Peter’s Story
Section Four - Episode One
Growing Up in Suburbia
The harsh reality of life in the suburbs of 1950's New Zealand,
and the traumatic experiences of attending school back then.....
This story will now cover the period of my childhood and schooling, attempting to explore my own experiences from this time of my life from the vantage point of the person that I am now, (as at October 1998, with a few updates in 2002) and interweaving into the story some insight into what I now believe to be the truth of what was actually happening for me back then.
From the age of three until about eighteen, I lived with my parents and sister in a weather-board house on a quarter acre section in Hornby, a working-class suburb in the western suburbs of Christchurch. (Note: “weather-boards” were a common form of house cladding material in New Zealand back when timber was really cheap. They are wooden boards, from 6 to 12 inches wide, and about an inch thick, machined smooth, placed horizontally on the outer wall of the house, held in place by steel nails, and painted. Until the 1980's, when the price of timber sky-rocketed, weather-boards were the most commonly used form of house cladding in New Zealand.)
My parents bought our house in 1950, brand new, with a mortgage from their insurance company, in a street full of new, low-cost, houses. A typical example from the post-war housing boom of New Zealand in the 1950's. Fortunately, our street was not all that “typical”, in that there were houses on just the one side of the street, with an empty field opposite and another empty field behind our house. We were the end house in the small subdivision, with a poultry farm as our other next-door neighbour.
The main south railway line was on the far side of the field opposite us, and I have memories of watching the trains drawn by steam locomotives passing through frequently on their way south and west from Christchurch. There was also a large concrete products factory over the road, and us kids would often play in the large concrete pipes that were stored there, not realising that this was actually a very dangerous thing to do..... if one of those large concrete pipes had rolled on top of us it would have been very nasty.
Most of our neighbourhood was actually zoned industrial, but it was not until years later that factories sprang up in the fields of my childhood. On later visits to the area, in recent years, I was very disappointed that the whole energy of the area had changed, with factories now covering the green fields where I had spent many happy childhood hours.
The “back paddock” was a favourite haunt of mine. I spent many happy hours playing there, and in climbing the pine trees bordering the paddock, often pretending that I could not hear my mother calling for me to come home.
My sister and I attended Hornby Primary School, right through from Primer One (age five), through to Form Two (age twelve or thirteen). There was no intermediate school (ie, junior high) in the area. Note that in New Zealand, “primary school” means the same as “elementary school” in the U.S.A.
Hornby School, I realized years later, was quite a rough, tough, school, especially back then in the 1950's (it would have changed somewhat now from the way it was back then). It was just down the road from Islington Freezing Works, the largest freezing works in New Zealand. Many of the fathers of my school mates worked at the “works”, and while I have no wish to be judgmental concerning freezing workers, I now realize that many of these kids were from quite dysfunctional or even abusive families. (Note: a “freezing works” is a factory where large numbers of farm animals are slaughtered and processed into frozen meat for export.)
Hornby was one of those typical post-war suburbs that sprang up almost overnight in the fifties in New Zealand, catering for the post-war “baby boom” of which I was a part. Acre after acre of low cost housing, with areas of occupier-owned homes interspersed with large areas of “state houses” (government-owned, low-rent houses for people on low incomes). I have a very clear memory of going to play after school with a friend from the other side of Hornby, and being very envious that he lived in a two-story house!
What I did not realize at the time, was that the house that I was so envious of was actually one of those dreary government-owned double units, in a street full of similar dreary state houses and units. I did not notice whether there were any rusting hulks of old cars on any of the front lawns! Maybe that came a little later, in the sixties and seventies.
I have a very vague recollection of my first day at school. I can remember really looking forward to the day for months beforehand, with endless chatter to my mother about school, and how I could not wait for the big day to finally arrive when I would finally go to school. However, I was a very shy, sensitive boy, and I can recall being very shy of all these strange kids and adults on my first day.
I spent my first two school years in the “Infant Block”, a row of pre-war vintage classrooms with the dental clinic (the “Murder House” was what us kids called it) at one end. And a big concrete play area in front, facing north, with a sand-pit and jungle-gym.
With my birthday being in January, I began school on the first day of the school year in early February, and progressed through the classes right on cue, with a promotion to the next class every six months, just as the “system” dictated.
My memories of my time in the infant classes (ages five and six) are very vague, with the exception of a couple of incidents. I have a very clear memory of the whole class doing art, and we were told to draw a picture of a Mãori canoe. I did my drawing, to the best of my ability, and it was probably of average standard for my age. The teacher looked at everyone's drawings, and I can recall her giving mine some praise.
But one of my friends, who must have had a natural talent for art, had done an incredibly beautiful, life-like, drawing that to me looked as good as a photograph. I compared his drawing with mine, and I was ashamed of my relatively primitive effort. I did not realize it at the time, but at that moment I decided, deep within me, that I had no talent at all for art, and this became my reality for the rest of my life. To this day I still believe this, with the result being that I have a very deep mental block regarding my ability at any type of art or craft.
With one exception. Because my father was a cabinet-maker, a very talented cabinet-maker, I grew up desperately wanting to be just like him. Right through primary school, if anyone asked me “What are you going to do when you grow up?” my answer would never be “A fireman” or “A traindriver”, like most of the other boys, my answer was always “A cabinetmaker, like Dad”.
So part of my reality became that I was very good at woodwork. When we did what was called “Manual Training” in Form 1 and Form 2 (age eleven and twelve), I was always top of the class in woodwork. And I am still a very good handyman, but that's another part of the story.
This part of my story is set against the background of the energy of 1950's New Zealand culture, which was very similar to the culture of most English-speaking countries back then. The energy of these times is a very deep, integral part of my story, and of the story of every one of us baby-boomers who grew up in these times. Whenever I look at old black and white photographs of this era, and when I watch old movies, I can feel, touch, smell and taste the energy of this time. It made a very deep impression on me.
And I am not talking about the obvious “icons” of this era. The wooden toy “buzzy-bees”, or the three china ducks on the wall of our lounge. Nor of the sound of “Aunt Daisy” from the kitchen radio. Nor of the sight of thirty ten-year-olds (me being one of them) on the school Rugby field.
It goes much, much deeper than these hackneyed old icons that the popular media dredges up from these times. I am thinking more of the actual energy of these times. The collective unconscious of our tribe. The deep Jungian archetypal forces hidden beneath the surface, but nevertheless acting as the driving force for all that was happening.
The old photographs and newsreels of the All-Blacks (note for American readers: the “All-Blacks” are the New Zealand national rugby team, and here in New Zealand they have the same hero status that all top-class sportsmen have in all cultures), in their long-short trousers and their short-back-and-sides haircuts, brings back the memory of this energy, but these surface level physical things are not the actual energy of which I speak. The energy of which I speak is at a much deeper level. The haircuts and clothes are just the surface manifestation of something much deeper. Looking now, at those old black and white photographs of myself in those stupid-looking shorts that came almost down to my knees, it feels really weird, almost “alien”, but back then it was “normal”, everybody dressed like that.
Maybe if I describe some of the dominant emotions that were driving the thinking of the people of my parents' generation you will get an insight into what I mean.
My parents had grown up in the 1930's, during the great depression, and they had both suffered from very deprived child-hoods. Many of the adults of this time, especially those living in a suburb like Hornby, would have had their whole psyches molded by this childhood deprivation. They had also recently been through the experience of a major war.
As a result of this, two of their dominant emotions were fear and control. Fear of the deprivation of the depression era, and of the horrors of the war, ever happening again; and a determination to exert maximum control over everything in their lives to make sure that these things did not ever happen again.
They were actually very successful in this determination of “Never again!” The 1950's in New Zealand was a time of unprecedented plenty. Plenty of jobs for everyone. Plenty of free state-funded schooling, health-care, etc. Plenty of low-cost housing, with many ordinary workers buying their own homes. Literally “the land of milk and honey”. They were so successful, compared to how it had been a decade earlier, that, I believe, a certain amount of arrogance crept in. They came to believe that their success could go on for ever, if they just kept excerting enough control to make sure that it did. And they did not realize that, just beneath the surface, their society was just as dysfunctional as ever.
The fear showed up in many ways. There was a fear of anything or anyone who was a little bit different from the norm, including a quite blatant racism. The corner dairy at the end of our street, on the corner of Waterloo and Carmen Roads, was owned by an Indian family. This must have been one of the first Indian-owned dairies in New Zealand; it was certainly uncommon in the 1950's.
The whole community had an attitude of blatant racism towards the Indian dairy-owners, the Patels. It was not so much that anyone would say anything openly derogatory or critical, it was more of an attitude of superiority and suspicion. I can recall being warned many times by my mother to be very careful to make sure I received the correct change from the Patels; there was a belief that Indians were “sharp operators”, bordering on the dishonest.
The racism was pervasive. Chinese were referred to as “Chinks”. Germans as “Gerries”, Americans as “Yanks”, Arabs as “Wogs”, English as “Poms”, and Mãori sometimes as “Horis”. Even Australians were looked down on as “Aussies”. We were “God's Own Country”, and as such were inherently superior to everyone else.
But it was not deliberately racist in a deliberately nasty way. It was just part of a belief system that was deeply ingrained. Partly, I believe, a hangover legacy from the old British Empire superiority mentality. Partly inherited from the pioneering spirit of the 1800's and early 1900's. And partly a substitute for the patriotic pride that they felt unable to display in the way that citizens of other countries displayed.
The racism even struck deep into our own family. My great grandfather, my father's mother's father, was from Jamaica. No-one knew his exact racial makeup, but he was at least half West Indian, maybe more. Several of my cousins were quite dark, with dark curly hair. I can recall one time asking my parents “Was great-granddad a Mãori?” and being told “No, much worse than that!” And, when they used that word, “worse”, in that context, they were doing so as part of an all-pervasive belief system that was not consciously considered by them to be “racist”, it was just the way it was for them, and for everybody back then.
It is only quite recently that I have gleaned some information about this branch of our family, and of my own genetic heritage. It was never spoken about much in my childhood, it was treated like it was a dark “skeleton in the cupboard” secret. There is another reason for this, however, which has nothing to do with racism. It was probably just too painful for my father to be reminded of his mother and her family, as he was separated from her at a young age and still bears the deep emotional scars, but more of this later in the story.
The other incident from my time in the infant classes, that I have a very clear recall of, was the day I messed my pants at school. I do not know why it happened, I think that I was afraid to ask for permission to go to the toilet. I was very shy and sensitive, and probably reluctant to draw attention to myself by putting my hand up in class.
I can clearly recall that we were all standing up for some unknown reason, gathered near the front of the classroom. My little “accident” happened, and I had no idea what to do! I was terrified. The other kids who were standing close to me noticed that something was wrong, they certainly noticed the smell! I can remember some of them edging away from me, leaving me in a clear space by myself. I stood there totally petrified.
Eventually the teacher noticed, and upon discovering what had happened, she called the Head of the Infant Classes, Miss Lawn. I am eternally grateful to Miss Lawn, as she took me away to a quiet, private place, and cleaned me up. She was very understanding and supportive, and I can remember being sent home with a note from her for my mother explaining what had happened. It was a very traumatic experience for a shy, sensitive six year old, and I am so grateful that it was handled with sensitivity and understanding by Miss Lawn, bless her.
I have a vague recollection of being teased later by the other kids about the incident. This would certainly have been the norm for my classmates, especially some of the rougher boys; but maybe at this stage, as six year olds, their meanness and bullying had not fully surfaced. I think it was a year or two later that the full extent of the harshness of life as one of the softer, gentler kids in a school full of bullies fully hit me.
The other emotion that I mention above, control, was also pervasive in our society of the 1950's. At school, we were controlled in many ways. The only sports allowed for boys were rugby and cricket. The girls played netball (called basketball back then), and any boy caught kicking the basketball, as if to play soccer football with it, was in very big trouble!
Even rugby-league was banned at the school, which was quite ironical as Hornby had one of the strongest rugby-league clubs in New Zealand. But at the school it was banned, rugby-union was the only boy's winter sport permitted by the teachers. And no-one argued about this, ever! Everyone meekly fell into line. We became so used to being controlled in so many ways that we thought nothing of it; it was just part of “life as normal” And, on looking back to how it was back then, was there really any other choice? I think not.
Click here to continue on with the next episode of this section of this (1998 version) of the story......
Section Four, Episode Two..... Sex in suburbia in the 1950's.
