Columns from The Weekend West

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Opinion Ros Thomas Opinion Ros Thomas

Drive Me Crazy

I am yet to meet a man who can resist the call of the open road. We are gunning towards Kalgoorlie on a week-long road trip. My husband is enthroned in the driver’s seat of our hired motor home. The kids are strapped in the back, squabbling over a box of Jatz crackers. I’ve eaten an entire packet of Twisties in the sixteen minutes between Meckering and Cunderdin.

The man in the van couldn’t be happier. He croons the backing vocals to Slip Slidin’ Away, then launches into a falsetto for the chorus:

You know the nearer your destination,

The more you’re slip slidin’ away.

A road train roars past, buffeting us sideways. I catch a glimpse of the Hulk Hogan behind the wheel and his sign on the dash: ‘Highway Warrior.’

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Opinion Ros Thomas Opinion Ros Thomas

Along for the Ride

A green speck appeared on the crest of the hill. “Bus!” I shouted to the kids, Small daughter and her brother (plus 4-year-old Finlay on loan from up the road) hopped down from the park bench and teetered on the kerb, desperate to be first to recognise the bus numbers.

“That’ll be the 107,” said a spry fellow who was leaning against the bus-stop, dressed like a man who hasn’t cared about fashion since 1970. Beneath his herringbone flat-cap I noticed the bulbous nose of a man prone to thirstiness. His polyester Bermudas were as short as his socks were long. His cable-knit socks were folded just under his knees, insured against gravity by a pair of elastic garters. I could see the indent where his garters gripped the top of his calves. I hadn’t seen socks like that in years.

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Opinion Ros Thomas Opinion Ros Thomas

Driven to Distraction

My first car was a 1976 custard-coloured Datsun 200B. I bought it from my Uncle Andy for $800. Aged 19, I was now free to explore my Perth universe.

My car had no air-conditioning, no wing mirrors and often no petrol. After a week of crunching the gears to locate reverse, I snapped off the gearstick knob into my hand.  “Knobs don’t like rough treatment,” Mum sighed. I rammed a squash ball onto the gearstick and drove it like that for the next four years.

My Datsun boasted six ashtrays – we teenagers didn’t let driving inconvenience our smoking. The flip-down trays in each door panel blew ash in our faces as soon as we wound down a window. Two larger ashtrays slid side by side out of the dashboard, side by side, in case driver and passenger didn’t want to share.

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