Having lived in cities for most of my life, at first this seemed like a difficult subject for me.  However, I did live in the country until I turned five, when our parents decided to move to the “city” to get the best possible education for us that they could afford.  So I am starting with a paragraph from a story I wrote last year.

My first memories are of a house in Healesville – or more accurately, around 5 “miles” out of Healesville.  Up the hill from our home was a large guesthouse – catering for around 150 guests.  This was originally run by our grandparents and another couple in partnership, although my clearest memories are of my uncle taking over the running.  Our house was like a log cabin, but far from small.  There was a large dormitory style room where my three siblings and I slept, the girls one end and the boys the other end.  All around us was bushland.  With the guesthouse, and some holiday flats as well there were plenty of other children around although they changed all the time.

The guesthouse provided some of their own produce.  The one I remember most clearly is the milk and cream.  They had cows.  My older cousins had the task of milking them for the milk and cream for the guesthouse.  I would not be surprised if they also had chickens for eggs, and probably grew a range of vegetables, but I cannot remember this.  My memory says that the milking was done by hand – no milking machines.  This was during the fifties.  Memories of visits after we moved away from Healesville still had these cousins and later some paid staff milking the cows.  The uncle who ran the guesthouse had owned a farm close by before taking over the guesthouse, but I cannot remember whether this was crops or animals.  Thinking about the area, I would expect that it was animals – perhaps dairy cattle.

Down the hill from our log cabin was the road to Healesville.  Over the road was bushland, with a creek.  In the creek was a pump for pumping water up to supplement the water supply for the various dwellings – the guesthouse, our log cabin, the holiday flats.  Another of the jobs for our cousins was to start up the generator to run the pump when it was required.

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​It is interesting how starting to think about the past, memories come back.  I can now remember seeing the old-style milk cans at the gate to my uncle’s farm (or was it some other farm in the region?).  This is the memory I have of the milk cans at the gate.  Maybe this confirms that my uncle had a dairy farm.

What is failure?

​During my school years, I was an academic, rather than an athlete.  I was also not considered artistic, although my sister and father were quite talented.  During my school years, failure was not something that I experienced academically.  The areas in which I had problems were artistically and athletically.

As far as athletics or sports were concerned, I did not shine at all.  And no-one expected me to so I was not given a chance to improve.  I did surprise them once.  The oval at the school had been infested with some sort of grub.  It had to be ploughed up and re-sown, and this happened just before our scheduled annual athletics carnival.  To give us some sporting competition, it was decided to have a competition around various sporting skills.  The one I remember was netball goal shooting.  There was an assumption as to who would be the winners, although it was not clear how they would place – who would win, who come second and so on.  I surprised them all, and came in second – it had been assumed that I would “fail”!  This was my only placing in any sport activity.  So, did I fail at sport?  This just not the direction my life was to lead.  I was not a failure in life just because I did not excel in sports.

The school I attend was a small (very small) private school, with only 200 students from years 1 through to twelve.  This meant that there was a limited number of subjects available.  Art was compulsory until the end of year 9.  I was ready to drop it as soon as allowed.  In year 9, it was a close shave as to whether I would pass or fail.  Fortunately, in year 9, there were two components to the subject – painting and Art History.  My vague memory is that I managed a paltry 45% in the practical side – a fail!  But for the Art History component, I shone.  A solid 90% or thereabouts.  Adding the two results together, I managed a pass overall.  Again, did I fail as an artist, or was it just that I was not a painter?  These days I could be considered an artisan, with my knitting – and I have worked in a few other crafts.  I was not a failure as an artisan just because painting was not my thing.

Academically I did not fail.  I passed all exams, even in the days of external exams for Intermediate (year 10), Leaving (year 11) and Matriculation (year 12).  Possibly I “failed” to get high marks, but I gained entrance to University in my chosen course.  I did get one low pass during my studies.  This just meant I could not continue in that subject – and it was the fill-in subject and did not stop me pursuing my chosen path.

Overall, there have been some low times, but failure can be a learning experience – learning about the direction to take in our lives.


Joy Shirley
​April 2017