nutfield 3099

The mice are trying to eat the rice, but I've hidden it in the fridge. No sound of traffic; not out here. I look to stare at the stars serene. It's awfully quiet, something must be going on. Are there aliens? Ah, now I hear them, picnicking in the oven, breadcrumbs for their children, a feast from days of baking. I'm a good baker, you know, did it in Ireland when I was on the dole. Mouses in my house on top of the hill. They gnaw at my leg! Clap! There's soon to be one less. I'm a vegetarian so it's hard to hear their heads get hit and the convulsion of their bodies, dragging the trap. One foot's about all they're going to get. They'll twitch a little longer, and then they'll die. Hey, I can hear a frog. Dark, beauty, concert, comfort.

Morning comes well. Jumbo jetsetters leave white clouds above Kinglake; they do it when it's cold. I thought they were meteors once, especially when a little one almost hit me on the head when I was in the paddock with Peter picking mushrooms to fry up with soya sauce. It was the only thing I saw the king cook apart from foccaccia It flashed past my ear and hit into the ground. It is cold, I'm going to have to go and piss. Mist rises in the early day and the country leaves you with your thoughts. Rosellas and parrots play in the grass as cockatoos screech earth delight; and cows eat rocks for some reason. Life here isn't like that of the city. Piss on the ground with the big white goat with a beard that appeared one day and decided to join Uncle Sandy's cow herd. Scrape the frost, with your nails, from the gate, let it curl up and melt. Slide your tongue along the fence and feel the frosty tingle. Better than blackberry brambles.

The morning's too bright to ignite the tractor. Avoid that big dieselised beast, sneak a stroll down to work, down to earth. Peter was pissed anyway after that incident with the petrol. Petrol and diesel are the same thing I thought, but the tractor thought otherwise and the man had come and pump it all out after it spluttered up the hill then almost died. I frighten a hare as big as a dog, then the dogs run after it more ambitious than capable as it sprints down to the creek. The Blundstones break the ice like eight beers at a share-house party. I'm going to check the tomatoes; be planting them out on Melbourne Cup day. No matter how sunny it looks spring cannot start until the nation stops. Tomatoes, for those with no sense at all, have purpley-green stems and furry white bristles. Little green leaves sprout at the top, people once thought their fruit was evil. People once thought that cats caused the black plague. People think a lot of different things. Advertising people try and tell people how to think. An advertising man or woman will tell you at great expense the virtues of fruit, but I'll tell you for the price of a bit of quartz that you do not know a tomato until you have grown a tomato. Like children, you feed them and keep them from the cold. If you ask me, you have to love them as well.

Brocky's up there by the big pink house glittering in the sun, sporting his fluffy-white dressing gown and cup of herbal tea - there's over 40 varieties in the walk-in cupboard up there, more than the health food shop in Hurtsbridge which Bev sometimes visits. Though Bev says it's okay to go to Safeway - you just have to swing a crystal over them to extract all the nasty vibes. Peter, Australian legend, you love him sometimes but his eyesight's too good and he sees from the top of the hill that all is not perfect. I told you to plant a tree down by the gate, he nags me, and I ignore him as I'd ignore my father as I have a million other trees to do. Get stuffed, nothing's always perfect Peter. Bev and he, are beyond the trees, preparing for the day. I love their chanting and pictures of Sai Baba though at times I'm sure they think they are all a little nutty in Nutfield. It gives me faith that the world can change; even for the better - a crazy thought. Anyway, Vovlo's asked Pete, Australian legend, who used to drive a Torana and smoke the sponsor's Marlboros to flog off their new model something or rather 126 or 521 as though the numbers mean anything. All it does mean are finely dressed, over-stressed and highly paid people walking around the farm in high heels filming between mobile phones and instant coffee. Some of them are cool, but one particular lady needed running over with the tractor. That's when tractors come in handy… except Peter decided he'd need it as a backdrop to some picture, so I have to walk down the hill with the wheelbarrow with a hundred trees and a shovel pretending again that I'd forgotten the space where Peter's tree was meant to go. Bev says we have to humour him as he thinks he's a farmer.

I return here and smell the plants; it's life in your lungs, probably bacterial. Life. Seems more people want ads than life. Oh well, the gods have their plans with their fuzzy hair all up there, who am I to judge. Wonder what the god of tomatoes is? Texsicotel? He makes the sauce that goes with the sacrifice that the priests make at the top of the pyramid as the blood pours down the slots in the stone. It's good for you prostate - if you have one. I shower the babies with seaweed spray. It smells rotten, bit like the Healthy-Mite Pete puts on his mash potatoes - he's convinced it's better than Vegemite and Bev doesn't want to rock the boat by telling him any difference. You know, we had Who magazine out the other day, and they didn't take a single shot of the tomatoes. Go figure.

Work, keep the stories going in your head, keep you sane, hot, wet, icy, dry, windy, you keep going like a snowman or a melting butter pie smothered in flies.

UNCLE SANDY

(Old Massey Ferguson tractor)

Getting dry. (Seasoned pause) Don't rain soon, the grass'll die.

ME

(New Kubota, Japanese tractor)

Yeah.

3 weeks later…

UNCLE SANDY

(Old Massey Ferguson tractor)

Getting wet. (Seasoned pause) Don't stop raining soon, the cows’ll die.

ME

(Honda 125, trail bike, very wet)

Yeah.

City people don't always know you need rain and sun; shit dies otherwise. Drought's a drought, if it floods it floods; there's nothing much you can do about it 'cept plant trees and hope it catches on like the new Volvo…

I lift a piece of plastic covering the compost. A metre-and-half long brown snake freaks, looks left, looks right, sees me, then is off, born free as long as the grass grows and the kookaburras don't eat it. A fat old tiger snake just yawns and looks for its plastic blanket. "No!", I say, but it persists and tries to bite. I just want compost but need to bear in mind those neuro-toxins. Peter drives past, waves and sips his herbal coffee in a fine china teacup. Bev obviously has had enough of him and has sent him off to some car show in Perth or Hobart or somewhere. I prod the snake to safety as it strikes at my long rake. I'd never kill them, they eat mice. Besides, they're interesting.

Time for lunch. Dust swirls, here in Nutfield.

*snakes were poked with rakes but otherwise not harmed during the making of this story.

© John R Atwood 2007

email:greenpaddocks@gmail.com