remember having a strong sense of protectiveness towards her. But she and Claire were far closer to each other than I was with either of them. I’m not exactly sure why that was, although it occurs to me now that they may have interpreted the high expectations my parents placed on me – rather than on them – as favouritism. I probably got the lion’s share of attention (for both positive and negative reasons) throughout our childhood, and I can understand that that might have been infuriating for my sisters.
But I know now that siblings feel more rivalry towards each other when they sense there’s not enough parental love to go around – and that’s certainly how I felt. It’s weird but I’ve been thinking a lot about the Thompson Street yard, partly because it seemed to me that my parents’ nurturing abilities – such as they were – went straight into that garden. The whole area of Boronia Park was a very arid, inland place – a desert, really – but my parents worked incredibly hard to create a pretty garden, and they were rightly extremely proud of it. They set it out a bit like mini botanical gardens, even leaving the names of the various tropical shrubs attached to the stems so people could identify them (well, after all, they were in the biological field). I remember there were hibiscus bushes (yellow and pink), and poisonous pink and white oleanders about which we were given stern warnings. There were poinsettia (ditto the warnings), a camellia climbing up the sprayed concrete wall, and a crimson bottlebrush, which is an indigenous Australian shrub. I was most drawn to the wonderfully bountiful frangipani tree, with its creamy-yellow blossoms harbouring an intoxicating scent; it’s still my favourite flower. At some point a small rockery appeared in the front garden, while in the back yard there was a yellow wattle tree, a kumquat tree and a lemon tree – both dwarfed by an enormous, practical-but-unsightly, steel rotary clothes line.
Seasonally, my parents would plant poppies, gladioli, amaryllis, marigolds and various imported spring flowers, such as pansies, beneath the patio. These took a lot of work and lasted a very short while. I don’t know why they bothered; native Australian plants were beautiful and far more hardy, although back then warratahs, kangaroo paws and banksias weren’t considered as generally desirable as they are now (I suppose there was an element of European-style neighbourly competition involved). That garden had to be watered early and late; if the sun hit the plants before the water was absorbed into their roots they’d be fried. As I lay in bed at night, after our mother had read to us and turned out the lights, I would hear a pitter patter – not of rain, but of the garden hose. After my parents died, a photo album came to me with pictures from the Thompson Street days. There are forty pictures of the house and garden, five of my sisters, and none of me (although that was probably because the album was created after I’d left home). Yes, my parents loved and tended that garden with a passion.
You sound sad, bitter . . .
Yes, I am. But even though the ‘hurt child’ part of me is asking, ‘Why didn’t you spend that time tending to me instead?’, my adult part understands that, in a way, they were probably just trying to recreate the lush landscape in which each had been raised; my mother in the Fijian tropics and my father, whose New Zealand family home had boasted a wonderful garden and an orchard sloping towards Takapuna Beach. I don’t imagine it had been easy for either of them to relocate to Australia.
When our family returned to New Zealand for Christmas holidays we stayed in that Stephenson family house. It was a wooden, forties-style residence in Brown Street, Takapuna, and you could see the ocean from the back veranda. ‘There’ll be a ship along presently,’ Grandma would say, taking her late husband’s brass telescope and aiming it out
But I know now that siblings feel more rivalry towards each other when they sense there’s not enough parental love to go around – and that’s certainly how I felt. It’s weird but I’ve been thinking a lot about the Thompson Street yard, partly because it seemed to me that my parents’ nurturing abilities – such as they were – went straight into that garden. The whole area of Boronia Park was a very arid, inland place – a desert, really – but my parents worked incredibly hard to create a pretty garden, and they were rightly extremely proud of it. They set it out a bit like mini botanical gardens, even leaving the names of the various tropical shrubs attached to the stems so people could identify them (well, after all, they were in the biological field). I remember there were hibiscus bushes (yellow and pink), and poisonous pink and white oleanders about which we were given stern warnings. There were poinsettia (ditto the warnings), a camellia climbing up the sprayed concrete wall, and a crimson bottlebrush, which is an indigenous Australian shrub. I was most drawn to the wonderfully bountiful frangipani tree, with its creamy-yellow blossoms harbouring an intoxicating scent; it’s still my favourite flower. At some point a small rockery appeared in the front garden, while in the back yard there was a yellow wattle tree, a kumquat tree and a lemon tree – both dwarfed by an enormous, practical-but-unsightly, steel rotary clothes line.
Seasonally, my parents would plant poppies, gladioli, amaryllis, marigolds and various imported spring flowers, such as pansies, beneath the patio. These took a lot of work and lasted a very short while. I don’t know why they bothered; native Australian plants were beautiful and far more hardy, although back then warratahs, kangaroo paws and banksias weren’t considered as generally desirable as they are now (I suppose there was an element of European-style neighbourly competition involved). That garden had to be watered early and late; if the sun hit the plants before the water was absorbed into their roots they’d be fried. As I lay in bed at night, after our mother had read to us and turned out the lights, I would hear a pitter patter – not of rain, but of the garden hose. After my parents died, a photo album came to me with pictures from the Thompson Street days. There are forty pictures of the house and garden, five of my sisters, and none of me (although that was probably because the album was created after I’d left home). Yes, my parents loved and tended that garden with a passion.
You sound sad, bitter . . .
Yes, I am. But even though the ‘hurt child’ part of me is asking, ‘Why didn’t you spend that time tending to me instead?’, my adult part understands that, in a way, they were probably just trying to recreate the lush landscape in which each had been raised; my mother in the Fijian tropics and my father, whose New Zealand family home had boasted a wonderful garden and an orchard sloping towards Takapuna Beach. I don’t imagine it had been easy for either of them to relocate to Australia.
When our family returned to New Zealand for Christmas holidays we stayed in that Stephenson family house. It was a wooden, forties-style residence in Brown Street, Takapuna, and you could see the ocean from the back veranda. ‘There’ll be a ship along presently,’ Grandma would say, taking her late husband’s brass telescope and aiming it out
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