Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.
I have this memory which has stuck with me, I think it always will really. I was walking up the stairs and as I walked up I could hear another argument, this one involved Mum, Dad and my brother.
My brother just got sent home early from camp because he injured himself quite badly and was wearing a cast. Dad was away on camp too and he also had to come home, obviously to care for his son. He wanted to stay at camp and was unhappy that he was sent home and that they wasted the money on the camp and they don’t get the benefit of being there now. It was all his fault!
Mum was trying to stop and intervene and then I heard my brother, he sounded scared. There was a big sound, like a thud and crashing but kind of muffled and when I got to the top of the stairs I saw my father standing over the top of my wounded brother, who had his arms and legs up in the air as defence, and he was really distressed. He said “stop” weakly and was crying silently.
My dads face was red and fierce and he hit him some more. Mum said to him to stop and that he was scaring the kids, but that didn’t matter to him.
I just walked down the hall, and into my room. I sat on the bed and pretended to read.
Later Mum managed to help my brother to his room where they both stayed and talked quietly for most of the night. Too quietly for me to hear.
One morning, weeks later we had run out of Vegemite, which was a disaster and we all wanted some toast so dad volunteered to go to the shops and get some then come back and we can all have our toast. We didn’t like jam or p nut butter so it HAD to be Vegemite.
I wanted to go for a car ride, so I asked if I can come too and I will just sit in the car and mum said yup you can go, dad didn’t want me to come cause it would slow him down and he just wanted to be quick. But I insisted that I will be good and just sit in the car n wait, I just liked to ride in the car so wanted to tag along with him.
So I got my way and I remember on the car ride he was very quiet and annoyed , I picked up that he didn’t want me to come pretty quickly. He said to me how come you wanted to come with me? And I think I just said I like riding in the car or some lame thing, I really just wanted to hang with him and have him all to myself for a little while. My sister knew this and was jealous that I was going on this car ride. She knew I wanted him to myself for a bit and wanted for me to admit that is what my plan was, but I would never admit it.
On the way to the shop dad said to me “now I am going to make a stop off for a little bit and I won’t be long, you are to wait in the car for me to get back n then we will get our Vegemite for brekkie.”
I asked where we were stopping, we were driving in a street with houses on it so he must have wanted to visit someone. He said “never mind that just sit n wait here.”
So he was gone for a long time after walking inside someone’s house. I don’t remember how long. But I do remember that it was long enough for me to find there was a new unopened jar of Vegemite sitting in the car, it had rolled out from under the drivers seat into the back seat floor.
When we got back home we had breakfast and then were pushed outside to go play so we did. We spent most of the day outside, either on the trampoline or mucking around with ant nests or lizards or visiting our friend over the back fence. Sometimes we’d hang in their house if we were sick of being outside. This was most of our days really. We sometimes got locked out of the house during the day. So we just went for walks or bike rides or just sat around in the yard with skipping ropes or the trampoline so we went and busied ourselves with our important play tasks.
So later on mum and I were talking and I think I brought up the house visit in the morning to her and said “who did he go see?” (Or something) and she was all confused. So I explained that “we drove to a house, we parked in the street and he went inside for a while and I waited in the car and who’s house was this mum?”
Well she had to go speak to him to find out about this so I was sent outside again with everyone else.
At some point, I can’t remember how soon after this if it was the same day or the next, but mum asked me to go and get my brother from his room, he spent a lot of time in there to get away from the aggression and the yelling, anyhow he was completely outraged and scared all at once and said to me he said “I haven’t done anything wrong!?”
I said that “mum said to come get you and that we are all in the lounge room.”
We had never had a family meeting before, I didn’t know what they were all about really. Until today.
Mum looked very cold and hard at dad and,
She said to dad “well why don’t you explain to them what’s happening” or something like that my memory of the exact words have faded a bit.
He, was totally flummoxed and had no idea what to say, it was like he thought that mum was going to explain everything to us like how she handled everything else related to us kids lately because he was hands off, hands raised and no longer felt obligated to deal with us or even speak to us apparently, unless it was for a smack. I think he even said, well … I thought that you would… we all looked to her like we always did and she tensed up even more and clenched her jaw.
But after he could see that she was leaving this task up to him he sputtered, and he blurted and cried. And held his hands out in front of his head ready to brace his head in them, then grew the courage to say “we just can’t live together anymore!” And buried his head in his hands and became a shivering quivering mess in front of us all.
I didn’t understand what was going on, why he was saying this and what these words meant once they had been spoken in terms of how our lives would all change. I was about five years old at the time all this happened.
I just saw my father, quivering and crying and needing something. So I shuffled over close to him on the couch to try to hug him. I was sitting nearest to him so it seemed like it was right.
He didn’t respond or move or even look at me and then I looked over at mum and she looked at me with fierce eyes, that said to me “how dare you attempt to comfort him” I was so confused and upset now also because well everyone was upset, I didn’t fully understand and I would not for some time. That was the first time I saw her hate. I remember it so well.
Soon he was packing his things. I wanted to have a bit of time with my dad again so I went downstairs to see what he was doin.
He was loading the car with his belongings, one by one. T-shirt rolled up into a ball and projected forward into the open hatch of the car. The same thing with each item. A book, a jumper. Stuff was breaking, and just everywhere. Some stuff didn’t even make it into the car, but maybe he didn’t see it or maybe it didn’t matter. Once the car left there was still stuff everywhere.
I don’t remember the first time that mum spoke to me of the reasons why they split, but I do remember my sister telling me.
And it wasn’t until then that I understood the hurt that I had added to her (Mum) when I slid over to him and tried to reach out and make his hand hold mine. But I finally understood the distance and the tension that now always seems to fall between me and my mother.
She was so hurt and I had only inflamed that hurt further with my naive gesture of comfort or support or whatever it was that I instinctively was doing at the time. It is almost as though she associates me or my presence with that hurt inflicted on her by him. Like my silly gesture made an imprint on her subconscious where anything disagreeable that I now do or say becomes an opportunity for her to vent a backlash on to me and then recruit others in the family to join in also, which they did/do. It comes across as lighthearted and half joking, but that isn’t how it feels to me. That isn’t how she treats them.
We never really speak about him. When I have asked her questions about him, I can see that it tears open a vicious wound and so I just never bring him up anymore.