are apple varieties to suit all climates- ASK!
o grow a hedge of dwarf apples along your fence (but dwarf apples aren't as wind or drought hardy- though still pretty good)
o grow an apple tree near your favourite window - you'll get a good view of both fruit and blossom (and be able to yell at the parrots when they come for a feed). It'll also shade the window in summer and let the light though in winter.
Plant the seeds? Plant apple seed either as soon as its picked, or chill it in the fridge, in the fruit, for two months before planting. It may not germinate till next spring. Most apple trees grow reasonably like their parents, but crosses are common, especially if there are several varieties flowering at once. Seedling apple trees grow tall and are very hardy, frost and drought proof- take a look at those seedlings by the side of the road.
How to keep alive: If you live in an area that gets fruit fly or codling moth apples are NOT easy to grow. (Well, they are easy to grow - it's just that the pests will get the fruit before you do.)
So - grow dwarf apple trees instead, then net them from December till picking time with fruit fly excluding net. This will also keep out codling moth. Dwarf apples also give you a good crop sooner - in maybe a year or two from planting - and you get MUCH more fruit for the space.
Try a hedge of dwarf apples along your fence - keep them pruned neat and level. Or grow a few in tubs on a patio. (Ballerina apples are those tall stick-like apple trees - okay if you have VERY limited space but pretty ugly looking. I prefer normal dwarf apples.)
These days I mostly grow very early apples, that fruit in November, December, January before fruit fly numbers start to really explode, or very late ones that crop in June or July when the fruit fly aren't active around here- still lurking in citrus, unless we take care, but not rampaging. .
PS. Many crab apples are bite-size and quite sweet; they make great jelly, are good stewed and the flowers are GLORIOUS in spring (there is nothing like a driveway lined with crab apple trees - and fruit fly and codling moth don't like them as much).
Fruit fly and codling moth
We control our codling moth and fruit fly by making sure there is a three weeks gap between ripening crops, by growing parsnips wild under the trees (their flowers attract pest eating predators) and by letting the fruit 'overripen' on the tree. Infected fruit falls prematurely, and if you feed that AT ONCE to animals you'll break the fruit fly/codling moth cycle.
YOU MUST HAVE TWO TREES OR A MULTI-GRAFT TO CROSS POLLINATE OR YOU WON'T GET ANY FRUIT. Ask your nursery when you buy your trees to make sure you're buying varieties that pollinate each other or buy a multi-graft - two or more varieties on one tree. Granny Smith usually pollinates any other varieties.
Pruning: don't bother for a backyard tree. Different varieties have different pruning needs - but if you don't mind lots of smaller apples, you'll find that unpruned trees suffer less bird damage and ripen unevenly - which is what the home grower wants. (Commercial growers need fruit that ripens all at once for ease and economy of picking). Unpruned branches are weighed downwards by their fruit and develop more fruiting spurs on the upper surface. You end up with a wider and wider tree. If it becomes too messy, prune thin and tangled growth every few years. Start NEXT TO THE TRUNK and work outwards.
Harvest:
Dunno - when they're ripe (a bit like 'cook until cooked'). Apples ripen from late November to mid July. If you don't know what variety of fruit you have, take one of the fruit down to your local nursery and ask or enquire what time of year the fruit is ripe when you buy the tree.
When in doubt, have a nibble and see if it's sweet enough - and if it doesn't come off the tree into your hand when you nudge it, it's not ripe enough. As a general rule, pick when a few sweet fruit fall to the ground or when apples almost fall into your hand when you pick them - 'Picking Dates' really don't suit all areas of the country (Jonathons, for example, 'should' be picked on the 14 February - ours aren't really sweet till a month later and then they're incredible).
PS. I try to leave the apples on the tree for at least another three weeks after they're supposed to be ripe. They keep getting bigger and sweeter. Birds like their fruit sourer than I do, and just ignore the ripe apples if they can get their beaks into a green one. Don't pick apples till you need them - they keep longer on the tree. Store in as cool a place as you can find. If fruit fly are a problem, wrap each apple individually in newspaper. They can be reused year later year.
Which ones to grow: Apples ripen from late November to mid July. If you're sticking to the varieties commonly available, the earliest are Gravensteins in late January; and the latest are Lady Williams, which ripen from June till mid or even late July. However there are hundreds of varieties of apples available in Australia. (We have 115 varieties here). The earliest that ripens here is Irish Peach which ripens in late November. It's a good tart, softish apple. Beauty of Bath is an excellent apple, ripening about two weeks before Gravenstein- like Gravenstein though it turns floury pretty soon, but doesn't have Gravensteins slightly turpentine taste. Our latest are Lady Williams (a really great multipurpose apple) and French Crab (a good cooking apple that cooks into a fine slush). Sturmer Pippin is wonderful- it is best after it's been picked for a month or two, and is stunning picked in July and sliced into salads in November.
Generally, later season apples are better keepers; very early apples are best eaten straight off the tree or they turn soft and lose their best flavour - I find shop bought Gravensteins have an unpleasant aftertaste, and no subtle taste of sunlight and soil. Very late apples are less likely to be infested with fruit fly, and I find they are much more welcome than yet another tree load of fruit in late summer. It's also a heck of a lot easier to store apples on the tree than in a box.
In other words, I'd grow at least one very early apple, and two very late ones so you have enough to store till the next crop. I'd also add at least two mid season apples- whichever are your favourites. (Mine are Golden Delicious - which only really have a good flavour if they are fresh and home grown) and Cox's Orange Pippin, which needs a cooler climate than ours for a good flavour. Bryan likes Macintosh (mostly because he likes Macintosh computers) and Edward likes Granny Smiths sliced with salad dressing, or the giant Prince Edward apples. I also love cooking apples like Bramleys and Twenty Ounce - they boil down to the most wonderful soft fluff.
If you're interested in apples, contact Bob Magnus, PO Woodbridge 7162 Tasmania. His trees are grafted onto dwarfing stock, perfect for hedges or espaliers. (On the other hand larger trees are usually tougher, and withstand drought, heat and cold better. They're also easier to prune 'tall' to keep them out of wallaby and sheep reach.)
Store:
Apples need to be kept cool - they will ripen as much in one day at 70 F as in ten days at 30 F. Try the fridge or dig a cool pit in a shady place, line it with bricks or stone and cover with corrugated iron etc or store them in the best insulated part of the house. Try packing them in crumpled newspaper. One friend took an old fridge and buried it door upwards in the shade and stored the apples there. To get to the apples you just open the door. (Warning- remove the catch on any old fridge so children can't be trapped in them.)
Eating:
Apple and Quince (optional) Sauce
1 large quince (optional)
3 tablespoons sugar
6 apples
grated rind of an orange and a lemon
a bottle of cider
Simmer all ingredients till broken down and thick. Bottle and seal. This can be used as a jam or chutney (great with pork or turkey) or eaten with pancakes or icecream. Or just scoff the lot the night you make it.
Jellied Apple Squares
( Peel and core apples; boil with a very little water till slushy. Add an equal weight of sugar and the zest of two lemons or limes. Boil again till the sugar grains have all dissolved and the juice looks perfectly clear. Spread on a greased tray and cut into squares when cold or pour into small greased moulds and tip out when set. The latter look beautiful and can be served with thick cream.
Dried apples without a dryer
Peel apples; slice as thinly as possible, then as you slice them dunk into water and lemon juice - 1 lemon to 3 cups water.
Now thread them onto a needle and thread - leave about a finger space between each slice. Hang them up in the sun and wind, preferably under the eaves of the house where they won't get wet in the dew or rain. Bring them in when they feel rubbery.
Apple Jelly
1 kilo apples (any variety, including crab apples, but red skinned ones give a clear red jelly)
white sugar
Water
Slice but don't core or peel apples. Cover with water. Simmer till soft. Strain- I bung mine through a strainer, then pour that juice through a clean old stocking- the more finely you strain out the pulp, the cleare your jelly will be.
For every cup of juice add 1 cup of sugar. Simmer, stirring often, till a little dabbed on a cold saucer turns into jelly. Pour into clean jars at once and seal.
Blackberry and apple jelly: replace half the apples with blackberries, or loganberries, mulberries or raspberries etc.
Rose petal, lemon leaf, mint or other herb jellies: Add mint leaves, rose petals, scented geranium/pelargonium leaves, lemon or lime leaves, lemon grass stems, a few dried cloves, hunks of fresh ginger root etc to the final stage of jelly simmering. Use a slotted spoon to hoik them out before you pour it into jars. This technique will give you exquisite and very interesting jellies - the savoury ones are good with cold meat, the sweet ones stunning with scones et al.
Other uses:
Crab Apple Necklaces
Thread crab apples on doubled cotton with a needle. Tie them off securely and place in a pan with a syrup of three cups of water, three cups of sugar and a third of a cup of white vinegar. There should be enough syrup to cover the fruit. Leave overnight. Simmer till the syrup is almost gone - don't boil too hard; the whole simmering should take at least an hour or two. Take the necklaces out of the sticky pans and hang them up to dry. As long as the weather is dry they can stay hanging for long time; if it's humid take them down when they're crisp and store in greaseproof paper in a sealed jar till needed.
Crab apple necklaces are excellent decorations for a Christmas tree or round Christmas stockings. Eat them as sweets or instead of sugared almonds
How to Keep the Flies out of your Eyes (and the mozzies off your ankles)
I think it must be a gardener's dream to find a plant they can grow that will keep off the pests that bug them as they garden - the mozzies that suck your ankles, the flies clustering round your eyes, the sandflies that attack you in any vulnerable place they can find.
Sadly, while there are many plants that these pests don't like, none of them are strong enough to keep them away from you - just to keep them off the plants themselves. Unless you are actually gardening under the plant - or rub the leaves or flowers on your skin - there'll be minimal effect on the bugs around you.
Mozzies, for example, are repelled by marigold flowers - marigolds give off volatile chemicals called thiophenes that will also kill adult larval mosquitoes - but you'd have to be lying down in a patch of flowers to get much protection. Mozzies also don't like lavender flowers and balm of Gilead or citronella grass, but unless you distil the essential oils of these and apply it, there won't be much anti-pest effect. Sandflies dislike marigolds and lavender too.
Mozzies like still, shady gardens- a bit of careful pruning will let in the breeze and discourage the little biters. Avoid ferns and other moist leafed plants next to outdoor seats, and change the water every day in dogs bowls and drain saucers under pots regularly to discourage mozzies.
As for flies - while wormwood, stinking roger, elder trees, tansy and many other plants contain fly repelling substances, basil is the only plant that repels them without being made into a fly spray or lotion. But you need an awful lot of basil to repel flies, not just a pot on the windowsill. A giant bucket in the doorway is more like it - and it's even more effective if you keep brushing against it.
There is one foolproof method, however, to keep the flies out of your eyes while you're gardening - wear a big hat. Most of the flies that bother you outside are bush flies - and bush flies are claustrophobic - they don't like enclosed spaces. Houseflies, on the other hand, don't like the great outdoors. They'll try to get in while bush flies will try to get out.
A wide brimmed hat that casts good deep shade on your face will give bush flies the heebie jeebies. They'll keep away from the 'enclosed space' around your face... and of course there are other advantages to wearing a hat as well.
Recipe
Wombat Muffins
(carrots for the wombats; rounded choc tops that look like wombats)
Ingredients
3 large raw carrots, peeled and grated OR 2 large beetroot, NOT canned, cooked, peeled and grated
1 and three quaters of a cup SR flour
third cup cocoa powder
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
third of a cup olive oil
third of a cup buttermilk
Put oven on to 225C while you mix the muffins. Muffins must be put into ahot oven or they won't rise well.
Mix well, by hand- mechanical mixers over beat them.
Place in greased muffin pan or paper cups. Cook for about 25 minutes, or till well risen and kitchen smells of chocolate. Check after 20 minutes to make sure they aren't singeing on top.
BACK TO SCHOOL
(I wrote this many years ago. My Dad just asked me to email it to him for the first school day of his step grandson. It made me quite sentimental to read it again, about a son who has faced far greater adventures now than this; anyway, for any parent/ grandparent who has just faced the First Day, here it is again.)
My first day at school was also my teachers'. She wore high heels and stockings and a dress that covered shoulders and bosom. This was the 1950's, even if it was the middle of a Queensland summer, and the amount of flesh that could be shown was limited.
Decades later I can still remember her terror as she gazed at us, braided and Brylcreamed and waiting to cry or chatter or be taught. Her voice was unsteady as she lifted the cane and grazed the board, diving right into our education and pointing to an 'A'. There were over forty of us.
I don't think we understood any of it. But it made a good impression on the parents outside.
The parents watched critically through the window in case she tortured us or mentioned sex or evolution or any other new fangled idea she'd got from teaching college. I found out later she was only two years trained, which given Queensland's education system at the time might have made her as young as eighteen or as old as twenty.
The headmaster prowled the corridors and cleared his throat in the doorway before barking messages of loyalty and dedication to school and Queen and country and the state of Queensland.
School loyalty came first. It was clear which side we were expected to be on if the school ever declared war on the rest of Australia.
Her name was Miss Davies. She mostly wore dark skirts and dark shoes. I can't remember her top half much. It was mostly from below that I looked at her, craning up to see her face. I think she had dark hair. She certainly wore perfume, or maybe it was just talcum powder. Aunts and Uncles always gave you talcum powder in those days.
I do remember her kindness and her enthusiasm. I wrote my first book length work for Miss Davies, all six and a half pages of it. She stapled it together for me, and wrote to me when she was transferred to another school, after I had progressed up from the two years of infants to primary with its bare dirt play ground beaten down by a thousand bare feet, smelling of crusts and orange peel, to thank me for the 'book'.
I suppose I was scared that day I started school. I was certainly bored, going over the letters my mother had drummed into me years before. I was definitely hot. I remember the sweat beading down onto the desk and how the paper was too damp to write on. I cried at one stage too, which was probably terror, but I only remember the tears now and not the emotion.
Watching your children start school is infinitely more terrifying.
'I can't go.' Edward announced after breakfast.
'Why not?
'I've hurt my wrist'. He held it out to me.
'Where?' I asked, examining it.
'Somewhere there.' he answered vaguely.
'It looks okay to me.' I said, hoping to get back to the washing up.
'How about my foot then?' he inquired, bringing it out on display.' Pete trod on it yesterday.'
'It looks fine" I assured him. He looked at me doubtfully.' See that yellow bit there?" he pointed out.
I shook my head. He looked for it again "It was there last night'. he assured me.
Later though, dressed in school uniform, posing for photographs on the lawn, bounding down towards the school "Come on Mum, there's kids there already!' he seemed quite happy. I was the tearful one. They look so much older in school uniform.
'Mum!'
'Yes?'
'I forgot my handkerchief.'
I went back for it while he sat on the grass and examined his lunch box. (new, red, with his name on. He'd grown out of his preschool lunch box he said.)
'Mum! We forgot my school hat.'
'We'll remember it tomorrow.' I said.
'Mum! What if they forget to teach me to read?'
He took my hand on the footpath and then reconsidered. (I heard a mother lament afterwards 'He wouldn't hold my hand. He held his friends though!')
We joined the horde of kids and parents in the hall. All of us nervous. The names were called out. Edward kissed me considerately and went off to join his friends. The boys crowded towards the back and the girls in front. He looked blasé in the back chatting with his friends. I sat with the parents in the audience. A small girl at one end started to cry. You could feel the tension rising in the parents- would she set the lot off? but she didn't, and they marched out waving.
Suddenly you realise that one day your child will be an adult. You realise how much they already have a life of their own. As my father says :They're only borrowed.'
Schools don't smell the same as they did in the fifties. Maybe the garbage is collected more often (we had great bins for the food scraps, collected once a week for the piggeries. I liked the thought of my vegemite crusts being savoured by a hungry pig). The smell of new steel from the new prefabs for us baby boomers has mellowed too, though after three decades the temporary classrooms are still there. I suppose school bags still smell the same-of slightly fermented fruit juice and musty peel and the indefinable scent of school books. I'll have to wait a few weeks till Edward's mellows to find out.
There seems to be less concrete now, more landscaping (I saw my first erosion gullies in the playground where the rain had etched the soil from hot bare ground). Teachers wear slacks and jazzy earrings instead of neck to knee dresses. They still look kind.
The school buses still line up like lions along the road waiting for feeding time. The shrieks of hundreds of kids playing are still the same.
I checked my watch every five minutes to make sure I wasn't late picking him up on his first day. I thought of sentimentally rifling through his baby clothes, but did some work instead. I wondered if there was a 'parents anonymous' where parents could go after they'd sent their child off for the first day of school for comfort.
The new mums gathered that afternoon like a horde of bright rosellas against the duller school uniforms. None of us were quite sure what to do or where to go. The kids were more blasé. It was a bit of an anti climax.
Edward bounced out of school complaining that no one had taught him ANYTHING so he'd NEVER learn to read and why I hadn't thought to provide him with an elder brother at school 'like everyone else has.' Also he'd forgotten to eat his lunch, he'd been too busy, could he have a sandwich please?
I watched as he came back from his world to the one we share. For a time.
Jackie French