Gembrook Orchard in Spring

This surprisingly stark scene is the chestnut orchard just before the buds begin to burst forth. Peter thought this was an opportune time to take this panorama combo, to attempt to show the scale of the much talked about orchard. And this might only be a quarter of it. Soon the leafy canopy will return for another summer, and in Autumn we will celebrate another chestnut harvest with family and friends.

These goats are the natural means of keeping down the blackberries. Three of them are confined on long chains and are moved to new locations every second day.

Tropical Garden

In this last northern visit, whenever Peter passed through Kuranda on the way to Cairns, he pass this beautiful tropical garden. It grew up a slope across a gully from the road's edge. Eventually he had to stop to take a picture of it. The shear scale of the growth and the variety of greens were so attractive. Tropical things still tug at Peter's heart even after nearly thirty years in Melbourne.

Ten Pin Win

Peter has to brag about this event. This was the first time he has ever won in ten pin bowling. It was due to two factors. One was that he found ways to relax and not worry about his score. The other was the his brothers lost their earlier form just enough to let him sneak into the lead at the final roll of the ball. The scoring at the Atherton Tenpin Bowling was semiautomatic, so it was like we were back in the 70's.

Max and Sons

It was Barb's idea to have three pictures of Dad with his sons, and to have them framed. The photo shoots were done with great cooperation from everyone. But an appropriate frame to contain them could not be found. After a long search, the plan fell back to an earlier idea of framing the sons in heart shaped frames Barb had already found. A second copy of the sons with their dad became part of an attractive album. The album appropriately had Barb and Dad on the front cover. The heart frames were given to Mum and the album to Dad, with our love.

Morning Tea at a Dairy

Peter's Mum continued to improve and it was not before long till we ventured out with her to a nearby dairy come tea-house for morning tea. We (in the group pic) arrived in time to see the cows coming up for the milking. The impressively long line wound its way from a distant field through a tunnel under the road and up the hill to the adjacent milking sheds. It seems that their body clocks told them it was time to come up. It was a nice way to celebrate Mum's surprising recovery after having her life swing in the balance just ten days prior.

Midwifery and Long Playing Records

Here is a beautiful and true story, told by a retired midwife remembering the time when her family lived on an outback station. Her roles were wife, mother of young ones and the station nurse.

One evening, one of the girl workers on the station went into labour. It was a week before she was sheduled to travel to the hospital. The nurse found herself in a crisis of commitment. Her children were fed, but there was no one about to watch them while she attended the birth.

Her creative resourcefulness won out and she placed a stack of six LP's on their record player. Each record was of songs and stories for children. The children loved these times when the records played and they were delighted to see their mother prepare a stack of six. They all sat quietly and listened while their mother hurried off to the sick-bay building.

At a certain time during the labour, the nurse was able to dash back to her children and turn the records over to play the other sides of them. The labour went well and the baby was born safely. Everything went remarkably well with the children too. They did not realise what their mother had been up to. They had thought she had wanted to lavish them more than usual that night before bed.

The Touch

While Peter was standing outside room N of the Atherton Hospital where his Mum was, he noticed a painting just by the door of the room, in the hall. There are areas in the picture that are pure painting brilliance and other areas that have been overworked a little. The composition is not that sound either, but when Peter stepped back to review it in totality he discovered that he knew the story. It was a story from the Bible where a woman with a debilitating illness reached forward unnoticed and touched the edge of Jesus' garment as he passed by. As the story goes, he felt the power of God's Spirit leave him and he stopped to investigate why. She eventually owned up. Jesus confirmed that her faith had made her well and she discovered that the illness had indeed left her.

There was something about that story happening in that room (N) of the Atherton Hospital. This was the room the hospital has designed for those departing this world. A touching of Jesus' garment has taken place. Peter's Mum recovered to being allowed to come home. This was the second time this year this has happened to her and both times from the same room. There is power in that painting. A story with meaning.

Just for the record, the artist is Yvonne I. Wozniah, as painted fairly clearly in the corner. We don't know the title of it, but it is bound to be something like "The Touch". Bless you Yvonne for adding story to image and reminding us of the power of hope and faith.

Mum Recovers

Peter's Mum had a very close call medically and since then has been slowly recovering in the Atherton Hospital. We both flew up to Cairns and drove up to Atherton to spend some time with her. It has been a positive time and we have been encouraged. Our decision to come up there was good.

Windows into Gembrook

It is about time Peter shared a bit about how the Gembrook building alterations are going. The last part of the story looked at the termite problem and the construction of a wardrobe (June 08). An earlier story covered an "interior reformation" and the installation of the first window (May 08). A lot has happened since. The termite highway has been discovered and blocked. More rooms have been created and three more windows have been installed.

The two additional windows along the north wall were simple projects because they fitted neatly between the structural studs of the building after the wall cladding had been removed. Later on Peter and Steve will put up a weatherboard external cladding as a final step in those renovations.

Another much more complicated window was installed on the south wall. This wall is cavity brick, double brick! This required removing bricks, mortaring in split bricks, and building a timber frame to house the window itself, and get the flashing (weatherproofing) right. This window will be the new toilet window, and a story about that project should come later on.

It is a strange experience to "break through" from the interior. It is something akin to an imagined prison breakout. From a spiritual perspective, we pull away the last of the wall of our world and we find the beauty of God's world waiting in all its glory. That's the feeling each time. And the Gembrook Retreat offers that beauty, especially to the north. Truly magnificent.

The World of the Child.

Peter decided to review a particular toy sale brochure that he found recently in our letterbox. It was titled Australia's Biggest Toy Sale at Target (24 July to 3 August 2008). He did not go to the toy sale, but did browse through Toy Kingdom at Greensborough. There, he became aware of the huge range of toys available. One could spend half a day there and still find something new.

It is hard to make sense of it all, but he does have the feeling that the marketers are pushing the children's toy culture more than the children. People might say that marketing companies are sensitive to the movements of the market, but he thinks they actually move the market the way they wish. What they have done is also self-perpetuating, in that once a behavioural pattern is established and it is accepted as the norm, it just keeps moving in that direction.

With the electronic games waiting in the wings, toys as we know them seem to have a short lifespan. Even days after a toy is given, it may be discarded for a new novelty. Another toy. That is certainly the case when electronic games are "discovered".

If a number of children are together and all want to play with cars, or feed and change doll babies, then the game could last for hours, do much for the tired parent, and create positive communal learning experiences. If there is only one child playing with a toy or game, it may not last. The child is more often a social creature.

Parents tend to regard toys, games, TV or movies as leverage for obedience or as a child pacifier. The respite they receive for this dispensation may come at a future cost. The child's healthy development may be curtailed. A toy or game should be selected with care because it has the potential to help the child's thinking and learning process which helps to clarify and relive experiences, even to rehearse adult roles. The wrong sort of toy or game, especially the kind that carries with it set expectations on how to play (i.e. a toy Batmobile or a fashion Barbie), will restrict this learning and experimenting with life in the world of play. This world is the primary environment of the child for mental growth and advancement. The challenge the child has, but does not realise it, is the need to play with "open-agenda" toys or games, to experiment with their world.

It is believed that children do not play by instinct and have to be taught to play. Adults have an opportunity to teach children how to play well. Adults who are willing to play alongside children are readily admitted into this "play" world. This sharing at play is very healthy and the child in turn has much to teach the adult. This point can be translated into our Church environment and yet we are still to utilise this in my church. Jerome Berryman, founder of "Godly Play", has applied this principle well. We will share a wealth of learning as we play out the "good news" with children and it will be fun. At present, we are only half way there in our church provided we allow ourselves to include craft activities as a form of play.

The children of fifty years ago (Peter's generation) more often created a game out of nothing but the sticks and stones they found. They did watch movies and these indeed influenced their shared play (i.e. cowboys and Indians). The difference today is the faster pace and the greater variety of choice available to the child. Games are shorter and much more varied. Being able to maintain a sustained focus on a task is now a greater challenge for the child.

Schools play a pivotal role in preparing the child for their future years. Here the trend is to bring computer usage into the youngest classes. As the budget allows, classrooms are being equipped with computer labs and interactive white boards. These IWB's are connected to the school's intranet system and therefore also allow movies to be shown. By grade five, children are expected to have a working computer portfolio of their current work tasks and future objectives. Children have controlled access to the web and to their own email account. Learning experiences are becoming very complex and time is at a premium.

Sometimes schools are saddled with having to teach social skills to children, such as how to play fairly. Schools try to remain one step ahead of problems, by continually shuffling children's seating arrangements in class to provoke a better social culture. But no matter how well organised schools are, gangs can still form, and violent behaviours can still happen. This culture of violence is fed by "suspect" movies that children are determined to view. For example, the Batman movie Dark Knight has been promoted by fast food chains and primary school children have found ways to see it. The peer pressure to see the latest "violent" movie is just as powerful amongst the preteens.

Now as we are beginning to understand the situation, we seem to be facing a problem of massive scale. The vying for our children's attention seems to have been well and truly won by the corporations who have done their marketing research and are raking in the dollars. Open ended play seems to be no longer attractive. This latest generation of children, born into the computer age, are having their play dictated. Their parents are giving them more protection and indulging them with more material comforts that perpetuate this. Yet, we also notice how quickly a child will dispense with electronically fabricated play when s/he is given love and attention. They will respond positively to genuine interest in their personhood and are fascinated by the new world of story, play and spirituality that we adults can offer them. It is a calling of God to enter this world and play out the learning.