Broken Dreams (6 page)

So I came back to live in Mitchell, my home town. A small place that today has five pubs and a population of 1212. To begin with, I lived with my brother Peter and my sister Michelle. (Weasey had died a few years ago, and my mother now lives with Michelle.) Since I moved back home I have a lot more freedom and I see much more of my mates. They weren't real sure about coming to see me while I was in a nursing home.

One of the first things that happened was that I made an enemy: my sister's white cat, Pitta Pat. It began one night when I was just dozing off to sleep—it was about ten o'clock. Something disturbed me: I opened my eyes and came face to face with Pitta Pat, who was sitting on my chest. I can't move my arms much when I'm lying down, and when I tried to make the cat get off me she grabbed hold of one arm and started scratching and clawing. I had to call out for Michelle to come and back me up. A bit embarrassing, to be beaten by a cat!

A few nights later I had another run-in with Pitta Pat. This time it was around eleven. Lying in bed, I heard the cat enter my room and jump up on the desk. On top of the desk I have a telephone with numbers dialled into the memory function, so that when I want to ring up someone, all I have to do is press one button. After the number is automatically dialled the phone works like an intercom, so that I don't have to pick up the handpiece to talk or listen to whoever it is at the other end of the line. Somehow the cat walked over the top of my phone and must have pressed one of the buttons. Sudenly I heard this voice say loud and clear: “Hello, this is the Roma fire brigade.” A mate of mine was in the fire brigade, and that was why the number was dialled in there. I lay in bed not knowing whether to reply or keep quiet. I mean, if I said: “Sorry, but it was a cat that rang you up” who would believe me? They'd probably want to put me in a strait jacket and send a little white truck to take me away.

I am sure Pitta Pat knows she can put it over me. One day as I was sitting typing this story, she jumped on my desk. Then she came over and sat on the keyboard. When I tried to go on typing, she grabbed my arm and started to bite. Like a real wimp, I had to sing out to Peter to come and kick Pitta out of my room. I don't think Pitta really likes Murries—well, not this one, anyway.

Since coming home, I miss my horse Four X and my faithful dog, Mungrel. I never had a chance to see Mungrel again after I left the PA spinal unit, as he was with my horse out in the bush, and now he is dead.

As I sit in my room, I look at my sports trophies displayed on the cabinet. I took up boxing at thirteen—I never had much style, but I could hit hard and I also had a hard head, which enabled me both to take and to give out a hiding. Those boxing and football trophies meant a lot to me: they were an indication that I was playing well, and winning. Today they no longer mean anything to
me. When this book is completed and launched, I can bury my memories of sport. Instead, I hope to write.

For a long time my football memories were pretty sad for me. When I came home from PA I went to the football in my wheelchair for the first time since my accident. As I watched the Mitchell Magpies run onto the field I felt real low and down in spirit. If things hadn't turned out the way they did, I knew I could have been running onto that field. I recalled the week just before my accident, when I played with the Magpies and we won the Grand Final. I felt pretty helpless, sitting in my wheelchair. Ten minutes later I'd seen enough of the game and headed for the bar. But now, with each year that goes by, I find it easier to go to the football. Today, I don't even notice that I'm sitting in my wheelchair as I watch the game.

In 1989 I was presented with a beautiful football jacket. It was the players who put in to get me this jacket. It just goes to show that they still believe in me, as I do in them. Words on paper cannot tell how much I appreciate this jacket. When people do something like this it makes things a hell of a lot easier for me. The people in Mitchell also put in to buy me an electric typewriter. For me, life was always a bit of a struggle and if I wanted anything I had to battle for it. I never thought I would get a typewriter given to me. Although I needed one, I wasn't game to ask anyone to help me out. Now I sit here using that typewriter with a special splint on one finger.

Since coming home I've become a lot closer to my nephews and nieces in Mitchell. Anne is the second eldest of my five sisters. She lives with a fellow called Robert Doyle and they have two lovely children, Cheyne and Kym. Cheyne is four and fairly shy until she gets to know you. Kym is three and really cute. Her look of innocence gets her out of a lot of trouble.

My sister Robyn has three children—Sharna, Daniel and Dennii. Sharna is six, a great little mate and good
company. One day Sharna's grandmother asked her: “What are you going to do when I go up to heaven?” Sharna looked at her grandmother, shook her head and answered: “Don't worry, Nan, I'll be there beside you.” Another day, one of Sharna's teeth fell out, so she put it in a glass for the tooth fairy to come along. That night, some of my mates came to the house and sat up all night partying on. Next morning, Sharna went to the glass to get the money the tooth fairy would have left in exchange for the tooth. But the tooth was still in the glass and there was no money. “Nan,” she complained to her grandmother, “those noisy mongrels sat up all night drinking—they must have scared the tooth fairy away.”

Daniel is two and a nice looking kid. He's mad on Santa Claus. One day we were watching television when Santa came on the screen. He walked over to a pretty lady who was also in the picture and Daniel said: “Look, Mum, there's Santa and Mrs Claus!” Later that day, as we were on our way downtown, a helicopter flew over and Daniel reckoned that was Santa Claus going home for a rest. One thing I like about Daniel is that he can give as good as he gets. And he always shares with you. One time he had a packet of chips and I asked him to give me one. “No,” he said. “Why not?” I asked, surprised. “Say ‘please', Uncle Bill, then you can have a chip,” he told me.

Dennii is five months old and when he grows up a bit, with Daniel around I guess they'll be a pair of outlaws together.

Michelle, my fourth eldest sister, has two kids, Teeghan and Jayde. They now live in Morven with their father. Teeghan is six and his brother Jayde is five. Jayde and I share the same birthday: when I turned twenty-one, Jayde was one year old. Each afternoon after school, those two boys used to run up the road to do some chores for an old bloke they knew. He used to pay them their “wages” every Friday. Sometimes, during the week the
boys would get side-tracked and play with their mates instead. One Friday they were on their way to their chores when they ran into some of their mates, who wanted them to play. “Let's play,” Teeghan said, but Jayde shook his head. “Bugger you, Teeghan, you can stop and play but I'm going to work—it's pay day.”

My brother Peter is twenty now. I don't think brothers come much better than Peter. He knows his own mind, doesn't care too much about other people's opinions and doesn't let people get to him.

Last but not least is my sixteen-year-old sister, Donna, the youngest in our family. She often gives me a hand when I do leatherwork. Donna is really patient with me, and sometimes she needs to be.

Today I really believe in my sisters. Once, when I came from Westhaven to stay in Mitchell for the weekend, I found that Peter was out, so he couldn't help to lift me out of the car into my wheelchair. My sisters came out to greet me and said they'd lift me out instead. I was a bit of a male chauvinist at that time and told them they wouldn't be strong enough. Most of the men who lifted me whinged about how heavy I was. Without a word, Michelle and Robyn took charge. Robyn grabbed me under the shoulders and Michelle took my legs, and that lift was as good as any I had known. Robyn never said a word, just looked at me as if to say—“Now will you bloody shut up.”

Before my accident, I guess I never really appreciated my sisters as much as I do today. I have to depend on them a lot. Seven years ago I would never have dreamed that I would write this sentence, but if one of our family had to end up with a broken neck, I'm glad it was me and not one of my sisters or Peter, for they don't deserve to be hurt in any way.

I have had a lot of time to look back over my life and think about myself, and without too many regrets I
realise where I went wrong from time to time. I was young and wild. If my father had still been alive, then I reckon there would have been no way I would have been going out at night, drinking. I know I would have received a few more kicks up the arse. I would have obeyed my father because I respected him more than I've ever respected anyone else.

It's really great to have got to know my nieces and nephews so well. They are curious about me and ask a lot of questions. I try to explain things to them. For instance, I can't feel my bladder, so I don't know when I'm urinating. When I do a pee, it runs down a tube into a drainage bag with a tap which you turn to empty it. One day I tucked the tap neatly into my sock, not realising that the nurse who visits me every day had forgotten to turn it off. The result was that I peed into my boot. When something like that happens, all you can do is smile. (The kids thought it was a great joke.) Life is too short to let a little thing like that worry you. Another day, I was lying in bed when young Daniel came into my room. He looked at the drainage bag and remarked: “Orange cordial!” All my nieces and nephews give me a bit of help, a lot of laughs and a bit of strength as life goes on.

I don't think we know who our real mates are until the chips are well and truly down. I've found that a real mate will stick by you, no matter what, while others find they just haven't got time for you any more. Even today I'm not really sure what I mean when I call someone “mate”, but all the people I write about in this chapter I think of as my mates.

At school, I had five people I called “mates”. In those days, a mate was someone who would back you up in a fight, even if you both knew you'd be beaten. Ten years later I still have four of those mates: Alan Martin (“Chong”), Michael Cambarngo, David Nixon and Graham Buckley. Chong and I were like brothers—we more or less grew up together. If I got into strife, Chong was never far away. Back in 1982, Graham and I had a fist fight and I put him into hospital with concussion. These days, he jokes about that. A year later, in Brisbane, it was
Graham who came every afternoon when he'd finished work to visit me in the spinal unit at PA.

Soon after I arrived at Westhaven, I went to watch Mitchell play the Wattles in Roma. It was a very hot day and I was sitting in the car when I was approached by a young bloke who introduced himself to me as Greg Doyle. He was living with my cousin, Robyn Finlay, in Mitchell, and he invited me to stay with them one weekend, an offer I took up later on. Greg was a top bloke. When he was in Roma he'd always call in to see if I wanted to go to the football, or visit Mitchell for a few days. One day, as Greg and I were having a yarn, he told me he had cancer. The doctors had given him twelve months to live. In spite of this, he never changed—he kept on coming to see me. As time passed, I could tell he had trouble keeping up with the other blokes when we went out to the pub; sometimes he'd have to go home as he wasn't feeling too good. Greg Doyle was someone really special. He never whinged or complained, even though he knew he was dying.

One night at Westhaven, my sister Narelle came to tell me that one of my five schoolmates, Adrian Finlay, had been killed in a car accident. The car in which he was a passenger left the road and turned over. He was twenty-one. On 25th July 1987, I lost a great mate who could make you laugh even when times were tough.

Early the next year I received a telephone call and learned that Greg Doyle had passed away. Although I knew he had cancer, somehow I had never really believed he would die—not a young bloke of twenty-one, who had done so much for me. After I heard this news I went outside and disappeared into the night for a while. If ever I needed a mate it was then. Tears ran down my cheeks as I thought about the good times we'd had. As the loneliness of the night closed in, I didn't want to go back to my room—I just wanted to be alone. I was usually a
bit frightened about being outside by myself in the wheelchair in the dark. But that night I didn't care.

One thing that the deaths of Greg and Adrian proved to me was that I did have a heart that can bleed and I do care about other people. When I was sixteen, I wasn't sure about that. I think it has taken life in a wheelchair for me to appreciate others, and I seem to have learned to get closer to people. There's a different view from a wheelchair.

Back in Roma, I had a group of mates who would take me to the disco or the football, the drive-in, or for a seafood meal. We even went to the races, and once two of them strapped me in a life-jacket and conned me into going for a swim in the nurses' pool at Westhaven. I used to go partying with the nurses—they were a lot of fun, and I was always sorry when those I got to know well completed their twelve months' training and moved on.

Taking me around involves lifting me in and out of a car and stowing my wheelchair in the boot. I don't think it would matter to my mates in Mitchell if the only way I could get around was by elephant: they'd still lift me into the car, then put the elephant in the boot. Once two of my mates lifted me in my wheelchair up the steps of the football grandstand so that I wouldn't get rained on.

Two girls I got to know in Roma are Donna Clifford and Lisa Aspinall. Donna was doing work experience at Westhaven—she was sixteen when I first met her. I was sitting in the sun in my wheelchair when she came over and started talking to me. Suddenly a gust of wind blew her skirt up a bit too high. Poor kid, I thought to myself, and tried to talk to her as though nothing had happened. But I found the words wouldn't come out—all I could do was laugh. Donna, a bit embarrassed, turned red and took off. That was the only time I've ever seen her lost for words. She's a great mate, and whenever I see her, I remind her of that incident.

I met a girl named Lisa Aspinall at a party in Roma. As I was talking to her, the beer I was drinking ran out and I decided to go back to Westhaven. “You can't go yet,” Lisa said. “I know where I can get another beer.” Ten minutes later she came back with a stubby—she had gone home to get it. “I took one of Dad's beers out of the fridge,” she said. She had left him a note that said—“Dear Dad, I took one beer for Billy Dodd. Love, Lisa.”

I drank that stubby, then Lisa went home for another beer and left another note—

“Dear Dad, I took one more beer for Billy Dodd. Love, Lisa.”

After drinking that one, she got me a third and left one more note—

“Dear Dad, I took one more beer for Billy Dodd. Love, Lisa.”

After three beers I did go home. About a week later, I met a new wardsman at Westhaven. His name was Rex. When he came in to lift me out of bed and put me in the shower chair, the nurse introduced us. “Rex, this is Billy Dodd,” she said.

“Billy Dodd!” Rex exclaimed. “You're the bloke who drank my beers!” He told me how he'd woken up one morning to find those three notes on his fridge door.

Two of the most faithful mates I've ever had would have to be my faithful horse Four X and my blue cattle dog, Mungrel.

Mungrel got himself into a lot of mischief. One day I was riding a young horse that kept taking off and kicking up. I wondered what was wrong, and as I rode along I looked at the shadow of me and the horse—I thought maybe a loose strap was hitting him under the belly. Then I noticed another shadow—my dog. He was coming in all the time and biting the horse on one of its hind legs. “You're nothing but a mongrel, dog!” I sang out to him—and that was how he got his name.

For three years Mungrel and I grew up together. Some mornings, if I was still asleep when my brother Peter got up, he would let Mungrel off his chain, and then my dog would come upstairs to wake me up. Like the rogue he was, he'd come to the top of the stairs and look around to see if my mother was there—he wasn't really allowed indoors. If all was clear, he'd run into my room and jump all over me. Hopefully, he'd make it outside again before my mum arrived with the broom.

One day I needed Mungrel's help. I was seventeen, and having a real bit of trouble with our local postman, who was going out with one of my sisters. I was seventeen and he was twenty, and if we'd had a punch-up I knew I would have come off worst. A few days after a bad argument with him, I watched as he pedalled along on his bike, delivering the mail. I decided to let Mungrel off the chain, and as the postman approached our mailbox I sooled the dog onto old mate. The postie scored a fast lap up the road and I gave Mungrel a piece of steak and a pat on the head for a job well done.

The day of my accident was the last time I saw my faithful blue cattle dog. One of my mates took my horse and dog into the bush to look after them, and when I finally came back to Mitchell, over six years later, he told me my dog had passed away.

The last mate I want to talk about is a fellow called Chris Martin, known as Bunny. Ever since I've been in a wheelchair, Bunny has been my best mate. He's a quiet bloke and nothing seems to worry him. He has done a lot for me and takes me to lots of places. This bloke wouldn't say twenty words a day when he's sober, but like me he makes up for it when he's had a few beers.

In February 1990 I decided to go to Cairns to see my favourite cousin, Deana. My sister Donna, cousin Dearne, Bunny and myself all went off together. We spent a week at Ipswich on the way, staying with some relatives, two
weeks in Cairns, then went back to Ipswich for another week. During our first stay at Ipswich, Bunny and I drank beer most of the time. One night, three of my cousins took Bunny to a disco. My cousins made it home all right, but they lost poor old Bunny somewhere. Next day we discovered that Bunny had got himself locked up by the law and spent the night in the clink. By the fifth night in Ipswich, the grog began to take its toll on Bunny. At midnight, when everyone else was asleep, he jumped off his bed and tried to pick up the big television set. His grunting and groaning woke up a fellow called David. “What d'you think you're doing, Bunny?” he asked.—“No worries, mate,” Bunny replied, “I'm just lifting Bill into his wheelchair so we can go down the pub.”

Next day, as we travelled by train to Cairns, Bunny and I were two sick boys. We were two days and a night on the train, and when we got to Cairns we spent a lot more time sober.

We enjoyed ourselves in Cairns, and after two weeks it was time to leave. We had to catch the train at seven o'clock on Saturday morning, and the night before we all went to a night club. Next morning, one of the girls in the house where we were staying told us it was six o'clock, so we had one hour to get ready and be at the train station. Dearne came in to help me, and then I looked at the clock on the wall ... its hands were pointing to seven. I thought it must be daylight saving, but in fact it
was
seven and we'd missed the train. However, we made it back to Brisbane and stayed in Ipswich for another week before catching the bus back to Mitchell.

Not everyone I knew turned out to be a good mate. Like I said at the beginning of this chapter, we don't know who our real mates are until the chips are down. One bloke who disappointed me was Scoob. He was from Mitchell, and I ran into him in Brisbane one night. I was seventeen at the time. We went to a disco together one
night. On our way home we found ourselves walking along behind a bloke who was really bandy-legged. “Hey, cowboy, where's your horse?” I called out to him. The bloke swung around, saw Scoob and told him to put his fists up. “Wait until I take my shirt off,” Scoob said. When the shirt was off the other bloke said, “Come on, then.” Scoob replied, “Wait until I get my shoes off.”—“Okay, let's fight,” the bloke said when this was done.—“Wait until I take off my socks,” Scoob said. I thought, if Scoob keeps this up it could get a bit embarrassing. I said, “Do you want me to fight him for you, Scoob?” He replied, “God, I thought you'd never ask.” I threw a couple of punches and the bloke took off.

Before my accident, Scoob seemed a good mate, but afterwards I realise all he'd wanted was for me to fight his battles. I was sitting in my wheelchair in the pub in Mitchell one day and saw Scoob at the bar. He couldn't even walk over to say “good-day”. But I guess he wasn't a real mate in the first place.

My other mates haven't let me down in any way. There are heaps of others I haven't mentioned here—if I went through all the people who have helped me out in different ways, I'd run out of paper. The help and understanding I've had from people in Mitchell and Roma has been invaluable. For all those who've helped me—whether it's been lifting me up stairs or moving a stool so that I could get a bit closer to the bar, all I can say is: thanks, I do appreciate it.