Being the new person in town can be intimidating, but as a person who has moved on several occasions, both interstate and internationally, I developed different approaches depending on my age.  Changing schools as a child can be difficult, but when one reaches retirement the onus is on oneself to make friends and feel at home.
 
In 2012 my husband and I moved from Tatong to Portarlington on the Bellarine Peninsula.  I was the driver of this move as I had always wanted to live on the coast.  We had no family living nearby, knew nobody there, so we were starting from scratch.  At that time, the town had a lot of holiday homes.  The resident population was spread far and wide, with many houses occupied only on weekends and holidays.
 
I checked out the various activities available and initially joined an exercise class which was held in the local Senior Citizens building.  The ladies were very welcoming, so after a few weeks I started to feel at home.  I had not been swimming for years, but with the beach on my doorstep, I ventured back.  Swimming is not really a social sport however I found a swimming pool near our house.  I joined, became a regular morning swimmer, and further extended my circle of acquaintances.  I then discovered that the local Neighbourhood House held various activities and joined the Family History group.  Initially I was not really interested in Family History but joined to extend my social circle.  However, as anyone who has an interest in their history will tell you, it can become an addiction!
 
My husband and I decided to try our hand at bowls.  After five compulsory lessons we were invited to join the members for a social day.  Unfortunately, the weather was lousy.  Although we played several games I ended up with a flu-like infection which seemed to put an end to that venture.
 
One weekend we had a visit from a Benalla couple.  During the weekend the lady, Betty, persuaded me to have a hit of tennis.  This was another sport that I had mothballed about twenty years previously.  I enjoyed playing again and, as a result, I joined the Veterans at Port Lonsdale and played twice a week.
 
As a Vinnie’s Volunteer in Benalla, I sought out the nearest Vinnie’s and offered my services.  This was located at Queenscliff, both extending my knowledge of the area and introducing me to a different group of people.
 
As you can see, I spread my net far and wide.  This is the only option if one moves to a new place in one’s senior years. 
 
I thoroughly enjoyed my time on the Bellarine Peninsular, however realised there were many downsides to living there, particularly as one ages.
 
Our decision to return to Benalla to live was made easier by the fact that we already knew people here.  We would not be ‘New in Town’ once more.
 
 
Margaret McCrohan
March 2021

​My father warned me that we could be buying into a ghost town.  It was a bit ram shackle and a couple of the original houses needed to be demolished.  

Seeing that we couldn’t afford to live out in the bush where I would have the peace and quiet that I craved, Goorambat was the next best thing.

For three years we had enjoyed lived in the farm cottage by the banks of the Broken River.  In 1973 with the sale of the family property it was time to move on.

Don was a high-level quadriplegic from a diving accident in years past, so he couldn’t help with the move. The people we were buying the house from were in the same boat. The husband was recovering in a Melbourne hospital after open heart surgery, so we were two women managing the best we could.

It was evening when we moved into Main St Goorambat. Gwen still had open topped boxes in the living room, so I put my boxes alongside. I was tired so just threw my purse into one of them. Don also tossed his wallet into one of the boxes without looking.

“What’s for tea?”  I told him I had only brought enough food for a light tea and breakfast, and I would shop in the morning.

The night was almost consumed with juggling furniture around. After midnight the ancient Queen Anne bed was still on the floor in pieces. Don said, “Go and get Ray from next door to help you.”  “No, I’m new in town and I’m not going to be a nuisance.”

At three a.m. I was looking forward to a nice hot bath with water that wasn’t straight from the Broken River. Horror, this was worse, it was dark brown with mud from the Broken Creek!

At 5 am we were woken by an unholy racket; it was the twice a week goods train stopping opposite the house to unload supplies and barrels for the Pub.
 
In our tired state we had no idea which boxes contained the money.  At lunch time Don said, “Just go to the store and ask for credit.” “No, I’m not going to have anyone think that we’re going to be a nuisance in this town.”

The sun was setting when we found the wallet.  I still remember the intense joy of that moment. We said, “Let’s go to the Royal for tea to celebrate, we can pick up the cat from the cottage on the way back.”

We got used to the early goods train and the grain trucks being loaded from the silos at three in the morning, with the slamming of lids and the crash of each rail trucks buffers colliding as they careered down the track after being filled.

Most people in the district were related and were proud of their family connections. I soon found that the quickest way to be accepted was to have knowledge of the extended family trees.

With the early 1970’s drought, farmer’s sons were moving away for other employment. The small mixed farms surrounding Goorambat were about to be swallowed up by larger acreages. Small towns were struggling, but social division of the sexes was still alive and well.  In the town there was men’s work and women’s work, and no one crossed the line. But the winds of change were blowing.

Victory Park was looked after by the local members of the R.S.L. who were mostly farmers. When Don returned home with a request from the men for me to cut the grass in the Park, as they were busy with the harvest, I knew there would be trouble.  It nearly caused a revolt from the town’s women who wanted to know why I was doing the men’s work.

When Don passed away, I inherited his position as Goorambat Football Club Treasurer. When I also became the Secretary, there was another bunch of very indignant women to deal with and I found the first nails placed under my car’s tyres!

At the Presentation Night I was awarded the Best Clubman trophy.  When it was asked if it should be ‘Club Person’, the men said “No, she belongs to the men’s committee” and I got more nails in my tyres.

I treasure my Clubman of the Year trophy.  There was no ‘person’ nonsense then. I was appreciated and it was not long before I was considered a local.
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Times and attitudes have changed.  It doesn’t matter if you are a newcomer or whether you are male or female. Now we all work together for the good of the community. 
 
Bev Morton
March 2021

Thursday the 15th of March 2018 was the day, the day we finally moved from Mt Eliza to Benalla. I say finally, because we had purchased 10 Benson Street in the November of the year before. We had opted out of moving quickly because of my medical procedures that had to happen over the January and February period of 2018, but move we did!!

The day before, we had loaded our belongings into two furniture trucks for the journey North.  The procedure had, however, taken much longer than anticipated.  The trucks bivouacked over night at the company’s yard, but we ventured forth and stayed overnight at “Benson Lodge”, our home away from home in Benalla.  Ray and Liz Gallagher had become friends - we had stayed with them quite a few times whilst searching for the perfect new home in Benalla.

Why Benalla, you may well ask?   Well, the horrendous traffic down on the Mornington Peninsula had finally taken its toll.   We just had to move to a more traffic civilized area.  Benalla ticked all the boxes!  Excellent medical services, a vibrant community, and the essential rail connection to Melbourne.

Benalla was not a foreign town to me by any means, for I have often visited it over my lifetime.   As well as having a third cousin living here, so does my adopted sister of some sixty-five to seventy years, Jill Ross, nee Hartridge and her brother John.  My family and the Hartridge’s have had family connections for nearly a century and now we have cemented that relationship once again!

My first action after coming to town was to transfer my Lions Membership from the Lions club of Mount Eliza to the Benalla club. I had been a Lion for twenty-four years at that time, in six clubs and two Lions Districts, as well as being the two thousand and eleven/twelve District Governor of District V2. This I did and promptly found myself as the club secretary, a position I held for two years.  I also joined the Benalla Sub-Branch of the RSL and Rose City Probus.

My hobbies include coin collecting.  I have a complete collection of Australian decimal coins, up to 2021, as well as a few unusual non circulated ones. I also have quite a few “spares”, so if any coin collector wants to make up a collection, just give me a call.

My other passions are my classic cars.  My 1997 Mercedes Benz 320 started off as the PM John Howard’s chauffeur driven vehicle, purchased when PM Kevin Rudd sold off the Australian government’s prestige car fleet in 2009.   I also have a 2000 Jaguar XJ8, which I drive on long trips.  I belong to two Car Clubs, the Grampians Vintage and Veteran Car Club, based in Ararat/Stawell and the Northern Peninsula Classic Car Club.

Both my wife Cheryle and I have now ventured into the world of the Benalla U3A. 
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My life has become quite active in my new-found home!
 
David Lowing
March 2021

​I have been “new in town” on several occasions.  I wrote about these in 2020 but left out the most recent move.  Perhaps it is time to write about that move – the move to Benalla.
First a quick recap of the earlier moves.

There was a move from Melbourne to Canberra.  We had a one-year-old son, no way of meeting people and I was very lonely.  Eleven months later we moved back to Melbourne but only for only 14 months.  I knew with our move to Adelaide it was up to me to meet people, not wait for them to find me.

Later moves were easier – Adelaide-Melbourne, Melbourne-Adelaide, Adelaide-Canberra.  Both our children were at school and I was back working.  This meant I had opportunities for meeting people.

One last move – children grown and no longer at home, now retired and without the work environment as an established network.  It is possibly our last move.

Being retired, I was back in the position of our first move – no job giving a built-in way for meeting people, no children at school to meet up with parents.  Again I had to make the effort to meet people.

Well, maybe not quite the same.  We had a reason for moving to Benalla – the Gliding Club.  That helped my husband.  He knew some of the people and had a way of meeting others.  But I was not a pilot.

We had bought our new home in a short court (well, titled ‘Place’).  Just seven houses.  But before we knew what was happening, we had met most of the neighbours.  It was just before Christmas.  A group of the neighbours got together for a Christmas dinner at one of the restaurants.  We were invited.  We met more neighbours in the street at the end of the court.

I found out about “Rhyme Time” at the library.  They needed a volunteer for a few months.  From there I became involved in “Mother Goose”, an activity encouraging interaction between parent and child developed in Canada.  This is no longer run in Benalla, but a similar program is run by Tomorrow Today, called PEEP developed in the UK.

New opportunities opened up.  I spent part of the summer season helping in the Gliding Club Office.  My husband and I spent a couple of years helping with Meals on Wheels.  Then we found a new area for volunteering – with BPACC.  I still usher there one or two times a week.

The biggest change was finding out about U3A.  So many opportunities for learning new things and meeting people!  I have found new friends, and friends of friends.  I am always busy, either attending classes, preparing for classes, or preparing classes that I convene.

What have I learnt about being new in town?  That it is up to me to find what is going on.  That it is up to me to make the effort to join in what I have found.


Joy Shirley
March 2021