History repeating itself
The last few weeks have been a blur. A quick work trip to Perth was awesome, but mostly because I got to see my Nana. She seems very happy and timid and a bit clingy. It could be because she's losing her sight I suppose. It's a pretty cool story: we suspect her mother may not have been her biological mother. She seems to be older than she claims and her official records don't appear to add up. This "step" mother was really horrible to her actually and her little brother often stepped between them during fights. This mean lady who raised her was also unfaithful to her husband (my great-grandfather I suppose) with a farmhand and one day the husband came home to find his wife and the farmhand in a compromising position.. There was understandably a huge fight and my great-grandfather smashed a hurricane lamp over his employee's head, resulting in the whole farm house being burned to the ground. He went to court and was sentenced to some years in prison, but he asked the judge for a stay of two weeks so he could get his two children organised as he couldn't leave them with his wife. The judge agreed and my grandmother and great uncle were placed into a catholic orphanage near subiaco. My grandmother was a teenager, but she was put into the same class as the kindergartners because she couldn't yet read or write. After a few years she wrote to her father in prison, thanking him for sending her there and advising that she was so well looked after and loved that she decided she wanted to become a nun. He received her letter and packed her straight up to basically be a mail-order bride for a mining community (think "paint your wagon" at 16 years old! Poor little girl. She married my grandfather and had 6 boys and a masectomy by about 25 years of age. Apparently they just used to lop them off in those days if there were any lumps or difficulties with them. Now as a 90 year old, she's living in a retirement home and guess what - it's the SAME old orphanage that she grew up in and loved!! I'll stick a pic of it up here. Pretty amazing story. I'll get it all down more accurately from my father one of these days.
The last few weeks have been a blur. A quick work trip to Perth was awesome, but mostly because I got to see my Nana. She seems very happy and timid and a bit clingy. It could be because she's losing her sight I suppose. It's a pretty cool story: we suspect her mother may not have been her biological mother. She seems to be older than she claims and her official records don't appear to add up. This "step" mother was really horrible to her actually and her little brother often stepped between them during fights. This mean lady who raised her was also unfaithful to her husband (my great-grandfather I suppose) with a farmhand and one day the husband came home to find his wife and the farmhand in a compromising position.. There was understandably a huge fight and my great-grandfather smashed a hurricane lamp over his employee's head, resulting in the whole farm house being burned to the ground. He went to court and was sentenced to some years in prison, but he asked the judge for a stay of two weeks so he could get his two children organised as he couldn't leave them with his wife. The judge agreed and my grandmother and great uncle were placed into a catholic orphanage near subiaco. My grandmother was a teenager, but she was put into the same class as the kindergartners because she couldn't yet read or write. After a few years she wrote to her father in prison, thanking him for sending her there and advising that she was so well looked after and loved that she decided she wanted to become a nun. He received her letter and packed her straight up to basically be a mail-order bride for a mining community (think "paint your wagon" at 16 years old! Poor little girl. She married my grandfather and had 6 boys and a masectomy by about 25 years of age. Apparently they just used to lop them off in those days if there were any lumps or difficulties with them. Now as a 90 year old, she's living in a retirement home and guess what - it's the SAME old orphanage that she grew up in and loved!! I'll stick a pic of it up here. Pretty amazing story. I'll get it all down more accurately from my father one of these days.
Also have one more essay and one exam and then the school year is over. Come on 3rd of December - can't wait for it to come around! How exciting!
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