January Funks

Part of the reason for driving to Gembrook is to be with family. It is a fun time for everyone at once and that even goes for how many are allowed on the trampoline. We adults have to make sure that we bounce at just the right pitch so heads don't bang together. The trampoline was fun and we both played there with our grandkids for quite a time. It seems to be better than a swimming pool if you weigh it against the amount of upkeep a pool requires as opposed to a trampoline.

Bec or Gord must have made the large foam sausage that Piper and Jasper attached to. They looked like they were riding a bouncing torpedo. Piper may have considered that this was good horse riding practice.

Jethro enjoyed the bouncing about too. He certainly likes being involved in the same sort of games as his older siblings.

The pictures below were of the late afternoon story time. It was bed time for the kids but because of daylight saving it was hard to believe it. Piper is enjoying her more serious story. It is a special time for Bec too and she read the story with plenty of imaginative expression. Gord read to Jasper, or just turned the pages as Jasper directed. We couldn't help noticing that Jaz has grown and is looking and acting older. Jethro was just happy to stroll about with the occasional excursion into Peter's pockets for what to find there. He really is a sweet kid.

Gembrook Retreat

Last Saturday the Gembrook Retreat had its monthly working-bee. We were able to be involved in different ways. Barb walked about with the kids and watched them. Peter joined Gord and put up a wall to make two rooms in the compost toilet building. One day the project will be finished and visitors down in the valley will be able to shower at one end and relieve themselves at the other. These projects have to be paced in terms of years.

There was a nice community lunch shared with all who came along to help. And there were quite a few children too.

Roast Chook

We have recently been roasting chickens on a regular basis. It is more probably because Simon is with us and we are three. They are super meals and Barb is behind the drive to raise the bar. It is a nice place to share our space.

Yes, we still have that Norwegian Grey. That rabbit that is probably going to live a long life much to Peter's dismay, what with all the quality food she is getting. This picture was taken on a roast eating night and she got a bit of our salad.

Chaplaincy Orientation

The next step for Peter in the chaplaincy position process was to attend two orientation days at ACCESS Ministry head office. Each new chaplain was required to bring in a symbol that reflected chaplaincy for them personally. In the days prior to the training days, Peter saw leaf patterns on the foam of Barb's flat white and the idea developed from there. Peter's gum leaves came from a tree which had survived the drought through some level of spot watering provided by the city council. Peter never saw this water truck, so for him the watering had been done in secret. In many ways the nurturing of the school community through the chaplaincy service is a little like that. It might not be seen but be assured the nurture is there.

Bec's Thirty-First

This was an unusual birthday in many respects. Bec caught up with Gord earlier in the day down where Gord's office was. In the evening, she joined us and that is where our blog comes in. It is unusual also because Piper, Jasper and Jethro were not there as well. We had Bec to ourselves.

Bec loves the junk mail we get. She is strange that way. Maybe the junk mail people don't walk the streets of Gembrook. Anyway, the birthday girl was allowed to take as much as she wanted of that stuff.

We did come together as the original family of old - Peter, Barb, Bec, Simon and Dan (in a sense). We celebrated at Shuga where Dan was working. That way he was there to greet Bec and we could see him whenever we looked into the kitchen. It was really nice of Bec to go out of her way to come over during a time of the month when it was really hard to find convenient overlaps.

Australia Day Thought

Australia Day is upon us again and this year the Australian of the Year was a 55 year old guy called Simon McKeon who is Executive Chairman of Macquarie Group’s Melbourne office. At his interview he publically supported calls for a new national flag. Hear-hear to that. Many prominent Australians (even past prime ministers such as Malcolm Fraser, Bob Hawke and Paul Keating, are showing their interest for taking a real step towards a new and refreshing way we Australians can see ourselves.

Peter is interested in a change in the "up front" visual display of the change, in particular our flag. The one we are using is an antique from the early twentieth century. Other areas of change may require intensive debate but the flag issue ought to be clear cut. Throw out that stupid design done by some 1901 public servant and let us have something we can be proud of. The design above is Peter’s suggestion. It eats the pants off what exists at present. It is the Southern Cross constellation in the night sky over a red earth which has a line of yellow sunset. Simple, and simple is best.

Chaplaincy Position

This is a short news break! Peter's application to become a chaplain at Whittlesea Primary School has been accepted. This is a super-encouraging outcome, appreciated by all who have walked closely with Peter. We are both super-encouraged. The township of Whittlesea is just outside of Melbourne, half an hour's drive north of us, a community minded town. Peter is looking forward to serving the school community well and making positive and productive connections with everybody there. It is a special time ahead for us both, a time of considerable change.

Water Stories

In goes the token and in you go till the light goes red, then stop, wait. There comes the movement, the mechanical arms, the spraying, the soap and finally more spraying followed by a blow dry. The car is then assumed to be clean, and made that way after a thorough wipe over at home.

The day would start fine. The air would feel heavily humid and about our sticky sweaty bodies. And we turn on the ‘conditioner’. The laundry dries quickly enough but you have to watch the sky like a hawk. That cloud is looking heavier suddenly. Bring the clothes in before it is too late. They’ll have to do. And then it falls. It’s a natural cycle, each time the water is further purified and the rain is refreshing, and in a twisted carefree sense a blessed relief.

Where water collects it shares our journey. Where it cannot move it waits as still as a mirror for slow evaporation, to return again somewhere else, maybe next time running along the edge of a leaf. It does not matter. It holds life together. It turns the world the right way around and causes us to rest in its splendour and ponder its power.

The rush of the creek, sleek movement over randomly laid rocks, broken and smoothed by the erosive action. Pulled by gravity, the water masses together and races in free abandon headlong down, forever down, held up only in the eddying pools along the way. The sound it makes is a happy song of nature as water traps air in a variety of popping and gurgling tunes that delight the ear. All those little air bubbles burst in rapid succession as the water tumbles and catches still more. Over the next collection of rocks the water falls making more music further down, always drowned by the sound of more water coming, a cacophony of splashing and crashing in a rush to get there.

Hibiscus Garden

While on the Atherton Tableland, Peter had opportunities to walk through a friend's garden. This person, Kay, hopes that one day her garden will function as a wedding venue. The only trouble will be where to park the cars. Alongside many other exotic looking flowers there was a large variety of Hibiscus flowering shrubs. These were in so many delightful colours and shapes. Her collection was definitely worth blogging about.

It seems that the Ulysses butterfly is attracted to the nectar of these flowers. One of them was fluttering about visiting each Hibiscus for a top-up. Ants also found their way onto the flowers for the same reason. You may find an ant doing that in the Hibiscus combination picture above if you are up for a challenge.

Atherton Tableland Railways

There was a very efficient and encompassing rail transport service on the Atherton Tableland that had developed to open up the area to industry. Because few people had cars the rail motor and train services were in regular use. The rail motor would go north from Ravenshoe through Atherton to Tolga and then wheel around and travel south-south-east to Millaa Millaa and then start back again carrying mail and passengers. A train would leave Cairns and travel up the range and pass through Mareeba on the way to Tolga, Atherton and on to Ravenshoe. It was a daily service from Cairns to Ravenshoe – up every morning and down each afternoon. Tolga was an important railway junction where passengers waited when changing between these rail routes. With other grade six girls Peter's mother as a young girl took the rail motor from Yungaburra via Tolga to Atherton every school Friday to attend the domestic science subject at the Atherton Primary School. The Yungaburra girls loved Fridays. (Refer to the rail line map and stations above).

The Tolga station building has been moved from its position on the east side of the rail network passing through Tolga. It once had a platform to stand on. In its new position it is closer to the road and has become a small museum run by volunteers. Valmae (Peter's Mum) remembers waiting on the Tolga platform for the train to Cairns after getting off the rail motor from Yungaburra. She would make this trip up to Biboohra to visit Big Mumma (her grandmother). She liked to wait at this station as opposed to the Atherton Station because there was a boy who worked at the station who made eyes at her and she him. Valmae would travel back from Biboohra and wait there on her way back to Yungaburra. Much later (1972) on a family holiday to the Chillagoe Caves, Valmae met the person who worked at the Tolga station and had made eyes at her. He remembered her as well. He and his adult son worked as guides for the cave walks at the time. Valmae remarked how well and young he looked for his age (Peter then 19 years old witnessed that conversation).

Grass growth at the Tolga rail yard controlled by poisoning

The railway staff picnic. Once a year the Railways would have a picnic with a free ride to Julattan Station where there was a suitable space for the numbers and games. Everybody took a picnic lunch with them. Valmae thinks that Big Mumma took she and Gloria to two of these events. The organisers would decorate a train engine by painting it silver and a place a coat of arms over the front part. It looked “jolly good”. Valmae remembers a photo of Grace standing in front of this adorned engine. This was during the days when workers were looked after – all workers were given a free ride to a cherished picnic event. So many rail lines are already pulled up – all lost now. The short line to Mt. Molloy also pulled up. Those were the days when no one had a car and went everywhere by train or rail motor.

Atherton Christmas

This is a picture of John's Nativity set, a very nice one. Peter travelled to Atherton for Christmas. The deal was that his brother John has a couple of weeks off and Peter did the caring of their Mum. John picked Peter up at Cairns Airport on Christmas Eve and drove him to Atherton. So Mum had two sons about her on Christmas morning for present opening time. A nice memory.

Later in the morning, Peter and John took their Mum to Phil and Shellie's place for the Christmas lunch. Phil had slowly roasted a leg of pork. It was done to perfection. Harley though so if his looks are any indication.

After lunch, the family was able to Skipe with Bec and Gord at Gembrook. They found Barb there as well. So Peter and Barb were able to have a small shared Christmas moment even though they were about 3,000 Kms apart.

Later into the afternoon there was the traditional water fight between the people of the family and the backpackers who boarded at the vegetable farm nearby. They were from all parts of the world travelling about Australia. They all came with loads of buckets. The water supply, pumped in from the irrigation channel, did not come fast enough for the needs of this massive water fight. It was pretty fun though. Afterward there was a group photo of all the wet ones. Peter is the one in the picture with the whitest skin and John is centre back.

The next day, John left for Melbourne. Phil and Shellie took him to Cairns because they were going to look in the city for Boxing Day specials. This was the last time the three brothers would share the same time and space for this Christmas season so they stopped for a picture memento.

For the following two weeks Peter looked after his Mum. There may be a blog or two concerning this. It depends just how much time there is, given that a lot of other quite dramatic things have happened in the meantime.

A Funky Christmas

The feature picture is a Gingerbread house which Dan's girl Jess made as part of her gift to us. She had made a whole "street" of them as gifts this Christmas for a list of people she knew. She showed us how to thump it with a heavy hand to bring it into a state to share around. Clever.

Bec and Gord provided a turkey that became available without notice at the local butcher shop. Very serendipitous for us.

Bec is pictured here gently waking Jasper after a nap. If he is allowed to sleep too long in the day he won't settle easily at bedtime. There is a gentle art to this, bringing him to the surface.

Simon was able to be with us this Christmas. This had not been possible for a number of years because of his living in North Queensland. Now he desires to live in Melbourne and hopes to find work here.

The trampoline has been a boon of an investment. Almost everybody had a bounce. Jasper does very well and often calls us to watch how high he gets.

Our niece Kelli joined us for this "early" Christmas lunch (23 December) and she also had a bounce. Bec joined her for a time. They were pretty funny together.

Dan and Jess showed us how to relax and soak up the sun. The whole day was delightful. Nobody felt hurried so much so that it did not matter that we began our lunch at 2.30 pm.

Some of the gifts were children's books. Pretty soon Piper and Jasper found an opportunity to listen to some of them with the help of Barb who will always oblige. It was not easy for Barb because the pet chickens proved a distraction and Piper would be on and off her lap to catch one of them to listen to the story too.

On a sad note, it was just a week later that a fox killed three out of the four chickens. Bec and Gord have replaced them but the new ones are not used to being petted.

Jethro. Only moments before this 'snap' he had a chicken on his shoulder. He held his body very still as though understanding how special that was. He is such a sweet and gentle kid.

Jasper was not the only one who had a nap. It was the sort of day for it even for Simon. Anywhere will do. Nice memories to be had for all. We felt blessed by God.

Laptop Swap

Firstly our apologies for a full three weeks of silence over the Christmas period. That is because when Peter went through airport security in Melbourne he accidentally picked up somebody else's laptop and traveled with it! The situation has been resolved with both laptops back with their rightful owners but it took some time. Peter feels like a bit of a DILL.