Our Cottage Road house, between Park St & Whitney Ave by a laneway, was a compact two-story home belonging to Miss Kelly who lived in the house next door. Her house was huge. She had boarders on the second & third floors & she lived alone on the first floor. Her house was the model for the boarding house in my novel Coal Dusters. She deserves a post of her own, so this is all I’ll say about her now 🙂
This was a more upperclass neighbourhood. Larger houses, doctors & lawyers & sport celebrities abounded. Larger houses too – many 3 story, single family dwellings. Colby remained within walking distance & I would trudge Cottage Rd. in the morning, home for lunch, back for the afternoon. I’d walk home along central with the guys.
I was at Colby for grades IV & V. I have a class photos of me in Grade VI at Ashby school. I don’t recall if that was another summer move though. I do remember some of my Colby teachers though. The principle Miss Greenwood, Mrs. Butterworth & Mrs. McLeod. There were others but even seeing the list of teachers on the Colby School page didn’t ring any lunch bells. https://www.facebook.com/groups/colbyschool/
I do remember the hand bell that rang to get us into the school. I was a middling student even then. I had attention issues 🙂 I was also aware that I didn’t have the same feelings about girls as the boys claimed to have. I was, in fact, a sissy who preferred hopscotch to baseball. I don’t recall having any real pals or playmates of either sex.
I did get into a couple of fist fights though & lost. It was hard to keep punching when everyone around you was encouraging the other guy to teach me a lesson. I became a coward because proving my masculinity with violence was beyond me. Shame & fear were the biggest lessons I learned at Colby School.
It was here that I had to spend a summer writing out words from a speller. I did page after page of writing each word out twenty times. Then had to retake the spelling exam at the start of the new term before I could go on. I did pass but again, the real lesson learned was shame, not how to spell.
The other thing I remember from then was the birth of my brother. Now that my Dad was settled in Sydney, his job was going well, may parents felt secure enough to raise a family. I felt I was a disappointment & now they wanted to get it right this time. My brother was about a year old when my mother was pregnant again, & we moved again, this time to the Ashby area. 
Fully Human
I’m not enjoying this
so it must be good for me
the less I like it
the better what I am getting
the more I suffer
the more fully human I am
what I enjoy is to be avoid
it is merely a diversion
from suffering
because life is suffering
any attempt to diminish suffering
diminishes all life
we a cannot afford pleasure
to admit to liking something
someone
is to admit to weakness
is to admit to being
a shallow fun-loving
corrupter of basic human dignity
dignity requires suffering
and sacrifice
those who aren’t willing to suffer
aren’t worth the breath
they take to live
they should be face
the error of their ways
or be shunned
if you are having a good time
do it in another room
quietly
we don’t want reality
sullied by gasps
of sexual indulgences
we don’t want to hear laugher
behind our backs
take to another room
another city if possible
here we are on the righteous trail
suffering to fulfill our real
authenticity as humans
as a parade of weeping assholes
(poem prompted by one of Montaigne’s essays)
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