Back to the paddocks
It’s time to head back to the paddocks; this time, it’s over to Leeton to pick the oranges. The paddocks are hard work but we tell jokes and sing songs, too, and have a little play around. We really work hard. Mummy works the hardest—even harder than Daddy. He’s not with us again on this trip.
Sometimes, it’s real hot and all you wanna do is sit in the shade of the tree and do nothing. But we know we gotta make a living. Some of the trees are really big and have lotsa fruit on them. Mummy always tries to give us kids the side with the shade, when she can, but no matter how you try to fit your body into the shade of the tree, the sun always seems to find you. Mummy’s always standing on a ladder, picking the fruit off the top of the tree. It’s the hardest job. The bigger kids pick the sides of the tree—that way, it’s easier for them to reach the fruit. And me, I’m the smallest, so I gotta crawl into the middle of the tree to get all the ones inside. That’s my job and I’m pretty good at it; I never leave any behind.
Oranges are fun but you gotta watch the spikes on the branches; you can get lotsa scratches if you’re not careful. So we all wear long-sleeved shirts, even if it’s boiling hot, and we even wear gloves ’cause the thorns scratch you to bits. Mummy always wears a floppy old canvas hat and an old man’s long-sleeved flannelette shirt, otherwise she’d be burnt real bad. She tries to make us kids wear a hat, too. Each morning, as we leave the hut, our hats are on our heads but they don’t last there too long.
When I’m climbing in the middle of the trees, I really do like feeling important helping my family although I always worry a little bit about scratching my face. Some days, when it’s really hot and the sweat is dripping off you and your body is all sticky and wet, you really don’t feel like picking. Then, Mummy will give us lotsa spells. In the morning and afternoon, when it’s time for a spell, Mummy sings out ‘smoko’. Quick as lightning, we flick our buckets from around our necks and sit in the shade. We all know we can sit and rest for twenty minutes. Us kids tease Mummy. We ask her if we can have a smoke, too, since it’s called ‘smoko’ and she has one. She laughs with us and tells us ‘no’ and she hopes we never pick up ‘the dirty things’.
Mummy has a cup of tea and us kids get a cold drink from the water bottle. We got two: one filled up with water and the other with cordial. It’s just what you need to cool down and we always have something to eat, too—biscuits or cakes. We have little spells, too, but we gotta wait for smoko for a big spell.
When it’s lunchtime, Mummy sings out, ‘Tuckertime!’ Then we have lunch underneath the tree that we just finished picking. We got a tucker bag filled with bread and butter, Vegemite, tomatoes and onions and even a can of baked beans. If the paddock is close to our hut, Mummy will send us girls down to turn the jug on and to start making sandwiches for everyone but that doesn’t happen too often because, most times, the paddocks are too far away.
Picking fruit comes in pretty handy, too, if you’ve done something wrong, because Mummy can’t get to you to give you a smack. She’ll just tell you off; but sometimes, if you did something that’s real bad, she’ll wait till smoko and get you then. Usually, her telling you off is good enough. I think all our energy, especially Mummy’s, is taken up picking the fruit and climbing the ladders so she never worries too much on wasting her energy trying to catch us.
If we’ve done something wrong and the Boss has caught us, we had better tell Mummy before he does, so we wait until Mummy’s around the other side of the tree and sing out to her then. When she answers, we start to tell her.
‘Mummy.’
‘Yes, babe.’ I can tell in her voice she’s tired.
‘You know we weren’t supposed to go swimming in the dam yesterday after we knocked off ?’
‘Yes, babe.’
‘Well, it was real hot so we thought we’d have a swim to cool off and the Boss caught us.’
Then she’ll start telling us off. We gotta tell her, though. We’d be in a lot more trouble if the Boss told her before we did.
Each day, we gotta pick enough cases or bins to get enough money to keep us and get a house. Every morning, Mummy tells us how many cases or bins we need for the day and, when we get that many, then we can knock off. We always gotta fill our quota for the day. Usually, Mummy stays in the paddocks a bit longer.