by Jodie Moffat
Work in progress — Maria Scoda
Sex, love, death, betrayal, tragedy, heartache, letting go. There is nothing that can’t be spoken about in my rooms. I am a vault, a safe place where my clients can share their vulnerabilities and talk about the things that are troubling them. Sometimes I can help and sometimes all I can do is bear witness to their story. I don’t have a little pill to give them, or a magic wand to take away the pain, not for my clients and not for myself. I listen, I comfort, I reassure and I help process. I do whatever I can, but there is no panacea.
I learnt to swim when I was five. My mother walked with my brother and me half an hour each way to take us to the public pool for lessons. I loved the feeling of her wrapping me up in a big soft towel after getting out of the water.
Seven years old and I’m in the squad. One, two, three, breathe. One, two, three, breathe. My heart pounding and my legs shaking. Struggling to stay afloat, I reach over to my right and hold onto the side of the pool. Resting my head on my arm, I try to catch my breath. I hate swimming in the rain but apparently it makes you stronger. Not me though, I just feel cold and shiver uncontrollably. Looking up at the stall, I wave, trying to get my mother’s attention but it’s Mr Brown, my coach, who notices me as he paces up and down the pool. He slaps my fingers with his thong until I let go and start swimming again. My eyes are focused on the black line below me. Keep going or drown – that’s what I learnt in that pool.
In years to come, the pool becomes a place where I unwind and take some time for myself. It is a place where I feel free. All I can hear is the sound of my breath as if it is amplified in a large empty room. It is so deep and so rhythmic that it often sounds like a purr.
The human condition can be complicated, but we’re not overly mysterious in our desire for love, peace and purpose in life. Feeling as though we don’t matter can be a painful thing.
My father and mother emigrated from Italy, but at different times and from different places. They met in Marrickville and only knew each other for three months before they married. ‘We moved to Bankstown, twenty minutes further west, for our honeymoon,’ Dad joked. That’s where I grew up in the 60s: a working class suburb with streets lined with fibro houses and old station wagons. My brothers and I played cricket, climbed trees and rode our bikes up and down the street. We only went in when our mother called us for dinner. My mother’s family in Italy were poor. They got what they needed from simple things. I remember her telling me how when she was young she pretended that a rock was her doll. ‘I threw it up in the air one time and on the way down, it hit me on the head,’ she laughed. ‘I bled so much, and I still have the scar.’
My parents worked hard and did what they could to assimilate, and for the most part, things were good for us. But there were times when we were reminded that we didn’t quite fit, when people called us wogs or made fun of my name. By the time I was a young adult that was less of an issue. My Italian heritage seemed to have become more mainstream, part of the Australian norm.
Growing up, there was a degree of familiarity hanging around non-Anglo Australians, but I was at odds with some of the southern Mediterranean old-world views that many of the migrant diaspora subscribed to. It was hard to ignore the unspoken code that revealed itself when I met others from similar backgrounds, which I thought of as the ethnic nod. It went something like this: you should know better, good girls don’t go out late at night, or go to places where there are boys, or smoke. And they certainly don’t move out of home or have sex until they’re married. But I wasn’t a good girl – and as an older teenager I distanced myself from those values as much as possible.
I met one of my best friends at a drama class in my twenties. She mattered to me, still does. After our first class we went to the pub and sat at the bar and talked until the early hours of the morning. We shared an interest in books, the arts, coffee and vodka. The world was ours but I had no idea where I fitted in, or if in fact I did. I paid a karmic astrologer a hundred dollars to see if she could shed any light on things, and she said that in my previous life I roamed freely in the bush alone with no commitments, and that my purpose in this life was to build a meaningful relationship and work–life balance. That was encouraging, but I didn’t know how to make that happen, and I had even less confidence in myself that I could.
I was an ordinary kid who asked a lot of questions, most of them beginning but why? – much to the annoyance of my parents. I sang and danced (badly) and played hopscotch, and loved our goldfish and grey tabby cat. School was a place I enjoyed, and I had many friends. I remember sitting cross-legged and playing with my kindergarten teacher’s brown suede shoes as she told a story to the class. I was fascinated that they changed colour from dark to light brown as I rubbed them. She helped us learn the alphabet and to write; she asked us what we wanted to be when we grew up – as if we could do or be anything we wanted in that far away time of being an adult.
I failed my high school certificate. For a long time, I had excelled at school, but in my final two years as my home life became less happy and more complicated, I lost interest and my grades plummeted. I went from being a well-behaved child to an argumentative and defiant teenager, lacking confidence and confused about who I was and where I belonged in the world. Lost in my unproductive thoughts, I found myself regularly seeking the comfort and familiarity of the pool.
I haven’t always been a psychologist. For a few years after I finished high school I went to secretarial college, but I never finished the course. I couldn’t really type or take shorthand but I found I was particularly good at organising people and writing up presentations. I didn’t mind working all night if I had to, or picking up a new shirt for my boss. When you’re young and hopeful, any learning is good.
‘You’ll never be a secretary,’ I remember my lecturer insisting just before she kicked me out of the course. ‘You can’t type and you don’t look like a secretary. Can’t you see how nicely all the other girls dress?’ She was right; I had no interest in wearing pencil skirts, uncomfortable shoes or lipstick, but it still stung.
I felt like I was going to drown, but I pushed on. After leaving college I went through a couple of unskilled office jobs, which I quit because I found sitting in small dingy offices, answering the occasional phone call, soul-destroying. One of them ended for other reasons: I met a man one night through friends, and he offered me work at his law firm. I was excited about this job as it was an opportunity to build my secretarial skills, but within days he started asking me out and I believe it was my ongoing rejection of his sexual advances that got me fired within a few weeks.
I was only nineteen years old but I felt down and desperate about my future and what I was going to do. It took almost a year of trying before someone took me on in a job that worked out. It’s funny how in life, sometimes someone kind comes along when you really need it, and offers you their hand. Marg, my boss at a home nursing service, was an older, stocky woman who had short wiry hair and a private smile. She didn’t say much, but when she spoke, I listened. She mentored me and helped build my confidence. It only took a few simple words of encouragement to give me enough self-assurance to take the next step. About eight months into my job she told me I should apply for a role at head office as a secretary for the managing director. It felt out of reach, but I went for the job and I got it.
The women in my new job were also supportive of me – and in life, that is what matters. Everyone needs a foundation to grow from, a place to try new ways of being in the world. They welcomed me into their team, were patient with me while I learnt new skills, and gave me a sense of belonging.
At the same time, I took a second job waitressing on weekends to pay for an apartment I bought when I was twenty years old. My father taught me to be independent. ‘Make sure you buy your own place,’ he said. ‘That way if your partner beats you, you can leave.’ It was odd advice, but sensible. My father was always a pragmatic man. So when my boyfriend of five months put his hands around
my throat for getting my hair cut without telling him, I knew what I should do. But I was young and full of self-doubt, and acting decisively was not yet a habit I’d formed. Like many people in relationships with a partner who treats them badly, I found it difficult to leave. I felt torn; there had been many tender moments between us. It was a much smaller moment that ultimately prompted me to end the relationship: he couldn’t be bothered turning up to see me on my birthday. We had plans and he just didn’t show. That’s what made me finally leave – the unbearable feeling that I didn’t matter.
Sometimes we know what to do and we live with the shame of doing nothing. Sometimes we find the strength to say that’s enough, this relationship no longer serves me well, and we walk away. If that confidence doesn’t develop in us, or is lost to us as children, as adults we have to find other ways to build faith in ourselves and learn healthy or sustainable ways to manage the difficult times.
When I was twenty-one, I bought a return air ticket, left my job and with little more than a backpack, a tiny camera and a change of clothes, I took off to roam the world. I didn’t know how long I’d be gone – perhaps a few months, or a few years – it didn’t matter, I had nowhere to be. My only commitment, my mortgage, was being serviced by the tenants who were then renting my place. I hitchhiked to places that fed my soul and sometimes I cut people’s hair very badly for a meal. I found myself growing more confidence and in London, where I landed for a while, I was offered a job as a secretary for a lawyer with a large company.
‘Have you got any other clothes?’ the recruiter asked. I didn’t. ‘You’ll be working at a corporate office so you’ll need a jacket. See if this fits.’ It did. I was touched when she offered to give me a few pieces of her own that she no longer needed. My boss, an older, doddery but articulate man, was very friendly, supportive and respectful.
It was a few years later that I returned home, in need of a job and broken-hearted. I’d met a man in London who I found easy to love. But after eight months together, as we lay side by side in bed, he said, ‘This is nice, but I don’t love you.’ When I arrived in Sydney just after midnight I pulled out two scrunched-up twenty dollar notes my father had given me before I left. ‘Here’s some money for a taxi for when you get back,’ he’d said before he gave me a quick awkward hug, and he and Mum had waved goodbye.
By my late twenties I was personal assistant to the group general manager in a large Australian company. But I was treading water: I no longer found secretarial work challenging. I started thinking of other things I might like to do. I was working full-time and volunteering on a crisis line as well as emotionally supporting people who were dying from AIDS, and it was at this point in my life that I thought about working as a counsellor. Born a girl in a traditional migrant family in Bankstown, there was never any talk of going to university or having a career, so it wasn’t something I considered previously or thought I could do. Those aspirations were left to the boys. I decided to talk to my boss about studying.
‘You’re wasted here,’ she said. Nothing more. So powerful were those words that my throat constricted and I walked away, my eyes filled with tears. It was a warm feeling to know there was someone who saw my potential. Having someone believe in me gave me the confidence I needed to move forward with a new career. With new determination, I dived back into the deep end to study psychology.
When I sit in my office and wait for clients to arrive, I wonder what will they bring and how I might help. What have they endured to make them who they are and how do they cope with their day-to-day struggles? Do they feel loved, have they had their hearts broken and have they met people who have been kind to them?
We are all complex and our journey is often not straightforward. We don’t get everything we wish for. We can’t always control what happens to us. Somehow we need to learn to make meaning of what we have and what we create for ourselves. It seems so long ago now, but I remember when my kindergarten teacher asked us what we wanted to be when we grew up. Life was simple then. I wanted to be a giraffe.
These days, I am aware of my mortality and what I haven’t had or done in my life. But I’m also more solid than I have ever been. There is a calm in me that allows me to be reflective, to think things through for myself and for others. Through my own experiences I learnt how important the nurturing and support of others can be to instill confidence, develop a sense of self and help someone attain their goals.
I’ve come to understand that each of us is a work in progress and that it’s okay to sometimes fumble through life and learn new ways of being in the world and in relationships. Accepting that we’re not perfect is a good thing, being vulnerable is okay, and talking to someone you trust can be helpful.
A fortunate working life — Jenny Smithson
I didn’t set out to choose a career over children. But poor choices of partners found me, by the age of thirty, divorced, childless and involved with an older married man who’d already had too many wives and enough children. So my personal life had its limitations, and I turned to my professional life to find satisfaction.
I am a fourth-generation, white, middle-class Australian, the second eldest of five girls all born in the 60s. I wasn’t the smartest or the prettiest as a child. I had a ‘short back and sides’ haircut and wore glasses.
My results suffered in high school when image started to matter. I couldn’t see the blackboard sitting with the kids in the back row, and I wouldn’t wear my glasses because that wouldn’t be cool. I aimed to finish high school and scrape into something at university but had no real idea what; I was more interested in boyfriends and having a good time. It would be fair to say that I was a wild child in my teens.
My father would deny this, and I love him dearly, but when I was in my last year of high school, he asked me what I wanted to do when I finished – perhaps university wasn’t for me? That shocked me. It was the first time I realised my parents wouldn’t just keep paying for me forever and that I had to prove myself.
So I knuckled down, but study didn’t come easily. I didn’t like or couldn’t do the hard maths and sciences. I preferred English, history and geography, subjects that gave me limited career options.
Then, in a university careers book, I found a profession called Town Planning. I had never heard of it, but the core subjects were the ones I liked. Better still, I had a high enough entry score to be accepted into the course. The university rang me, I went in for an interview, said I couldn’t draw if that was required (it wasn’t), and they persuaded me to enrol. And I never looked back.
I have never been afraid to make my own way in life. I met my husband studying planning at university, and we had a long-distance relationship in the early 80s while I worked in a temporary role as a planner for the Albany Town Council and enrolled in a postgraduate degree in his hometown of Sydney.
I moved to Sydney to be with him and completed my master’s degree at Sydney University at night, working as a council planner during the day. In those days, walking through Redfern to attend night lectures was an education in itself, and my friends were horrified that I did so on my own, but in the 80s, the night streets of Redfern were alive with activity, and girls from Perth thought it was safe to walk at night alone.
In the late 80s, I convinced my husband to return with me to Perth. The only job either of us could get was the one I was offered by a small multi-disciplinary engineering firm, BSD Consultants, who interviewed me over the phone, offered me a job sight unseen, and paid some of our relocation costs back to WA.
I assumed I would hate working for the private sector and ‘greedy developers’, but I decided to stay at least six months to repay BSD for giving me a job. I stayed twenty-eight years, grew with the company and became a director, part-owner and, at one point, managed the largest planning consultancy in WA. The first eighteen years were with BSD, the last ten with the company that acquired BSD in 2004.
Being a woman and a planner in a male-dominated engineering firm wasn’t easy. Dr
inks on a Friday night, until I had a say in it, were beer or beer. In the early years, I worked long hours – sixty a week was common – and I thought that working weekends was normal. Other people went home to their families, but I didn’t have one: my marriage broke up in the early 90s. My parents thought I was choosing my career over my husband, but that wasn’t the case. I just married the wrong person.
From those beginnings, I became many things in my career, often simultaneously. I worked for some amazing clients, met movie stars and sports heroes, the who’s who of the Perth social scene of the booming 80s and buoyant 90s, mentored young professionals and toiled alongside colleagues, many of whom became lifelong friends.
In 1996, I was a finalist for the WA Citizen of the Year for my contribution to my profession. I was thirty-three. I had recently been appointed to the board of BSD, and was the most senior female employee in the company.
I was also the WA President of the Planning Institute of Australia. On the morning after the Australia Day long weekend that year, a young admin assistant at BSD, Sarah, was supposed to have finished typing some Institute meeting minutes for me. I recall being annoyed that she hadn’t come to work on time to finish those minutes.
Sarah vanished that long weekend. Two other young women subsequently disappeared and their bodies were found. Sarah has never been found.
How my emotions changed over the hours, days and years when I realised she would never come back.
We left her workstation and named coffee cup untouched for as long as we could. Everyone I knew wanted to talk about their theory of what had happened. The night she disappeared, Sarah had been waiting for a cab, but by the time it arrived there was no sign of her. Perth was notorious back then for how long it took to get cabs. These were the days before mobile phones and Uber, and as a young woman I also had waited at night for cabs that didn’t come, once walking alone for several kilometres to get home.
