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The Early
Years
My earliest memory is a dreadful one. I was
just three years old and inRoyal Prince Alfred Hospital, in Sydney,
to have a hernia and undescended testicle fixed. The old Matron of the
children’s ward didn’t like the fact that I was a thumb-sucker
and tied my hands to the sides of the cot. I distinctly
remember struggling to get free, looking pleadingly at my
parents, who stood mutely to the side, but the Matron insisted
that I remain tied up.
Somehow I realised that my parents were
not then, or ever, going to reach out to me in such times of
deep emotional need, and resigned myself to the fact that I
wasn’t worth loving and that my suffering just had to be
quietly endured.
I have vivid memories of being told on countless
occasions that “we didn’t want you, we wanted a little girl”…
such were my early years knowing I wasn’t
wanted
and feeling isolated. I truly believed, for many years (well
into my teen years in fact), that I MUST have been adopted, as
I simply didn’t “fit” in this family. As I was so different
from my parents and my older brother, I must have come from
“somewhere else.”
At around the age of 4 I was taken to the
closest acceptable church for Sunday school –
Croydon
Park
Baptist
Church
. I was left there with the specific instructions “If
he mucks up, belt him.” I spent many
years walking to and from this little church for my Christian instruction. Until
my older brother was considered of age to go to, what
Mum called the “proper” church – the Anglican church which she had
been raised in - St Thomas Enfield (at that time it was
still the Church of England).
So
it was decided that if he was taking himself there by bus,
that I could go too.
Life at St. Thomas
& High School
St
Thomas was a larger church than the local
Baptist set-up, some of the people I already knew, so it was
quick for me to fit in and get to know people. I had become a
loud/boisterous young bloke, a trait I would latter learn was
a tool to hide behind, especially when feeling
uncomfortable.
When time came for high school I simply followed my
brother yet again and went to Belmore
Boys High
School, this was fine by me as my
best church friend was also going to attend
there.
When my
brother had started high school, some 5 years before me, he
had joined the army cadets, but I was more interested in the
boys club at church – Church of England Boys Society (CEBS),
my father was very strict and said that I could choose – I
chose the CEBS and have never ever regretted it. Friday nights
was CEBS night where our fearless leader, Barry Moore, would
do his best to Christianise us, who were more interested in
fooling around, talking about girls, etc. than we were in
discussing the finer points of Scripture. We
did have lots of fun, I remember the night that my best mate
from school came along – Harley Willox – we played “murder
ball” a game in which there were few rules except for your
team to place the 25 pound medicine ball in a circle drawn on
a gym mat and hold it there for a 3 count. Apart from that it
was anything goes. As I’m sure you can imagine with a bunch of
teenage boys playing it got pretty rough. Well, poor old
Harley on his first night got slammed into the wall and hurt
his shoulder – it never stopped him from fronting up the next
day for our bottle drive fundraiser. Harley was like that –
true and tough.
I spent
around 4 years in CEBS, enjoying the physical activity and
comradeship. We were always off somewhere on a hike, bushwalk
or something else. I play tabled tennis in the annual CEBS
tournament and enjoyed that too. Sydney CEBS had a camp-site
south of Sydney at Loftus,
Camp Wanawong. Our group took
a lot of responsibility for its development and
improvements. We
would often travel down to Loftus in Barry’s old VW Kombi van,
often squeezing as many as 20 kids in the back. The camp was located
down a very steep hill, which the poor old Kombi could only
climb when it was empty, so us kids, after a day of high
physical activity, would have to walk up the hill, or indeed
help push the Kombi up the hill – if it got a spurt on we
would jump onto the rear bumper in an attempt to get a lift
up. As I write it
is now more than 30 years since I have been to Camp
Wanawong, after another
very dear friend was killed in a rock climbing accident there
– I just can’t face going there.
As well as
improvements our group looked after the rock climbing
activities; teaching abseiling, climbing, etc. as well as
bush-craft. I remember the very first
time I was harnessed up and instructed for my very first
abseil-I was terrified, but, totally determined to go through
with it. Like so many people after the first decent I was
hooked and took every chance I could get to abseil again and
again.
In those few years I had a great deal of
fun. In general
church life was fairly traditional in the Anglican sense. We
used the “new” prayer book, even though the oldies preferred
the old prayer book.
The Rector was
Rev. Laurence Bartlett, since passed away. He was fairly
progressive for his day and he was very good at getting the
young people in, but less good at keeping
them.
As I
reflect on those days I am somewhat surprised that I have
stuck it out in church life. Not that being involved in a
church is bad, it isn’t it can be truly
wonderful
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Max Watson