The Memoir - a work in progress
Background see Working on a Memoir
1st leaf see Memoir Leaf 1 - Mexico 2008
Leaves 2-6 Ireland, Launceston, Cape Town, Whyalla, CambodiaLeaves 7-9 Hooning, Teaching & Presenting
Leaves 10-11 Bookseller, Vexatious FOI applicants and shaky start to an academic career
Leaves 12-14 Car crash, Launceston early 1960s, A Road Not Taken
Postcard 12 “Now
we’re moving in slow motion, To a piercing steering wheel, There’s chaos and
commotion, The whole thing’s a bit too real" Mark Gillespie Pile-Up
November/December 1979 behind Bothwell
The
world spun and rolled before my eyes. Moments before I had been listening to
Sue and Deb talking in the front of the car. We were en route to the back of
Bothwell for a triple 21st birthday party for three law students.
Deb had just received her Provisional learner’s licence. When I was growing up,
in Queenstown, Deb was the type of girl I could never have imagined or
contemplated becoming friends with. She completed honours in ancient Greek art,
she worked part time (rare in those days), wore skin tight jeans and helped me
to appreciate women as something other than as “traditionally” viewed (mothers,
sisters, or objects of lust).
I
can’t recall the noise or any screams, but once the car had come to a
standstill after rolling along a long stretch of barbed wire fence, I remember
crawling from the vehicle. Someone who had been in the car ahead said that they
had seen the accident in their rear view mirror and feared coming back to
investigate. Yet, there were no major injuries, only minor cuts or scratches. I
can’t remember much of the aftermath except we continued to the party and I
think I got well and truly drunk. Now, as I try to recall the events of that
summer, I struggle to remember any details, apart from those very brief
snippets from the accident.
Leaf 13. “Living outside the law when way
too young” Elphin Road, Launceston 1963-1964.
I have
no real memory, only a few scattered images from “that night.” It is dark, very
dark, and I’m standing at a building site for a future hotel, just off Elphin
Road in Launceston. Maybe I was five or
six. I’m not sure why I was there: maybe, as a look out; to help carry things; or possibly
to scramble through somewhere to unlock a door or gate? There is a man near me
but it is hard to see, or remember his face, maybe there were more in the
background. In later memories, he becomes my mother’s boyfriend but I don’t
know.
My
feet were on the verge of another path one that could have led me into a far different
engagement with the law, a darker, more savage and higher risk engagement. On this path, I probably would have been
unlikely to complete high school and more than certain to have experienced
Ashley Detention Centre or its predecessor. This was a path I stepped from
without knowing why. At several points, until my early high school years, I
stepped on and off this path or similar paths as I flirted with and was caught
up in several types of unlawful activity - petty theft, vandalism and other
anti-social behaviour. At the time I never constructed a rationale why this
happened or what was drawing me to a potentially destructive path. Many years later, after reading The Outsider
and attending a rare political science lecture on alienation, the concept of
being an outsider struck a very strong and lasting chord.
Leaf 14 “Ride on the chrome horse with
your diplomat. Who carries on his shoulder a Siamese cat” Bronte Inn Sydney June/July
1983
I’d spent
just a few months in the Tax Office and my relationship with Esther was in its first
passionate but uncertain stages. In between the lust, passion and early
discoveries, both of us could sense a growing commitment to each other, despite
all our stark contrasts and few shared interests or approaches to life.
I found
myself at a breakfast table in the Bronte Inn in Sydney. I had used my internal
knowledge of the public service to arrive in Sydney a day before the final
selection round for recruitment into the Foreign Affairs Department. I was there
largely by a series of accidents, last minute decisions and a whim. Nearly
everyone else was on a determined mission, often started prior to their
university studies, to join the diplomatic corps.
The
three day selection ordeal was designed to pinpoint the final 30-50 ‘anointed
ones’ to join the Australian diplomat corps.
The initial pool of applicants had numbered several thousand. That
potential pool was culled via an intensive exam, and an initial screening of
the written applications, to produce a group of several hundred applicants who
were then interviewed. Finally, about seventy applicants were brought to Sydney
for a final 3 day culling exercise that consisted of tests, role plays,
seminars, presentations and intense, but discrete, scrutiny of behaviour at all
meals and cocktail parties.
Sitting
at the breakfast table, I was unsure whether my travel ingenuity had gained me
bonus points or raised questions about my ethics and commitment to correct
procedure. Many (including me) were surprised I had reached the final stage. On
a whim, I had sat a 3 hour entry test (problem questions, current affairs,
short essays etc) with little preparation. My application was written in a
frenzy, fuelled by coffee and orange juice after a very late and boozy Tax
function. My application was written more as a stream of consciousness missive than
a staid, proper and disciplined application. One part of my application
referred to my approach to things as being like a whirling dervish. Later, at
the interview round, the panel told me they had waited their whole journey
around Australia to meet the author of this unique application.
On my second
morning in Sydney, I sat at the same table, and the serving staff greeted me as
an old friend. Meanwhile, other tables
filled rapidly with applicants who had only arrived overnight or very early
that morning. The friendly and familiar greetings
from the serving staff convinced many of the other applicants that I was part
of the selection team and they started to speak loudly, letting their claims
for selection drop into their conversations. Later-to-be Prime Minister Kevin
Rudd had been through this process a couple of years previously, and indeed
that morning one nerdy guy blew me away when he talked about his honours thesis
and how he had translated newspapers from Vietnamese or Chinese. I started to
wonder how I would survive and make it through the next 3 days of the selection
process against such superior and gifted candidates.
My
doubts were confirmed when late in the evening of day two I realised I had
missed some sort of social cue and was the last applicant in the room among all
the selectors. Until that moment, I had pursued the objective to be a ‘trainee
diplomat’ simply as another intellectual challenge or job opportunity and a
useful escape option from the bureaucratic confines of the lowest levels of the
Tax Office. During the night, I started to think about whether this could be a
career path.
The
following morning as I listened to and observed the other applicants at the breakfast
table, I reflected on whether I had been allowed this far through the process
simply as a social experiment or a dark horse. Most of the other applicants had
far brighter academic qualifications, refined social skills and had already in
the last two days learnt to deliver finely shaped diplomatic responses. While I
could analyse, dissect and be objective as any of those around me on Timor or
military intervention in Africa, I was well aware of my preference to be ‘frank
and candid’ and to keep pushing the ‘we ought to’ case. I also wondered how
quickly my refreshing West Coast directness or bluntness would become
unsuitable in a sensitive diplomatic post. It certainly had not proved a career
advancing trait in the Tax Office.
After
the three day session, I left Sydney still uncertain about a career as a
diplomat. A few weeks later, I was asked to complete a security clearance form
to finalise the application process. I didn’t and dropped out at this final
stage. Why? First, during the three day
Sydney process, the Foreign Affairs staff had indicated how hard the job was on
families (spouses couldn’t work, and it would be difficult, if not impossible,
to leave a posting to return to Australia in a family emergency). Esther was
very attached to her horses and coming from a very small family, a foreign
posting of two or more years would be a major trauma for her and her loved ones,
including two elderly grandparents. Second, I had moved so many times in my
years at university, and in my first few months with the Tax Office (over 10
different lots of flat mates many who could rival the strangest people featuring
in He
Died with a Felafel in His Hand),
that it was easier to stay with my preferred option of remaining with Esther.
Another
road not taken.
I doubt,
in retrospect, I could have survived as a junior diplomat. I remain uncertain
whether at that early stage in our relationship I should have dragged Esther
into that life/lifestyle and whether our relationship would have survived.
Looking back 28 years later surrounded by my family and the life I have created
there are no regrets. Esther and I have grown together and now support each other
like two large trees, of different species, that have grown together giving each
other a strong physical and emotional centre. I think the diplomatic corps
would have offered neither.