The life and times of Australia's "Nullarbor Kid". True stories from his past.

I must have done something really really bad, what it was I can't remember now because there were so many bad things to do then, which we did. Anyway, I was loaned out to another transport company to load wool bales from the wool store in Ultimo Street to the wharf.

At first I thought Whoopeee a wharf job, an easy day. Finish early and down the pub. But obviously unknown to me I was  made to do some penance.

Those that carted wool to the wharves all the time made it look easy. But for a young  eighteen year old  thin as a rake  it was a catastrophe.

There are two types of bag hook used to move the large wool bales. One is a small two prong hook with a wooden grip that would just about fit into the palm of your hand. An experienced wool man would use one in each hand and they made it look so easy bundling those wool bales around expertly and effortlessly into place.

I was handed a huge heavy shiny steel monster of a thing that looked like some medieval torture implement. Big enough to hang around your neck like a collar, with a wicked claw like prong each side.

I weighed it in my hand and stared at it as if it was a Death Adder.

"That's the best one for you", I was told, the rest of the drivers standing around grinning at the bewildered look of doubt on my face.

I'm not sure I'm going to like this job, I thought to myself as I tentatively felt the weight of this strange heavy piece of metal.

I drove down to the Ultimo Wool Store and into the large yard and backed under the third wooden chute that jutted high out from the enclosed wall of the brick building as instructed. This building was about five stories high and the chute the bales came down started some where up in the high gloomy darkness. It looked to me as if it went all the way up the five stories but on second thoughts probably not. Standing on the back tray of my truck and with my hands as high as I could reach, the end of the chute was still a little way above me and as I looked closer I could see it was made of heavy shiny wooden planking. Thousands of bales of wool must have come down this steep chute I thought over the years.  Looking up I could see the chute disappeared up into the gloom to about the second floor of the store lost in the darkness way up above, like a long dark and steep slippery dip. Oh well I thought they must lower the bales down somehow, probably by rope or a sling.

"Ha Ha Ray", were you in for a shock.

A voice called down from the darkness above,

"Ready driver?"

I gripped the bag hook firmly and stood directly under the chute watching to see how the bale was lowered down to me and called back, 

"Yeah" tentatively, the yeah  sounding  more like "I think so ..or ..maybe".

Peering up into chute with my left hand shading my eyes, looking to see how it was done,... the next instant, Glory Be, a bloody bale was hurtling down the chute straight at me out of the darkness at a thousand miles an hour. I froze for an instant trying figure out what to do. It looked as big as a meteorite and coming just as fast. Then using my head I made a quick decision and jumped clear off the truck and ran away across the yard.

Like a shell out of a cannon it cleared the chute and ricocheted off the floor of the truck, and as the truck bucked and rocked it hit the front loading board with a resounding thump and then bounced over the side of the truck,( my side,) I think it was looking for me and then rolled and bounced past me across the yard hard up against the opposite wall twenty feet away. I stood at the back of the truck looking at it like it was a bull elephant just been shot. That bloody thing nearly killed me, I said to myself with eyes as big as saucers.

Swivelling the metal bag hook in my hand. I stared at this rampaging evil thing that now lay still about 10 feet away  contemplating what to do with it. There was no way I was going to get that bastard back up on truck, that's for sure.

 It can bloody well stop there I said to myself, but I had better tell them upstairs, it must have got away on them some how.

Even then it hadn't occurred to me that all this was a normal loading procedure.

 I jumped up on the truck looked up into the darkness of the chute and yelled

"It bounced off the truck... it's over by the front wall. What will I do with it ..the bastard nearly killed me."

"No worries mate we'll bring the fork lift around later after you are  loaded and put it on last".

"OK"... I called,... thinking... that seems sensible. 

Still not twigging that all this was normal.

"Next one" the voice of doom, up in heaven yelled.

Casually I glanced  up, standing once more near the front of the chute, bag hook in hand waiting to see how they lowered it down.

I couldn't believe it.

Not again?

To my absolute horror the next bale was also rushing down to-ward me at incredible speed, it seemed even faster than the first one.

 Just before it hit the deck the voice on high yelled  "Grab it with your hook".

"Like f***"  I thought.

The speed its coming down, I'll end up in Parramatta.

So... I jumped off the truck again.

Luckily it hit the loading board at the front and stopped on the tray. I climbed back onto the truck. OK. I stared at this second thing that tried to kill me. I have to dig the hook in and straighten it. As I dug the hook in and tried to straighten my arm nothing happened, it didn't budge. I pushed and I shoved and I huffed and I puffed, nothing happened. By this time the "penny had dropped" and I knew for certain that this was all normal procedure and some how I had to move this bloody great block of brown Hessian concrete. So with a vicious dig with the hook and bracing my right foot against the edge of the tray I heaved and it rocked a little and then fell back exactly where it was. It then struck me if I cant do this, I will be sent every time till I can. That was all I needed, with blood pressure up and adrenalin pumping I managed to put it about where I thought it should be.

I staggered over to the chute, sweat dripping into my eyes,  trying to catch my breath  and looked up into the heavenly darkness.

The voice of doom called down out of the blackness above.

"First time you've loaded wool?"

I nodded, with a shiver up my spine. I didn't care what he thought. I wanted to go home... now. Better still the pub ..anywhere but stay here and be killed by a  bunch of bloody woolly overcoats  They weigh a ton and move faster than a speeding bullet.

The voice of doom continued in a matter of fact voice, from the darkness above,

"The first couple are the hardest to manage, then they will stop the others bouncing. We usually have to come around with the fork lift and load one or two off the ground at the end. No problem."

No problem he says, I wish I could swap places and bomb him with these Bloody  bales, see how he likes it.

The next bale shot down and as the hidden voice on high had said, it hit the first one and settled on the tray without bouncing off. I stepped over to it from behind the chute where I had been hiding and gingerly jabbed the bag hook into one side to move it. There was a slight tearing sound as I pulled with all my might and with my right arm bent using all the muscle I had, I pulled as hard as I possibly could. The hook let go of the bale and whacked me fair in the face.

It hit with such a force I thought I had been "king hit" by Cassius Clay.

I dropped the hook and put both hands to my face in shock, everything was numb from my forehead to my chin. I staggered back, bewildered, wondering what had happened. The next second I tripped over and half rolled and half fell off the truck and onto the ground. More pain. Blood was dripping from a gash next to my eye. I took one hand away from my face to feel where my arse hurt from landing on the cement. All I could see was double vision or my eyes were crossed don't know which.

Coming back to reality I could hear the irritable voice in the dark on high calling down the chute.

"Driver... driver... where the hell are you driver?"

"Down on the ground"

"What are you doing down there?"

"I fell off the truck you stupid bastard" I yelled loosing my temper.

"Well hop back up... got to get you loaded."

I climbed back up and staggered over to the chute .

"F*** you and your bales" I hollered up the chute through misty eyes. "Stick em up your bloody arse." still holding my head that hurt like hell and blood dripping  into a fast closing right eye

The voice from the dark kingdom called down "What's up?"

"I just smacked me self in the f***** face with me hook, that's what's up"

I'm bleeding like a stuck pig and I think I've broken my jaw.

"F***  you and your bloody bales." I added.

"Oh Yeah ..meant to tell ya... with the hook, always whack it in real hard, you'll be right. First couple of times a bit hit and miss, you'll get the hang of it after a while."

My face felt like it had been hit by a freight train.

My right eye was just about closed by now, my chin was as sore as hell, it felt like a couple of teeth were loose at the front, and I was in the mood for murder.

I snorted through my nose, gritted my teeth as best I could, glaring at the bale over by the wall and the two on the truck  picked up the bale hook and decided after I was loaded, I would climb up into the dark kingdom and strangle that voice of doom, if it was the last thing I do. Then if he was still alive I would hurl him down the bloody chute, and bomb him with one of his own bales.

I only had 10 bales to load and I managed to push and shove them into place, well sort of into place after a fashion muttering to myself each time just how and what I was going to do to terminate that smug voice. After each one I would peer up into the dark kingdom with my head cocked to one side looking up with my good left eye as the right one was completely shut by now.

I must have looked like a parrot on a perch with my head on one side squawking resignedly, "next."

Well I finally finished loading, the fork lift came around and lifted the last bale off the ground, the driver grinned and said "You got a shiner out of that one."

He then helped me tie down the load.

He didn't seem a bad bloke.

That was when I decided not to kill him.

I was too tired and couldn't be bothered anyway. 

Sixty years later I still have the scar next to my eye where the hook let go as I was pulling that bale around muttering to myself about life in general and I was lucky I didn't put my eye out. That was the first and last time I loaded wool bales.

When I unloaded I told the office there was nothing I could do so wrong that warranted me being sentenced to an early and untimely grave.

Such as  loading bales of wool.

 I would prefer to be sacked,  I said, to the foreman still looking like a parrot with my head tilted to one side, peering out of my one good eye, the left one, constantly dabbing at my  head wound, a  large blue black lump, a closed and swollen right eye with  a very small cut and a chin that still hurt like buggery.

(The hospital said no, a stitch was not needed, it would heal ok.)

They were going to sack me... but I beat them to it... and left.

The interstate driving job I had been promised had come through.

Quite often in later years in a tough situation with plenty of trouble keeping me company, maybe broken down, snow bound or stuck in a sandy desert I would finger the scar next to my right eye, sigh, and nod to myself knowingly.

Stabbing myself with that bloody bale hook was probably when all my brains oozed out and adventure rushed in to fill the vacuum. With a smile and that thought I usually set about getting myself out of the immediate problem I was in at the time. One of many that ambushed me over the years.

In the mean time a friend of the family asked my Dad if I would drive a truck he was buying in about a weeks time, a semi trailer hauling roof tiles from Cessnock up near Newcastle to his Sydney yard.

Naturally I jumped at it. A big truck,.. long distance. I was getting there.

The horizon was beckoning...

From; "My Way on the Highway", Copyright 2005 Ray Gilleland

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