STORIES AROUND CONNECTION:
James and the kayaks
February 1983 (Lloyd)

Laurie smokes one after the other. It’s a little ironic for a guy who runs the Porirua Recreation Centre, a place dedicated to improving the health of young people in the city. His functionally grey office smells of stale smoke and I am sitting in it. The word is that he has some old canoes –they are locked in a shed at the beach and I want to use them.

‘They are broken, a real mess’ he tells me, and launches into a catalogue of complaint, stabbing nicotine stained fingers at the remote bastards who won’t give him the resources he needs to develop this place. I listen sympathetically, he is one of many leaders I have met since who fight battles for little result in their own time. Their struggles often lay the foundation for others, but it nearly kills them in the process and many leave their work in bitterness.

Eventually he comes back to where he started; ‘they are a bloody mess’ Laurie concludes.

‘If we pay for the materials and fix them up can we use them?’ I try and sound knowledgeable (how hard can it be?).

I sign some forms for him. Whatever happens next will be my fault (I seem to spend a lot of my life signing stuff like this). Laurie collects his paper work, throws me the shed keys and tells me where to find some life jackets.

I ask some of the guys in my small group at youth club if they want to come and help me with the canoes. They all say they are keen, but only James shows up the first time. We drive down to the bay and along the beach looking for an old boat shed with a green door. I tackle the salt encrusted padlock and we clear some weeds so we can drag the doors open on their rusted hinges. There they are, six fibreglass canoes covered in cobwebs. The air in the shed smells damp and musty, looks like no one has been in here for years. We drag them into the sunshine and find that four of them have splits and gashes.

We take the two good ones out for a little paddle. The water is like glass and the evening summer sun sparkles in great drops of water off our paddles as we weave in-expertly among the rocks in the gentle swell. Then we get to work, I follow the instructions on the side of the can as we mix the resin and smear it across patches of fibreglass matting. Our first efforts are pretty rough and will take a lot of sanding back. We learn together, and our hands are sticky with resin, it’s a good time.
We go to leave and I can’t find my wallet. I am mystified, we spend another hour combing the shed and the long grass around for it. James seems concerned. I am naive.

A small group of us meet regularly over several Mondays after school and work on the canoes. On a good day there are beautiful sunsets over the bay and as we finish our work we go for paddle among the rocks looking at fish in the clear water. Hunger, cold and the approaching darkness finally drive us home.

Eventually we get five of them watertight. The next afternoon an on-shore wind is blowing and we decide to try them out in the big surf. It’s harder than it looks, these canoes are designed for the river and have no keel. They get bashed sideways by the surf, waves dump through our spray skirts swamping the boats and making them harder to control. Sliding coming down a wave at the wrong angle digs the long prow into the soft sand, causing spectacular flips. We roar with laughter at each mishap, and try to outdo each other. I wish I had a camera. We finish the day with a bunch of funny stories, a few bruises, and new holes in three of the canoes. We lock them up back up in the old shed and wait for plastic canoes to be invented. I drop the keys back to Laurie.

Some time later I have put two and two together and worked out what really happened to my wallet. It just shows that you don’t have to be especially bright to do this job!

A STORY

A STORY:
A brief kindness (Anthea) May 1987

Being put ‘on the block’ is a local euphemism for gang rape. A rape crisis worker has rung up. The girl needs somewhere safe for a few days while they sort something out for her. They bring her around.

She is skinny, heavy shadow around hard eyes and a bitter mouth. Crude tattoos on her hands reveal an involvement with gangs. She is polite but wary.

Her support worker stays for a while and makes conversation. Promising to be back tomorrow she leaves us to it. I am left facing the girl across the kitchen table. I find I have no words of comfort, anything I could say would sound trite or patronising, I take the time honoured approach.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

She shakes her head, her polite smile doesn’t reach her eyes.

‘Or a coffee? Or a milo[1]? I make the best milo in the world you know!’ (this is actually true).
She smiles a little wider at that. ‘I’d like a milo thanks’.

One of our kids toddles through the kitchen as I get it ready. Some of the other girls who are staying with us wander past and say ‘hi’.

The girls who stay here all know what is going on and they regularly give the gift of acting normal. The presence of our kids and the other girls confirms that we might be from the same planet after all. She relaxes a little and we began to chat.

‘Fuck that’s good’ she exclaims as she tries her drink. She sips it again and declares ‘That’s the best fucking milo I’ve ever tasted’.

‘I told you I was the best’ I remind her modestly.

‘Sorry for swearing’ she adds.

We have a laugh, and our chatting becomes more animated. The normal rhythm of conversation in this community involves working out who you both know or are related to. You make connections and swap stories. We never talk about what has happened.

For a few hours she wanted a normal set of interactions that, briefly, helped her forget what she had been through, and that turned out to be our gift to her. It didn’t feel like much. They came and picked her up the next day and took her somewhere else. I don’t even remember her name.

[1] Milo is a hot chocolate drink.

Small Stories
It's a little book we are working on together -a series of stories and reflections from our engagement with our community as youth workers and teachers over the past 25 years. We plan to post extracts from the book over the net few weeks and would appreciate your feedback...

Another Saturday morning

April 1984 (Anthea and Lloyd)

The remains of breakfast, dishes and toys litter the cheerful chaos of an unhurried Saturday morning. As parents with small children know, relaxation doesn’t really come into it. A furtive knock and I open the door to Mere and Pauline from club.

They peer in anxiously, seem to be checking for something. Mere is a tall girl, long straight hair frames a freckled and earnest face, Pauline is shorter and quieter, with a bob of thick hair. They are both about 14.

‘We’re on the run’ Mere announces loudly, ‘our parents aren’t here are they? You won’t nark will you?’ They look at me anxiously but don’t seem to expect an answer. ‘On the run’, I haven’t heard the expression before, it doesn’t sound like a sports event, and no one seems to be chasing them down the street.

We invite them in. ‘We’ve been sleeping under the school for the past few days’ Pauline explains as they sidle past us in the hallway, and a stale smell confirms their story. We settle around the cluttered kitchen table, feeding them tea and toast as we listen to their story.

‘Things are bad at home, we had a big argument’ Pauline begins, they emphasise the drama, skirt around the details and invite our sympathy. It sounds like the novelty of running away is wearing a bit thin and they are hinting at an invitation. As beginning youth workers we listen gravely and are impressed. Now what do we do? It’s a classic youth work dilemma.

‘You can’t stay here unless your parents know’ Anthea explains -a safe answer.

‘Oh no’ Mere protests, ‘we don’t want to get you into trouble. We just wondered if we could have a shower’.

It’s a good compromise, and Anthea persuades them to part with their clothes so she can put them through the wash. They sit at the table in Anthea’s dressing gowns and work their way through the rest of the loaf as we keep the toast and tea coming. The girls take turns at holding Rhys (our baby) and play with our son Josh, who is persuaded to tell them that he is nearly three. Mere keeps up a steady commentary about their adventures over the week as our other plans for the morning fade away.

There is a loud bang at the door. Mere and Pauline exchange a stricken look as I go to answer it. Curiosity instantly outweighs fear, and they peek down the hallway modestly clutching their dressing gowns to their throats.

Two angry men stand on the doorstep (people always seem bigger when they’re mad at you), they glare past me down the hall. It is Saturday morning, and they have just found their missing daughters, in dressing gowns, both standing behind a man who claims to be a youth worker. Explanations form on my lips and are dismissed, none of them are going to work. I even begin to feel guilty.

‘Are you Lloyd Martin?’ they demand aggressively. Obviously they like to know who they are about to punch.

It sounds like a pretty stupid name when they say it that way, but I own up to it. We all pause briefly as they consider how to begin the violence. At that moment Anthea shows up with Rhys on her hip.

‘Hello, are you Mere and Pauline’s Dads?’ She asks brightly, fully aware of what is going on. My chances begin to look better, I even feel less sleazy. They admit that they are, and tell us how worried about them they have been about their daughters. Why have we taken the girls in without letting them know? Anthea briefly explains the situation, and invites them in. The girls slink back in shamefaced as their fathers take their places around the kitchen table.

I make more tea and Anthea takes charge of the situation, she has a way of putting everyone on their best behaviour. Further explanation is provided, their anger shifts from us to their daughters, tempered by our presence. I think if we weren’t here they might be getting a hiding right now.

More talk and the atmosphere lightens, we even manage a laugh or two. The girls ask if they can stay a few more days, and to our surprise their fathers agree, insisting only that they go home and sort things out with their mothers first.

They assure us several times that we are ‘obviously good people’.
No one pauses to ask what we think about it.

A few days later I (Anthea) go down to see the girl’s parents, after some initial embarresssment I strike up a friendship with Mere’s mum Theresa. Later on in life I will get an idea of what it feels like to ‘not cope’ as a parent in front of strangers. Before you want answers, you want understanding. We chat and share some laughs as we compare notes on living with Mere. The awkwardness is overcome and a friendship develops.

Days turn into weeks, and we realise that this was not an institutional arrangement, we have simply become part of an informal network of support for these girls, an honorary uncle and aunty. They regularly come over, eat, help with our kids and stay over, it relieves tension at home. In the informal world of the local community children often drift from home to home within an extended family network. It’s a healthy approach that is located in Pacific and Maori cultures, which treats parenting as a shared task, and often acts as a safety valve to relieve the tension of relationships within the pressure cooker of a nuclear family.

Other young people in their networks hear about us, their parents hear about us through the social networks of the pub and the house slowly begins to fill up.

Becoming present in the lives of other people has begun as a nice idea. In time we move beyond the pleasantries and begin to discover that becoming present means more than just physically moving into the neighbourhood. The realities of becoming present in someone else’s comfort zones create tensions as we try and figure out how to actually do life together.