The Beach or The Farm

Michael had been standing by the shore watching the waves crash and the sea gulls cry.  Kylie, his wife of ten years, had been watching him.



“Do you still think we should sell up and move?”



Her question broke his reverie, and he turned to face her. With her white panama hat and dark glasses, with her blonde hair framing her shoulders, leaning back in the sand like that, he could see the girl he had married. It had been a while.



“I don’t know. They love it here don’t they.” he said. He squinted in the afternoon sun, looking down the long beach towards the yacht club where their children we’re playing in the surf with the neighbours children. The beach house neighbours that is. They didn’t have any neighbours, so-to-speak, where they actually lived on some acreage on the outskirts of Melbourne. That was the whole point of their conversation, the reason why MIchael was feeling so blue. The reason why he had this talk with his wife everytime they stayed at Kylie’s dad’s beach house on Western Port Bay.



Merricks Beach was a family friendly beach community with dirt roads and no town water or gas. With no hoons with their hotted up cars, families walked the streets together and rode their bikes sans bike helmets. It was a beautiful beach, at times striking with it’s ocean plains.  The foreshore committee did a superb job looking after the native  vegetation and the Yacht Club offered sailing lessons to the kids (over a certain age and swimming skill level, of course) and put it self up as the destination of choice for movie nights and trivia challenges. Kylie had grown up here, spending every holiday she could running back and forth between her parents beach house and that of the neighbours. In fact, they were the same neighbours today. Like Kylie’s family, they had never left and now there was this second generation of beach kids.



Michael didn’t grow up in any beach communities like his wife. Michael grew up in another type of community: housing commission. Whereas, his wife had a happy childhood frolicking in the surf, Michael had lived in an apartment with his single mother and his big brother. Both he and his brother had stayed out of trouble, but the only time he caught up with his neighbours was when he watched Crimestoppers in the evening.



Working multiple jobs plus night school, Michael’s mother had eventually moved her small family out of the commission flats. His big brother went of to university to study french. Anything, just so he didn’t have to get a job, he said. Michael’s thoughts ran the other way. He would work at anything so he didn’t have to have the uncertainty of a students life and never run the risk of returning to the housing commission lifestyle. Lucking, in to an apprenticeship at an early age, Michael had not looked back. Nor, had he ever done anything to jeopardise his secure future. He was still in the same job, at the same factory, in the same trade, twenty years later.





Moving to the country hadn’t been his idea. When he and Kylie had gotten married, the plan was for a horse property. Before Kylie had been a successful corporate business-woman, she used to buy and sell horses, train them, and also compete in Dressage. She was pre-st.george and now that she was older and ready to start a family, she thought she could return to that lifestyle. She hadn’t counted on first, two counts of post natal depression with the first two children, and then the Multiple Schlerosis hitting her after their last child, Max.



Needless to say, they still had no horses.



But Michael thrived on the property. Working on the house, restoring the cedar panelling, building a backyard from scratch out of an old paddock. With no father figure, no voice of experience to turn to, he had done things the hard way: through hard work and imagination. Unlike some of his workmates, Michael had grown up with books and had been left to his own devices. He hadn’t had a father to watch and learn from, then or now. Michael had learned the hard way to maintain the property, and there had been many false starts. The joke was that now his own children watched and learned from him.“Wait until they’re older and they find out I’m making this stuff up as I go along,” was a common refrain in answer to Kylie’s growing pride in his efforts as a practical father.



Still, at times he doubted their choice to stay in the face of Kylie’s growing illness. There were weeks on end when they would not leave the property as a family, and Michael would often arrive home from work to find Kylie crying on the couch.

When their daughter, their first born, was only 18 months old, she had came up to them with the plastic packaging from a bag of king-size building blocks. Featured on the cover were a little boy and girl playing.

“I’m ‘onely,” she explained.

It took Michael and Kylie some time to understand but when they did it near broke their hearts.

Still, they stayed. Still, they perservered. Still, they refused to let Kylie’s sickness beat them. Against the wishes of their respective parents, and the advice of several friends, they increased their brood to three. Three little friends running around in the paddocks, building cubbies, and jumping on the trampoline. One of their favourite games was to find a fallen branch, still with leaves, and hit it with a stick to make the loudest bang. They called it, “doing their tax.”

Kylie was always doing her tax.



“So, do you think we should sell?” Kylie repeated her question. Michael stopped looking out at the ocean and dwelling on the past and faced his future. She was laying on the sand. Her cane laying next to her.

“I just don’t know. When I’m here, I feel like we should. When we’re home, I love it there. When I’m out in the paddocks, I don’t want to be anywhere else.”



Kylie squinted up at him even through the sunglasses. Michael could see the vague outline of his reflection in them, but he couldn’t see her eyes. He wished he could see her eyes. She took her time responding, choosing her words carefully. Not just because of her illness but because of their gravity.



“I’m unsure as well. It’s so beautiful there. When I’m sick, I just want to pack up and go. And then, when I’m better, I just love it so much. Would they have a better life in suburbia?”

“Ash and Max might, but Jet loves working on the farm. He’ll love growing up on a farm.”

“He’d love it with a backyard. We’d find somewhere with a park near by.”

“I’m not a park kind of guy, Kylie. What would I do with just a house? I’d spend all day on the computer and drink too much.”

“You drink too much now.”

“But at least I drink outside!”

“You shouldn’t drink so much.”

“It’s how I cope,” Michael found himself looking at the sand, looking at the waves breaking softly against the shore line. He started to walk away. Back to the beach house. He couldn’t face anymore today.

“Why don’t you go play with the kids,” Kylie said, her tone harsh. “My dad always played with us down here. Don’t go up there and start drinking.”

“I’m not your dad,” Michael snapped. “I don’t know what any Dad does. I don’t know how to be a dad.”

He left her there, laying on the sand with her cane.



--



Sitting now, his back leaning into the cedar wood of the beach house, looking out at the leaf-strewn backyard, taking in the towering gum trees framing the gardens, and being near-blinded by the brilliant and dazzling white of Kylie's four wheel drive, he heard the unmistakable sounds of motorbikes; their throaty, stereosonic rumble denoting their large number. A herd of motorbikes? A pack of motorcyclists? A murder of bikies? Or a natural causes of bikies, if they were of the octogenarian sort?



The dust and noise reached cacophony-level as the .... group .... of motorcyclists drew near the beach house. Cockatoos sqwawked, small branches fell, and the dog ran raging on his lead as he snapped and barked at the terrible din.



Still sitting, Michael craned his neck and grimaced at the spectacle. From where he sat, on the back veranda facing the communal tennis court, he saw them in all their dangerous glory. There were seven of them. An assortment of choppers and big, bold bikes. No expert, Michael imagined each bike was chosen for their ability to instill horror and their affinity with twisted, living metal behemoths breathing fire and belching smoke. The stuff of nightmares, that kind of thing.

None of them had taken off their helmets, or their gloves, and each stood straddling their motor beasts. The occasional one would twist his throttle, like a whip on a thoroughbred, and there would be a roar in response.

The back door flew open and Ash, Jet and Max flew out, their mad scramble of arms and legs almost taking out the dog.

"Wow!!" Jet bellowed in a voice of excitement worthy of two exclamation marks. "Daddy! They are NOISY!"

"Motorbikes Daddy! Motorbikes! Santa rides a motorbike," piped up little Max, and for a moment  the scene dematerialised as Michael wondered where on Earth Max had picked that little gem up from.

"Daddy," Ash's whole arm sneaked around Michael's forearm and he looked at her.

"Its okay, Angel," he reassured her. "They're just passing through. They'll be gone soon."

As if he had super-human hearing, able to hear the gentlest tone amongst the harshest of aural environments, the lead bikers head snapped around to them. Ash gasped and clutched him tighter.

"No, Daddy. You don't understand. I WANT one," Ash breathed.

"Daddy," Maxie said in all seriousness. "Santa has one. Why dont you?"

That was it, it was the last straw, Michael had had enough. First, the kids were enjoying themselves too much down here, then they were not noticing when he went back to the farm to pick up the mail and put out the bins, and now they were so excited by a group of noisy, filthy and ,no doubt about it, naughty bikers that they were prepared to push him into their midst.





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They had stayed at the Husband’s father-in-law’s beach-house for four weeks.His kids loved it there, it seemed like they didn’t want to come home. But when they did come home, the two eldest children, on different occassions, remarked to him how good it was to be home.

The eldest child, a girl of 7, was sitting on a rock on their family farm eating a can of baked beans for dinner (the Husband could not cook and the Wife was sick in bed).  They were all out there, the Husband and his 3 children, and his daughter was looking out at the view and enjoying the last of the sunshine.

“It’s good to be home,” she said to him, out of the blue. “It’s good to see that view again.”

A day later, the middle child, a boy of 5, told him, out of the blue as well, that it was great to be home because he was able to make bigger and better boats out of lego because, “home was where all the good lego was.”

“Lego should trademark that.” He told his wife later that night. “Home is where all the good lego is.”







What if ... the kids didn't like the beach house and wanted to go home.



What if ... the kids didn't like being home.



What if ... the wife did want to sell.



What if ... the husband wanted to sell.





Each of these what if's is important because the dynamic is that of a family drama. The father isn't sure he's doing the right thing by his kids and wife by NOT selling the family farm.

But, with any of these What Ifs, another story comes out. A different one with a different theme and one that would have to be even further fictionalised, I guess.

As it is, the kids love it when they are on the farm and they love it when they are at the beach house. There are other long term concerns the father has, long term benefits to staying on the property they have. Like, lack of parental control, teaching the kids good work ethic, not bringing the kids up in too relaxed an atmosphere. That kind of thing.

As such, what if the father doesn't see the kids reactions to being home. What if he hadn't taken the kids out to sit on the rocks and eat baked beans out of a can and watch the last of the sunshine. What if his middle boy hadn't decided he wanted to make (yet another) lego boat.

What if his wife's sickness worsens and they have to sell anyway. Or what if she was never sick in the first place and the issues of whether to sell her dream horse property never arose.

For a short story based on emotions, which I'm guessing this vignette will end up being, I could actually incorporate a lot of these what ifs into internal and external dialogue and problem solving/conflict solutions.



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Lesson One Exercise – Practicing Point of View          Select one of the the slice of life vignettes that you wrote for orientation last week and rewrite it in each of the following tenses:



first person,



third person limited,



and third person omniscient.



Keep all of your point of view vignettes and your answers to the questions below in one static item.





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first person,

We stayed at my father-in-laws beach house for 4 weeks. My kids love it there, they didn't want to come home. But my two eldest on different occassions, remarked how good it was to be home. My daughter was sitting on a rock on our farm eating a can of baked beans for dinner (I can't cook and my wife was sick in bed). She was looking out at our view and enjoying the last of the sunshine. A day later my middle boy told me, out of the blue, it was great to be home because he was able to make bigger and better boats out of lego because home was where all the good lego was. Lego should trademark that. Home is where all the good lego is.







third person limited,

They had stayed at the Husband’s father-in-law’s beach-house for four weeks.His kids loved it there, it seemed like they didn’t want to come home. But when they did come home, the two eldest children, on different occassions, remarked to him how good it was to be home.

The eldest child, a girl of 7, was sitting on a rock on their family farm eating a can of baked beans for dinner (the Husband could not cook and the Wife was sick in bed).  They were all out there, the Husband and his 3 children, and his daughter was looking out at the view and enjoying the last of the sunshine.

“It’s good to be home,” she said to him, out of the blue. “It’s good to see that view again.”

A day later, the middle child, a boy of 5, told him, out of the blue as well, that it was great to be home because he was able to make bigger and better boats out of lego because, “home was where all the good lego was.”

“Lego should trademark that.” He told his wife later that night. “Home is where all the good lego is.”





and third person omniscient.

They had stayed at the Wife’s father’s beach-house for four weeks. Their kids loved it there, it seemed like they didn’t want to come home. But when they did come home, the two eldest children, on different occassions, remarked how good it was to be home.

The eldest child, a girl of 7, was sitting on a rock on their family farm eating a can of baked beans for dinner (the Husband could not cook and the Wife was sick in bed).  They were all out there, the Husband and his 3 children, and the daughter was looking out at the view and enjoying the last of the sunshine.

“It’s good to be home,” she said, out of the blue. “It’s good to see that view again.”

A day later, the middle child, a boy of 5, remarked, that it was great to be home because he was able to make bigger and better boats out of lego because, “home was where all the good lego was.”

Lego should trademark that. Home is where all the good lego is.



Analysis

The differences in the pieces are largely to do with outlook and level of insight. They had to change to incorporate the extra information needed, especially the third person limited piece as the narrative had to revolve around him. I didn't really change the narrative voice on purpose, but the first person piece did lend itself to more personal language and word choices.

I actually liked the third person limited the best as I got to play around a bit and include a few more scenes ie. The denouement with the wife.