So if you’ve read my blog over the past few days, you’ll know I’ve been venting about a specific period in my childhood, the realisation that’s been in the back of my brain for years that my mother saw me only as a tool to get at my father and pretty much otherwise abused me. It’s been cathartic to write and cry a little.
I wonder what I would have been like, without the crappy things that happened to me? If I hadn’t had to take care of my brothers, would I have developed leadership abilities? If she’d taken care of us, would I be as resourceful?
When I was twelve, living with my father and stepmother, we used to camp alot. At Christmas we were spending the summer holidays at a camping ground up north. One morning, I got up early and took myself down to the estuary to do some fishing. I was sitting alone on the wharf and I was approached by an older boy, he told me he’d found a giant crab in the mangroves. You can see where this is going. The long and short of it was that I initially followed him but as it got muddy, my girly side didn’t want me to continue. It was then he pulled out a knife. He told me if I told anyone, he had friends watching who would kill me and my family. He molested me, then sent me on my way. My stepmother found me crying and making my way back to the river. The Police were called, the offender, a local was recognised by my description, he admitted to the charge and was sent to a reformatory, we still had those then. Some years later we got a letter from the justice department informing us he’d served his sentence. I don’t know his name, I don’t know or care what happened to him after that. We never went camping there again.
Would I have done this, if not for that?
A few months ago, last November in fact. I went outside to have a smoke while at work. I saw my car door open, wide open. I thought oh wonderful, my car has been burgled and went to lock and shift it. Lo and behold, at the halfway point I realised there was someone in my car! At this point I was committed, I took stock, I was alone, it was night and he’s seen me, I’m 4ft 9inches tall and weigh 50 kg soaking wet with gum boots on. So what did I do? I opened my mouth and yelled at him, I called him names and told him to get the bleep out of my bleeping car. I showed him my police id, I didn’t say I was an officer, just showed him that I was Police, I dragged him out of the car, locked it and took him across the road, into work, locked him in the foyer and rang upstairs for a cop.
I’m not a victim. I could have been, it would have been so easy to be a victim, lousy childhood, been molested and if thats not bad enough, I’m short, have a club foot and limp. Life gave me lemons, I made lemonade. Why is that? Why do some people become eternal victims?
