Stories from My Father

-1-

My back stuck to the brown leather seat of the bus, a physical phenomenon that served as a marker of how hot the day was. Late January and the start of the school year often brought extreme, oppressive heat with it and today was no exception. The air-conditioner gave us little relief and the other students, in a vain attempt to alleviate the discomfort, stood on their seats to open the little windows just below the roof. This exposed us to dust from outside, which clung to our moist foreheads and coated my white blonde hair.

The bus halted to a stop. I thanked the bus driver on the dismount not expecting a response; a man broken by years of monotony and discomfort. One can’t help but notice his oily, lank hair adhering to his brow as he mumbled inaudible profanities. The bus pulled away and I was left alone. The hot air burnt my nostrils as I inhaled and surveyed the all too familiar landscape. It was flat and brown. The summer had been hot and the drought gripping the area meant it was more desolate than ever. We lived on farmland outside a small country town. It was exactly 2.89 kilometres down a straight dirt road to my house from highwayside bus stop. Between where I stood and home there was one large tree (about halfway), two houses, fields of dead crops, a pair of horses with a stable, a handful of cows and a channel for irrigation. The sun felt like it was beating me into the ground as I began the walk home. My head bowed as I felt the moisture sucked from my eyes by the incessant heat. The blotchy earth shimmered and the animals stooped low in a feeble attempt to escape the harsh sunlight. The horses were motionless in their stable, not even flicking their heads to shoo away the flies that relentlessly landed in their eyes. I promised myself a rest in the shade once I passed the stable, it was the first checkpoint on my journey home.

As I reached the shade on the other side of the building, I was confronted by a surprising sight. A man leaning up against the wooden support that held the corrugated iron roof aloft. A mirage I thought, but after giving my eyes a vigorous rub and refocusing my gaze I saw that the man was still there. He was tall, had broad shoulders and dark curly hair. I knew him well. It was my dad.

“G’day Joe,” he said in a voice far deeper than mine.

“Hello Dad.” My voice broke as I squeaked back at him.

“Mind if I walk home with you?”

“Nup” enough said

At first we walked in silence; the nature of our relationship meant that we were both comfortable with this. If I were walking with someone else, I’d feel the need to talk about things that didn’t really matter in order to make them feel at ease. A necessary social lie that is never questioned in the moment. I didn’t have to lie with Dad. We were approaching the tree before conversation began.

“How was school today Joe?” “It was alright.”

“Why just alright?”

I knew that question was inevitable. “Nothing good really happened.”

Truth be told, I hated school. I was constantly bored and resented most of the other students. At a country school your value is measured by how disruptive you can be in class and this irked me. Whilst I was mostly apathetic to my studies, I didn’t see the need to actively

torment the underpaid and overworked teachers as they attempted to do their job. I wasn’t disliked but I was a loner. A bored loner.

We walked in silence some more but I knew Dad was preparing to tell me a story. Dad had a story for everything, it was one of the great things about him. They could be boring sometimes and I’d heard them all before but they always meant something and that was important.

“Do you remember what I told you about the winter of 1857?” Questions like this were a familiar signal that a story was about to begin.

“No,” I mumbled, bending the truth for the sake of the story. Maybe I did have to lie sometimes.

“Well, in January 1857 there was an extremely harsh winter in much of North America. In the US state of Iowa there was a group of settlers who were really feeling the pinch. Food supplies were low, they were running out of dry wood to burn and the people were anxious about their future. To make matters worse, tensions were rising between the settlers and the nearby Sioux camp. Do you know who the Sioux are?”

“Yeah, the natives right?” I knew he would be annoyed if I called them Indians.

“Yes, that’s right” Dad said as he waved to Mr Nicholl on the way past his house. He didn’t wave back, just stared right through him as if he wasn’t there. I thought Mr Nicholl must have been at least one hundred but Dad said he wasn’t that old. He just looked like that because of the sun and cigarettes.

“Anyway, the settlers were suspicious of the Sioux people,” the story resumed. “They were suspicious because every time they came across the Sioux hunters they always had huge smiles on their faces. The settlers didn’t know how this was possible in such a harsh, unforgiving winter and suspected that they must have a secret food source they were hiding from the white people. In a desperate attempt to discover this source, a local farmer named Eli, along with his sons, ambushed a Sioux hunter called Ahanu on the edge of their property and tied him to a tree for questioning. Despite several beatings, Ahanu denied any knowledge of a secret hideaway and asserted that his people were starving too. Eli replied in frustration ‘why are you all so god darn happy then?!’”

I cringed as Dad attempted an American accent but I admit it added to the story.

“Ahanu replied ‘the spirits are around us, they created the earth, the animals and even the snow. Because of this, it is Sioux law that every day we must find something beautiful, pause, and worship. It is hard to be sad when you are always seeing beautiful things.’ Eli did not believe this response and left Ahanu tied to the tree to die. That night, overcome with guilt, one of Eli’s sons returned to the tree to find Ahanu dead and frozen but with a smile on his face.”

The story was over and we walked a while longer in silence, the channel as we neared the end of our journey.

“That ending was a bit dramatic Dad,” a little dig to delay serious discussion.

“Yes but it serves a purpose.” He wasn’t interested in bantering. “You said ‘nothing good really happened’ but maybe you weren’t looking for good things. Something good always happens, even when things seem shit. If you’re looking you can find something.

He stopped talking to let me think. I supposed he was right; it was a simple story with a simple message, which disappointed me at first but simple stories have their place. We were nearly home now.

“Alright Dad, but try not to make the next one so obvious.” A deflection that I think we were both grateful for. I’d take his message on board and we didn’t need to dwell any longer. We had reached the gate so it was time to wrap up anyway.

“Thanks for walking home with me.” I left him at the gate and walked down the driveway to our white weatherboard house alone. I was sick of being alone.

-2-

Everyone stared at me as I climbed onto the bus. I wore the stigmata of someone who had been in a school-yard fight. I had blood all over my yellow school polo, my nose was crooked and my right eyelid was completely closed over. I sat down at the back of the bus alone. I recalled a story my dad had told me about a Greek warrior called Ajax the Great. After the Trojan war, Ajax laid claim to the armour of Achilles and was enraged when instead it was given to another warrior called Odysseus. At the height of his fury, Ajax slaughtered a herd of livestock he was tricked into believing were his enemies by the god Athena. When he came to his senses, he was so embarrassed by his dual dishonour that he elected to kill himself with his own sword. In my own ignominy, I understood his decision.

My dishonour had a duality to it much like Ajax’s. I was given a cricket bat by my grandfather that was signed by a former captain of the Australian Cricket Team. It had been my father’s and now it was mine. I cherished it and so I took it to school to show it off. At first, boys huddled around me during the lunch break to look at my prized piece of willow. Then came the inevitable. Some older boys caught wind of my peacocking and decided it was their duty to deal me a lesson in humility. They took the bat and walked away. I naturally followed and in a fit of rage, struck the ringleader in the back of the head with a closed fist. I was solid for a fifteen-year-old and normally handle myself well physically, however this boy was far stronger than me, so I immediately regretted hitting him. The boy hardly flinched, he knocked me to the ground, grabbed my collar and began to punch me until I was bleeding from nose and mouth. Afterwards, he snapped the bat in two and tossed it onto the roof of the chapel. The other students were delighted. It was an unfair fight but lessons in humility often aren’t fair. I had lost the bat and my position within the school hierarchy was even lower than before. I skipped the last two classes of the day to avoid any questioning or human contact. I didn’t want anyone to try and distract me or make me feel better. These events were significant and I didn’t want to diminish their importance by cheering up. As the final bell rang, I felt embarrassed and bitter as I walked to the bus.

Exiting , I said nothing to the driver. On the dirt road I headed straight for home. At least it wasn’t hot. The year, as always, had advanced into autumn, meaning the walk home was more comfortable and I could focus on my thoughts. One of our school texts, Maestro, contained the line ‘a little discomfort is necessary to maintain alertness,’ which is somewhat true. If you’re in too much discomfort it requires you to focus only on the discomfort itself, diminishing alertness to the rest of your surroundings. I was at the stable when I heard his voice.

“What happened Joe?”

Dad accompanied me

“Nothing Dad.” We both knew denial wouldn’t suffice but I needed some time to adjust to conversation and collect my thoughts.

“You have blood all over your shirt mate and your face is a mess. You may as well talk to me about it before you have to face your mother. I just want to help.” I wasn’t worried about him being angry. Dad was never angry, always calm and measured. I think he exhausted all his anger when he was a kid. Hopefully the same thing will happen to me.

“Well I got in a fight and obviously lost.” The easy part. “An older boy took your old bat; the one Pa gave me after...” I paused, a topic for another time. “I lost my cool and punched him but he was bigger...” I stopped talking as my voice started to quiver. I didn’t want to get upset in front of him.

“Are you okay?” A more complex question than it sounded. “I’ve been worse,” a truthful response.

“Do you think you need to get checked out by Uncle Steve?” My uncle was a doctor. “No.” I hesitated, “well maybe just my nose.” Steve wouldn’t ask questions.

“Okay, How old was the boy?”

“I don’t know, seventeen?”

“Right, well he is a coward. Even if you laid the first strike, only a coward would do this to a fifteen-year-old.”

Dad was of the firm belief that a fight should be fair. Conversely, I thought that fights generally only happened when there was an imbalance of power. It didn’t make sense for a person to start a fight they were just as likely to lose as win. Nevertheless, I appreciated the sentiment.

We walked for a time without talking. I was reluctantly happy for the company. We had passed the halfway tree before he started talking again.

“You know, I once read about an order of Buddhist monks who lived in the twelfth century; I can’t remember the name of them for the life of me.” He paused to think.

I wasn’t really in the mood for a story but did not protest.

“Anyway, these monks were some of the most revered of the time. They travelled to many different temples and it was considered a great honour to welcome them as guests.” A breath. “They were also extremely mysterious and all the other orders of monks at the time knew very little about their practices or how they came to be held in such high regard”

“When a temple was notified that the order was coming to visit, they would take several days to prepare with strict meditation and religious ceremonies.

When the monks arrived, the hosts would bring out their most precious and sacred items to offer to their distinguished guests. Do you know what they did with them?”

“No.” It was in the back of my mind somewhere but I didn’t want to chase it and ruin the crescendo.

“They took the items and shit on them.” My memory clicked.

“The hosts were predictably horrified at first but being monks they contained their anger. In the end, the guests had taught them a valuable lesson. No matter how important, sacred or revered things are, they’re still just things.”

I suppressed a sigh.

“Material objects don’t define your character but your actions do and that’s important. You’re allowed to be upset about losing the bat and it’s good to stand up for yourself but keep your cool and put things in perspective. You’re too important to get hurt over a cricket bat.”

The lesson was over. We walked the rest of the way home without talking, he obviously didn’t feel the need to push me further and I felt sore and defeated but I was glad he was with me.

-3-

I didn’t always get the bus home from school. I used to walk along the river that ran through town, past the football ovals and through the churchyard to Dad’s work. As a shire engineer, he had an office in the council building at the centre of town. A thirty-minute walk all up. When I arrived, it would be after 4 o’clock and I would sit in the tearoom and do my homework until Dad finished work at 4.30. On really hot days we would buy an ice-cream for the journey home, on cold ones we would make hot chocolate. Sometimes on the drive, he would let me change the gears in the car while he operated the pedals and steering wheel. I loved doing that. We talked too, often about trivial things like school or sports and other times he’d tell me longwinded stories that would take the whole journey home to complete.

One day as I was leaving school, my grandmother met me at the gate. I thought it was strange that she was visiting town and I hadn’t known beforehand. Then she told me Dad was dead and it made more sense. They’d found him out of town, checking up on a road that needed repairing. He was alone and unresponsive. I pressed her for information but she just kept telling me ‘he had a funny heart.’ She probably thought it was best I didn’t know the details but it made me angry. I never understood why children, the people most affected by a tragedy like this, were always robbed of knowing the reason why. Maybe it was for the best. Dad once told me about a Greek king called Oedipus who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother. After searching for the truth and discovering his folly, he cut his own eyes out in despair. Whenever I would ask too many questions Dad would say, ‘he who tries to see too much might just end up blind.’

The weeks and months following Dad’s death were a blur. We constantly had visitors and well-wishers dropping in to the house. Mum collected me from school every afternoon and more often than not, we cried together the whole way home. Gradually people returned to their lives, the visitors slowed and mum had to go back to work. That was when I started to get the bus home.

-4-

Winter was pleasant where we lived. It was never cold enough for me to have to exchange my school shorts for pants but it wasn’t so hot that I would sweat on the way home. It rained sometimes, which meant the fields were tinged green, a more welcome sight than the endless brown of summer. The animals seemed happier too, the horses would trot out of their stable and the cows fattened with new pasture.

I breathed in fresh, cool air as I prepared for my last walk home before the winter break. Soon I would head down the coast to stay with my grandparents to save me being home alone during the days. I felt bad leaving Mum but I was happy for the distraction. Besides, she wasn’t very pleased with me at the moment as I was doing poorly at school. I didn’t care about study much, since Dad died it just seemed unimportant. What was the point of studying if I could just drop dead one day like he did? Plus, on a less dramatic level, I didn’t think I was smart enough to get into university and thought it was more embarrassing to try and fail than to not try at all.

I reached the stable quickly and before I knew it the first part of my journey was finished. As I set off towards the tree Dad joined me. It wasn’t really him though. The further time moved along from his death, the less lifelike he became, more a caricature of himself than the real thing, a ghostly presence that comforted me in times of need. As my memory faded, the less tangible he became. I was probably too old for these fantasies now anyway. He barely spoke at first, we just walked side by side until we reached the tree. When he did speak it was soft, mingling with the whispering of the tree as the leaves caught the faint breeze.

“Why aren’t you trying at school Joey? It’s making your mother upset,” he began. Not the cheeriest start to a conversation, it wasn’t like him at all.

“I don’t know Dad, I just can’t be bothered anymore.” My voice had finished breaking so this childish response sounded strange in the deepened tone.

“C’mon mate, I know there’s more to it than that.”

I thought about deflecting but decided not to. “It’s just that ever since you died I feel like I don’t know what to do or where I’m going. I know I’m not smart enough to get into university so I don’t see the point in trying. Plus everyone just ends up dead like you and school doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Don’t be like that.”

“Well it’s your fault for dying.” I immediately regretted saying that. I knew he didn’t mean to die but it was me who was left to deal with shit alone and sometimes I felt angry with him.

He didn’t seem offended, he gave me some time to calm down before speaking again.

“Do you know who discovered America?” He asked as if nothing had happened. I decided not to answer him. “It was the Spanish. They were masterful sailors who conquered the ocean. Christopher Columbus sailed east to forge a new route to India and discovered the Americas. Columbus was followed by a fellow Spaniard named Vespucci and Vasco Nunez de Balboa sailed through the Pacific Ocean, where no European had been before. They were the greatest sailors of the time because they were fearless. Do you know why they were so fearless?”

“I have no idea.” I played the game.

“Well, the Spanish were devout Catholics and believed that in spreading Christianity across the world and advancing their nation they were doing the work of God. The great explorers often prayed to Saint Erasmus of Formia, otherwise known as Saint Elmo, who was the patron saint of sailors. Have you ever heard of St Elmo’s fire?”

He didn’t wait for me to respond. I didn’t wait for myself to respond.

“St Elmo’s fire is a phenomenon that scientists can easily explain today. When the air is highly electrically charged and it passes around tall objects, such as a ship’s mast, the air particles become ionised and they emit a luminous glow, kind of like the northern lights. So, in the midst of the wildest storms, the Spanish sailors would pray to St Elmo and as luck would have it, during these times, the mast and horizontal yardarms of their ships would begin to glow in the shape of a crucifix. They believed that St Elmo was with them and God was watching over them, and continued sailing fearlessly with this blessed confidence.” He paused to draw breath. “It might sound corny Joe but belief can do great things. I don’t know if the Spanish would have conquered the seas without this superstition but I’m sure it made their journey more meaningful regardless.”

“I don’t have anything to believe in anymore,” I whispered to myself. It was true, I wasn’t really religious, even though I went to a catholic school. My dad was gone, and I lived in a small town that was difficult to break away from. I felt insignificant and lost.

“Believe that someday the things you’re doing now will matter. Even if they don’t feel like they do in the moment. Work hard, keep your chin up and be confident. You’re important to me, you’re important to your mother and if you don’t believe anything else, then just believe that.” We walked for a while longer side by side but eventually I felt him leave.

That was it, I let his words sink in. I still felt a little angry, clichés and old stories don’t bring people back from the dead but who do I have to blame but myself? It wasn’t really Dad; he was gone forever. I walked the rest of the way home alone, thinking about everything we’d talked about over the years. I wished my teenage life felt as simple as some of Dad’s stories. Maybe one day soon it would. As I neared the end of my journey I could feel warm tears rolling down my cheeks. I knew then it was the last time we would walk home together.