Boys Being Boys

As many of you already know, boys never really grow up, they just grow old. No matter how old the boy there is some sort of toy that will give him back a little wonder of his youth. They also learn very slowly about the machine that keeps them going and how to treat it properly. I am told that the sporting helmet was invented 100 years after the sporting codpiece and I'm not surprised.

I'm a bit of a machine nut, even though I am mechanically inept. Twelve months back I had the opportunity to view machines that made feminine hygiene products. There are several gratuitous jovial pieces that I could use here, however the important thing was: they were machines. Pieces of metal and plastic ingeniously cobbled together to make whirrs and clunks and allow us boys to have our eyes glaze over in childish rapture. The best in factory was a terminator looking device (or at least the arm thereof) that packed 'outer' cartons quicker than Sarah Connor could reload a shotgun.

The best machines for me are the ones that defy gravity and launch themselves and their occupants far into the blue void. My brother feels the same way and on very rare occasions we have a boys' day out.

This started several years ago when our father was still alive and the three of us would selfishly shun the rest of the family and saunter around boys things, often ships and aircraft. My brother still organises days like this and even added an extra day to a medical conference last year for us to visit Point Cook Museum, on the hallowed ground that was the birthplace of the Royal Australian Air Force, RAAF Williams.

Peter stayed the night at our house and after one-too-many medicinal reds (and a couple of Scotches) I woke up decidedly seedy. Not one to usually feel too sorry for self-inflicted wounds, I set off early to pick up a parcel waiting for me at the Post Office. The idea was to walk off the fog in my head. Once I returned and had, had the obligatory greasy breakfast I should have been set for the day. Unfortunately I felt worse. In fact, on the way to Point Cook I thought I was going to pass out in the Domain Tunnel. A stop at the service area and a couple of aborted ralph-calling trips we decided it would be better for Peter to drive and I would attempt to gain composure. The corrugated road towards RAAF Williams almost destroyed me and while Peter attained the World's fastest museum visit I sat, slumped in the passenger seat, shaking like a Parkinson's sufferer.

I'll be honest and say there are less times than I could count on one hand that I have ever felt worse. On seeing my condition Peter rushed me to the emergency department of the Werribee Mercy Hospital, where I sat like a green moron wondering how a heck a hangover could get so bad. I was cognisant enough to let a woman through ahead of me who was wailing like a harpy about her lacerated thumb. Peter has taken the mick about me being a gentleman, however if she didn't depart from my earshot I felt my brain would explode. As it was she drove me to the loo and, not to put too fine a point to the description, I managed to purge the demons temporarily. Peter drove me home and I crawled into bed for three days. As it turned out I had contracted a virus, although Mr Merlot and Johnnie Walker did me no favours.

So there was Peter, sitting at Tullamarine airport, staring at large passenger jets, feeling a large boyish-wonder gap where there should have been Phantoms, Sabres, Vampires and other adventurously named aircraft of our boyhoods. At the time I didn't care, mainly because I didn't care about anything except shutting out any malicious light trying to get past my eyelids. When I felt better physically I felt fraternally worse, as it was a crappy day all round, especially for Peter.

This trip to Adelaide I tried to make it up to him and, at his suggestion, we headed towards Parafield airport to see the Classic Jets Fighter Museum. For a small, privately run affair, the CJFM is a very impressive show. It is also very casual and you are allowed to get far closer to the toys than you can at Point Cook.

Jostling for pride of place was an Avon Sabre and, albeit not a jet, a P-38 Lightning. A Sea Venom, Tiger Moth, Wirraway and a slightly out of place Chinese Warbird all hustled around the hangar with bits and bobs of aviation history filling the holes. We had the opportunity to see a short documentary on WWII fighters and were socially mature enough not to make Brrr and Rat-a-tat noises (although I got close when the Spitfire came on).

Peter is really in his element when it comes to the more human side of these things. He has an interest in uniforms, rations, webbing, and he goes kind-of queer when any headgear is around. It is a delight to be able to talk pure aviation rubbish with him and he has an inexhaustible wealth of information on this stuff. I'm more than happy just to soak it up and snap away at anything that seems to have photographic merit. I have a reasonable knowledge of aviation matters, especially military warbirds, but on pure trivia I need to bow to my brother and his photographic memory for this stuff.

Peter's wife, Paula, had made lunch magic (I kid you not, Paula is Hermione Granger with food) and we hit this with gusto. I know this sounds inconsequential, however even wolfing down homemade lunch has boyish charm and helped seal the day.

Signs that say WARNING DO NOT ENTER COCKPIT, SOME DANGER are, of course, to be ignored and the Avon Sabre became Peter's domain for some time. He even contemplated a $20 donation to be able to wear the circa 1960 'bone-dome'. However, I did not encourage this in fear of never getting him out of the damn aircraft ("Sorry Paula, he pulled down the cockpit perspex and kept yelling 'Mig-15s at 11 o'clock'. The police are still trying to talk him down").

As it turned out there was a Mig-15 (actually a Polish variant Lim 2) next door in the restoration hangar, along with a Mirage feeling a little dejected in the dust (no way to treat a French lady) and a partially restored Airacobra. There was, what appeared to be an airworthy Mustang tucked under many tarpaulins. It was a shame that CJFM don't have the space to show all of these worthy exhibits to their full advantage. I thought of climbing into the Mirage seat, but even the more modern aircraft are a tight fit and I could see me wedging my girth in so tight the local fire brigade would have to cut me out with the jaws-of-life.

I left the CJFM with my wallet only $6.50 lighter (Peter got senior's discount, a fact I forgot to rub in) and a chest full of boy-toy bravado. Of course we returned home and downloaded the photos onto other boy's toys, but I'm sure they'll feature in another blog.

CJFM is not Point Cook (it also doesn't get large amounts of Government funding) but I think it went a little way to filling the gap punched into Peter's visit by a very untimely virus. If not, then I suppose we'll just have to suffer another boys' day out in Melbourne sometime.

Cultural Heritage

Maybe it's the fact that I spent the first twenty years of my life in Adelaide that it feels so right when I return. The city is clean (relatively, in urban terms) neat, ordered, and lastly: not too big. The North-east air is fresh (again, relatively) and the view of the Adelaide Hills at sunrise pleases the soul immensely.

I have enjoyed just walking or driving around some old haunts and savouring all the good things Adelaide has to offer. A fellow church city ex-pat has just written on his Facebook profile "...is in the magical city of Cooper's and Vili's", but this place is just more than beer and pies (and the best lemomonade made, and honey ice-cream). This I was about the re-discover because of a promise to my Mum.

In all my years of living in, and travelling back to, Adelaide I had never visited The Cedars, the residence of not only two of SA's, but two of Australia's finest artists, the father and daughter Hans and Nora Heysen. I rectified my very un-South Australian attitude by bundling my Mum and my kids in the car and heading through a cold and frosty day to the yuppiesville that is Handorf. The old German township of Handorf is Adelaide's version of Daylesford (without the day-spas or drive) a haven for the overworked bourgeoisie to sip Chardonnays and chomp on eye-fillets with red wine jus. It is nostalgic, pleasant and ready to accept all of the money that Monday to Friday has just provided. Of this sport I partook with the purchase of a walking staff carved in the likeness of Tolkien's ent, Treebeard. My Mum, a keen artist and purveyor of all things creative had made a beeline for the Acadamy art gallery in the main street and Treebeard spotted me sneaking in to the next gallery. Slowly, as is the way of the entish tongue, he spoke to me: "Tony, it is your solemn duty to buy me, before Sauron spreads his dark malice over Middle Earth." How could I not accept the quest? Treebeard is keeping an eye on me in the motel room as I type, making sure I can write as much dribble as possible into this blog.

However, I have digressed. The Cedars is a rambling 125 acre property about 5 minutes drive from Handorf, along one of those little rural roads that make you wonder why you are so dense to live in the suburbs. The property still belongs to the Heysen family and is still used by them for special occasions. Hans' studio is perched some 200 metres from the homestead, up a grassy knoll and guarded by an ancient pine (presumably guarded by Treebeard until I removed him from Handorf). The studio has the feel that Heysen will return from his garden in just a moment and put another touch on the huge oil sitting on the easel. It is such a place that, even though you are sharing it with fifteen others on the tour, you are sure you are the only one who has been invited. Anney, who is arty to the core, felt the need to stand in one of the places that Heysen had stood to paint, her feet sitting easily in the worn out carpet that had accepted such big shoes.

Heysen's majesty of line and light is only equalled by the beautiful pencil, charcoal and conte drawings of his daughter, Nora, in the gallery down the hill from the studio. Both artists made their work attract all of your attention, allowing you to leave your world for moments and see things through their eyes. Stunning portraits, vibrant still lifes and the ubiquitous scenic paintings are in abundance. As expected they are far more evocative that any reproduction found on a dining room wall or in a gallery catalogue.

Our guide, knowledgeable and pleasant, took us through the sprawling garden of sunny daffodils indispersed between native and imported plants, and under the massive eponymic cedar trees (there are a couple of sideboards in those) to the homestead. Again, I got the feeling of hospitality and welcome I walked through the lazy verandah and into the house. The walls are adorned with original Heysens and I could have plonked my bottom on the same raised floorboards that felt the light feet of Pavlova and had resonated with powerful voice of Melba. But, of course, that day I was the guest.

A well appointed gallery and store are mandatory to the survival of any self-funded heritage enterprise and The Cedars is no exception. Books, bookmarks, postcards and cards accompanied us back to the car (for Treebeard to peruse in the boot).

A pleasant return drive down through those beautiful hills and the eponymic Heysen tunnel set off a day that leaves you feeling good about South Australia and its place in the cultural world.

Although I am now thought of as 'a bloody Victorian' I still feel very much at home when I visit Adelaide.