A Rolling Stone

By Garnet James

Wattle Creek is a typical Australian country town in the 1960s, floundering in its attempt to keep up with a rapidly changing world.  This is the era of draft dodgers, mass migration of the young to the city, hippies, the death of local industry, struggling footy teams and large properties - once jewels in the nation's crown - being broken up, their beloved fittings gracing the local antique stores and larger country pubs.   At least 6 o'clock closing is now a thing of the past.

Jock Hathaway, a recently retired post master, his mind a whirr at the wonder of life's many mysteries, is never idle.  Like those around him, we can only watch with bemusement as we follow him on his latest venture.  We meet many of the town folk and begin to see what makes a rural community tick.  Unnervingly, the name of Bernie Ellis, the unscrupulous mayor, keeps cropping up.

An inveterate handyman, always ready to serve those in need, particularly the ladies, he must also tend to the wishes of the wife's belligerent hospital-bound brother. All this, and managing his new scheme, is becoming a nightmare.  Oh, and have I mentioned the son-in-law?

• Language: English
• Publisher: SPIKEBACK BOOKS
• Release date: Dec 6, 2018
• ISBN: 9780648133803

Book preview

Portrait

of

an

Australian country town

and

one man’s

chaotic journey

––––––––

1

An idea blossoms

THE SMALLER MAN appeared to be doing all the talking, and of course he was.  If nothing else, the perky little hat signalled it was Jock Hathaway.  Arms, making brave parabolic sweeps interspersed with neater chopping actions and tinkling quivers of the fingers, clad in their usual flannel shirting.  The tiny red mercurichrome beacon protruding from beneath the band-aid on his thumb, acted as a light on the conductor’s baton.  His words must have been aimed at the larger man, he was the only other one there, but for all the reaction he was getting, Jock might have been speaking to some hushed audience hidden in the dark cavern behind them. 

Over the entrance to that cavern one could read, if one was in the know, or had the patience to fill the gaps, Ironmonger’s Ironmongery & Forge.  What with  competing pigeon dribbles, tufts of iridescent moss, peppered with the unmistakable signature of a muddy tennis ball - not to mention a long-abandoned swallow’s mud-bowl nest entirely covering the capital F - the message from the generously seriffed lettering entirely different from the one of forty years earlier.  Bert, the larger gentleman, pounding a metallic and somewhat phlegmatic and ill-timed accompaniment to his animated friend, looked like, and was, the owner of the establishment.  Clearly, there were no serifs on Bert.

In case you’re wondering, no, he wasn’t the famous cricketer of the late twenties early thirties and, yes, he had grown weary of announcing the fact to the many who’d enquired over the years.  Fond of the amber fluid, not to mention others of a similar but warmer tone, Bert at least had the benefit of many free drinks from the naive who hadn’t bothered to ask.  In fact, if he hadn’t filled the role of smithie so well, he may have been tempted to open a pub.  Even had a name picked out, ready and waiting -  Not The Cricketers’ Arms.

‘Bert, I want a ball with some kind of pocket arrangements, any metal will do, that’s not important, what is imperative is that it can follow a downward course relatively unimpeded.  About eight inches diam should be the ticket, heaven knows what that is in centimetres.  I’ll leave that to your mathematical genius.  And by the way, it’ll require some sort of texture I suppose...although come to think of it, the pockets’d fulfil that need already, wouldn’t they?  P’raps spikes of some sort could be a viable alternative. Long as they didn’t protrude to any great extent they should do the trick.  Anyway mate, I’ve made a few drawings here...’

About this time, Bert became aware of Jock’s presence.  The parts of him still moving after each beat of his hammer slowly settled back into their more natural positions.  When all was still, he turned, a mild look of surprise on his round soiled face. 

‘G’day mate, how’s it goin’?  What can I do ya for this time?’

Bert always irritated Jock with his slow unruffled approach to life, but what really got on Jock’s wick was constantly having to repeat himself.  Bert on the other hand, was slightly miffed at the way Jock always seemed to start his conversations somewhere in the middle.  Jock hadn’t learned after fifty years of friendship and yarning to slow down for Bert, and Bert was blowed if he was going to change any of his ways this late in life, particularly as far as tuning in quicker was concerned.

The smithie listened considerately to Jock’s rehash of his brainstorm, his dirty lower lip over its even dirtier upper companion, nodding slowly and rhythmically, the plans and elevations taking shape in his mind.  Over the years, Bert had brought about the manifestation of many of Jock’s schemes, making all the necessary adjustments to his old friend’s miscalculations and impracticabilities with the ease and grace of a true professional.  This request was, however, slightly more enigmatic than usual, if that were possible. When the lower lip was fully extended, the hairs of his whisky-stained moustache protruding horizontally, Bert gave a conclusive nod and said, ‘Gotcha.  But strewth mate, stretchin’ that envelope a bit this time aren’t we?’

‘You see a problem Bert?’

‘Yeah, an’ ‘es got a sunburnt nose if I’m not mistaken.  Better watch that mate.’

Jock’s tap of that protrusion slowly changed from the exploratory to one of contemplation.

‘Yes, I suppose we should consider remuneration for this one, eh Bert?’

‘You mean actual spondoolicks?’

‘Hmmm.’

‘Ace it up mate.’

‘Well I just thought...’

‘Well don’t.  It usually gets you into trouble.  And if I remember correctly it’s me what ends up in the poo with ya most of the time.’

There was a slight hint of guilt in Jock’s gurgle.

‘When d’ya need ‘er?’

‘Hmmmm?  Saturday’d be good Bert, if you think you could manage it.’

‘Shouldn’t cause too much panic in the chook’ouse’, said Bert, mentally slotting this new assignment in between Mrs Cartwright’s barbecue tongs and Percy Porter’s cowgate.  The school tuckshop’s spouting would have to wait seeing it was a freebie.

‘Bout five then Bert?’

‘She’ll be apples.’

‘Ripper.’

‘Hoo roo mate.’

000

It’s true, even I have to admit, he was a man of peculiar habits.  If you think it’s eccentric to spend part of the day sitting in a wheelbarrow cogitating life, then I suppose he was, and if you would relegate such a person to life’s lesser pile, perhaps you’d better not read on.  Go and make yourself a cuppa.  On the other hand, if you consider it reasonable to ponder such dilemmas as why we find it so easy to forget what we’re trying to remember, but always seem to remember things we’d rather forget, you may have some sympathy for the man.  You may even find, as I do, people with an individual slant on the world are a boon to its rotation.  I know one thing - my life would be just that little bit greyer if I’d never met old Jock.  Come to think of it, I’d have a different attitude to kettles too - but more about that later.

Old Jock Hathaway was quite an institution in our town, in the whole district in fact.  Recently retired as the local postmaster he should have had time on his hands to, well, act like someone who’d retired.  Instead, he was always on the flit.

Something of a compulsive handyman, living in a large hybrid Edwardian/Queen Anne house, pretty much the same vintage as the man himself, meant there was always plenty to occupy him around the place.  Unsticking stuck windows and doors from where they’d settled into a more comfortable position in their old age was a constant chore.  So was tending the cracks in the plastered walls - not to mention retouching the constantly peeling paint.  Much of the external timberwork was rotting after years of battling the elements,  requiring  patching or even replacing, particularly on the damper sou’ west, but this was no worry to Jock.  His shed bulged with, among other things, bits and pieces of timber to fill any nook, cranny or rot hole the prevailing weather could force on him.  If there was a leak in the roof, or the verandah was giving way, or a leadlight window was missing a piece of its design, a fossick in the shed would provide, if not the solution, at least a solution, and as far as Jock was concerned, the more fiendishly creative the better. 

Not quite the same view was held by Mrs Hathaway, but given time she could, if not duplicate Jock’s zeal for the unconventional in matters of repair and maintenance, at least appreciate it.  Well, all right, tolerate it.  To her credit, she rarely commented (after that unfortunate first time) upon his occasional rehanging of some, or even all, the doors in the house, shifting the hinges and knobs to the opposite sides to which they’d become accustomed.  On this particular matter neither quite saw the other’s point of view. But as in all good marriages a degree of acquiescence prevailed - Jock coping with the days of moody silence following each operation, Mrs Hathaway stoically refusing to complain.  The bruised fingers, or the flattened nose, resulting from the subsequent collisions between her own ample figure and the proverbial immovable object of her husband’s creation, were, I suppose, her badge of courage.

Even the boundaries of the property kept Jock busy. The cypress hedge on the Hennessy’s side possessed a vigour which belied its years, the fence on the south, along the lane, tending toward the waywardly mobile, rather than the stable and static mode any owner might expect.  The local lads, scaling its heights in order to raid the Hathaway fruit trees, kept the ex-Postie’s carpentry, and his ingenuity, honed to an impressive degree.  Anyone else may have simply resorted to topping the fence with barbed wire, but damaged boys and safe apples was not the equation Jock sought.  Perhaps it was empathy, who knows?  Jock was young once, and he’d have informed the kids if they’d asked, but of course they could hardly be expected to put much faith in anything as unlikely as that.  So the kids continued to climb and Jock continued to pinion, prop and refurbish, all seemingly enjoying the ‘fruits’ of their labours with equal relish. 

If working in wood was therapeutic for Jock, cementing was even more so.  Trowelling had a definite soothing effect on the old man, and for this reason it was an activity greatly encouraged by his wife.  She knew only too well Jock needed more than his fair share of sedating, particularly if she was to enjoy any tranquillity of her own.  As a consequence, the Hathaway surrounds tended to be considerably more encased in cement than the average rural backyard - leaving aside Joe Veriani’s place of course.  But it was the Romans, after all, who invented the stuff.  The relatively harsh nature of the area after all this paving necessitated a great deal of trellis building, with Joe offering valuable advice as to which grape vines were most appropriate.  Jock, to whom Joe’s ‘Sheezabewdymate, goodonya’ meant a great deal, wallowed in the challenge.  Mrs Hathaway too enjoyed welcome peace of mind over a considerable period. She not only knew where her husband was, she could actually keep him in sight whilst maintaining control of her own not inconsiderable regimen of household duties.  This, while no ironclad guarantee, was some comfort at least. 

Neither was it merely for the nourishing bounty alone Mrs Hathaway manoeuvred her husband of forty-some years into the daily tending of their vegie garden.  Her thumb was as green as his wasn’t, and any method she could employ to keep her husband under the safety and control of that digit she would gladly use.  As a result, Jock, to the surprise and relief of those who knew and loved him, remained fairly well out of harm’s way throughout his adult years.  To boot, he was the proud, if somewhat surrogate producer, of some of the best homegrown fruit and vegies in the district.

Mrs Hathaway learned very quickly managing Jock was no different from caring for the garden itself.  Time and timing were of the essence, not to mention quality and consistency of nourishment.  Certainly when it came to her husband, it was vital to plant the seed at the perfect moment, nurture it with all due care, preferably when his stomach was full, and definitely before he managed to escape to his shed. The chaotic disorder of that iconic structure gave more than a hint of the potential disaster area his mind could, and often did become. 

Leaving school at fifteen, Jock joined the Post Office department on the very day the term ‘Letter Carrier’ was officially superseded by the word ‘Postman’. He loved his work, and his workmates, earning the admiration of all who knew him as the self-taught, ever enthusiastic seeker of knowledge he was.  His relatively slow progress up through the ranks, a constant frustration for his wife, was due not at all to a lack of diligence, but in fact the opposite.  You and I would probably term him a perfectionist, albeit the lateral thinking variety, but Jock wouldn’t see himself in those terms at all.  He simply knew no other way than to do a job thoroughly. Unfortunately, if indeed it was so, like many who keep their eyes on their work, he often missed the opportunities the more ambitious around him snapped up in his stead.  So what? At least Jock felt he was his own man, in charge of his own destiny. A quicker trip up the ladder would only have denied him those many opportunities to examine, absorb, fossick and sift at the various rungs along the way.  An insatiable need to know all of whatever he was involved in at any time, his main inherent weakness, and of course, his major strength.  It frustrated the tripes out of the fleet-footed brigade, but to the rest, the Postie was a constant, rock-solid figure of reliability - an inexhaustible supply of information and humanity. 

A fair percentage of Jock’s research into life’s ambiguities took place in his shed, and it was here one warm, slightly thundery November morning, while searching for something, anything, to act as a flange to fit the gyrating thermostat on the washing machine, he worked his way further than usual into the rubble of his past. Even his dog was beginning to take an interest.  That interest, it’s only fair to add, partly engendered by the need to dodge the occasional life-threatening item flung in its direction, accompanied by what for Jock Hathaway was a gruff expletive.

‘Botheration take it, why do I keep all this useless junk?’

The dog exhaled loudly.  The stream of outburst passion, interspersed with gasps of wonder at the occasional rediscovery of some long lost treasure, for a second or two made the whole exercise seem perhaps not quite so crazy after all. I suppose this was indicative of that love/hate relationship all true hoarders have with their junk pile.

‘Well I never’, Jock would whisper, stroking an item lovingly, placing it on the special pile to his left, the one containing items worthy of re-examination.  Each time the pile reached about shoulder height it would topple over, a new one slowly taking its place. This stock check and relocation of items an essential forerunner to any possible, and quite probable, future recycling.

As Jock dug back to the beginnings of time, more in a Hathawaynian than strictly archaeological sense, he came across a dilapidated flakey grey exercise book.  Flapping the mustiness off on his overalled leg, the dog momentarily opening one eye as the dust whirled in a frenzy of Caravaggian light stabbing its way through the cobwebbed window, impaling the gloom.  The dog sneezed, eyeing its alternative cubbyhole among the gumboots under the old kitchen dresser.  It chose to remain, burying its nose further into one of the boots, its discomfort appearing to ease considerably - the smell obviously a bonus.

Through spectacles caked in layers of grime only carbon dating could grant a specific age, the old man read the carefully written, and even more carefully coloured-in block letters of the frontice piece.  ‘A ROLLING STONE GATHERS NO MOSS’.  It may have been the eye mist, but let’s say it was the dust-encrusted glasses blurring out the letters as ageing fingers, one with blackened nail, another encased in bandaid, quivered across the now fading Derwented icons.  As the words dissolved, an image of old Miss Colbert took their place.

‘Hmmmph!’  Snorted Jock, ‘Wonder why silly old Miss Kafoops got us to write that twaddle, and on the front page of our work book of all places?  Silly old biddy.  Certainly had some queer ideas that one, eh Dog?’  The image of her hairy chin, the scent of her blue/grey cardigan reeking of stale cigarette smoke, moth balls and gum leaves, wafted into his head.  ‘Probably isn’t true anyway’, he muttered as he gazed around the shed forgetting why he was there.  He tapped his nose with a finger, it did no good.  ‘Oh well, it’ll come back I shouldn’t wonder’, he mumbled, his head no doubt totally immersed in the strange smell of old Miss Colbert and the hum and scratch of the rickety classroom under the old rambling Peppercorn by the bluestone wall.

Whether Jock was fully aware of it, who knows, but there was a time when he truly adored that tiny woman no taller than him, crackling arthritic wrists, hair net and little pale blue socks worn over thick brown stockings, wrinkled and carelessly darned.  There was no carnality in this adoration of course.  That came later in form two with Miss Carruthers, known as Fat Cow to the girls and as Buzza (as in bosoms) to the boys.  Boy, was she a clinker!

Noticing the addition of his black thumb print to the overall pattern of the page. Jock spat out a ‘Drat!’  Wiping the back of his hand across the page he was aghast to see the oval etchings transformed into long ugly streaks.  He swung a guilty glance to check if old Miss Colbert was watching.

‘Better quit while I’m only a bit behind, eh mate?’  He said to the dog, chucking the book, now something of a liability, back at the smelly battered box where he’d found it.  Fortunately the dog had risen in anticipation of movement at the station, the book skidding harmlessly into the boot where its nose had been only seconds before.  The dog appeared unimpressed - Jock beamed.  ‘Consolation prize at least for that shot I’d reckon, eh Sport?’

The only comment the little foxie made was the mimicking of its master’s walk as he trotted out to the basin stand by the lemon tree.  Jock dragged his singlet over his head and proceeded to give his hands and forearms a brisk going over with the Solvol.  Shed, carpentry, and other men’s work soil was not to be removed in the bathroom, nor upon bathroom towels, by edict.  The dog shook the remainder of the shed from its short coat and flopped beside the wheelbarrow. The old man gave his armpits a couple of thwaps with the cold soapy water and followed this with a quick once over with the special half-length towel he’d been allotted. 

By the time he’d sloshed the water out under the lemon tree, the dog was already behind the shed.  It seemed to understand, and accept, there was not a shred of malice in the old man, but a sitting dog and a disposable dish of water created an irresistible urge in any human male, whatever his age.

Jock adjusted his clothing and climbed into his overalls.  This was the dog’s cue to re-emerge, returning to its place beside the barrow, a permanent fixture in the yard.  In constant shade during the winter months, except for about an hour in late afternoon-early evening, the barrow lay dormant.  In warmer times however, when the sun’s axis cleared the roofline, this gnarled sentinel took on a secondary role, Jock’s thinking quarters.  Perched on, or rather in its own slab of cement, left over from the rear access driveway job and trowelled lovingly and precisely into place, it was now encased in moss. The tall couch grass socks continued to grow ever taller, the Victor never quite able to reach.  The grit collecting in its lowest corner, now sported what appeared to be a Cherry Plumb sprout and foretold of a difficult decision some time hence - to transplant or not?  Mrs Hathaway would naturally say yes, get rid of it.  Jock would agonise.  But of course, that’s who they were.

Having completed the crossword at the breakfast table, Jock sat motionless in the barrow, chin on his hands, hands clasped over his chest.  Slowly as if in a trance, a scrap of paper emerged, probably an old receipt, then the squat stump of a carpenter’s pencil.  Soon enigmatic lines and arrows evolved into some kind of...well it could have been a working drawing, but with Jock’s scribblings it was difficult to tell exactly what purpose they might serve.  Some even thought they were quite possibly of a purely abstract, therapeutical nature, not unlike his painting and cementing, with a less practical basis.  Others, like the dog, merely accepted it.  No point in tying yourself in knots over it was there? 

Little did the dog know his master’s mind was once again reliving the discovery of his old history book, particularly that hand-coloured frontice piece and those carefully manufactured tablets.  A ROLLING STONE GATHERS NO MOSS, they’d spelt, and for some reason had stuck in his brain.  Miss Culbert was a quaint old bird, but the thing Jock remembered most was her always being one step ahead of the class, particularly the boys.  She seemed to sense when Freddo Edwards was about to launch a paper dart, or place an explosive hazel nut under the base of his desk, even with her back turned as she wrote her spidery scrawl on the blackboard.  Writing a comment in your book, it was never a simple ‘good work’ or ‘must try harder’.  There was always something relating to you personally, something indicating she understood what was going through your mind when completing a particular task.  Yes, he realised now, she was a real bobby dazzler, and if she’d suggested those words for such an important place in their history books, they must have meant far more than any of the class realised.  Although on second thoughts, perhaps the girls twigged, even if he and the other boys hadn’t.  A case of the bleedin’ obvious in a way...yet - it may in fact be a furphy.

‘That’d shock the world, eh dog. Another long-held theory down the tube.  A bit of a giggle to prove the old girl wrong though, even at this late stage.’

It could be great fun testing it with the grand-kids too.  Well, the younger ones anyway.  The teeny boppers did appreciate Jock’s handyman abilities, he knew.  Who untangles their fishing lines and mends their boogie boards?  But old is old, not only a foreign country when adulthood is within coo-ee, it can be downright embarrassing.   Besides, he really had nothing else to do...

Another thought, not for the first time crossing his mind concerned his wife’s attitude to his various projects.   Strange woman the missus - sensitive, intelligent, perceptive, yet it would seem with scant understanding or appreciation of their scientific value.  On one occasion he’d even thought he heard the word ‘childish’ in her mutterings, although unlikely, particularly with his hearing a little dodgy these days.  But, like any negative thoughts in the Hathaway head it vanished as rapidly as it had appeared and soon one leg began to swing, the dog peeping from beneath a dark brown lid embroidered with pale orange lashes.  Not often was such a warning given.  Suddenly Jock sprang into action as he usually did after a lull (it was probably something to do with an inner biological balancing mechanism for which people like Jung and his cohorts no doubt had a defining label).  At any rate, Jock was either all stop or all go.  One minute he’d be unconscious in his chair, or deep in thought over some complexly simple conundrum such as why the preying mantids were all facing the same direction on the Jasmine. The next, he was a blur, disappearing through the doorway or the gate, leaving the dog doing frantic wheelies on the carpet or lawn in a frenzied attempt to catch up.  This time it was twigs, leaves and grass showering the backyard, as the ever opportunistic chooks, after their initial trepidation, bruck-brucked their way forward to investigate.

‘I’ll prove it one way or the other,’ his wife heard him muttering above the crunch of gravel as Jock hoppity-kicked past her open window to the drive and on through the gate.  She toyed momentarily with the idea of calling out a reminder that he could finish painting the front wire door, if he was looking for something to do.  His suggestion of leaving it that way, in lurid orange undercoat, as an ingenious sign post for any voyager looking for their house had been half in jest - hadn’t it?  With a quiet sigh, Mrs Hathaway reached for her rubber gloves in resigned acceptance she would not see her man again until hunger pangs, or worse, facilitated his return.  At least he wasn’t driving.

Jock Hathaway’s unique walking action was due to one leg being slightly shorter than the other, a legacy of his youthful motorbiking days when he’d had an unplanned meeting with a ‘hurry-up’ wagon in the city.  Absent-minded beyond his years - a facility momentarily compounded by three nubile office girls hugging themselves into a stiff westerly - he hit the heavy black vehicle head on. The girls giggled their appreciation of the young two-wheeled daredevil vroom-vroooooming past them, his slipstream eddying with the breeze to buffet not only their skirts and hair, their hearts a little as well. With his mind temporarily engaged in amorous thoughts, the young Jock momentarily forgot Collins ended at Spencer.  By the time the penny fell into place, so had Jock, so to speak.

His left leg badly broken, wedged between his heavy Harley and the front wheel of the hearse.  Jock tried to remember how he’d got there.  Three frightened cherubic faces protecting him from an overcast Melbourne sky appeared as if behind a gauze.  One blond, one brunette and one hovering delightfully between true auburn and the dusky red of the granite facing of the building on the corner of Collins and Queen which had so impressed the young bikie.  He’d insured his machine there just twelve minutes earlier.

‘I love the colour of your hair’, murmured the pallid youth weakly, his eyes striving to focus.  ‘Thankyou’, said all three demurely.

‘Could’ve killed the whole damned lot of us, stupid yarra’.  The undertaker fumed as he ran his thumb over the jagged edge of his freshly dented mudguard.

‘Yeah, but at least we’d ‘ave ‘ad the ‘earse on ‘and, eh Dad?’  The barely tolerated assistant son, large ears forced perpendicular to his head by an oversized top hat, knuckles whitened by the constant clasping of hands insisted upon by his father as the most suitable pose for such an underling, cheshired gratuitously at all around him.  His father, nerve endings already feathered by the importance of this particular funeral, and from the forty minute drive in the company of his gibbering offspring, brought an angry fist down upon the lad’s generous top hat.  The ears disappeared completely.

Even the notorious Ed’n’Edie had no chance as he almost clean bowled them rounding the corner of Miller and Main.  Both mouths open and ready, remained in static mode as their owners realised they’d let a golden opportunity slip.  Jock winced at the notion of this garrulous couple ever getting wind of his project.  Every man and his dog would know of it within the day, no doubt the more unscrupulous among them would be in like Flynn, desperate for the glory.  The gabardine-clad couple sighed and continued stoically on in their quest as Jock headed off to who knows where.

000

Just a short note.  Wives are an interesting breed, aren’t they?  I only mention this as mine suggested I insert a couple of pars as... What to call it?  A warning?  Heaven forbid.  A friendly reminder perhaps, of the influence a certain Jock Hathaway has had on yours truly.  Now, I’m not saying I agree with her on this matter, but there are suggestions, and there are suggestions.  When my wife hints I do something...  Enough said. 

I’ve recently taken up golf, and she says even there, the old man’s influence shines through.  Some golfers drive the ball straight down the fairway, as I’ve been known to do on occasions, but generally, as she cryptically suggests, the progress of my ball has a definitely Hathawaynian trajectory.  I agree, Jock does, at times, tend to get off the track a little, so what’s there to complain about?  As long as the journey is an interesting one, who cares?  He usually gets to the point - eventually.  Anyway, what do wives know?

2

Green Hill

The old men on the verandah at the Cosy Glen retirement village nodded with varying degrees of accumulated wisdom, and quiet bemusement, as Jock hurried by with the enthusiasm of a boy who’d landed the part of Batman in the school play.

Destination Green Hill, he thought, as he waved to Ed’n’Edie.  They’d obviously used the shortcut up Cranky’s Lane but thankfully were still at a safe distance.  He would have used the lane himself, intending to check the condition of Hilda Henderson’s front gate, but luckily it dawned on him his timing was way out.  Hilda probably wouldn’t finish her baking for another hour or two yet, so it was probably a fortunate coincidence his route there had been blocked.  Hilda would be terribly disappointed having to reward him in anything baked over three days ago.  Not that he expected payment of course.  No, it was just that she was too good a person to upset in that way - hardly the gentlemanly thing to do at all.

Congratulating himself on this fortuitous set of circumstances, he detoured down Johnston Street, again avoiding an actual encounter with the twin E’s whilst being no worse off, distance-wise, on his jaunt to Green Hill.  It would mean missing out on his morning check of the Willie Wagtail triplets in their neat cosy mud bowl on the branch overhanging the toilet block at the bowling club, but they’d probably cope.  They were being given a hard time by a couple of Wattelbirds and Jock made it his habit to encourage their disinclination.  He’d pop over this arvo, maybe combining it with his visit to Hilda.  Thinking of birds reminded him of the old canary cage.  The hinge on its door would be just the ticket to correct the wobbles on Hilda’s gate, and if that wasn’t worth a reciprocal slice or two of her blueberry pie, he’d eat his socks.

Mentally replanning his week, Jock saw Green Hill looming behind the green-black cypress trees just beyond the football ground.

Frank Smitherums caretook the sports pavillion, had done since the days when it was no more than a two-roomed footy shed reeking of liniment, grotty socks and worse.  Frank’s idea of taking care was taking care not to make too much unnecessary movement in case the natural balance of things was somehow, inadvertently and irreparably, disturbed.  Never without his broom and rubbish bin, but these usually served more for leaning against, or sitting upon, than any actual cleaning activity, he was a static constant.  It may well have been Frank Smitherums who’d coined the phrase, ‘sometimes I sits and thinks, and sometimes I just sits.’  At any rate, he certainly spied Jock well before the little Postie noticed his shadowy figure, cigarette pilot light aglow, sitting in the gloom of the boiler room doorway. 

‘What’s that crazy coot up to now?’  Each wondered of the other, neither really giving a hoot.  An ever so slight movement of the caretaking foot allowed the boiler room door to silently close out the disturbing image of a man too determined for his own good.  Anyway, Frank felt too much light not good for the eyes, the energy exerted in any conversation with Jock Hathaway an unnecessary waste of that commodity. It could be downright dangerous too.  Who knows what obligation might result from communicating with one so radical, so giving of his time?  Memories of past liaisons haunted Frank and he felt it best to let sleeping eccentrics lie.

Like Frank, Jock was relieved the potential meeting did not eventuate, but he thought little of it as he strode somewhat lopsidedly toward stage two of his latest scheme.  Above him the Sulphur-crested Cockatoos worked their way silently, obsessively through the seed boxes of a large Mountain Ash, liberally spraying the ground below with their leftovers.  Perhaps if these birds had heard the news such big trees were in danger of dying out in this area, they would modify their excessive eating habits. 

In the dry grass either side of the track, families of Red Rumped Parrots, rarely seen this far south, then only if you had the eye, worked methodically toward their aim of full bellies.  Up to ten thousand seeds a day some needed, Jock read recently in the Reader’s Digest Of Australian Birds. A bit like the grandchildren on the chips, he would say if asked.  Perpetual motion if ever he saw it.  He slowed a little and made sure to only look sideways so as not to unnerve the colourful feeders, dusky in the dappled shade.

The delicate, almost forensic foraging technique of the Lyrebird, as each finely articulated clawful of mulch is grasped, examined seemingly by osmosis, for even the tiniest morsel, then flicked disdainfully away to form a whole new permutation of forest litter, formed an image in stark contrast to the habits of the bent-billed, dry grass species here.  However this image was not forming in the mind of Jock Hathaway.  It was filling the head of Edith Thistlethwaite (a name Jock now knew never to attempt whilst eating a scone). She was at that very moment lying only some feet away, on her back, to facilitate her watching of the Gang Gangs, now joining their pristine cousins.  An enigma to the locals, Edith loved nature with a far greater scientific interest than Jock could ever muster.

By now Edith’s own chicks had flown the coop, almost completely free of the embarrassment caused by such behaviour.  They shared the general view eccentrics were great fun, and made the world a more interesting place, but only if they were in someone else’s family.

The fact Edith was lying on a Jumping Jacks nest would not have surprised her children in the least, the soon to eventuate war dance resulting from the ants casual reconnaissance turning to aggressive defence, would have seemed to them a fitting, if somewhat cataclysmic conclusion to such an unnatural and provocative act.

Edith Thistlethwaite didn’t swear or blaspheme as she gyrated, stamped, slapped and pummelled her disapproval. This would have impressed Jock no end, if he’d understood the true significance of the exhibition which had shaken him almost as severely as it had the parrots.  A non-blasphemer himself, Jock felt it simply a matter of discipline, and anyone who put his mind to it could relieve himself of the habit if he really wanted.  But discipline of that kind was a somewhat elusive commodity for most, and Jock understood that too.

Undoubtedly Edith Thistlethwaite was a silly old twit in Jock’s estimation, well beyond help, but he knew her to be a woman of self-discipline and Christian charity. She was also, perhaps unfortunately and inconveniently, something of a kindred spirit.  If only she could bake like Hilda Henderson.

Having no idea the cause of this flamboyant display was other than a cauliflowered brain, Jock merely rolled his eyes and continued dead ahead.  His only mild concern, with her distinctly skeletal construction and flailing angular limbs, she may well do herself an injury.  If he’d had the slightest inkling here was a woman in some distress, he’d have been in there like a rat up a drainpipe, with not a care for the dangers to his own well-being, either from the blackberry barbs or from the close contact with someone with surely only a few marbles left in the bag.

Jock’s live and let live philosophy prevailed.  If Edith was into ritual forest glade dancing, it was hardly anyone else’s business.  He’d only the previous week marvelled at the highly evocative coloured photographs in the National Geographic of the Pawnees dancing in Oklahoma.  Perhaps Edith was a subscriber.  Perhaps the influence was that new hippie commune up north which had everybody buzzing, some of them filtering south of late.  He’d actually met a couple at the Saturday market and thought them rather bonzer people.  Their carrot cake had been a revelation, if a bit windy.

All this tolerance aside, Jock did click his tongue and make possum noises in his throat.  He was not immune to the craziness of this world by any means, and no matter how well he coped with, and was fascinated by its constant enigmatic changes, he was, on rare occasions, filled with that fear which comes from total bewilderment. 

As the hoops and hollahs faded into the McCubbinish surrounds, khaki to most, infinitely subtle to people