Skeletons

Even more disconcerting was Dick’s and my reaction to our step-father’s
wooing our mother – I’m told we charged into Even more disconcerting
was Dick’s and my reaction to our step-father’s wooing our mother
– I’m told we charged into the lounge-room where Mum and Sam were
sitting on the sofa and delivered some mighty kicks to the interloper’s
shins before triumphantly charging out again.
Mum’s going to the inaugural Rutherford reunion about now, so we chatted
about the Rutherfords and about Jock Rutherford in particular. Mum was born
a Rutherford and early on we all lived on Mendip Hills, a large sheep and cattle
farm in north Canterbury, until Norman’s premature death the age of fifty
five. The seven Rutherford sons had each inherited a share of the original enormous
property, but Norman, the youngest of the seven and Mum’s father, had
the prime piece of real estate in Mendip Hills, which may have been the cause
of some resentment. In any case, we were only really aware of one of the other
brothers, Uncle Eric, who had a penchant for Jaguars and Citroens – as
well as trotters and pacers.
Dick and I stayed with Uncle Eric on a couple of occasions. Eric was keen for
us to stay with his son Jock, for whom he’d built a house a mile or so
from the homestead. Jock didn’t want to leave home, so Eric thought that
if Richard and I stayed there with him it might finally wean him away.
Jock was a simple soul, but it never occurred to us he was actually simple.
We knew he liked to wrestle, which we liked to do too, and anyway, wrestling
with Jock was infinitely better than being teased by Uncle Eric with a cattle
prod.
Later we heard there was an ‘incident’ involving Jock and the husband
and wife share milkers, where he’d lined them up and fired off some shots
(in between them) with a .22 rifle – and was taken into custody.
We heard that later still he’d moved to the North Island and had been
run over by a ‘steam roller’ while working for the council, but
Mum had an elaboration on the theme that had Jock moving to Sydney where he’d
been not quite as conclusively killed in a knife fight.
Perhaps Jock was a borderline case, but in the ‘60s it was quite acceptable
to have your defective child consigned to an ‘institution’ never
to be seen or heard of again and, more often than not, that unwanted teenage
pregnancy was hushed up, the girl concerned spirited away to some other town
to give birth and to have the child adopted.
As I’ve got older I’ve come to realise that virtually no family
is immune from some such hidden drama, so if you think your family is totally
boring and conventional, think again and start asking questions.
The ultimate ‘family’ drama of course, is that which is playing
out in the Catholic Church right now. Thousands of lives have been affected
and in some cases destroyed by predatory priests preying on vulnerable boys
and girls. One can’t help observing that the children – and the
Church for that matter – were badly served by the presumed majority of
untainted novices and priests who must’ve been aware of what was going
on and who failed to do anything about it, let alone the hierarchy of complicit
archbishops, bishops and clergy.
Given its nature and the available evidence, this kind of thing has been going
on for centuries, but the inherently unnatural imposition of celibacy seems
particularly obsolete and untenable in the context of the 21st century. One
of the principal reasons my NZ mate Tony Brittenden chose to work at St Andrews
College in Christchurch rather than my old school of Christ’s College,
was because one of the rectors at St Andrews boldly chose to defy tradition
and to go co-educational.
Tradition is one thing – unexamined tradition can be a curse. The unexamined
family history may be withholding some vital information as to why you are the
way you are, so all the more reason to start asking questions of the gatekeepers
– now!