The Street Family Road Trip, began from our family house at 6 Firth Road Lenah Valley, Hobart, Tasmania. Mum and Dad shared the driving of a white Premier Holden. We all piled in, excited to leave our super suburban existence. A road trip was exactly what our crazy day-to-day chaos required.

I was not so sure Dad could last the distance away from the R.S.L.; he should have invested in shares because he almost lived there. He would smuggle his tallies under the house for when he gardened, cheekily. The aroma on Dad’s breath was hardly a hidden thing and it was easy for Mum to lose her marbles every time he came home intoxicated, or inside from his garden haven, oblivious to the aromatic evidence. He was always growing beans and strawberries most keenly. Mum’s flower garden made our humble one-storey, four bedroom house far more interesting and colourful. It was the most colourful garden in the whole street, but most importantly the whole of Lenah Valley. The land next door had not yet been subdivided and remained bushland where my cat prowled almost wild. He would come home stinking of dead animals he rolled in thinking he was wearing some exotic fragrance. Animal adventures and behaviours never cease to amaze me. Also we had a reptilian visitor who regularly sunned himself on the rock facing mothers garden feature. The bee tree. Mum believed he was protecting us from snake invasion. However looking back now i fear he was patiently waiting for a much sweeter meal.

Mum conned me by allowing me to adopt a kitten if I attended private school without an argument. Unfortunately, I was allergic to his spray. But it was a done deal anyway. He once dragged a black snake into the front yard. Mum proceeded to thrash it to smithereens with a huge rock. It is quite ironic that she was born in the Chinese Year of the Metal Snake. I am the Wood Snake.

The engine purred as Mum closed the gate. Dad drove out of the driveway that he himself built. We were the last house on Firth Road so it was a right turn and  then a left down the very, very steep Girrabong Road. Even with these Aboriginal-named roads I never saw a single Aboriginal in the whole of Lenah Valley There was one Indigenous female at the private high school, Mount Carmel College Mum made me attend.

After the seriously steep decline it was a left turn onto Lenah Valley Road. Before you turn, there is a fence where my only brother Jason once broke his ulna skateboarding right over it, head first. He never told a soul, scared to admit he’d broken Mum’s rules, until he almost developed gangrene! On the left hand side of the road was the Lenah Valley R.S.L. Club where Dad was a respected and valued member. Every time Mum drove past it or Dad’s G.P. a few blocks further down the road you could almost read her disturbed thoughts. I am sure she contemplated burning both buildings to the ground if only she could get away with it. She hated the Club for obvious reasons, but his doctor had prescribed him “mother’s little helpers” for his P.T.S.D.

We had a few hours of driving through the city to the country until we got to Eagle Hawk Neck. We called into the Devil’s Kitchen. The legend of the ill-omened spot is that allegedly the spirits were cannibals, who would capture and eat victims who ventured too close. The cave is blackened with soot, believed to be from the evil spirits cooking fires. That is why it is named the Devil’s Kitchen. For some reason, the cooking spot for the Devil really did not interest me too much. I was far too concerned about reaching Roaring Beach.

I remembered a fishing trip with Dad to Eagle Hawk Neck Beach. He went wading out quite far, fishing for flounder. He was a rather tall man. so this was not a super unsafe option for him. Us four children had inherited Mum’s shorter genes. We stayed knee deep in the cool Tasmanian shoreline when the tide was in. While Dad was out searching for flounder and spearing the reflection and not the actual light of the fish, we were all dazzled by the dance of the two huge stingrays. They were fluttering and flickering, not even threatened by our teenage presence. Unbeknownst to me,  a predatory stingray would be so significant in the future, with the death of Steve Irwin, the great environmental adventurer. But right then, in that moment, I harboured no fear. One stingray would dance in front of me like the  left wing hockey player I was at that time, gliding across the hockey field. The stingray’s  mate would copy on the right and then they would pass each other, swap, and synchronise their swift, graceful moves. They were oblivious to our human existence, evidence of nature’s mysterious magnificence, the darkest grey opulence. It was as if they were performing just for us. Dad completely missed this very special performance.

So we all looked over Eagle Hawk Neck Beach, where the stingray’s mated, contemplating the journey to Roaring Beach. We proceeded down the slim road inland until my brother yelled out.

“Are we there yet!?”

My mind was packed full of memories of the roar in great anticipation. We pulled up with huge sand dunes in front of us, almost meeting the clouds. Dad jumped out of the driver’s seat and stared at an  imaginary bar in the sky. His alcoholism was playing havoc as he had exercised great stamina to get us here safely, all in one piece. Unfortunately, all he could do today was fantasise about having his cold frothy beer, remembering the taste sensation. We all fell out in great excitement. We proceeded down the sandy track with a hurrying snake ahead of me and Mum. It didn’t even look up; it just slithered away symbolising regeneration and transformation. The life force.

Faced with climbing the huge sand dunes that kissed the sky, and in the darkness the moon, I struggled physically. If we didn’t fit into Mum’s tight basket of control, we were all in the dog house, all barking to escape. Dad was a prisoner once again. Dad risked his life daily with his best mate to steal food from the Japanese storehouse in Changi Prison Camp from 1941 in the Second World War until the end. If was caught he would have a choice of standing in the piercing heat with a pineapple in each hand and one balanced on his head; if he dropped them he would be shot. He chose to be locked in a box from where he  could just see a bowl of water. His perspective  gave the illusion the water was close, that he could just poke out his tongue for a drip of relief. But that action dehydrated him completely. After three days baking in the dangerous sun, if he had any fat before he entered that box, after being released he would be just skin and bone. A hideously severe punishment. If he was caught three times it was a decapitation. Unfortunately, Dad witnessed his best friend slaughtered with the unyielding Samurai Sword. The worst thing about this traumatic event was Dad had to bury his mate’s head. This obviously traumatised him. I grew up with Dad’s P.T.S.D. from this very cruel event. Dad and his best friend were vital to the survival of the whole prison camp. Their storehouse raids  fed the sick patients under Weary Dunlop’s care. He was the General and camp doctor in Changi. One day Dad was in a lineup to be shipped off to the notorious Burma Railway. The General  swapped Dad out at the last minute because he had a shrapnel wound. The Japanese did not abide by the Geneva Convention. The ship to the Burma Railway was bombed before it arrived.  This is why I really thought Dad deserved his alcoholism. I only wish I had known the Bible scripture Proverbs 21:19 in my teenage years: It is better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a contentious wife. Dad could have avoided her nagging.

So heading to Roaring Beach seemed like a peaceful option. We all felt the weight of each step through the heavy dry sand. We finally made it to the peak of the sand dunes and could see out to sea. We made the descent to the beach. The waves crashed violently onto the shore likening the roar of a ferocious lion. The spirit of the predatory lion had previously swept over the shore.

A whole pod of killer whales had recently beached on the sands of Roaring Beach. Their squeals would have been drowned out by the roar. Unafraid of the violent, decaying aroma we walked right up to the carcass of the nearest majestic animal. Standing on the grey sand I stared into the giant black and white scene. I likened this image to my Mother’s black and white thinking. I was standing in the shade of grey that makes everything feel okay. Mother was so one eyed and neurotic. No one is all evil and no one is all perfect. It is all a matter of perspective that Mother had sadly lost. We walked past all the orcas solemn graveyards. I had an overwhelming experience of great sadness with the death of these magnificent beasts. It was a highly memorable spiritual experience.

The passing snake earlier was our spiritual warning of the passing of these wonderful creatures, the regeneration of their spirits, kissing the universal voice. Captured in the violence of the tide and waves they hardly had a choice. Pulled into shore and trapped on the sand they collectively perished. It was, quite disconcerting to view such a powerful vision. It was a premonition of sacrifice that all the Street children would have to break away for their survival, defying nature early in life.

We all left Roaring Beach feeling heavy and carrying a quiet sadness. The journey back seemed like a walk in the park compared to the crazy smash that I could only imagine the killer whales would have had to contend with in a horrific fight. It was best we had arrived at this time as it would have been worse, if we had while their perilous struggle was actually happening. Powerless to assist them, it would have been traumatic. So I was leaving grateful, leaving them to dissolve, washing away each day in the high tide. They spread evenly across the beach. As we walked up the path where the snake had glided quickly, we shed our sadness just as a snake sheds its skin. Our family just experienced something quite emotionally unique and universally spiritual. Exhausted we were all speechless and all quietly piled into the Holden. Mum drove this time as we said our goodbyes to Roaring Beach. I envisaged a wild lion King roaring as we left. Somewhere in the ocean was a killer whale giving birth to another pod. That was the snake’s message. He passed making it seriously spiritual. It still brings tears to my eyes today, a highly emotional and challenging day.

I think Dad deserves a beer when he gets home, hey?

V.C.S.