Immortality is in our hearts and minds

 

It was that liminal moment when one class has finished but you’ve yet to make your way to the next period. She walked out onto the veranda of the demountable building school had installed while the permanent classrooms at the ‘new school’ were being built and told me to wait a ‘sec.

 

I had probably lingered longer outside class than was strictly necessary. Next period was maths and both the subject and teacher – Mrs Grindley, who oversaw enforcing uniform violations by doing things like getting the girls to kneel and then measuring the distance from the bottom hem of their skirts to the ground, and whose extremely hairy legs were visible through the sheer stockings she wore in winter – were not favourites. 

 

English, on the other hand, was a favourite. I loved reading and I loved books. And our new year ten English teacher, Miss Cusack, was excellent. She made the books come to life, and I looked forward to her classes. It was 1988. The Bicentennial Year. I’d been at the Pentecostal school since fifth grade and my best and closest friend, Eliminator Jr, whom I’d met in year 7, had left at the beginning of term and gone elsewhere. We somehow managed to stay in touch and great mates, and still are, but that’s another story for another time. 

 

I wondered why Miss Cusack wanted me to wait behind. Was I in trouble? I’d got in shit from other teachers for ‘coasting’ but that’s because everything was, at least to me, easy. Why put in effort when you know you’ll get good grades anyway?

 

She held out a slim volume and said, “you should read this.” I took it and looked at the title. It was Heart Of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad. I’d never heard of the book or the author before but told Miss Cusack I’d read it. I stashed the book in my bag and scuttled off to Mrs Grindley, her hairy legs and the pointlessness of learning how to calculate the area of a parabola. 

 

Fast forward to 1990. I was in year 12, still at the same school I hated, and was one of three students in Miss Cusack’s 3-Unit advanced English class. And one of the books we were going to study for the HSC was Heart Of Darkness. I’d read it when she’d given it to me nearly two years earlier, but didn’t have the capacity at the time to appreciate its deeper themes. Then we began studying it, and I ‘got it.’

 

I could really relate to this passage from the book, as it echoed something I’d long felt about myself, and still do, that I am what Conrad called a 'hollow man':

 

“I let him run on, this papier-mâché Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.”

 

Miss Cusack would organise study days for us on a weekend at her place, a lovely two storey red brick home that was in her family, and overlooked the Pacific Ocean on Collaroy Plateau. She let us call her by her first name, and didn’t mind that me and Narnie smoked. Unlike the other teachers, and the school, she treated us like the young adults we were. She showed us respect, and we respected her – loved her, even. 

 

One Saturday afternoon she told us to call our parents and let them know we were staying for dinner, and she’d drop us all home later in the evening.

 

Naturally, our folks were cool with this. She was a teacher, after all. 

 

Then she said to us “you can’t tell anyone about this,” and outlined her plans to take us, underage, to the Three Weeds Hotel, out the back of Glebe, to see former Saints guitarist and songwriter, Ed Kuepper, perform. 

 

And so, we went. We didn’t drink, but if school had found out she’d done this, she would’ve been sacked. And we never told our parents.

 

With her teaching and support, I sailed through the HSC. I got the top grade for my school and scored in the highest five per cent in the state for 3 Unit English. 

 

We stayed in contact after school, through life’s ups and downs. She was one of the few people willing to call me on my bullshit and would do so in no uncertain terms.

 

Miss Cusack also came to my 50^th, making the three hours plus trek up the coast to the party at my place from her home at Umina, on the Central Coast. 

 

Two months ago, she died. She’d been sick but was certain she’d beat it. A few weeks before she died, she called me at 5am, but I was, uncharacteristically, sleeping and so I missed it. I rang back when I awoke, but it went to voicemail. I never spoke to her again, and it fucking bums me right out that we were unable to have one last conversation.

 

I don’t know that I’ll ever fully get over her death. She was instrumental in me being who I am, in the career I chose, and in shaping my world view. But more than anything, she was a good friend. So, this is for you, Belinda. Thank you for everything. I’ll never forget you.