A Wild Bull from the 'Bogies

"As far as I was concerned, there was only one good job on the farm, and the bull had that."

Graeme grew up on a farm out of Warrenbayne. He was in the middle of an answer to my question as to why he couldn't read or write. He'd let it slip when telling me about his recent knee replacement that it was hard finding the specialist in Melbourne as he couldn't read. He left school at twelve, at the end of primary school. He had trouble staying awake at school, after milking cows in the morning, putting out hay, then milking again after school. He'd worked on the farm from as young as he could remember. There was never any pay. After leaving school he worked for years for nothing. On Sundays his father would get out the boxing gloves, give him a lesson, and a hiding, after which he'd sneer, "You'll learn eventually to keep your gloves up so you don't get hit."

Gord and I were at Frieda and Will's daughter Tammy's place at Upper Beacy yesterday. The occasion was Frieda's 60th birthday party. Lib didn't come. She was called out early to fill in for a nurse whose two year old daughter had got into a box of sleeping tablets and was rushed to hospital. Lib's matron had a breakdown recently and is off on stress leave, so Lib is acting DON. The power was out due to the earlier storm and the throng were crowded inside round the 'Coonarra'.

Graeme was carving meat at the bench when we arrived an hour late, but before the feast began. Carving seemed a labour of love to Graeme as he deftly and reverently sliced a number of joints as people went back for seconds and thirds. Later he showed me pictures of his fishing chalet in Tasmania, and of trout strung up on a rope. When someone opened the door to come in the cold air was sweet and inviting so we stepped outside and leaned on the rail overlooking the pool and view to the west. The rain had stopped. At 61 and still a large, powerful looking man with shoulders like the proverbial brick outhouse, long curly hair and a bushy black beard, there was something in his eyes that matched the wild stormy day. If you replaced his neat slacks and sloppy jumper with leather, he'd look like the chief of the Hell's Angels.

"The old man was a miserable bugger. He'd never give you anything, not even a compliment. If I was fencing he'd come along and say, 'That's not bad, but you should have done this.' Whatever the job, there was always something better you could have done. At school it was brought in that every kid had to have a bank savings account and make a deposit every week. When I left school he made me go to the bank, withdraw the money and give it to him."

"As soon as I was old enough I started doing jobs off the farm, to get money. Carting hay, shearing, digging spuds, fencing, anything I could find. An old neighbour used to do some concreting around dairies, and septic tanks and things. He taught me a bit about concreting. We'd dig the hole for the tank by hand then box it and pour a square tank with V in the bottom. When I went to Melbourne after I'd saved a few bob I got a job with an Italian concreter at Dandenong. This was the mid sixties. I didn't know my way around and couldn't read the signs. I had to ask people when catching a train or tram."

"From memory I was getting $35 a week with Joe Viccarro as a labourer. Louie Lunardi offered me $50, so I changed employer. After a while I started doing a few small jobs of my own on Saturday mornings, putting driveways in mainly. At one time I was milking cows some mornings at Narre Warren, then doing a full days work concreting before knocking off and weeding carrots for a couple of hours in the evening. Then I'd do my Saturday morning private job then head up to the Strathbogies with the ferrets and catch a load of rabbits. Back Sunday afternoon I'd sell the rabbits at the Hallam pub. A customer'd ask how fresh are they and I'd tell him they couldn't be fresher and go and wring their necks. What I couldn't sell at the pub I'd take to the Sandown dog track and sell live to the dog trainers. There was good money in it."

"One day the concrete truck didn't turn up to my Sat morning job, said he'd come Monday. I told Louie I was crook and had to take the day off. He was too smart for that and found out from the concrete place where my job was. He came round to the job and took his barrows (he loaned me his barrows for Saturdays), and sacked me. I didn't mind, I was getting as much for the Saturday morning job as I was in whole week working for him. So I went on my own and concreted for years. I did a lot of work around Toorak that paid real well. I did all the cable boxing on the Melbourne loop. I concreted all over the joint. I met Will on a building job. He worked with me for awhile. We did about two acres of concrete for a huge pig farm being built at Corowa. He called out to Will, "When did we work at Corowa on that pig farm?"

"Too long ago. Some time in the seventies". Will is a builder. He and Frieda lived in Gembrook when our boys were at primary school with their son Liam. The boys shared much of their childhood and our two families spent a lot of time together. Frieda nursed with lib at Salisbury House. I planted about three acres of trees and shrubs on Will and Frieda's place as a joint business venture, beginning the day Princess Di died in 1997. A few years later Fieda's mother died leaving a large inheritance, so Will and Frieda sold up and moved to Phillip Island where they built houses during the boom, and then tourist units for disabled people on a 15 acre property at Ventnor, which is now a thriving and demanding business. Will said, to me, "I don't even like thinking about those days working with Graeme. We'd drink till midnight then get up at 4.00am to start work at first light."

Graeme wasn't drinking. I recalled seeing him at Gembrook some ten years earlier, probably Frieda's 50th. He was off the grog by then. His third wife was there yesterday. They're now separated but are the best of friends.

"I did a lot of work at Appleton Dock. The wharfies were on strike and had a picket line. I drove the truck through the picket line with my head out the window yelling, 'Get out of the fucking way or I'll drive over you then throw you in the sea.' The bloke with the big red sign waved me through after that, saying I was a comrade."

"Why'd you give the concreting away."

"I was sick of it. Around then I started playing football at Emerald with Will. I got sued for $6000 by an opponent. He was running behind me kneeing me in the back of the legs. I told him if he did it again, I'd belt him. He said, 'Have a go', so I swung round, knocking him down with a punch. He lost all his front teeth. I built a big log cabin for a rich bloke who played footy with us, out of treated pine poles, then started a business doing them. Will worked for me for a while. I got sick of building cabins too. I'd always done fencing here and there. I used to be into show jumping horses and would go everywhere to jumping events. I sponsored some and along with a cash prize I'd donate a horse rug to the winner which had written on it 'XX Fencing' and my phone number. A lot of rich horse people who won events rang me up for fencing work. Some of them had nightclubs and hotels in Melbourne and more cash money than they knew what to do with. There were two lesbian shielahs, one bought a six hundred acre property for her girlfriend to ride around and keep her little pussy wet. I did $40,000 fencing work for her. Money was nothing to them. I never had a bad debt. One builder was late paying and avoided me. I knocked his front door down with an axe in the middle of the night. He wailed that the cheque was in the mail. I locked him in the boot of my car and told him he doesn't get out till I get the cheque. The cheque came in the mail that day."

Graeme bought a beef cattle property at The Gurdies in the 1980s and, having an eye for cattle developed from childhood, he prospered. Not being able to read or write was no handicap as he had a good head for figures and could calculate in his head at cattle sales by weight and price per kilo. His accountant did all the written stuff. I remembered in the '90s Will going down to his farm to help him build a dairy.

"Why'd you go into dairying Graeme, after doing so well with the beef cattle?"

"It was a mistake. Maureen always wanted a dairy farm and I gave in to her. It was at the time when milk prices were very good. It didn't last. Around 2000 I was nearly bankrupt. Maureen and I split. I paid her out and took the debts myself, but kept the farm. An accountant, whose farm I'd worked and made him some good money, said he'd do my books for nothing for one year. I couldn't pay anyone to do anything, I did everything myself. I was up at 3.00am and worked all day everyday. I can remember waking up sitting on the motor bike, after stopping when the cows were going through a gate. They were still in the lane waiting to be milked. More than once. At the end of one year I'd removed some debt and the accountant said he'd do the books for another year. Things improved, there was deregulation. I sold the milking cattle and kept the breeding stock. I have no debt now. Dairying's buggered again, they're getting 18 cents a litre for milk that's costing them 32 cents to produce. Farmers are hanging on by the skin of their teeth month by month. Half of them'll go out. Then it'll come good again."

"What do you do now?"

"Export young dairy breeding stock. We sent 220 calves to Russia last week. Only six were mine, I bought the rest from other farmers. We send to Mexico, many places. I work through Elder's. It beats milking."

"Is there good money in it."

There's no good money now. The farm's worth $2 million. I don't have any money to speak of, unless I sell the farm or the chalet. I don't know whether to sell or not. As I said, there's only one good job on the farm, and not even the bull gets to do that anymore. I've never been anywhere, except Tassie. I wouldn't mind seeing the rest of Australia, especially up north, the big cattle stations. What do I do? How do I do it? Buy a caravan I suppose. I can't see myself driving around with a caravan behind. Where do you pull up? Around here I know where I am, where I'm going. In Tassie I leave a four wheel drive permanently at the Devonport airport and know my way to the chalet."

I could understand the uncertainty if you couldn't read signs or maps. I said he should write a book. Will laughed. "He'd have a bit of a problem with that."