Interview from Fathers and Sons by Christine Williams. Published by HarperCollins, David Newman, nurse

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Interview from Fathers and Sons by Christine Williams. Published by HarperCollins, 1996.

1 Interview from Fathers and Sons by Christine Williams. Published by HarperCollins, David Newman, nurse Aged thirty-eight at the time of this interview in 1996, David Newman was the youngest of three children in a working class family when he was growing up in the 1960s in Sydney s western suburbs. He felt homosexual stirrings from the age of about ten but never spoke to his father about it. Over the years David learnt not to rely on his father and, having been diagnosed as HIV positive, he found loving friendship with a group of men as being much more important in his life than the missing bond with his father. David says he s now an open book, with nothing to hide from the world. David Newman: We lived at Bankstown until I was about five. I ve seen photos but can t remember anything about it. Apparently we were living in a tent in the backyard of my mother s mother s place until our house was built at Casula, near Liverpool. An average fibro house, and I have good memories of playing there as a kid. Christine Williams: What are the earliest memories of your father? David Newman: Always working. Never coming home until late, and it was my mother always saying, Wait til your father gets home and I ll tell him what you ve been up to. CW: What in a threatening way? DN: Oh yes, because we d been naughty. We d done things like throw rocks at the trains going past and get caught, and tie strings across the road and have the police car drive through it, and steal a friend s father s bread van. CW: How old would you have been then? DN: Oh, I was in high school by then. CW: What about when you were about seven or eight, playing with kids in the street? DN: Oh yes, always playing with the neighbours. And the parents, it wasn t like Mr & Mrs, it was Auntie. Our next door neighbours were the first people in the neighbourhood to get an inground swimming pool so I was there a lot. CW: What is it that you do remember about your father when you were young. DN: He always used to comment about how I was different from other people. You re such a girl, he d say to me. I was always an exhibitionist, I think; I would muck around and put on shows. When I was disciplined my way of coping with it, when he d hit me, was to scream like there was no tomorrow. It drove him up the wall. CW: Where would he hit you? DN: Across the face or the head. It didn t really matter, he was so upset. CW: They weren t formal beatings? DN: No. I would have done something to bring it on. I would have a tantrum if I wasn t allowed to do something. I had a habit as a young child of throwing things - even pulling the phone out of the wall and throwing it at my brother, or smashing chairs. [Laugh] I was the youngest in the family and would be told, You can t do that - you re not old enough. My brother was two years older than me and my sister four years older. -1-

2 CW: So it wouldn t have been that you were spoilt because you were the youngest? DN: No, I don t think so. But I look back now and wonder how my parents ever afforded to let us do so much. We had a caravan, we had a boat, then my brother and I got involved in horses and polocrosse. That s when my mother died. She d had to go back to work because we kept wanting more and more. You get the horse but then you need a new saddle and you go to all the gymkhanas. CW: So your father was often at work at night? DN: No, he d come home at five o clock but then go out to functions because he was an engineer. Go to cocktail parties and things like that. Because my mother didn t like to go she d stay home with us, which was good. She was more of an introvert. CW: Whereas your father was extroverted, and enjoyed social functions? DN: Yes, he s still the same. He lives in Perth; he s got friends who are millionaires. CW: And when he d call you a girl, what did you interpret that to mean? DN: Well, I knew from an early age that I was gay and I think he saw it and it was his way of trying to change me. Because when I was about fourteen and he guessed that I was gay his idea was to take me to Kings Cross to get a prostitute and that I d be alright then. But it doesn t work like that, I m afraid. I didn t go. CW: So from what age did you know that you were gay? DN: I d say as early as ten or eleven. It all started with your mates, you know, playing in your bedroom. I always knew I had this attraction to men. CW: And not an attraction to women? DN: Well, most of my friends are female now, but as far as physically, no, women don t turn me on at all. CW: A physical attraction to boys? DN: Yes. CW: And when he d say to you, You re acting like a girl, when he d hurt you, what did you think about that? DN: I was probably thinking that he was embarrassed about me. I m sure he was. I know he still is, now. About being gay. It was hard really to tell what he was thinking because sometimes he d drink quite a bit too, so it was hard, really, to understand what was going on. CW: Going on in his head? DN: Yeah. [Laughter]. CW: Did you feel close to him or distant? DN: Oh, very distant. I think it s only now that any sort of relationship is forming. I think there s been nothing there all along because from about fourteen I ve been virtually on the street. My mother died and he left. I still had to finish school and I had a horse at that time so I moved to a friend s place on a farm not far from Liverpool to finish school. I was in hospital last year with HIV for a while and I got a friend to ring him to let him know, but there was no, Are you alright, or, I ll come and see you. CW: Did you feel rejected by him as a boy? DN: Oh, definitely

3 CW: Compared with your brother and sister? DN: Oh yeah. My father idolised my brother and does to this day, yet my brother s been in prison for assault, and he s a bikie. But there s always been the thing that my brother s the favourite. CW: And you felt rejected? DN: Definitely. CW: Even before your mother died? DN: Oh, yes, that was always the way. Why can t you be like your brother? CW: And what was it about your brother that he wanted you to be like? DN: A typical boy - he played football. I didn t do anything like that. CW: What did you do? DN: I was involved in competition ballroom dancing. As well as going off to to pony club for show jumping and dressage. CW: They re not necessarily girls activities. DN: I know but I never really had masculine traits, like the typical Ocker. I was a bit more refined. CW: So did you father discourage you in ballroom dancing? DN: No, he thought it was good that I was dancing but... I became anorexic and missed a competition at about 14 because I d been a fat child and then I thought, This is revolting. I stopped eating. CW: Was this before your mother died? DN: After. So that may have triggered it off. At the time my hormones were going crazy. I was meeting all these good-looking people, the women with fabulous figures and the men great bodies, and here was fat me, so I thought, Time to do something. CW: And what caused your mother s death? DN: Cerebral haemorrhage, at home. I had a really hard... I never really got to say goodbye to her because the day she went into a coma at home was a Friday and we had a big fight because she wouldn t let me stay at home to look after her. She had high blood pressure and it s almost as if she knew something was going to happen. Dad was quite worried about her and said he d call back in later in the day to do the washing up and for her to stay in bed. I remember distinctly I had this big argument and I called her a bitch for not letting me stay home. And about midmorning at school the principal came to my room and said, You ll have to come with me. Your mother s been taken to hospital. At that time they didn t let children into intensive care so I never ever saw her again. She was ventilated for about four days but was obviously brain-dead then they turned the machine off. So that was really hard. They had a viewing of her corpse, but I couldn t bring myself to go and view the coffin. Whereas now, death is nothing, I ve lost so many friends in this last year from HIV. But at fourteen it was very difficult. I used to convince myself that she d just gone away on a holiday and I d run into her again one day. That was my way of coping with it. It wasn t until I was about eighteen and I d moved in to live with a guy and we split up... it wasn t until I d had this big argument with this boy and left that it really hit me that I really wanted to speak to my mother. But she wasn t there anymore. CW: So you d been close with your mother and distant from you father when you were young? DN: Oh yeah. That was because, I think, in that era the mothers did everything. I mean when - 3 -

4 my mother died my father didn t even know how to go and do the shopping. Or how to use the washing machine. A useless man. So we three children had to do it all, because we d watched our mother doing it. My poor sister... she became pregnant soon after my mother died because she hadn t even realised that having sex was how you conceived a baby. My father went berserk about that. He tried epsom salts in the bath to try to get her to have a miscarriage, but she didn t. CW: So how long did you stay together as a family after your mother s death? DN: About a year, that s all. And then he wanted to move on. I don t know whether he was coping. He went a bit haywire after my mother died. He tried to start up a relationship with my mother s best friend who was married and lived around the corner from us. She wasn t interested - she was horrified when he made the advance to her. She told us about it, so my sister would confront my father about it. Then he d meet women and try to bring them home and get them to cook, and my sister would have the biggest arguments with him. CW: He would have felt a great loss. DN: Oh, I m sure he did. CW: And how is it then, that you father left? DN: I went to a friend s place, my sister went on the pension and lived in a little flat in Liverpool, and my brother went to Queensland, I think. He would work with horses and go to work out at cattle stations. I only had twelve months to go before I got my School Certificate. CW: So how did it happen that you all separated? Did he sit you all down at home and say that he had to go away? DN: Yeah. He expected us to move with him, but we said we re not going, we ve got all our friends here. We re not running away from anything. CW: Did he have a job to go to? DN: No idea. He ended up opening a menswear store even though he d been an engineer. CW: So where did your father go and how much contact did you have with him? DN: He went to Newcastle and would send money so I could finish school. After I left school I went to visit him once. I was meant to stay the weekend but I arrived on the Friday and by the Saturday I wanted to come home. He would say, What s wrong with you? I just felt so uncomfortable. I hadn t seen him for a year or so and it was so distant I couldn t believe it. At the time I was in love with this guy down here and I just wanted to get back to see him. I couldn t tell my father. So I came back earlier. CW: You didn t feel you had anything in common with your father after the separation, and you had a passion back in Sydney? DN: That s right. I just wanted to get back down here. I thought, Oh well, I ve seen you. I ve made the effort. See you later. I mean he never makes an effort. CW: So you felt a certain responsibility towards him as your father? DN: Yeah, but no great fondness. CW: Never? DN: No. Never. CW: Did he ever give you a cuddle when you were young, when you were very small, before your mother died? DN: No, I don t think so. I can t remember it. It was always my mother who did. He d always favour my brother, and he d say my sister was an introvert because she d always sit in her bedroom all the time

5 CW: What contact did you have with your father after visiting him the once in Newcastle? DN: Hardly any. I ve lived in so many houses in Sydney. He lived in Newcastle a couple of years and then moved to Perth and has been there ever since, about fifteen years. In that time I ve probably seen him five times. We ve never written letters but made a few phone calls. Actually he rang about two weeks ago because he d called while I was overseas a few months ago and a friend staying with me told him that I was away. CW: When he first left how often did you have phone contact? DN: Hardly any at all. It was like he didn t seem to care. So it was easier to get on with my own life. CW: Did you feel a lack of a father? DN: Not so much a lack of a father, but the whole family concept. At Christmas it would be nice to go and see your family like everybody else does but I stopped feeling... It s hard. CW: But that s the way it is. DN: Oh yeah, and I accepted that ages ago. I don t have contact with him at Christmas. CW: So the contact you ve had has been in Sydney or Perth. DN: He s been here, on business or passing through on holidays. He s called me and said he ll be in town and, Can I meet you?. Twice he s been through and I haven t contacted him because I ve been doing other things. I had my own life, and just because he was coming for one little visit... When he rang a couple of weeks ago I asked him if he was coming over for Christmas and he said, no, no, he d just been to Singapore. CW: So as an adult have you felt the lack of a father? DN: No, because I ve always been snapped up by men, and been in relationships for seven to eight years. I guess they ve probably become the father figure, from when I was young, because I ve always been with somebody. CW: They ve always been older? DN: Yes. My first one at eighteen was seven years older. I thought, Ooh, he s old. And I guess I must have been pretty immature, because looking back now, I can see they were leading me and telling me what to do or what not to do. CW: You think that might have filled an emotional gap that you felt about your father. DN: Oh, probably. But I never really think about my father at all. CW: On his side, what do you think he thinks about you as a son? DN: Oh, I think he s proud of me now because, of all the family, I ve turned out the best. I think he s proud that I m a nurse and doing well. Whereas my brother has just got out of prison again. And I said to my father that he won t hear from him until he wants something from him. I ve never asked my father for anything, ever. I ve never given him any problem apart from my sexuality. I think that s the biggest problem for him. CW: So you think he s more proud of you than he is of the others? DN: Yeah, and I think it s a bit too late. I feel pleased that he looks at me in a different light now, with more respect. When he came to visit he was impressed with where I was living. I think he was happiest that I was living by myself, because I wasn t throwing my sexuality in his face. I think at the other place he visited when my lover was at home, he felt very uncomfortable. CW: Can we go back to when you announced your sexuality to him? How old were you? DN: I was about twenty something and it wasn t me who announced it. We were at the races - 5 -

6 and I d taken a girl who I was working with, a vivacious blond. She met my father and said, Hi, Ron, how are you? Pleased to meet you. How do you feel about having a gay son? I went, Oh, no. All my father said was, We ll talk about that later. And of course he never did. CW: How did you cope with that? DN: I was embarrassed. That he d been told that way. Because I should have been able to tell him, not my big-mouthed friend. I felt sorry for him, finding out like that. I think if I d told him he would have been able to deal with it better. CW: Yet you never raised it again? DN: No, well, we didn t see each other again for quite some time. The first time he came to visit I was living in a really big mansion in Burwood. There were about five of us living there and I was sharing a room with a guy and I couldn t let him know that so one of the girls in the house made out that she was my girlfriend for the time he was here. CW: Even though this was after he d been told? DN: Yeah. He never ever brought it up. CW: And you felt that you had to pretend? DN: Oh yeah, all the time. I think it was protecting him, because I knew he couldn t face it. It was easier to do it without having any confrontation, I guess. I didn t think really it was any of his business. When he and his girlfriend first came to visit I asked her if he had told her he had a gay son. She said no. I told him about two years ago that I was HIV positive but he has no understanding of that either. He seems to think it will just go away. I tried to tell him it won t. His girlfriend s alright; she s more worried about me than he is. She s a nice lady. I m glad he s happy. CW: So what were the circumstances of when you told him about the HIV? DN: Well, they came round to lunch and I just happened to bring it up. I guess I like shocking him sometimes. I thought, He looks a bit too comfortable; I d better drop a bombshell. [Laugh] I said, Dad, I m HIV positive. He looked at me; didn t say anything. She was the one asking the questions. Well are you alright? No, I ve been in hospital. She was the one who said that if at any time I needed anything, to ring. Then I tried to do that when I was in hospital and my father didn t even contact me. CW: When was this? DN: About eighteen months ago. I got a friend to ring because I was too ill. My friend gave him the direct number to my bed in the ward but never a phone call. CW: Have you contacted him since? DN: He rang two weeks ago. CW: So from a year and half ago when he heard you were in hospital you haven t heard from him again until two weeks ago? DN: Yeah. Until about four months ago when he rang while I was overseas. CW: Had he contacted your friend to find out you were well and out of hospital? DN: No. Not at all. I mean it doesn t worry me anymore because my friends are my family. CW: I think it does worry you because you looked a bit upset as you spoke. DN: Do you think? I guess I am very disappointed that he didn t, you know, really care. So I always tell me friends that if anything happens, don t bother telling my father, just ring up and tell him when I ve... when I ve died. That ll do. I mean it s pointless. He won t come and see me. I mean, I guess I must be upset about it

7 CW: Is he frightened, do you think? DN: I m sure he is. CW: You look well, and perhaps you looked well when he came to visit. DN: Oh, yes, I did. CW: And you re sure that the friend rang him? DN: Oh yeah. I m still involved with this friend. CW: So are you in the position where you have to be the forgiving one? DN: Oh yeah. Yet he s the one who s supposed to be teaching me - I don t understand that. But I ve learnt a lot more than him about people and relationships. CW: Is he perhaps morally self-righteous, with a you got yourself into this sort of attitude? DN: I don t think so. He wouldn t have the mentality to think that way. It s just his way of not dealing with it, I think, not to talk about it or even tell anyone. CW: In terms of fatherhood, you don t have any sons? DN: No. CW: Do you have any regrets about that? DN: No, not at all. I m a paediatric nurse and go to work every day and I m so glad I don t have children. I see some people... A couple who ve just had a baby and the husband says, Before we had a baby we had a life. I don t regret it at all. I m too irresponsible to bring up a child. [Laugh]. I m too selfish, I couldn t give all that love to a child. CW: Do you think there s something of that in your own father though? When he decided he didn t want the responsibility? DN: I don t think he s changed at all. He had affairs; he still thinks he s a young kid. CW: Do you think you re like your father at all? DN: Well, I really hardly know him. I ve never really been given the opportunity to get to know him. He s made no effort so I can t be bothered now. CW: Any qualities you think you share? DN: Everybody says I look like him and I say, Shut up, I do not. He holds his age pretty well, like me. CW: You ve chosen a nurturing career. DN: Yes, well I ve always liked looking after people, entertaining them. I m in amateur theatre too. CW: Anything else you think about your father, about bonding? DN: There s no bonding. [Laugh] CW: Do you blame him? DN: Oh yeah, I ring him and have a go at him. I say, You haven t really done anything for us, and I joke and say, Now don t lose my address this time, because I want that inheritance when you die. And he laughs and thinks I m kidding. [Laugh] CW: Do you resent that he cared more for your brother? DN: I don t resent it. It s his loss. I ve turned out quite well without having the father figure around

8 CW: You didn t feel, Oh I want a father to love me? DN: Oh, God no. CW: And you don t feel that way now? DN: No, not at all. I ve got other men to do that

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