What a wonderful idea to have a TRA reunion and how sad I am not to be able to attend! I really would have loved to catch up with you all. It might even have been possible but for the fact that this year I have been persuaded to return to work for one day a week and, of course, our summer holidays are in January so there was no possibility of having time off.
I have really enjoyed reading all your stories and I'd like to make a plea to those of you who haven't put pen to paper yet to do so now. To be able to read everyone's story would help to ease the disappointment of not being able to attend.
The Restless Years
In my last term at TRA I felt pretty unsettled, rather like Mike, as my father was retiring after 31 years in the Police Force and my parents had decided to relocate to the south of Scotland. As far as I was concerned it might have been Australia, as the end result was going to be the same, a new school for one term with all the stresses of trying to break into established peer groups. I'd already experienced that when I moved to TRA mid-way through my first year and, being basically very shy, it took me until about fourth year to feel part of the group. In the end my parents decided to send me back north to stay with friends to complete my last term.
At that point I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life but I'd had enough of study and exams and never having any money so I entered the Civil Service. My first (and only) post was in the Telephone Manager's Office in Edinburgh. In "The Young Women's Christian's Association Hostel" on The Mound I met and made friends with some other " Young Christian Women"?? and we moved out of the hostel to share a variety of flats together for the next two years.
Initially I rather enjoyed my job as it involved a lot of written correspondence and English had always been my mayor strength at school. However, after the first year I began to find that I needed to do something which presented me with a greater challenge so, almost by default, after two years, I ended up enrolling at Moray House in a teacher-training course.
There I met two girls from the north, Carol MacKay from Rogart and Rosemary MacLean from Portmahomack (Rosemary had been at TRA too but several years behind so our paths didn't cross at school). They have remained two of my closest friends despite the fact that we have spent our lives on opposite sides of the globe.
On graduating I got a job in the Primary Dept. of Golspie High School where I was to remain for only one year. The following year I returned to Edinburgh to complete my fourth year at Moray House. This I did on a part-time basis over two years while teaching at Ratho Primary. At the end of that time I was finally granted my "Parchment" which left me free to travel, and Carol and I set forth on our first adventure to teach in Montreal for a year. For the first time I was exposed to a range of different cultures as my appointment was to a school in downtown Montreal where only six of the children enrolling for their Kindergarten year spoke English. I team taught with another Scottish teacher and at the end of that year a little Greek boy who had no English at the beginning of the year was overheard to say to his friend," Och Stavros."
Unfortunately, throughout the year, I suffered recurrent bouts of flu, chest and throat infections and had to return to Scotland and its milder climate at the end of the first year. After a few months in Scotland teaching at Loanhead Primary, I was feeling much better and along with improved health came the desire to travel and see another part of the world. The opportunity came in the form of a job teaching at the Royal Naval School in Singapore. The years in Singapore remain amongst the happiest of my life. I was able to see a large part of Asia with trips to Malaya (as it was then), Sabah, Borneo, Sarawak, Thailand and Hong Kong. The social life was great for a single girl with a constant round of parties and outings. It was in Singapore that I learned to play squash, water ski and sail. We were able to do all this in the afternoons when we did not work because it was too hot. I remained in Singapore for two and a half years until the British withdrawal. In Singapore I met my ex- husband, an Australian, so I returned to Scotland for only a few months before migrating to Australia. Jim and I were married in 1971, a marriage that was to last for twenty three years.
Grief and Happiness
After two years we moved to Melbourne where our first son, Graeme, was born in 1973. At the age of 16 months, just a few weeks before the birth of our second son, Jeffrey, Graeme was diagnosed with a cerebral tumor and he died just a year later. During this time my father also died in Scotland from cancer so this period was one of the lows of my life. We returned to Scotland for a visit in 1976 while Jim was on a business trip to Europe but it was to be twenty years later before I returned to Scotland again.
I had been teaching up until the time of Graeme's birth and after our third son, Grant, was born in 1978 I continued to stay at home to care for the children. When Grant was two months old Jim changed jobs and we moved from Melbourne to Geelong, a large country town seventy kilometres west of Melbourne. Jim's job during the early years of our marriage entailed a lot of overseas travel so, with no family support, I was unable to participate in any activities outside the home and there were times when I felt quite isolated.
Back in the Workforce
By the time Grant was at kindergarten I had made friends with other mothers of the children in his kindergarten group and two of us decided it was time to test the waters and return to teaching. For two years in Geelong I did emergency teaching which left me free to be at home when necessary. During this time we built our dream home and, though Jim was still travelling I was feeling more settled and happier than I had been since Graeme's death. However, another move was looming. With the restructure of Dalgety, the company for which Jim worked, The Geelong branch became relegated to a sub-branch so it was back to Melbourne to another new job with another company. This move was not as traumatic as both boys were now at school and many of my friends were still there. It was very difficult to get full-time teaching positions at this time so a friend and I decided to embark on a post- graduate course in teaching learning-disabled children. Part of the way through the second semester because of my four year training (thanks to the Scottish system of teacher training) the Victorian Education Dept. offered me a full-time teaching position just 5 minutes drive from home and I decided to accept it. At this time I had been absent from full-time teaching for twelve years and I had only ever taught in an infant classroom so the transition to full-time teaching in middle school was fairly traumatic. The next few years were amongst the most enjoyable and rewarding of my career, but with promotion came additional stresses and these continued to increase so that my last few years before retirement two and a half years ago had ceased to be as satisfying.
A Crisis in my Life Leads to My Happiest Time
This period also saw the breakdown of my marriage, a traumatic event in anyone's life, but at the end of the day a very positive one for me as I married again five and a half years ago to a wonderful man with whom I am very happy. Ian has four sons by his first marriage but only one of them lives in Melbourne. One is in Tiawan, another in Brisbane and the fourth currently in Sydney.
My elder son, Jeffrey, is still at uni. He gave us a rough ride during his teenage years and ran the gamut of negative behaviours. Though very able, he displayed a complete disinclination to study, preferring instead to spend much of his time on the golf course preparing to be a professional golfer!! At the time when he had his handicap down to one he decided to give the idea of professional golf away to concentrate on acquiring an education. At twenty-six he has just completed an Arts degree with First Class Honours in Philosophy and is currently completing a post-graduate degree, a Bachelor of Letters. If anyone had predicted this ten years ago I'd have said they were crazy.
Grant, who is twenty three, has done a Computer
Science degree and is working as a lead programmer for a company
designing computer games. From the time he was eleven this was
his dream and he has been fortunate enough to be able to pursue
it.
With sons Jeffrey and Grant at my 60th birthday party December,2001.
For a variety of reasons until five years ago I had not been back to Scotland for twenty years. Because I had no family support I couldn't leave the boys and the financial cost for all of us to make the trip would have been too great. Because of the value I put on education (possibly a legacy of my own Scottish education) we decided to give the boys the best education we could afford so we sent them to private school and in doing so put on hold any plans for travel. Now I am making up for the time when overseas trips were not possible and, as a result, Ian and I have had three trips to the U.K. and Europe in the last five years.
Currently
I have read with interest of Walter's involvement in Scottish Country Dancing. In fact, both Ian and I are keen Scottish country dancers. When we are not carrying injuries!! we dance at least three times a week and have been regular attendees at national schools. My other major interest over the past five years has been resurrecting and developing my French (I wonder what Beefy would make of that given that he told me on the day before Higher French in fifth year that I had no hope of passing. I did, in fact, pass but no doubt by a narrow margin). I participate in a weekly conversation group and I am a member of U3A (University of the Third Age). I learned a bit of Spanish last year and plan to start Italian next term. Thanks to Mr Morrison and Mr Dick for developing my interest in languages. For me they were the two outstanding teachers at TRA.
My other interests include gardening (though we are about to lose a large part of our garden to a new swimming pool and conservatory), travel, reading and sampling the food at Melbourne's seemingly inexhaustible range of international restaurants and coffee shops. Up till last year I would also have included sailing but we have sold our yacht in favour of less physically taxing pursuits.
Ian has a very wide range of interests. He still runs the administrative part of his pharmacy, paints, is learning Italian, loves the beach and swimming, enjoys travel, plays the clarinet, has flown small planes and, most recently, while we had the yacht, completed his navigation and seamanship certificates.
Looking Back
Like Mike, I also have dual citizenship. Living in one country whilst being born and growing up in another gives one a strange sensation. When I am in Australia I feel Scottish and while I am in Scotland I feel Australian! I love Australia and, as well as an Australian husband, I have two Australian sons who will, I hope, one day, visit the highlands of Scotland and see where their mother lived and went to school.
One final question, I wonder how many of us would have chosen a different career? Reading the stories posted so far I get the feeling that for most people the career they pursued was the right one for them. As far as I am concerned, with the knowledge of hindsight I would have gone to uni. and done a degree in psychology. I really would like to have worked as a clinical psychologist but back then I don't think I knew such a job existed. Teaching was never truly my thing though I think I have made a reasonable success of it.
Finally, I wish you all a great reunion and really wish I could be part of it in the flesh as well as in spirit.
Gay Russell (Mackenzie)
Contact Details
10 Whalley Drive
Wheelers Hill
Melbourne
Victoria
Australia
Ph. 03 9 574 8586
Email: igr@ bigpond.net.au