26/03/2020
I had planned to read this to Julie Willis-Lyons in-person with Lee Calleja-Thomas + Bec Castelli Purcell there to help capture the moment, but with COVID-19 changing everything, we took the story to Skype. We recorded it, but the file is very big as it's a long story, so I'm sharing the written version here. If anyone has kids, this is a story my children loved.
~~The (true) story of Julie and the lead scar, by Greer Quinn~~
It was probably one of those Grade Three rules where girls and boys had to punctuate one another to prevent distractions.
That’s the likely reason I was sitting next to Paul Vidler who – accidentally or deliberately – stabbed me with a lead pencil during class on this day. It must have hurt because decades later, I still have the scar. In fact, if I study that tiny scar very closely, I can still make out the lead stain from Paul Vidler’s pencil.
It was 1980, but the toxic perils of lead poisoning were well enough publicised to make it to the awareness of my largely TV-deprived six-year-old self. The pencil’s sharp tip had broken off and embedded under my skin. I literally had a lead splinter. Bright red blood spilled from my forearm, reaffirming the violent act.
Stress response #1: fright.
“Excuse me Mrs Clarke, but Paul just stabbed me with his pencil,” I said.
“It was an accident,” Paul claimed. If Paul had any skerrick of remorse, it was undetectable to me.
“Quiet, you two,” Mrs Clarke commanded.
“But I’m bleeding, can I please wash my arm?” I asked.
“It’s nearly lunch-time, you can do it then,” Mrs Clarke said.
I lapped the dripping blood with my tongue, sucking it back to stem its flow.
“But it’s lead, Mrs Clarke,” I said, worried.
Mrs Clarke refused to let me leave the classroom to rinse it under the bubblers or visit Mrs Allen who was both Logan Reserve State School’s librarian and sick bay nurse. Mrs Allen was always the first to believe a bone was broken even when an x-ray later confirmed it wasn’t. And she never scolded me for returning library books late. But Mrs Clarke wouldn’t let me go to Mrs Allen’s safe haven.
“Wait until lunch-time,” Mrs Clarke said. “Put your hand down, Greer.”
That was Julie’s tipping point. Julie was now outraged. Fired up. Furious. Incensed by the injustice.
Stress response #2: fight.
“She needs to wash her arm now,” Julie said. “Let her go to the taps.”
“No, Julie, she can wait,” Mrs Clarke shot back.
“She’s going to get lead poisoning,” Julie’s impassioned eyes were moist with concern.
“Sit down, Julie.”
“No, Greer needs to wash her arm,” Julie said raising her voice along with her hand in panic.
“If you keep this up, I’ll be sending you to the principal’s office Julie,” Mrs Clarke threatened.
Our school principal was charismatic man, who on the rare occasion would enter classrooms to deliver what felt like keynote speeches. Mr Reinhart was a fine orator. Everything he said sounded like a profound quote, followed by a pregnant pause or an ellipsis. While I literally can’t remember a single word from one of these in-class sermons, I do remember him approaching me back in Grade Two during a little lunch break after he saw me yawn while sitting alone on a bench chair.
“Why did you yawn just now Miss Quinn,” he asked, slowly exhaling cigarette smoke from the corner of his thin lips.
“I don’t know Mr Reinhart,” I replied nervously. I thought I was going to get in trouble for not covering my mouth. Or for going to bed too late the night before.
“You did that because your brain needed oxygen. A yawn is a pathway to transport oxygen to the brain,” he explained. He stamped his Whinfield Red out on the ground with his leather shoe, twisting his long beige trousered leg to be sure it was properly extinguished. It was obvious he knew he’d said something very clever.
Since that day, I’ve felt like every yawn has made me smarter. I don’t think there’s a single yawn that I’ve done since that day in Grade Two that Mr Reinhart’s words – and oxygen – haven’t entered my brain. He really taught me to relish yawns.
My parents liked Mr Reinhart even though they thought he was a “bit of a socialist”. He was a fierce supporter of public education and by default philosophically opposed private education. He was a bean pole of a man who had straight hair that alternated between being greasily tucked behind his ears, to lusciously flopping about as he sauntered around the school grounds. Some days, it appeared mousy brown. But on other days, fresh blonde.
It was a couple of years into my private high school education, when I was told that Mr Reinhart had been sacked as principal at Logan Reserve State School because he’d be caught stealing fridges from the school as part of an elaborate way to embezzle public funds. I was shocked that a man of such authority could do such a thing. That is, if he even did it.
But Mrs Clarke didn’t send Julie to Mr Reinhart’s office on the day Paul Vidler stabbed me with a lead pencil.
And that was despite the fact that Julie continued to fight for me until lunch-break. Julie was fearless. But Mrs Clarke maintained her unmoved position despite appearing visibly off-kilter. The two of them were like a ping pong match, but I had become silent. It felt like I was floating above the classroom looking down.
Stress response #3: freeze.
Mrs Clarke wasn’t a mean teacher, but she did some things we thought were pretty weird. She had round dinner plate eyes, her hair was dark and short and cutely curled to frame her deceptively friendly face. She seemed to always don a long string of plastic beads draped over blocked brights or monochromes. Her look was a 1920’s vibe with a 1980’s twist. But it wasn’t her fashion choices we thought were odd. While reading books aloud to the class, she’d suddenly yell random words like “shut up” or “quiet” and jerkily point or gesture for no reason. We were told it was because she’d been in a car accident and something had happened to her brain. It wasn’t until the 2000s while watching a character on the TV show Ally McBeal that I realised Mrs Clarke most likely suffered from Tourette’s Syndrome. While she’d often startle us, we were used to it. This was the second time I’d landed Mrs Clarke as a teacher. She’d also taught me when I was in Grade One. To snap me out of a day-dream during class, she’d once struck my four-year-old head hard with a wooden ruler. But Julie wasn’t around back in Grade One.
One time, when reprimanding a red-haired, freckled boy for misbehaving, she lost control. She shook him and shook him while ramming him towards a rubbish bin in the corner of the classroom, in which she eventually forcefully inserted him. It was only then, that Mrs Clarke seemed to become cognisant of what she’d done – as if coming out of a trance. She began apologising profusely, helping to break the suction his bottom and the bin had co-created by pulling at his flailing limbs to return him to his feet. The boy – literally and figuratively shaken up – stoically sucked his tears back into his eyeballs and ran back to his desk. I was grateful Mrs Clarke managed to keep her calm and control her tics on the day Paul Vidler stabbed me with the lead pencil.
Julie Willis was one of the Willis kids. The Willis kids were the athletes of Logan Reserve State School and were responsible for the long reign of Mars over Pluto and Venus. Mars, Pluto, and Venus were the names of the school’s three house teams. The Quinn kids, including me, were in Venus, the house that always lost. Everyone wanted a Willis kid in their house. There was even talk about splitting the Willis’ evenly across the planets to level out the playing field. Not only were they talented athletes, but they were fair and kind.
The Willis’ were born in Papua New Guinea, the same as me and my two older brothers, even though our parents were New Zealanders. Our families knew each other back in Papua New Guinea, but it was a coincidence that we became reunited on the dry flood plains of Logan Reserve.
It didn’t matter that Julie and my first conscious memories of each other only arrived when she appeared at Logan Reserve State School. That we had different parents. That she was back-row and centre in school photos while I was front-row and far-left. That my hair sat flat or in knotty fluff balls while hers sprung so high and proud that I wondered if she even needed a bed pillow. That she won ribbons for running the fastest while I won cards for reading the quietest. According to Julie, who was a whole year and a half older than me, we were sisters. And sisters stuck together.
For a while, Julie’s dad – who was originally from Melbourne – worked for my dad. Julie told me her dad told her my dad made $500 per week. I asked my dad about it, but he laughed and said that wasn’t really the case – that he was in business and it always varied. Sometimes he made more. I think this was the first time I found out my family was richer than other families. But Julie’s dad wasn’t a born real estate salesman like my dad, so he didn’t stay long in the job.
Particularly during this era, our families were friends. Julie’s eldest brother John was friends with my eldest brother Mark. Her sister Lucy was friends with my second eldest brother Peter. And Julie and I were friends. There were two more Quinn boys to come – in fact, brother number three Daniel was already earth-side – but they’d never be lucky enough experience a Willis friendship. There would only ever be three Willis kids in the entire universe.
I only remember Julie’s mum wearing batik or floral mumus. I sometimes stared curiously at the intricate deep green tattoos decorating her face – she wore them differently to other inked adults I’d seen. Her voice was so soft I couldn’t make out her words. Perhaps it was because she wasn’t speaking to me in English. Nevertheless, I knew all her words were kind because her smile was as wide as Julie’s. I wondered if it was the width of Julie and her mum’s smiles that made the sound of their laughs so warm and joyful.
Sometimes Julie would come to my house after school and we’d eat carrots until our stomachs hurt. Julie thought the carrots from our fridge tasted better than other carrots. I thought our carrots tasted better when Julie and I ate them together.
Julie told me that one night, not long after her mum’s dad passed away, her mattress began to levitate while she was sleeping on it. Long before the Catholic Church infiltrated Papua New Guinea and broke up tribal culture, the brother of this grandfather who passed – Julie’s great uncle – was chief of Papua New Guinea’s largest tribal village. This chief bloodline relative had a legendary status for sacrificing himself in battle to defeat Japanese invaders during World War II. I imagine he was adorned in the most majestic of headpieces and the fiercest of war paint with the most formidable bone piercing through his nose. I imagine Julie’s grandfather fought shoulder-to-shoulder with his brother in this war and the loss of the village chief brought much grief upon the village and in particular Julie’s extended family. It was her grandfather’s spirit visiting her all the way from Papua New Guinea that raised her mattress that night. He was hiding under the bed lifting her mattress up with his legs as part of a game. No doubt about it. Julie didn’t lie.
It was from her royal Papua New Guinean lineage that Julie inherited not only her warrior spirit, but also her values. Julie’s mum didn’t speak much English, but she taught Julie about her indigenous heritage in her own way and her own language. She taught Julie to never arrive somewhere empty-handed and to always greet and thank the host. The host was the matriarch, not the patriarch, and it was imperative to acknowledge the matriarch as it was always the mothers who maintained peace in the village.
If anyone ever attempted to pick on me, they knew they had Julie to contend with. Susan Manovic was the first to test this. She shoved me really hard one day outside the Grade Three classroom and sent me into a rapid sprint. To save myself the humiliation of face-planting, I converted her “push energy” into “running energy”. Her shove propelled me to run faster than I’d ever run before, albeit for only 10 metres. My quick-thinking strategy, ensured I remained upright and dignified. Still, when Julie found out about it, she wasn’t happy. She told Susan that both she and I were born in Papua New Guinea and by virtue of that, she was my protector. That’s all that needed to be said. Julie didn’t need to use force. Her words were always so commanding and packed with authority. But to be honest, Julie was everyone’s protector. She was anti-bullying, anti-discrimination and pro-LGBTI rights before she or anyone else had a language for it.
During the previous school Christmas school holidays, the Willis’ returned to PNG for a family vacation. While they were gone, a friend of theirs moved in with her baby to house-sit. One night, the woman left her baby asleep at home while she popped next door to play cards and have a few drinks with a neighbour. That same night, there was an electrical fault and the house caught alight. The Willis’ house burnt all the way to the ground with that poor little baby inside. The Willis’ felt sadder for the woman who lost her baby than they did about losing their house. They could rebuild their house, but that poor mother couldn’t bring her baby back.
The house was still ash and rubble with that little baby’s ghost hovering above it the day Paul Vidler – accidentally or deliberately – stabbed me with a lead pencil.
Finally, when lunchtime rolled around, Julie whispered to me the plan she’d hatched to fight the injustice of my unwashed, lead-filled, bleeding arm.
We would run away from school. We would go to her old house, which was closer to the school than my house, but in the opposite direction to mine. There, we would wait and her dad would come and get us.
“But how will he know we’re there?” I asked. “Nobody will be home because it’s burned down. There’s no phone to call anybody.”
“Dad will know we’re there. He’ll come,” Julie assured me. “He’ll come and get us.”
“Aren’t you scared of the baby’s ghost?” I wondered, but I decided not to ask any more questions. It was my turn to support Julie.
To be honest, by lunchtime, the flow of blood had stopped and so too had my worry about lead poisoning. My worry had turned to our mission to run away from school. But Julie was so incensed. And she was incensed for me. I wasn’t one to disobey, but in this circumstance, it seemed that disobeying the school was the less-wrong-thing-to-do than disobeying Julie who was looking after my best interests.
We made the strange decision to wait until the end of lunch-break when we were already lining up to go back into class to make a break for it. There, Julie gave the word.
“Run!” she shouted to me as the whole class and Mrs Clarke turned around to see us bolt from the back of the line. While Julie was an experienced escapee – the back of her fro with her hand clutching her brown vinyl suitcase disappearing up the road was a common sight – this was my first time.
No sooner had we exited the school gate and crossed the road to reach the cemetery had Mrs Allen pulled up beside us. Given there were so many witnesses of our escape, it wasn’t exactly a stealthy getaway.
“Come on girls, get in the car,” she said gently.
I immediately caved and got into the car. My protest was concluded. All the bravery I’d conjured up to follow Julie had evaporated. It was a complete anti-climax. Like a film ending abruptly due to lazy script-writing.
But Julie wasn’t a quitter.
“Julie, come on, hop in the car,” coaxed Mrs Allen, now out of the car and trying to grab hold of Julie.
Stress response #4: flight.
“No, Mrs Clarke wouldn’t let Greer go to the taps,” a defiant Julie yelled over her shoulder. “She’s got lead poisoning because of her. I’m not going back into that classroom.”
Julie kept running. Away from Mrs Allen, but also from me. I felt guilty for being in the car, while Julie was out in the elements. We followed behind in Mrs Allen’s white sedan with the window down while Mrs Allen did her best to appeal to her. But Julie point blank refused to engage. She began jumping fences into paddocks. High jump. Long jump. One hundred metre sprint. Two hundred, 400, 800 metres. Julie’s athleticism was on full display. It was clear why Mars ruled. And she kept running. Unable to trail her through the paddocks, we u-turned back to the school.
I imagine Mrs Allen went straight to Mr Reinhart’s office to report back so the school could come up with another strategy to catch Julie.
I was later told nobody could catch her. Not the charismatic Mr Reinhart. Not even the police. But eventually, her dad did arrive. I imagine he traveled by foot through the paddocks to reach her right on dusk, like some kind of mythical messiah, the afternoon sun catching the tips of his light brown locks to make them glow golden. I picture Julie running into his arms still fighting for my cause, “I can’t believe Mrs Clarke treated Greer like that – it’s not fair,” I can hear her sob.
I can see in my mind’s eye her dad wrapping his arms around his little girl, more proud of her big heart than angry at her rebellion while catching her tears with his bushy beard.
I thought I’d get into more trouble for my radical action to run away from school, but I didn’t really get into any – not from the school, not from my family, nor from the police. I did cop a lot of teasing from my family, however. They believed I had run the wrong direction home. Even my brother Peter got in on the joke, “You’re an idiot, you don’t even know where you live. Greer doesn’t know where she liii—ves.”
I knew where I lived. Every day, I walked from 52 Henderson Road along the base of the clay rock wall, to catch the bus on the corner of Loganview Road where we putted along until we reached the quarry and then turned into Logan Reserve Road, where we’d tail trucks dropping tantalising batons of sugarcane. We so wanted to suckle on these sweet stray fibrous sticks, but we could only look at them longingly from the bus window as we’d drive past. What a waste.
I tried to explain to my family that we were going to Julie’s house, not my house, but they didn’t understand. They thought my version was part of an elaborate cover story to conceal my poor sense of direction. It didn’t make sense to them that I would run towards the site of a burned-down house where a baby had died, rather than come home. And it was too hard to explain.
While revisiting the story of our great escape from Logan Reserve State School, I reflected on the stress responses Julie and I collectively experienced as six and seven-year-olds. I thought about how we responded differently at different moments, but in many ways, how our responses were the same: fright, fight, flight, and freeze. But I knew one was missing. It related to the need to connect, communicate and commune during a crisis, but it didn’t start with a “c”. It started with an “f”. I tried to find it in the thesaurus, but it wasn’t there. It took me a few days to find the word, but it wouldn’t come to me while I was awake. Then, one night, just as Julie’s grandad had visited her, it came to me in a dream.
Stress response #5: Friend.
