In case I ever want to write my memoirs
May. 28th, 2025 09:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gemfyre1979
I am born in October.
Mum's water didn't break so the doctor broke it with a hammer thingy and scratched my head in the process. They didn't tell mum, just handed her a baby with a massive lump on its head. For years I claimed I could still feel the lump.
The family GP gives mum a copy of "Custard The Cowardly Dragon" which features a heroine named Belinda.
1980
I turn 1.
I don't remember it.
1981
I turn 2.
I don't remember it, but we fly to Melbourne to visit my aunt and newborn cousin. (this might have been in 1982)
1982
I turn 3.
I don't remember anything else.
1983
I turn 4.
For my birthday I get a book about how I'm all grown up now I'm 4 years old.
1984
The family drives to Melbourne to visit my aunt, uncle and cousin. I have vague memories of this trip.
I turn 5.
Either 1984 or 85 we travel to Dongara. Dad plays Ravel's Bolero (made famous by ice dancers Torvil and Dean) as we drive through the sand dunes. Bolero is forever more "sandhill music".
My brother catches blowfish, I keep some in a bucket for a day or two, then my brother "pops" them and disposes of them. I swear they came in blue and green colours, but now I know my local fish, the Weeping Toadfish comes in one colour - a creamy, greenish/brown.
My pre-school teachers are Mrs King and Mrs Hedland.
I have a ladybug cake for my birthday at school.
All us kids dig a complex series of channels and bridges in the sandpit.
1985
The family road trip is to Busselton and Augusta.
Our cabin in Busselton smells of the kerosene heater.
My brother catches a flounder.
We visit Jewel, Lake and Yallingup (Nigilgi) caves. A water drop falls on mum and the tour guide tells everyone, "okay everyone on three. One. Two. Three." *everyone goes "awwwww"*
Oddly I can't remember where we stayed in Augusta.
I turn 6. My mum invites my "friends from school". Most of those girls I didn't regard as my friends.
I start primary school
My teacher is Mrs O'Mara.
My best friend is Lisa Willmot, a girl the rest of the students have collectively decided is the lowest rung on the pecking order. This puts me on the second lowest rung.
For Christmas I get a trampoline (probably a joint gift to me and my siblings). And I get an orange pony toy with apples on her butt. Applejack is my first My Little Pony.
1986
We travel to Cervantes to stay with mum's cousin.
There are sea hares all over the beach.
I am in grade 2. My teacher is Mrs Robinson.
We have two class goldfish named Fergie and Andrew. Eventually they die and some of the kids blame me because I accidentally dropped this craft thingy made of a toilet roll into the bowl briefly.
This year and all through pre-primary school I am bullied, pins are put on my chair, I am accosted for my lunch money and sometimes walk home the long way to avoid this.
Because I have few/no friends I often eat lunch in the toilets, which feels safer.
One time I retreat to the toilets when chased by bullies and make "wooooo" noises like a ghost in hopes of scaring them off. A teacher comes in and tells me off for making the noise and makes me stand in a corner of a building for the rest of lunch. I cry while I'm there. It's also not a safe place to be outside like that.
I see dog faces in the terrazzo walls of the toilet cubicles.
I hate the large gap at the bottom of the doors and walls - some kids peek underneath them.
Thursday is fishburger day. I still remember the taste. I buy fruit balls with my canteen change, that way the bullies can't get money out of me.
If I can, I sit in the library most of lunch. No wonder I became a bookworm. For a few years I pretty much refuse to read fiction, only reading "fact books".
1987
Family road trip to Broome. Nanna Forbes comes with us.
I need to find my diary from this trip. Written in soft lead, smudging, pencil and a child's messy handwriting.
In Minilya we end up camped "next to a cesspit".
We stay at Wittenoom overnight and visit Wittenoom gorge where we have a close call with a kangaroo and collect rocks, some containing asbestos.
In Sandfire a friendly black cat sleeps in Nanna Forbes' feet and cows wander through the campground at night.
I fall in love with Broome.
I am in 3rd grade.
My teacher is Mrs Rennick.
We have a class bunny called Nibbles, who pees in Mrs Rennick's lap one time.
Saturdays are shopping day. I sometimes throw tantrums when I want something. Sometimes I get what I want. Specifically the My Little Pony Pretty Parlour and a beautiful big book called The Atlas Of World Wildlife. I love both things, and I still have them to this day. The book is probably one of the foundations of my lasting love of nature.
1988
Road trip to Monkey Mia. We stay in an onsite van on the beach. The woman next to us has a black cat.
I feed and pet the dolphins. None of these things are possible these days.
We meet a woman with hands attached straight to her shoulders - no arms. She is a thalidomide baby.
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
I am born in October.
Mum's water didn't break so the doctor broke it with a hammer thingy and scratched my head in the process. They didn't tell mum, just handed her a baby with a massive lump on its head. For years I claimed I could still feel the lump.
The family GP gives mum a copy of "Custard The Cowardly Dragon" which features a heroine named Belinda.
1980
I turn 1.
I don't remember it.
1981
I turn 2.
I don't remember it, but we fly to Melbourne to visit my aunt and newborn cousin. (this might have been in 1982)
1982
I turn 3.
I don't remember anything else.
1983
I turn 4.
For my birthday I get a book about how I'm all grown up now I'm 4 years old.
1984
The family drives to Melbourne to visit my aunt, uncle and cousin. I have vague memories of this trip.
I turn 5.
Either 1984 or 85 we travel to Dongara. Dad plays Ravel's Bolero (made famous by ice dancers Torvil and Dean) as we drive through the sand dunes. Bolero is forever more "sandhill music".
My brother catches blowfish, I keep some in a bucket for a day or two, then my brother "pops" them and disposes of them. I swear they came in blue and green colours, but now I know my local fish, the Weeping Toadfish comes in one colour - a creamy, greenish/brown.
My pre-school teachers are Mrs King and Mrs Hedland.
I have a ladybug cake for my birthday at school.
All us kids dig a complex series of channels and bridges in the sandpit.
1985
The family road trip is to Busselton and Augusta.
Our cabin in Busselton smells of the kerosene heater.
My brother catches a flounder.
We visit Jewel, Lake and Yallingup (Nigilgi) caves. A water drop falls on mum and the tour guide tells everyone, "okay everyone on three. One. Two. Three." *everyone goes "awwwww"*
Oddly I can't remember where we stayed in Augusta.
I turn 6. My mum invites my "friends from school". Most of those girls I didn't regard as my friends.
I start primary school
My teacher is Mrs O'Mara.
My best friend is Lisa Willmot, a girl the rest of the students have collectively decided is the lowest rung on the pecking order. This puts me on the second lowest rung.
For Christmas I get a trampoline (probably a joint gift to me and my siblings). And I get an orange pony toy with apples on her butt. Applejack is my first My Little Pony.
1986
We travel to Cervantes to stay with mum's cousin.
There are sea hares all over the beach.
I am in grade 2. My teacher is Mrs Robinson.
We have two class goldfish named Fergie and Andrew. Eventually they die and some of the kids blame me because I accidentally dropped this craft thingy made of a toilet roll into the bowl briefly.
This year and all through pre-primary school I am bullied, pins are put on my chair, I am accosted for my lunch money and sometimes walk home the long way to avoid this.
Because I have few/no friends I often eat lunch in the toilets, which feels safer.
One time I retreat to the toilets when chased by bullies and make "wooooo" noises like a ghost in hopes of scaring them off. A teacher comes in and tells me off for making the noise and makes me stand in a corner of a building for the rest of lunch. I cry while I'm there. It's also not a safe place to be outside like that.
I see dog faces in the terrazzo walls of the toilet cubicles.
I hate the large gap at the bottom of the doors and walls - some kids peek underneath them.
Thursday is fishburger day. I still remember the taste. I buy fruit balls with my canteen change, that way the bullies can't get money out of me.
If I can, I sit in the library most of lunch. No wonder I became a bookworm. For a few years I pretty much refuse to read fiction, only reading "fact books".
1987
Family road trip to Broome. Nanna Forbes comes with us.
I need to find my diary from this trip. Written in soft lead, smudging, pencil and a child's messy handwriting.
In Minilya we end up camped "next to a cesspit".
We stay at Wittenoom overnight and visit Wittenoom gorge where we have a close call with a kangaroo and collect rocks, some containing asbestos.
In Sandfire a friendly black cat sleeps in Nanna Forbes' feet and cows wander through the campground at night.
I fall in love with Broome.
I am in 3rd grade.
My teacher is Mrs Rennick.
We have a class bunny called Nibbles, who pees in Mrs Rennick's lap one time.
Saturdays are shopping day. I sometimes throw tantrums when I want something. Sometimes I get what I want. Specifically the My Little Pony Pretty Parlour and a beautiful big book called The Atlas Of World Wildlife. I love both things, and I still have them to this day. The book is probably one of the foundations of my lasting love of nature.
1988
Road trip to Monkey Mia. We stay in an onsite van on the beach. The woman next to us has a black cat.
I feed and pet the dolphins. None of these things are possible these days.
We meet a woman with hands attached straight to her shoulders - no arms. She is a thalidomide baby.
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
