"Out The Back"

Some of you will remember an old building like this - out the back - of every home. Those ofcourse who didn't have the sewerage connected and gosh, there weren't any that did that I could recall - that is. until I went to the city to work..and until our new home was built after the roof blew off when I was 7...

They had some endearing names like 'the dunny' the 'loo' the 'long drop" and many many more, and generally, at night when one had to take a lantern 'out the back' for a visit - one encountered the usual spider-webs and became entangled in those even before getting there..or wet with the rain, and once there, if one could open the door properly, well, one would never know what to expect inside because there was only the lantern-light to show the way.
I recall - especially in the Outback - a piece of wire hanging from somewhere and on that - well, the usual squares of butcher paper had to suffice and woe betide those who had used the last piece and never replaced it!
Alongside the 'seat' inside stood a 4 gallon drum, mostly full with ashes together with a jam tin of sorts and the idea was - to pour some of that down the hole where one's body fitted quite well as a rule..or else...
Ashes down what seemed to we children the darkest deep hole in the world, and sometimes = just sometimes, there may have been some live coals from the wood stove where the ashes had come from generally early in the morning, - and many a time - there was a disaster - yes, when smoke came flying up through the deep dark hole and if there was no-one around on the farm or station property - well - that was the end of the old dunny out the back...
Ofcourse a new one was promptly dug by someone and rebuilt rather smartly, and the deep dark hole was filled in and another pepper tree planted right there...
(You might see a bit of a pepper tree protecting this old dunny, they themselves were great air-conditioning at schools and ofcourse - these old buildings...)
I recall the door(s) would either accidently lock one in, or just wouldn't open from the outside, (too much other work to do on the farms in those days with draft horses to get ready for the day's work, etc.,) and so a yelling child, or sometimes a big boot to the bottom of the door(s) would do the trick.
I recall one of my cats went missing - oh no, and little Brother Dear was in great trouble for tossing Puss down there one day - oh, farm kids got up to some mischief alright..Puss was rescued - I've often wondered how, but he was, and all cleaned up from the ashes, etc..No wonder Brother Dear got lots of scratches from him after that apisode..
Oh, and I have forgotten the red-back spiders (remember the song?) which can kill a child under 12 - and we had many around, and spiders were regularly sorted out by the Elders, or the Cook, with a very potent spray which would kill a cat too - and so it was a dangerous exercise at times - just to visit the old dunny out the back.

Probably why I'm not frightened of much really, even snakes..they visited often too as it was cool in there, and don't we have it just ever so good these days, eh!













And don't we have it just so good these days?