Glitz

the glitz the colour
the cut and chase
surround your frame and aura make

the hype the speed
the grunt the size
your time and money, energy take

the frill the fluff
and all your stuff
you fill your world with for its own sake

the shallow
the fake
the plastic
awake
all senses and longing and this you take

the easy
the sleazy
the grope and the grog
the flashy and ditzy and bring all things down
are easy and sleazy
and gropy and groggy
far harder to see any deep and dear
far harder to frolic in cold light of day
the makeup all gone and no flashy heels
far sharper to cut and no one to chase
untangle your frame and aura replace.

Blackberry

The houses backed onto the schoolyard.
The schoolyard backed onto the creek.
The creek had blackberries. Lots and lots of blackberries. Berries that glistened in the sun and were just out of reach. Hundreds of black fat berries that were best ....  way out of reach.

My mother and sister and brother and I and all the neighbourhood would get down there at some time in the creek and along the bank and in the brambly bushes and pick those black berries. All over summer we did this, and other stuff. No permission needed in particular. Just evidence of our doing written on our faces or shirts filled with pickings. (Hard to clean, but worth it.) We all picked the blakkas. Pails would swing and be filled. Pink hands, stained with juice and mouths red - evidence of the quest for the best, or a repeat of the best.
The sounds of buzzing of the pesky flies and the legs covered in thin red scratches where our thin cotton homemade shorts came short but a small price to pay for pails full.

Heat and crackling sounds. Slithery sneaky sounds. Red belly blacks. Shy creatures. Not so keen on their homes being tramped on. Or maybe rats?

The edges were bare. The little kids and the oldies got the easy pickings. The determined pickers got right into it. The really determined took down planks and laid them over the thick prickly boughs. Planks with paint and scrapes and rough edges where we slid the thin homemade cotton shorts along to get to the best fruit. The pail was very quickly filled and spilt the best of the best while sliding back over the rough edges and the thorns that scrape. The thought of a warm bath softening skin and magnifying hurt pushed back into the brambles for a little while. Concentrate. Concentrate.
Another pail and now no more pails, so any saucepan or pan would do now.
As the pans were filled and bellies bulged we set back for home. Across the paddock and through the palings that became a hole in the fence. Sneaky sounds, sounds of retreat, satisfied sounds.

Now mum got to work. There was jam and stewed berries bubbling away on the stove and plates of fresh on the table, pushed away to make room for pastry. Maybe even custard if mum was not too tired.  Score tonight! Blackberry pie! Crusty pastry and oozing black goo with lumps and bumps and odd hasty stalk. Oh bliss. Custard. She was not too tired. Happy mouth. Happy happy mouth.

For weeks we lived on the pickings of the summer. The jam lasted (if were were good) until the next summer. Jam rolly polies replaced the pies but that was ok. They were our sweet favourite after the pies. The scratches faded and the plank was back beside the fence. The sneaky sounds were hushed and low. The heat of summer shone through the jars if you held them up to the light and you could squish the lumps in the jam to remind yourself of the big best ones that you were brave enough to scrape skin for.
Big fat round berries. Big fat round bellies. Big fat round memories. Happy happy mouth.

going to primary school in the 60s

Going into primary class was a big deal. It was all of ten steps from the infants school but a million miles from my experience.
Miss Northey taught us about tadpoles and let us read aloud in class. I sweated on my turn to bring the words into life. The school magazine brought delicious stories and plays and articles into a grey life. The radio broadcast gave us songs each week and sometimes a story. The frogs got out and hopped all over the room. We sang and learned poems. "Someone came a knocking on my wee small door..."
I couldn't see the board so I copied Donna's neat writing.
And we drank milk. Milk in bottles. Free milk that came in bottles to the school.

"Hey there Hooplah
the circus is in town.
Have you seen the elephant,
have you seen the clown...."
Mr Baird in 4th class with the dark rimmed glasses who sat behind the desk and did not like me giggling. Humour was everywhere and much chat to be had and chanting of poems. Down the front under his watchful eye the board was much clearer. He smacked my legs because I giggled so much. Up on the raised platform he smacked the back of my legs and I had to stand still and quiet.
And the milk waited on the verandah until recess and got warm.

Miss Northey again in 5th class. Fountain pens and ink and running writing and ink wells and a new boy from England. He filled the ink wells and placed them in the holes in our wooden desks with the lift up lid. Duncan who sat behind me dipped my pigtail in his ink well. Up the back again next to Donna I copied her curls and roundy letters. Desiree got three red ticks in her margin for good adjectives in composition. Three! The one book that we had for the whole year sported three red ticks. Unprecedented.
SRA and education week and a library flipped my little school nest into some sort of other thing where other people came and sullied and mussied.
School inspection and Miss Northey had to show when she taught science and geography. "...and Kerrie, what is the mountain range called..?" ..silence and Miss Northey on trial awaited the verdict..."The Great Dividing Range." Tension gone. Three red ticks for Miss Northey.
And I gave my milk to Pauline who got no milk at home.

D. A. Read for 6th class and sitting next to Arthur. Arthur who kissed me in folk dancing and lent me his texta colours whose lids I lost running around the playground. He hated me after that and changed his name from Pusscheck to something Aussie and plain and from here rather than there (wherever that was).
D.A. Read was often out of the class (being principal) and the deputy came in sometimes. Long division and tears...lovely school magazines..and singing in the choir. Pauline and I threw rocks into the creek. Apparently not allowed. Pauline took the blame and got the cane. Stanley mowed the lawn while we did bookish stuff. Duncan no longer dipped and I walked home with David. Kevin stopped eating the whole block of cheese each day for lunch and wore ear things so he could hear, and we lined up for high school. Susan, John and Pauline headed the line for the other school further away. I tagged along...last in line.
And the milk was cool in cartons on the verandah and we could drink it in the morning.