I was, in my youth never aware of class, money (as in the cost of things like buildings), or even that houses can look different than from my area. It was only until we moved away to Underwood, I started to realise class and to a lower extent, money.
What I really liked about Inala, was the connections made between my needs as a child. I needed friends (Bobby from across the road) Mr Bosen, the owner of the 4 square store. and surrounding creeks and play fields that entertained my curiosity as a child.
Oddly enough, I still remember when my father ran a red light and the police booked him, I wondered why the car didn't stop for it. This was because I thought cars where controlled automatically by a wire in the road and the driver was only used to turn the car on and off.
I really had a great time, from elephant beetles in the poinsettia, from getting fly in my eye, from helping my sister do a science project on the Chinese elm tree. From making lego filled balloon craft, jumping of the roof several times, using an orbital sander as a cool new car. Although, one memory will be with me.
It's the time when we where playing cricket. The ball had gone over a hardy plank fence that my father had built, we (when we had parties and we seemed to have a few) had a string of light bulbs that where strung over the fence. I went over the fence, and got the ball, came back over the fence, and swung my leg over and hit the infra red lamp. This lamp, and I still remember it now, had paper thin glass, and even now looking at that picture, brings back memories. When I hit the bulb, it exploded into several pieves, of which a slither had gone into my leg. It had cut it open and I immediately jumped from the fence into the pool. `I looked down and saw red blood dance into the water like a red sea slug I had seen on "The world Around Us".My father came to me and pulled me directly up and he drove me to the hospital, but on the way he saw an ambulance and from there rode to the Mater hospital. I remember the doctor looking at my leg saying 'That'll need some stitches", of which at the time I though was a bit obvious. I looked into the crevice that was my leg and saw something that resembled the mouth of a whale, stringy and white. I really did not feel comfortable as the doctor started to sow my leg up. They organised several orderlies to hold me down. I was bed (and sofa) ridden and the use of my leg was really hard as I had lost strength there. To be continued..
