I Remember When With Milton Rendell

Do you remember how you dealt with the heat without air-conditioning? Some of us had fans, some had water coolers and some of us had nothing at all. One of the things we used to do was open the house at night the best we could do to get some cool air. It wasn’t uncommon to see the front door of a house open and if they had a flywire door that was locked then that was the security. Compared to today’s standards it wasn’t ideal security nor was it that effective until late in the evening. Sadly I slept in the sleep-out on the east side of the house which got plenty of morning sun, so I would wake up pretty warm and the room pretty bright early in the morning. I would open the louver windows at night with no fly wire then spend the night listening to mozzies buzzing around my room. Some nights I would just throw a blanket on the lawn in the backyard to keep cool enough to sleep mind you though in Guildford the planes would wake me every now and then. The worst thing about summer was the easterlies which were warm but also carried the perfume of the drying sheds in Helena Valley. Boy, it was a great way to clear out your nostrils. This odour was simply horrible and if it got inside your house it was worse.  It affected different areas at different times depending on the wind direction but when the easterlies hit, it had its own unique smell and sometimes coupled with the loving scent of the abattoirs made life very interesting shall we say. Sadly after a while you got used to it but I don’t think the washing hanging on the line at the time would have been that pleasant to wear later without airing. The drying sheds were located on the southern side of the Helena River near Bushmead and by the river on Stirling Crescent. I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t see any approvals for those to return to our area, nothing like the smell of rotting flesh to start your day or as you sit down to dinner.