June 1973 ~ Aussie Board
Reading 1973: a quick guide for non-Australian readers
Rain, fog, and the smell of wet wool. This monthâs textures come from winter exams, civic libraries, and the cold discipline of country endurance. The light thins, the breath shows, and strength becomes a quiet verb.
Where we are
Wagga Wagga, Riverina winter.
Fog off the Murrumbidgee makes mornings white and silent. The cold is the kind that seeps through jumpers and finds ribs. Asphalt still slick from rain, breath clouding on the oval, socks never quite dry. Heaters hum, windows fog, pencils squeak across test paper.
Exam halls.
Austere and echoing. Desks evenly spaced, chalk dust on cuffs, the smell of pencils, polish, and damp wool. âDescribe a moment that changed youâ could plausibly appear on a 1970s English exam ~ unadorned, moral, and open-ended.
Everyday textures
Wet wool and chalk dust the smell of mid-year schooling.
Electric bar heaters that glowed red and hummed faintly dangerous.
Graphite pencils bitten through during exams.
Mud-streaked thighs, steam rising off the oval.
Dettol and cotton wool the sting and mercy of care.
Frost on the riverbank at first bell.
Speech and register
Mate. Still universal, tone-based. Could console or wound.
Youâll be right. Cultural shorthand for donât show pain.
Fair go. Occasionally used by boys challenging unfairness, often met with laughter.
Conditioning. A physical and moral term, used without irony.
Library and print culture
Lives of the Poets. The Fire and the Eye. War and Protest 1965â1972.
Titles typical of a civic libraryâs 60sâ70s nonfiction shelf, half literary, half moral education. The binding glue smell, the metal drawers, the old Daily Advertiser volumes are all true to Waggaâs archives of the time.
Small Australian mercies
A teacher who praises a single sentence.
A friend who walks you home through drizzle.
A mother who tends bruises without comment.
A body that chooses to strengthen itself in silence.
A mini glossary from the chapter
Heater: portable bar heater, glows red, smells faintly of dust.
Dettol: antiseptic liquid used for every household wound.
Advertiser: Waggaâs local newspaper, held in bound volumes at the Civic Centre.
Conditioning: term for both PE training and character hardening.
Then and now
Winter still rolls through the Riverina the same way, fog, breath, and frost biting early. The civic buildings remain; the libraryâs bound papers are digitised but still whisper dust. PE still happens on ovals, though cruelty now has less room to hide under endurance. The language has softened, the lessons havenât.
Juneâs world is smaller, colder, but steady, a month where the body and the page both learn what staying power feels like.
Questions welcome
If anything still felt unfamiliar, say where you stumbled in the comments, and I will expand this guide so the next reader can ride the current more easily.