the fifo wife

He was lying there on the beach his hands on his chest smiling. His skin reddy brown from too many shirtless days on the job, in the boat and now here. She was on her knees in a bikini the water lapping at her feet he was in his pair of Australian flag speedo’s the white sand whiter still on his skin.

The sand was so very fine the water so cool, and if I remember right it was Police Mans Bay Gove and we had driven here on the back of a ute sitting on a mattress. It was perhaps midday or just before I’m not sure not that it is important.

I was some distance from them sitting in the water but had walked over and saw that he was smiling but she was not. He was there but not. Still kneeling her hands on her thighs I remember her saying to him it’s this or us but being so young I never knew what that meant.

When asked do you recall this he says no, and so I sit wondering did I imagine it? Perhaps. Regardless however I know there is a crowd the one that exists in FIFO work where life is a party. It exists in all types of industries but FIFO is an easy target and blaming FIFO for alcohol and drug problems is easy. Just as it’s easy to say all truckies have a meth problem, all defence like some e and have a girl in every town or port, that jockeys are bulimic and station hands are mull heads.

Regardless of industry or not those that fall into that crowd do so on their own. Nobody sits them down with a beer or joint in hand when they start their induction. When they board that flight for their first FIFO job, they don’t say drink this and smoke that till your health is at risk and your marriage is no more. Live life as a single man and forgo your family at home. They make that choice despite knowing not to; out of site should never be out of mind if it happens then perhaps they were never in the for front?

And while I know it to be true that often drugs and alcohol is used medicinally for depression I know and have witnessed it, it doesn’t make it okay. It makes it an excuse. The options for treatment are endless, there is no excuse now. There is no reason for lying, stealing, abusing and cheating your family of security for the sake of a rush or engagement of a crowd.

And while he never did any of this, this man I love and admire. It never got to that point I believe my she made him make that choice sensing what could be having seen what was around her. And I’m not sure what prompted it that day. But she gave him a choice a consequence because without either I imagine he would have continued his ways but it was his choice to do so.

Either way it was four simple words that I’m sure were more than simple but the consequence simple enough- them or us.

Fortunately for him he had a strong wife who knew him well and would have supported him accordingly but I know if it had come to it she would never have stayed regardless of promises made and I wouldn’t have blamed her.

Life line 13 11 14.

xx Deb

 

We eat dinner together at the table every night whether husband is at home or at work we always have done but up until last year we had a tv in our kitchen/dining room. So the reality was we ate in front of the TV because the TV it never got turned off, or there was the plead I just want to see this and it was not always from the kids either. Come meal times the TV was on most often when the husband was at home, when he was back at work the TV wasn’t really an issue I simply turned it off and suffered the momentary whinge. However when the husband was home without fail, it would stay on until one day I got jack of not having a conversation at the table like I did as a kid. So put the TV in another room when he was at work. It has been out of the room ever since.

I like dinner conversation; I like breakfast conversation. I like the jokes my B1 {attempts} to tell, and I like playing I-spied no matter how cryptic and drawn out it is I like the chatter that comes at the table as they all attempt to tell me something about them, their day or something of complete and utter importance like how friend Mr S got on Red Hot at school again and they will neeeeeeevr get on red hot.

I don’t want or like the TV invading our conversation, speaking over the top of me because we may as well sit on the couch and eat separately than together as a family. So since I banished the TV from our dining room our conversations they have returned and it has made a massive difference in our family ‘dynamics’ so I wasn’t surprised when I read the following article..

‘children who eat dinner with their families are less likely to drink, smoke, do drug, get pregnant, commit suicide, and develop eating disorders. Additional research found that children who enjoy family meals have larger vocabularies, better manners, healthier diets, and higher self-esteem. The most comprehensive survey done on this topic, a University of Michigan report that examined how American children spent their time between 1981 and 1997, discovered that the amount of time children spent eating meals at home was the single biggest predictor of better academic achievement and fewer behavioral problems at school. Mealtime was more influential than time spent in school, studying, attending religious services, or playing sports.’

‘Further research sites that in a series of focus groups conducted by the Nutrition Education Network of Washington participants said they believed the primary benefit to eating together was strengthening the family. Allowing for more opportunities to talk and build relationships.’

This also can be seen in an experiment conducted by Oprah Winfrey back in 1993. She then encouraged five families to eat together every night for 30 days by the end of the 30 days all families said they would continue eating together after the experiment was over. The greatest observation was how much the children enjoyed the experiment and looked forward to continuing eating together as a family because it provided a dependable, uninterrupted time to talk with their parents.

Eating together however as a family doesn’t have to be every night modern day schedules often mean that’s impossible. Eating together can be as infrequent as once a week, and it doesn’t have to be dinner. Researchers at Columbia University’s Center on Addiction say having joint meals as infrequently as once a week makes a difference.

What do you think eating together at a meal time does it make a difference to your family?  Do you even eat together at all?

xxDeb

 

{research can be found here image source here}

How are you since Ian died I asked? I said it slowly because I never know how to ask questions like that.

Its lonely she said, but one foot in front of the other she said pulling at the top of her cardigan.

Our conversation then came to that awkward pause for a moment when she came in with the ice breaker I get so often.

Husband away she said taking off her bowls hat.

Yeah, I said quickly he will be back next week I said smiling at her.

How long she said started to say but I interrupted a terribly bad habit of mine when I know it’s the same question over.

Same as usual I replied four weeks at work four weeks at home.

I must say that is a good roster she said.

Yes, I said we like it.

I was waiting for her grandson to give me some information on the owners of our house and she was just here to see him. Our meetings were always like this on the verandah and brief.

She started as we both continued to wait Ian used to do droving up at the Cape and be gone for months never heard a word from him from the moment he left till when he came stumbling home. I looked at her waiting for the onslaught of back in my day. Instead, she said he always went to the pub before coming home answering the querying look on my face.

I smiled looking at the sunbleached floor boards of the verandah we were standing on. I never knew Ian we shared a the mutual affection of her grandson and I barely knew her but I had always enjoyed the brief conversations we had.

Well, she said it was tough but then she said I would much rather have it then than now. My head jerked up to look at her 83-year-old face.

Raising kids back then it was easier. I know lots of women and men say in my day it was tough when our husbands went away, and it was and I was one that use to say that she said but you know back in my day we had the support from our families and friends .

Now she said looking around her for a place to sit who do you have? No one. I mean my daughter lives but half an hour from her grandkids and where is she today? Goodness knows, and she has no plans to hang around and help out with these beautiful boys she said pointing at them inside sitting glued to the television to show me them. No, she wants to travel across to WA next month for two years they will be all grown up in that time.

Well, I said that’s kind of her right to do that I said not knowing what to do with this conversation. She has earnt the right to do that working so hard and all.

Yes she has she said. What she hasn’t the right to do is criticise my great grandson and his daughter because I helped her raise those children she said pointing to her chest trying to get her point across. Me, my husband and my family she said.

It’s what we did back in the day all of us we helped each other out, and it didn’t need to be family sometimes it was Vera up the road helping us. We all looked out for each other, now it’s different. Then if the husband went away be it war or work my dad stepped in or my uncle my mother looked after my children when I came down with flu and helped me when I had complications with George. Now she said conducting her finger in the air families they are different. Not resigning from telling me more she went on with now kids have to move to where the money is, and their support- gone but even if they don’t move there is no support. Their parents are these nomads seeing the world. I know it the thing to do but what about your kids? You don’t raise them and just push them out the door so you can go sit on cable beach with a bunch of strangers.

No you don’t she uttered again getting passionately angry and if you do want to sit on cable beach then don’t say back in my day kids were this and that and I would have done this and this because back in your day you had the support and care of those around you to get through the baby and teenage years.

I shifted uneasily on my feet I guess your right I said but I guess times changes I said.

She sensed my uncomfortableness and touched my elbow and said you do a mighty fine job for someone who is bringing up her kids without the support my daughter had and the support I had.

Thank you is all I could muster because if we are all being a little bit truthful as hard as it was back then families are a little bit different now.

{Image with thanks to here and content original by Debbie}

Husband went back yesterday it was a hard month. I wrote about it here. I don’t like the days following drop off after hard months. Last month was a hard month. Getting back into the swing after a difficult month whilst rare I know its hard and it fills your head with doubt that your ‘okay’ when really everyone FIFO or not has hard months.

In the days after drop off with months like these, I find its hard to get traction. I over think. Like should I feel guilty about not being sad about when he leaves for work. He doesn’t its a switch that goes off usually for the both of us but on hard months it is not so easily flicked. Does that make us odd? Or does that make us strong.

I miss him but this is our choice it is our working week our weekend will come so we are okay right? We just need to keep talking right, yes that’s right just keep talking.

Still after 15 years I do this its fleeting tomorrow it will be gone and I will be all composed and stuff.You are allowed a ‘grief period’ but not for too long, too long is bad for you. Bad for the kids.Bad for me. This was our choice. Our choice to handle the gone part. I am stronger than the gone part. I am part of the team that makes us us.

Traction found.

Next swing is a clean slate with lessons learnt.

xx Deb

Since starting work, I have been all about what fast and easy, even more so.

I am meal planning almost all my meals including the boys lunch boxes but to avoid the continual comfortable circle of spag bol, curried sausages and chilli con Carne I am utilising the recipe books that cramp our bookshelf to an inch of their dog eared life.
When I get home from work I have literally 30 minutes to get dinner done from start to finish, however, this is no Jamies 30 minute meals. I am talking one meal and I have a production team of a 9,7 and six-year-old.  My patience level is on par with trying to train seals, my success rate on keeping my patience would be better so its got to be quick and easy enough that my production team wont fight over who is doing what.

Notice I said me my kids are all for cooking dinner but after spending hours in a paddock in the hot sun, playing taxi, doing three lots of homework I am not kidding anyone on patience level hand raised its me, not them.

So dinners are fast with the right amount of flavour to please a kid fussier than a vegan in a Crèmerie and is done in less than 30 minutes to keep mum happy and on schedule to keep her from losing her cool.

This is an adaptation of Donna Hay’s recipe you can find the original in her Simple Dinners cook book page 102.

Garlic Pepper beef stir fry.

What you will need:

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

750g rump steak, trimmed and thinly sliced

2 teaspoons cracked black pepper

4 cloves garlic, sliced

250g green beans, trimmed and halved

2 tablespoons oyster sauce

2 tablespoons beef or chicken stock

1/2 teaspoon of corn flour

steamed jasmine rice, to serve

How to:

Heat half the oil in a non-stick frying pan or wok over high heat. Add the beef and cook, in batches, for 4-5 minutes or until browned. Remove from the pan and set aside. Heat the remaining oil over high heat, add the pepper, chilli and garlic and cook for 1 minute or until fragrant. Return the beef to the pan with the green beans, oyster sauce and stock and corn flour and cook, stirring, for 4 minutes or until warmed though. Serve with steamed rice and basil. Serves 4.