CHAPTER 7

My Saviours

Mum was lonely now Dad was away, and decided it would be nice to live near her parents. And Nana would make a great babysitter. So, we packed up our bayside flat and rented a house a 15-minute walk away from Grandpa and Nana’s in West Brunswick.

Nana was to become my saviour. Unlike Mum, she had mastered the womanly arts of loving and caring, including lots of hugs and cuddles. She would take me on her lap and we would be lulled together in her rocking chair. She would tell me stories and give me treats even when it wasn’t a proper meal time. She never worried they might spoil my appetite. She was good at cooking, sewing, gardening, nurturing, entertaining and treating little boys. She could grow tomatoes and make jam. She loved feeding me and I loved being fed.

Every Saturday she had a ritual of cooking a roast dinner in her wood-burning, one-fire stove. The “roast dinner” was always a special treat and known as “dinner” at midday or evening. Usually, it would be a leg or a forequarter of lamb. Sometimes we had a sirloin of beef. With the meat she would roast potatoes, carrots, parsnips and onions. On top of the stove, she would boil beans or peas. I liked peas best because Nana and I would pod them together. She was concerned beans were too dangerous because they required a sharp knife.

I could hardly believe that Nana liked talking to me. Whereas Mum was always telling me to shut up, go away and play or go to my room, Nana was bliss. She was tiny and as I grew, I measured myself against her and decided she was shrinking. She thought that was very funny.

Mum liked Nana, but she’d always told me privately Grandpa was a real tyrant, always calling him ‘Grumps’. ‘It’s our little joke,’ Mum said as she gave me a little smile. I thought it best if I gave her a little smile back.

I knew Grandpa was a Mason because near his front door he had a huge framed picture of all the big bosses in the Masons. You couldn’t miss it. They were all old men with big beards and moustaches. And they hated Catholics like my father.

But when we moved to West Brunswick, I got to know and like Grandpa. I was thrilled just to be eating and sitting by the warm stove in his kitchen. He never hit me or even threatened to box my ears like Mum. I accepted Grandpa might belong to the children-should-be-seen-and-not-heard school, but I was happy to be quiet while he listened to the news. It was much better than being at home with Mum.

He had always been interested in modern things and had built himself an early wireless called a crystal set. Now he had bought himself a beaut wireless and built a 40-foot-high aerial in the back yard to get good short-wave reception. He could hear about the war from the BBC in London and other wireless stations around the world. Aeroplanes were barely invented when he took a joy flight. Mum said it cost a bundle, but Grandpa reckoned it was worth every penny.

I enjoyed being with Grandpa on a Saturday night when we would listen to the police radio called D-24 from the Russell Street police headquarters. We’d hear about fights, domestic violence and drunken disturbances. Sometimes there’d be a burglary; it was exciting when the dispatcher was calling the patrol cars and they were all talking to one another.

He smoked a pipe with special Dutch tobacco that smelt nicer than Mum’s cigarettes. He carried the tobacco in a rounded silver case which fitted in his waistcoat pocket opposite his silver pocket watch. He had a big humidor for his bulk supply of tobacco, and a very sharp pocket knife for cutting it up. Also, a special ashtray with a place for his pipe, all kept within reach on a shelf beside the wireless.

Grandpa was a very organised man and I learned to admire him. However, I also learnt one thing about him that very few people knew. He had a chamber pot under the big brass bed he shared with Nana in the front room. I crawled under the bed one morning after he’d gone to work and in the chamber pot was the biggest turd I’d ever seen – so big it was scary; I hurried away, realising Nana would somehow have to carry it to the lavatory and drown it.

On Saturday after our yummy roast dinner, Nana and I washed up. I’d stand on a chair and help dry the dishes. When I was little, I was allowed to dry cutlery except for the knives. Nana said it was so I wouldn’t cut the tea towels, but I think she worried I might cut myself. Mum never worried about me hurting myself. If I did, she’d tell me to stop being a sissy and dry my eyes. If she was really angry, she’d yell, ‘Stop that bloody grizzling or I’ll give you something to really cry about.’

I liked Nana a lot. I think I liked Mum too, but I was scared of her. Sometimes she’d hit me with a belt that had a buckle on it. It was the one Dad used for sharpening his razor blades. She’d go for the belt yelling, ‘I’ll give it to you, you little bugger!’ I would be running my best, but not fast enough to get away and wishing I was bigger when I would really run away forever.

I don’t think my father ever hit me when I was little. He didn’t have much to do with me and rarely touched me. People used to ask where my father was and I would say he was in the war. He’d come home on leave for a few days bringing his friend Alan, and, with Mum, they’d all get drunk together. He used to play the piano when he was drunk and I liked that. I’d be in my bedroom listening to him through the lounge room wall singing ‘When Irish Eyes Are Smiling’.

The piano was Dad’s great talent and joy, something he excelled at. It was the only thing my parents bought on a layby plan. A man used to come to our front door every fortnight and Mum would give him 10 shillings and sixpence, which he recorded with a pencil in his little book.

It was different at Nana and Grandpa’s because they didn’t drink. They lived in the kitchen, which was warm and cosy with the wood stove and smelt good with Nana’s cooking. After the Saturday roast dinner, Grandpa would resume woodworking in his shed and Nana and I would prepare for the Saturday afternoon baking. After covering the dining table with a cloth, she would take out her big pastry board.

‘We wouldn’t want to waste a nice hot oven, would we?’ During the afternoon she would make sausage rolls for that evening’s meal plus a big jam tart or an apple pie. Then Anzac biscuits, a fruitcake and a plain cake with orange icing. Sometimes she made a delicious beef or lamb pie with the pastry on top in a pattern of leaves and flowers; she would go round the edge with a fork to make it look pretty. I wasn’t very good at helping, but Nana never got cross. I couldn’t turn the beaters fast like she did, but I was really good at licking them. She had a collection of tins for baking which she filled every Saturday arvo, even though there was only her and Grandpa. They needed lots of treats because in addition to breakfast, dinner and tea, they also ate morning tea, afternoon tea and supper with two sorts of cakes and two biscuits each time. I thought I was in heaven. Nana said I was a growing boy and should eat a lot. Mum said I had hollow legs and was greedy. I liked Nana’s place best.

Sometimes Nana would make a bath just for me. She had a gas hot water heater over the bath that didn’t need wood. At home we had a bath with a chip heater, but Mum said she couldn’t afford to buy wood; she would boil up the big kettle and the little kettle on our gas stove, but it was never hot and deep like Nana’s.

Nana regularly visited us and would always bring me a treat. If I was sick with a cold, she’d make a special pie just for me. When I had my tonsils out, she visited every day with a special custard for people with sore throats. I loved it. I think I loved my nana. I was not too sure what love really was, but I knew love was for people you liked and hate for people we didn’t like. We really hated the Germans and the Italians.