AUTOBIOGRAPHY

I was told to write an autobiography but as I do not know a car that is worth writing about I will write about myself instead.

I was born at a young age as the seventh of eight kids. I was a typical seventh child. I grew up on the wheat and sheep farm in the Mallee in northwestern Victoria. I went to Yaapeet, and Nypo Primary schools and Rainbow Higher Elementary. I was an ordinary student for a long while but I was a worse farmer so I stayed at school and become a teacher. I spent two years at Ballarat Teachers’ College where the mean temperature is just less than that at Mawson Station.

Having taught at a few country schools I transferred to Tecoma in the Dandenong Ranges. I have been around this area ever since.

I married Sue a heap of years ago and we have been ecstatically happy in that relationship ever since. We sometimes feel like a bit of a collector’s item. The tenure of this marriage says a lot about Sue’s level of tolerance.

We have two sons, Justin and Shannon. They have both long flown the coop. Justin is the General Manager of a timber company and Shannon flogs real estate. Justin married Kylie a few years ago.

I taught for over thirty years in the classroom and avoided taking administrative positions as I considered I was already silly enough. Having taught and enjoyed it I took a Kennett Scholarship. (read: Redundancy Package.)

Many years ago we had a storyteller called Monty Kelly at our school and after he left the librarian told me that she thought I could do it to. So I did. I used classes I taught and the classes of others to practice my storytelling. I enjoyed this more and more as I developed my skills and my story repertoire.

So here I sit at my computer, writing, reading, composing and getting backache.

When not telling stories and filling in as a relief teacher, I still enjoy the teaching bit, I work on my wood lathe, wood carve and do other woodwork. When I can, I sneak over the road to the golf course, in my frantic pursuit of a little white ball which I must despise as every time I find it, I hit it as hard as I can.    The problem with my golf is that I do not do enough walking in between hits.

So that is basically a potted history of me, leaving out playing heaps of sports in a fairly manic way.