I remember helping out with baby sitting for a lady who lived around the corner from our home in Kingston-On-Murray: first when her son was born & later when they had a daughter. Basically all I had to do was assist with the chores so she could rest & recuperate after childbirth. During one of these days the subject came up about how I could "make my fortune" as it were, by going up to Darwin, becoming a prostitute & selling my body to "set myself up for life, buy my own home, never have to worry about money etc." What a thing to say to an impressionable 16 year old girl. At the time I don't think I really understood what that meant as I was still a virgin. I was still dreaming about finding my one true love & living happily ever after, like in a fairy tale.
As a teenager, I remember all those hormones racing: feeling that strange new awakening of my body, the uncontrollable yearning for something that I didn't even know existed until then. I wanted what every young girl wants: to become a woman: to feel love & be loved in return. I had a crush on one of my teachers & often dreamed of how life could be. Doesn't every teen want to be loved, to feel that growing need to do something about the powerful urges going through your body & mind? I wanted that too! I wanted to have a boy like me & to show it. I saw other teens already in love & going out. Why not me? One year 11 or 12 student liked to make us younger girls blush. He'd come up & say hello & that was enough. Just to have someone notice was like a drug, it lifted me up & made me want more!
Living so far away from high school made it difficult to have a relationship with anyone. Bus travel took up most of my time & then it was a bike ride for the last couple of miles home. By then it was time to help make dinner & then a little bit of TV for relaxation & finally homework for hours after that. The kids in Loxton would have gotten home by 4 pm, gotten their homework done early & could watch as much TV as they wanted. They could visit each other after school & have friendships & relationships that I missed out on because of my isolation.
My family would do our shopping in Barmera every Saturday morning & during summer we would often go to the Barmera Hotel & Beer Garden for dinner, meeting our friends families as well. When I was 15 I remember running around after my little cousins while our parents got together. I was starting to develop & got a few looks from men & older boys by then. I got talking to a nice looking young man at another table but was too embarrassed to sit down, so I just stood there feeling like an idiot for quite a while before I finally sat down to continue our conversation. We arranged to meet the next Saturday morning when my family came shopping. I finally felt like I was growing up!
The next Saturday, I was excited & couldn't wait to get there. I felt eager to meet & talk to my new friend, but when I saw him walk past in the shop I noticed he hadn't shaved & I felt like he wasn't the same person I expected. I knew he hadn't seen me & I ran off to escape as I was to naive to realize then that he was just human. He didn't shave! Did that make him suddenly repugnant? I was just a silly teenager. My Prince Charming would have to be perfect all the time! How could he not shave? Wasn't I important enough to shave for? What silly girlish notions were going through my head? I don't really know as I was so full of those ideas of perfection & happy endings!
Life didn't always go as I expected! As I grew I realized that I couldn't have everything my way & that I would have to accept that. I would have to accept people as they were> I am sorry to say that I was a perfectionist & everything had to be just so or I wasn't happy! Typical teenager? Yes! Teens today are still the same. It takes years to realize how annoying & small minded we are until well into our twenties.
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