Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

You see, I’m sort of amazed that I can even begin to think the big stuff or have ideas. Even just the thought of unpacking them produces a quiver of excitement.

Twitter handle @Salinafix

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

Once upon a time there was a man with six children. They were very hungry children, and his wife was even hungrier as she gave most of her food to them, because the pain of hunger in her stomach was nowhere near the pain of hearing her little ones try to be brave about having no more bread in the house.

The man worked as hard as he could as a blacksmith to feed his family, but all he ever did was earn enough to barely keep them alive, week to week.

In between working he thought and thought about how to make their situation improve, so that they could eat meat every day instead of just on Sundays, and all have a new pair of shoes every year, and maybe even take a family trip to the beachside at summertime, because his children had never seen the sea, but he had seen the sea, and it was beautiful, and he would love to give that to them.

In October a circus came to town, and his children were very excited, and every day would run down to the circus tent just to be near the thrill of it, to hear the growl of the lions and the gasps of the crowd, although of course they could not buy a ticket to go inside

The whole town was talking about the strange, or strong, or beautiful circus performers, and their exotic animal accomplices.

The man’s children would come home after these days, their eyes shining with what they had heard or glimpsed or imagined. “Papa, have you ever heard an elephant? It is like the loudest steam train in the world!”. “Papa, they say there is a lady who can walk on a wire in the air, like magic!”, “Papa, there is a man who can lift a tonne with his bare hands!”

It was early one of these October mornings when the man was in his forge, with his hammer, bent over a frame of red hot metal bars and two wheels with dozens of spokes in them, wiping the sweat from his brow. He was secretly working on his invention, about which he had not told anyone, least of all his hungry family.

He had been trying and trying to perfect his machine’s function, so that he might become rich and smell the sea air, but it was confounding him. He needed to work on the milling part of the machine, whilst also turning both wheels, and he simply couldn’t do all tasks at once.

As he gently, finely twisted the hot metal, he heard a strange noise outside his forge, around the back, where the woodpile was.

He kept the hammer in his hand and went outside. He stood looking at the woodpile for a moment, then leaned in closer, and was astonished to see two versions of exactly the same girl’s face, about 14 or 15 years in age, looking up at him from behind the pile of logs. They had fine features and long limbs and brown eyes.

He was too surprised to say anything.

“Please! Please sir! Don’t tell them we’re here!” whispered the girl with the larger hair.

The man found his voice: “Er, pray tell, who?” he asked.

“The ringmaster, sir!” hissed the girl. “Oh please sir, just turn away, I beg of you.”

The man stood there still: “Ringmaster? From the circus?

“Of course sir! You do not recognise us? We’re the air-flying acrobatic twins. Oh sir, please have mercy and do not tell him! For he is trying to make us GET MARRIED to his grown sons. So we have made our escape, for to find another circus.”

“And you ran away because of that?” asked the man.

Finally the other girl spoke, quietly, coldly: “Yes, because of that.” She stared at him.

The man heard shouting in the distance, and without thinking he piled up some more logs in front of the girls, then turned around and pretended to be examining his hammer in the sunlight while a crowd of policemen trotted past on horses, craning their heads this way and that.

And as he stood there, looking down at the hammer, the sun hit the metal and pierced his eye, and a little idea began to form in his mind. He held the hammer and squinted at the gleam of light and let the idea form itself, until finally the clip clop of hooves and the shouts of the officers died off in the distance.

Softly he said to the air, “And what will you do instead?”

“I don’t know,” answered one voice.

“We’ll land on our own feet,” said the other.

“Yes – it’s your feet what interest me,” said the man. “Give me one week. Then I will pay you eight coins, you will be free to go, and I won’t say a word to any police sergeant.”

Over the next seven days, light would crack into the forge in the early morning as the man opened the door with a hidden bowl of porridge, and the girls, sleeping together under a grey blanket on the pile of hay on the floor, would rise from their slumber.

They would work into the day, each girl rotating one wheel each, which turned the mill, on which the man tinkered and hammered.

Each evening the man brought the girls some bread and a little vegetable stew, and locked them inside the forge again, for their own protection.

On the seventh day the girl with smaller hair said, “Wait, if you please.” said. “Our week is up. Where are these coins you have promised?”

“Indeed,” said the man. “You have been excellent assistants, and my machine is ready to be revealed. I will pay you your coins on the morrow.”

Then he bolted the door of the forge and walked the path to his home. The moon was out and the evening was crisp. His humming heart was fairly bursting with the thrill of finally seeing his machine in working order.

After so many months of keeping his invention secret, he could now confess all to his wife. She would be surprised, but proud. And he would take his machine to a factory, and have hundreds of copies made, and his whole family would eat chicken every day and go to church in a carriage with four horses.

But now he was here, now it was all within reach, it wasn’t enough. His mind continued to race, and it raced back to the gloomy forge he had just left, and the two girls in it.

They were industrious, not lazy, their waists were slender, and their hair was thick and healthy. The one with the smaller hair was quietly spoken, and he thought about his eldest son, who was needing a wife, and there were none as fair or demure in the village.

All the man had to do was invite the girl inside the house, whilst he alerted the sergeant to the other girl, the one with the big hair and the scowl, then he would be rid of the one whilst keeping the other, and never need to pay those eight coins, which he didn’t have anyway.

His heart was really pounding now as he considered his plan. As he came closer to his house, his plan became set, and when he climbed into bed beside his wife, he almost was too excited to sleep.

But sleep he did, deeply and smugly, full of the satisfaction of all he would soon have.

Sometime just before dawn, however, a noise entered his dreams. It had been going for a while, a repeated high-pitched sound, and finally his conscious self swam out of the depths of sleep and he sat up in bed.

There was the noise again, coming from outdoors – chink, chink, chink, chink.

He went into the kitchen, put on his coat and his boots and stepped outside. The sky was quite light now and he could see the path clearly. The sound was coming from the forge and he quickened his pace.

As he came up to the forge, he hissed, “What are ye doing in there?”. There was a shuffling in response, the girls murmuring.

“What the devil…?” snapped the man. He slid back the bolt and opened the door a crack but couldn’t see anything in the gloom. He opened the door and, as he let it swing wide and his arm fell down, something came rushing at him out of the forge.

It was the twin girls, one directly behind the other, but somehow they were sitting down, and yet at the same time being propelled forwards in a rush of skirts and feet.

His eyes widened and his mouth started to open, but nothing came out.

It was his machine, his treasured machine, but it was not his machine. The wheels were still there, and the frame, but the mill had been removed, and somehow these girls were sitting astride it, one after the other, pedalling furiously, a bar fixed to the front for steering.

They flew past him and away, away down the path, to the road. He shouted, and forced his feet to run, run after them, but they were like a bird with wings soaring out ahead of him.

And he could do nothing, not even shout, as watched them, and it, his machine, grow smaller and smaller, then disappear, off to the east, in the direction of the seaside.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

Once upon a time, Dad & Dave were going for a stroll on a fine Sunday morning. They came across a snail who was sunning himself on a rock. “Hey, you almost trod on me!” the snail said to Dad. Poor Dad was horrified as he had always taught Dave to treat all creatures as he would like to be treated.

The snail smiled at Dads humble apology and decided he would grant Dad a wish. “Every day, you must ask Dave what his favourite dinner is and you shall have the ingredients magically appear”. So that evening they decided to try it out.

Dave excitedly told Dad all of his favourite treats and they magically appeared for them to consume. One day, Dad was getting tired of all the rich, naughty food and begged Dave to change his dinner request. But Dave had become so used to eating his favourite treats that he had no desire for healthy food and vegies.

Because of that, Dad had started to feel quite ill and was unable to look after Dave any longer. In desperation, he cried out for the snail to return and remove the wish from his son. Dave became very angry with this and because of that he stomped on the snail.

Instantly, Dad became well and strong and Dave fell very ill. Poor Dad was horrified and cried for his poor son until finally the magic snail recovered and agreed to lift the spell so they would both be well and eat proper food again.

And they all lived happily ever after

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer

So here I am in the Gunnas writing class. It’s crazy because I have been thinking about this for the last week or more and have written ideas in my head, but when it comes to it I am lost.

I was sitting here thinking I have no idea what to write because all my ideas are for longer things that I can’t make into a chunk for today. But the reality is that is another excuse. Deep down I know what I have been circling and I am going to have to write it. I search desperately for something else. When I am at a loss I look back at the list of the pivot points in my life I just wrote for one of the exercises. And there it is again. That night. Oh shit I am writing it, please don’t cry yet.

At least if I finally do it then I can use it to say “well nothing is going to be as hard as writing that”. So I take a deep breath and plunge in.

I remember the build-up. The scene is that I am about nine or ten years old in the big shared house that we rent with two other families. The families are firstly, a single mum with one child much younger than me. Because I am 9 I find her intensely annoying she is always ‘borrowing’ my things and not respecting my only-child’s need for space.

The other family (the point of this story) was another single mum and her two children. The boy is my age, and his sister only a year or so younger. I love them both. They are my best friends. I have known them for three or four years, which at nine feels like forever. It is forever. We have lived together since their mother left her husband and moved in with me, my mum and my step-father. And our dog. Oh and the other annoying family… My mum has told me since that she never knew two children who got on so well and played so harmoniously as the boy, my best friend, and I.

So this day, my best friends had gone to see their father on an access visit and it is now getting towards night.

That night.

No, it’s no good, I am going to cry. Plunge on anyway.

It was getting late and I am trying to talk to the mother of my best friends, but she is not really listening. I remember feeling hurt that what I was trying to tell her wasn’t important. I am about nine and have a nine-year-old’s sensibility about what is important. Soon nothing is going to be important.

At some point I must have gone to my room. Been told to go to my room? Because I can remember sitting there and hearing the screams.

I can’t describe the screams.

Now, all these years later and I am a mother myself the memory of the screams is layered with what I can imagine about the screams. Then it was just screaming. Screaming I can’t describe.

Oh fuck I am really crying now – I might need to blow my nose. Why did I start on this? I am now the person who went to Catherine Deveny’s class and cried! Now the woman across the table is offering me a tissue. Oh shit, people are being kind, which only makes me want to cry more.

The screams.

“My babies, my babies”. I remember hearing this over and over again. And the endless barking of my dog. I don’t remember what I am thinking as I hear this. Eventually the bedroom door opens. My dog comes flying in from my mother’s arms.

“They’re dead”.

That was it. That was all she said. And the screams haven’t stopped.

“My babies”.

The door closes. I don’t really remember what I thought as I sat there trying to cuddle and calm my barking dog. I think I remember feeling like I shouldn‘t be left alone, that an adult should be with me. But maybe this is, in part, because I have since spoken (not very often maybe once or twice) with my mother and she asked something about whether I felt looked after that night. I had to admit I didn’t. I couldn’t blame her as she shook her head and felt again the pain that she hadn’t been able to make a difference to either  her best friend or to her daughter. That night. But who could help anyone on that night?

I also asked my mother about how I was after. The following week, months. I have very little memory of that time… My childhood memories are very fragmentary until maybe a year or two after that night. That night. I was trying to piece together a bit more of who I might have been then and how I dealt with the grief. She told me that I seemed ‘lost’ for quite some time after. But this doesn’t tell me much either. Lost… how lost? Where had I gone?

So I am here writing about it now – I have gone somewhere – it has never gone from me. That night. And I’m writing about that night but I still can’t describe the screams. I am telling people I want to be a writer but I can’t describe the screams.

How can you describe the screams of a mother who has just found out both her children have been killed by their father?

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer 

(This piece was written in July 2012)

 I met my husband late in life.

Not ‘late’ like ‘I’m-cashing-pension-cheques’ late. But late as in my reproductive clock has ticked over into Struggle Street.

I met him when I was 36. We married when I was 37. We got pregnant when I was 38 and then I actually started to feel old. Up to this point in my life getting older had never bothered me. No, I embraced it! I was happy to be done with my teenage angst, delighted to take life’s lessons in my 20s and ready to apply those lessons in my 30s.

Now I’m 40 and I’ve had four miscarriages in two years for no other reason aside from my age and bad luck.

When I was in my 30s and looking for love a girlfriend of mine said (over many a glass of red wine while we were seated at the singles table of the wedding of another friend), “Kimmy it’s just a numbers game”. Which roughly equates to “You’ve got to kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince.”

She was right. In the last few years I had struggled through 20 or so online dates before I finally met James. And I was only using the site for dating practice. I wasn’t even remotely committed to actual commitment with someone I met online. Not remotely.

But life’s funny like that. All that practice led me to the perfect fit. I played the numbers game and won a husband.

I mention this because that’s how I see this baby-making caper. It’s a numbers game. I’m a text-book mature-age want-to-be mother. I’m a statistic. A number. A percentage. Now that I’m ticking the next box in the age bracket my odds have gotten even longer.

And yet I’m hopeful. I simply believe. My husband and I are awesome people, with an awesome life that we love and into this life of awesomeness we will bring a baby or two (at this point I’ll settle for one, but he’s even more hopeful than me!).

I just need to manage my patience until the numbers swing my way.

Patience has never been a strong suit of mine. I was smoking behind the shelter shed the day they taught that in school. But, sometimes life makes you wait.

I waited the obligatory 12 weeks before having the obligatory 12-week scan at which point we discovered we had an eight-week-old dead foetus instead of a first trimester baby. Bugger.

Even though I was vaguely prepared for this (I knew the numbers were stacked) it still didn’t register when the nurse asked me to be specific about my dates because it seemed ‘a bit small’ for 12 weeks. So I had to have an internal scan (a delightful experience where you get a wand up your lady bits) to be sure the ‘a bit small’ was in fact, a bit dead. When we confirmed this fact the nurse said she’d leave us alone to ‘process’. I asked “Why?” because all I really wanted to know was what to do next. I had this lifeless thing not growing inside me. What does one do with that?

I had to go to my GP (I didn’t have one); I had to visit my obstetrician (I had one booked but we were yet to meet); I had to call work (I decided I needed two weeks to recover when I actually just wanted a free holiday).

So while I was in project commando mode, my gorgeous soft-in-the-middle husband had to process through this reality. He wasn’t quite as prepared for it as I was. We’d started calling this baby by it’s name. We’d talked about how we’d rearrange the house to accommodate and he’d been annoyingly vigilant about my alcohol intake (bastard).

But he put his feelings to one side and supported me 100% through my pragmatic approach to this wee conundrum. Bless him.

Two days after the scan we were up at 4am to be at the hospital for 5am. I had the added joy of having to have a suppository three hours prior to the procedure to soften my cervix (can’t remember the name of it, just that my cervix was clearly being as stoic as I was about the situation). Nil by mouth meant I was parched and hungry by 8am. I wasn’t allowed to move once the suppository had been inserted. So I was feeling pretty sorry for myself by this point and just wanted the whole thing over. What a palaver.

My darling husband sat patiently beside me the whole morning while we waited for me to go into surgery. He was the epitome of supportive. He didn’t talk unless I wanted to. He didn’t expect me to behave or act in any way in particular. He just was. Which was the opposite of how he behaved some years before when I was recovering from root canal, but that’s another story.

No, he was terrific. In fact, we’d been married for less than six months at this point and I fell in love with him all over again during this, our first miscarriage, together.

At 9am they finally summoned me to the operating theatre where all I remember is how fucking cold it was. That and that it was 9.10 when I lost consciousness and 9.45 when I woke up. Short and sweet. Actually, not so sweet really. The anaesthetic wore off pretty quickly and suddenly I was in a world of pain. “It’ll feel just like a bad period” my arse. I had so much pain I couldn’t lie still. The cramping was horrendous. Hearing my complaints the nurse tried to give me panadol. “Are you serious?!”, I screeched. “Get me the good stuff. Now!” Suddenly this whole miscarriage thing was making me angry. I did not expect the pain. Thankfully, now that I’ve been around the block more than once, I know that this level of pain is not normal. It was just not well-managed during this first procedure.

After some more screeching from me, and some signing of serious paperwork by my husband, I was allowed some of the good drugs and I drifted off into a lovely hazy slumber. I woke to Ellen on the TV and my husband sitting in the chair beside me – still. And then we were allowed to go home. Yay. Let the holiday begin.

In between pregnancy one and pregnancy two I was offered a fab new job in another state, so getting pregnant again meant getting acquainted with a whole new medical team.

I discovered we were pregnant again in the first week of the new job. Great. I hadn’t particularly bonded with any of my new office buddies so this was going to have to stay under wraps. Oh, that and I was suddenly a non-drinker. Try that one on when you work in PR!

Rather than wait it out and wonder we opted to have our first scan at the eight-week mark this time. The scan showed a 7-week foetus instead of an 8-week foetus but it was seemingly viable so we were advised to have another scan in a week. Not quite the ‘high five’ I was looking for, but we took it positively, none-the-less.

Within the week it was clear that pregnancy two, or P2 (I’ll start abbreviating for ease of reading shall I?), was going the same way as P1. Damn. I had some planning to do. Thank you baby Jesus for Christmas. To the surprise of my obstetrician I put off the procedure (technically a dilation and curettage) until I could break for a two-week holiday and have none of my new colleagues any the wiser. Happy days.

Ironically, for an atheist, I also have baby Jesus to thank for P3. We conceived in Tassie in a gorgeous stow-away apartment during our Easter holiday and while we were well-pleased with ourselves, twice shy by now, we were also naturally cautious.

Six weeks later we visited our lovely obstetrician again and the three of us held our breath and crossed our fingers as she did the scan.

Strike three. No heartbeat.

Off we go again for an early morning hospital admittance and form signing. By this stage I’m an old pro and just coast through it all, chatting to others in recovery as we come to. I even ask the nurses what’s in the sandwiches today because I want to avoid the weird tasting fish paste option this time.

I take another couple of completely unnecessary weeks off work and strike up another missed miscarriage. That’s what they call it, when you have no symptoms – a missed miscarriage. Like, ‘Oops, I missed my miscarriage. How did I do that? I’m sure I wrote it in my diary. I just missed it.’ Do they have a belated greeting card for that?

By now my quietly caring husband is getting a bit frustrated. Neither of us really expected that it would be this hard. It had taken all the joy out of planning for a baby. It’s true, if planned baby-making sex doesn’t dial down the romance then consecutive failed pregnancies will.

On the bright side, having three meant we were elevated to ‘recurrent miscarriage’ status which means that the medicos will investigate. Hurrah, thought I. We’ll get some answers. We’ll stop the leaky tap. We’ll replace the flat tyre. We’ll add more salt to the recipe. Alas, the investigations showed nothing more than a Vitamin D deficiency for me and that my husband’s batting average was pretty good (ask him to explain).

I now have two specialists in my medical ensemble – which is quite a lot for someone who’s never had a regular GP. I have a fabulous fertility doctor (which is queer because we don’t have trouble getting pregnant) who instantly bonded with my husband the minute he pulled out the Star Wars reference of ‘stay on target’. We loved him immediately.

I find out we’re pregnant with number four (P4) the same week my job (you know, the one we moved states for) is made redundant. This actually pleases me because I realise I’ll have all the time in the world to be either pregnant or recover from not being pregnant. Seriously. That’s how my brain works.

Because I’ve told you the ending at the beginning of this story you already know that P4 ends the same way that the first three did.

Me and Kim’s baby Eddie Rose concieved just after coming to GunnasI’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to it this time though. I mean, sure, it’s a shit thing to go through, but the legal drugs are fabulous.

Last week we actually had a counselling appointment with an IVF clinic, which I’d put off until after a US holiday and my 40^th birthday dinner – do you see where my head is at? Mr Star Wars doesn’t necessarily recommend IVF for us but pre-genetic testing will increase our odds of a viable embryo. It’s still no guarantee. Neither of us has particularly embraced the whole IVF thing. Don’t get me wrong. Science is a grand thing and I’m fully aware that I have limited years left to roll this dice – I’m just not ready to roll them down that route yet.

I’m not prepared to tie myself up in knots with fear and anxiety and financial investment every month to make that work. That’s just not how I operate. And to be honest I really don’t think that’s in our best interests either. I’m not religious. Some might call me an atheist (or if they’re generous, a heathen). But I do have faith. I believe our family will happen exactly when it’s meant to. And while I wait, patiently I’m going to be getting on with my life.

I hope the next time you read something from me on this topic it’ll be all sunshine and light about how P5 has turned out into a – you know – actual baby. But you know what? It might not be. I might have a few more numbers left in this game yet.

You can connect with Kim’s cheeky side at https://twitter.com/kim_cowen or her rent-paying professional side at http://www.linkedin.com/in/kimcowen . One day soon she’ll roll all this sparkling wit into a blog with real stories and stuff.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer

My smallest person said to me yesterday, “If my life is a dream, then this is a really long night.”

I keep waiting to wake up from my really long night.  Or to wake up and not feel that my heart has been ripped from my chest.  Grief is an inconvenient emotion.  No one really wants to hear about someone else’s pain – not real, raw, just-make-it-stop pain.  It’s unsociable, doesn’t want to be tamed.  I once watched my sister, the bravest person I know, cry for two hours while she waited for pain medication.  For two hours, I held her hand and said relief was coming soon.  But I do not know how far away soon is for me.

Every day my heart is a little more tattered.  One of my queeny friends used to tell me, “Honey, you don’t just wear your heart on your sleeve; you wear ALL your internal organs on your sleeve.”  So sometimes now I think of my large intestine dripping its disgusting contents down my arm.  I wish I were otherwise, but I am not.  I have always been thus.

I blame my parents.  They love me so much and have for so long that I find it incomprehensible he could not.  I come from a long line of people who love fierce and forever.  When I said, “with my body I thee worship”, I meant it.  I am sorry he didn’t know some of that worship would be the times when my body was taken up with little people.  How did he not know I loved him, underneath the daily stupidity?

Nearly every night now feels like the first night of the rest of a really long life I never imagined, a dream without a waking: the first night he told me about her, the first night after I asked him to move out, the first night that the children were not with me.  I am still waiting for the first night I do not miss him.

Already I miss the security of being with him.   And not in some plain vanilla (though vanilla is the most complex of flavours) sort of way.  Always, I was so open.  Again, I think my parents warped me.  The childhood lesson I took from my mother’s extensive lingerie collection and the naughty things I found in the back of my parents’ closet was, once married, you were free to get your kink on.  Even in a good Lutheran home.  I have been with him in ways that still amaze me.  To be that vulnerable ever again terrifies me.  But I still want to be turned inside out by sex. I have loved being so totally inside my body, feeling so totally myself yet not.  I want that again.

He has pushed me out of his heart ad given his body to someone else.  They tell me it happens all the time.  But my heart is still beating outside its bony cage, and my internal organs are an unsightly mess here on my sleeve.  I want nothing more than not to want him. To unlove him, as I have loved him, fierce and forever.

My twitter is @StedgeTanya.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer

Once upon a time there was a very unusual family led by a giant. This giant had an uncle of average height and a nephew (from his sister) who was tiny. These three lived a life of strange misadventure – break ups, meltdowns and backlash followed.

They lived in a time when life was difficult.

Everyday they would rise early to work hard at jobs that were physically exhausting and extremely low paid. They dreamed of a better life as most did in London in the 1900s. One day, Charles Wendt, known by all who knew him as Charles the Great, decided he had had enough of the back breaking jobs and wanted a life filled with colour and joy.  He decided that his only chance was to follow his boy hood dream of joining the circus. He convinced his uncle, Archibald Wendt and his nephew Harry to join him.

Because of that decision the trio set off on an adventure that could never have been for seen. They would remain together until the day they died. Until finally this story could be told – so sit back, relax and get yourself ready to listen to a story of great love and loss.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer

My husband is really pissed off with my parents…like REALLY pissed off. He is so pissed off that he can’t stop talking to people about how pissed off he is. He talked to his boss about what they did that has so pissed him off. She validated his feelings.  He told his Mum. He rang her over in Adelaide to tell her. She tried to avoid validating his feelings, instead she tried to rationalise the behaviour of my parents.  He was so pissed off he disallowed her rationalisation.  He brought her around to empathising with his position, even though she has her own problems.

He was so pissed off with my parents that I could not comfort him.  I’ve been there so many times and my anger has shifted to resignation and a motivation to change things to prevent the behaviour from occurring again, or at least from having an adverse impact on me and my family. This is routine for me, he knows that, so he knows is validated by me, besides which, my actions in response to this most recent episode showed him.  It doesn’t always work, sometimes I get really pissed off too, but it’s no use.

But what hurts me now is to see how affected he is and how it has produced such a negative response in him that affects everything and everyone around him.

“That’s what happens to me”, I thought.

“He has watched me go through the exact same process so many times”, I thought.

“How painful this is to watch and feel”, I thought.

He screamed at the kids, made each girl cry. He said they had driven him to it.  I had to tell him, “My parents are pissing you off, not the kids”.  Because I know. And he didn’t disagree.

“He has told me that before himself”, I thought.

“He must be feeling terrible at that realisation”, I thought. “I did too”.

He cuddled and apologised to each of the girls and told them it wasn’t their fault and that he loved them.

“I’ve done that many times too”, I thought.

“He must feel awful”, I thought.

But the girls embraced him and accepted his apology and showed him the unconditional love they have for him and I know it will melt his pain.

“He must feel wonderful now”, I thought.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer

Let me tell you a joke.

It’s 1973 and the world’s a different place. As no one had air-conditioning, summers seemed hotter and longer. Late at night, groans could be heard echoing around the suburbs, as the test pattern signalled the end of television for the evening. We’d now have to wait until morning to watch shows, which somehow were even more crap than what had been shown the previous day. Blokes were called Bazza and seatbelts were still perceived to be for wimps only.

In comparison to now, it seemed simple, or even a strange time. I bet you something though. There were a lot stranger things going on and unfortunately for me, they were happening under my roof.

Mum and dad were splitting up and had decided to sell the house. No big deal, right? Well, it was back then, as divorces were rare amongst my friends. Most parents I knew had been together for years. Mind you, they probably detested each other, but they certainly kept their misery private and carried on.

Okay, so the splitting up may have been a bit hard, but something more stressful was going on. Mum had officially become strange. I don’t know if there’s an exact moment when someone has lost their rocker, but the giveaway for me is when she started talking to herself. This may not seem too odd, but I can assure you it was, as she answered in a different voice, whilst being alone in a room.

As young child, I thought she was just going through a phase. A little odd, but was going to be okay the following morning. The next day of normality never arrived though and she would frequently become, what my siblings used to call, ‘mad’. How else would one explain your mother screaming at people in the street, accusing them of having followed her for over 40 years from another country? How else would you explain her talking in different voices, before launching into a screaming tirade? This solo scream-fest would always conclude with her opening and slamming shut the thick, wooden rear door, over and over again, causing the house to shudder.

Even through all of this repetitive behaviour, I still thought she would one day be okay, but until then, I learned to hide when she was ‘mad’. It was still what I’d call an internal family drama, as no one, including friends, knew what was going on.

During the lazy summer of 1973, this hidden drama began to seep out of our bland, suburban walls. It’s pretty easy to pinpoint the exact moment as well.

Our house sat on a busy highway and I could see the premises as I walked home from school. The ‘For Sale’ sign was easily visible from some distance. No problem, right? Well, yes, no problem, except one day the word ‘JOKE’ had been written in massive, black letters on the sign.

Huh? Who would do that? I had some suspects. My brother was living a last man standing, rough and tumble teenage lifestyle, which involved frequent fights with local kids and generally just upsetting everyone. He certainly may have disturbed one local too many.

Dad though, was just plain old confused and I guess he wasn’t the only one. Hell, it confused my world of friends, as kids would approach me at school saying, “Why is ‘joke’ written on the sign outside your house?” The best answer I could give was a very vigorous shoulder shrug.

Life continued on and the sign stood with the thick, black paint scrawled across it for a few weeks. I felt uneasy and ashamed to enter the driveway, as I imagined people looking at our house, which was suddenly the centre of attention. This was the exact opposite of how I wanted to live.

Things never seemed normal, but eventually when the sign was changed for another, I believed things were looking a little brighter.

It’s said you only remember moments from the past, which are significant. If that’s the case, what happened next must have been important, as I clearly recall it, even though it occurred 40 years ago. I could also say another thing. Be careful about what you view, as the sight can’t be removed from your memory and can linger for a lifetime.

Late afternoon, I was standing in the lounge-room, aimlessly staring out into the front yard. In my languid state, I really didn’t take notice as mum walked up the driveway towards the highway. She was out of view for a moment, before suddenly heading back into my sight. Now I was intrigued.

Returning down the wide, gravel path, she was bolt upright with a stern face staring straight ahead and purposeful stride in her step. Down by her side, something was held in her hand. What could it be? Quickly switching to another window, I only had a glimpse of what she was holding, but a momentary view is all I needed. It was an open tin of black paint with a brush protruding.

Damn I wished I hadn’t looked out the window that day. What I’d wished for mum was gone in a handful of seconds. I wanted her to be normal, as all the other mothers of my friends I’d met, but it wasn’t to be. From that moment it struck me she was gone and was never going to return from the alternative world she lived in her mind.

Remember the start? What was the joke? I’ve no idea, but I didn’t have to look far, as once again the new sign had that familiar word scrawled on it as before. ‘JOKE’.