HARRIER HOBBLED IN GOLD DUST

These days her long, evenly tanned legs waxed so smooth, are painfully thin, seemingly without muscle, mere bony spindles.  Stooped lopsided over her walker, instantly recognizable by her pallid beige surcoat and above-the-knee shorts; more so by an awkward gait unnaturally wide, knees splayed outwards like giant wish-bones, she shuffles limply along, head bowed beneath a ruffled mop of sandy-coloured curls.

Occasionally, some well-meaning jogger bobbing by would call out, ‘That’s the way, luv.  Good on yer!’  Or ‘’Ave a good one, darl!’  Or even: ‘Keep it up, Sunshine, and you’ll be right.  It’s all good.’

‘Ignorant, spineless cretins,’ she gnashed quietly to herself.  ‘No skin off your balls!  Take a long, hard look at yourselves.  Call youse athletes?  Youse’ve got no idea!  Way youse run is sloppy, so bloody ugly, lurching from side to side, heaving for breath.  Just look at youse, with your plonking tread.  Plonkers an’ piss-artists, the lot o’ youse!’

‘Go, girl!  You’ll get there yet!’  You can do it!’

No, she bloody couldn’t! 

Sixteen years ago, she was knocked down by a hoon speed-merchant high on crystal meths.  Upshot was a broken pelvis.  Which took months to heal.  Metal screws were put in.  She was on crutches for weeks.  Then allowed gentle exercise, no more than thirty minutes a day.  Following the op and convalescence, she found herself stumbling haphazardly, fearful of toppling over, falling backwards.  Lost her sense of balance, utterly.  The medicos strongly advised a walker.  She rejected the idea outright.  ‘Me, of all people!  I’m a very independent person.  Know what I mean?  I’ve always been Wonder Woman – to me, any rate.’

Back then she experienced periods of dizziness, staggering crooked, desperately reaching out for somewhere to sit.  Then one morning, with her mind fixated on the legal battle with her lodger, she tangled with a tree root and collapsed on the bone-hard ground.  Both shoulders were broken.  ‘See, I‘m a big-boned woman, so it gave me a nasty shock.’

‘You’ve got Parkinson’s,’ the doctors declared airily.  ‘All this stumbling around.'

Ignorant, smarmy knowalls!  At least I don't stumble over my words!  ‘Now I want an MRI scan,’ she insisted.  ‘All my life I’ve kept myself fit as a fiddle. Hardly ever get sick, yet now I’m having dizzy spells.’

‘That won’t be possible,’ the whitecoats said.  ‘Parkinson’s doesn’t show up on an MRI scan.’

‘But I haven’t got Parkinson’s,’ she protested.  ‘Look, my hands are not flapping about.’  Almost were, though, with irritation.

If only they had listened.  The scan would’ve shown she’d got hydrocephalus, pressure on the brain.  That would’ve explained all those dizzy spells.

Shortly after, she tripped and broke both shoulders.  ‘Like a fool, I let those frigging doctors talk me into having a double-shoulder operation, in spite of all my beefing about it.  That should give you more mobility, they said.  Trouble with medicos today, they can over-medicate. 

‘My instincts were correct.  The body didn’t want this.  Now I can only use my left hand and arm for everything.  Mark my words.  Today’s medicos are riding the wrong bus.’

‘Anyhow the surgeon inserted a shunt to allow for drainage into the abdomen and ease pressure on the brain.’

No, she bloody couldn’t reclaim the honed body of such a deeply focussed athlete.  Not now, not ever.  Yes, she had believed in the possibility, the promise, the glitter of gold, when she began the walker routine - making two circuits of the fitness track around the roughly oblong perimeter of the park, some 2,100 metres, laborious as it sounds but determined to heal, to beat the odds.

At first, she, Estelle Raines, bitterly refused this artifice, the stubbornly proud streamlined athlete who once challenged some of those heavy-heaving, cocksure men over long distances:  marathons, ultra-marathons, surf to bay, the Sydney-to-Melbourne classic 548 miles, the Death Valley Badwater . . . She dared hope to regain her own balance, if not that graceful, fleet-footed, fluid rhythm of yesteryear.  Never would she abase herself to such humiliating dependency on some despicable four-wheeled metal contraption that she must cling onto for life.

But as she jerked along and slid her feet over the compacted sand and gravel with short, mincing scrapes, crook back bowed with one shoulder blade humped higher, head hung stiffly immoveable, her hawkish green eyes looking up on a slant, she reluctantly conceded she was inevitably heading any moment for a fall, a trip or her wishbone struts just giving way, even cracking apart like matchsticks.  There was no pump-along arm swing, no gliding rhythm, no natural celebration of riding a cushion of air currents.  Sometimes her mind flipped to the closely cropped, emerald green of the racecourse upon which she used to train, smooth as a billiard table, manicured for true gallopers and free spirits..

Who would have guessed that in a former life some forty years ago, she was described as an Amazonian?  Tall and rangy, long-striding, powered by strong, thick thighs, five foot nine in upright military stance, quite the opposite of many contemporary long-distance women:  petite, wiry, pared down to the bone, half-starved. 

Now hobbled, Estelle Raines can’t even reach down for her runners, but pokes a metre-long ruler into the heels to drag them closer across the floor.  Bending to fiddle round to tie the laces takes an age but vital lest she trip over them in the shuffle across the ground floor and take another nasty tumble like she did a few years ago and broke her right wrist.  With the result that she can use only her left hand to manipulate things, so cannot straighten the collar of her jacket or tuck in her shirt at the back or evenly apply the heel balm and oils for her dry, leathery skin.  Take an umbrella when it’s raining?  Forget it!  ‘Bloody impossible to unfurl!’ 

Time hangs heavy where once times trotted trippingly off the tongue alongside distance and venue:  mile 4:31.3 (1972) London; 5,000 metres 15:54 (1970) Helsinki; 10,000 metres 34:15 (1973) Atlanta; Bay to Breakers, Death Valley Badwater … ‘You’d have to chain me up to stop me tackling the ultra-marathon!’

Boredom rather than anger appears to win out.  Frustration and loneliness vie for minor placings.  Fiercely competitive formerly, her record time in today’s straitened circumstances of hobbling half-way round the park to the side street leading up to the railway line, over the bridge and along to Safeway and safely back home is only twenty-five minutes shorter than her best-ever marathon.   

Estelle’s diet remains ultra-Spartan:  raw vegies, salads, occasional fish, fruit, nuts, juices, vitamin supplements, water.  ‘All raw food, remember.  My dietician told me not to think of mushrooms as a vegetarian’s meat.  Why would you want to eat fungus?’  To get the iron into her system in preparation for rigorous training, she would receive injections of the mineral from her kinesiologist.  On such a modest diet, she would train twice a day, 120 miles per week, and fasted once every seven days, sometimes even endure a three-day fast.

‘Sport I always craved, swimming and cricket specially, but I didn’t feel I had the gift till I hit upon long-distance running.  I was a demon fast bowler, according to dad, and a brutal number four batter.  At school we were only allowed to swim breaststroke, ‘cos that’s what young ‘leddies’ were supposed to do.  Because my dad went up the school to complain, I was the only girl allowed to dive off the top platform.  My mum used to drag me along to watch her play netball every Saturday arvo, but it was so boring.  Whenever I was selected, I always made shooter because of my height and strength, but I got bored just jumping up and down beneath the hoop  in the scoring zone. 

‘My father’s influence was huge, though.  Reg Raines played state cricket, Sheffield Shield.  Was an all-rounder with an impressive physique and big heart.  I’ve got my dad’s genes.  He made a habit of jogging round the lakes in the heartland of Victoria and encouraged me to tag along.  Till his dodgy knees went.  Guess I’ve always loved a challenge.  But at that time, I never really stretched out, didn’t realise what I was capable of.

‘Ours was gold-diggers country:  small turn-of-the century spa towns of timber cottages and mineral springs.  Eucalypt scent wafting down hillsides to valleys of blackwood, whose short, slender, close-set black trunks were a constant reminder of the danger of being burnt out by bushfires.  Below, stands of manna gums, whose forks might cradle a koala munching its leaves.  Amateur prospectors were still panning the creeks and sluicing the river banks.  Running through the forest trails, I’d catch a glint of what seemed like quartz, but most likely fool’s gold, that’s iron pyrites. But I was determined to aim high for the real McCoy.  Mum used to say I had gold in my veins.

‘Back then, in the 1970s, long-distance running for women was strictly taboo; men’s stuff only.  Women were frowned upon if they had the gall to barge in, but sneak in they did, surreptitiously.  The 1500 metres was the longest track event permitted for women.  In 1972, finally, the Boston Marathon was opened up to us gals.  That suited me just fine.  I much preferred road-running to track races and running through uneven bushland.  Competition was spiced up by the dream of becoming the first woman to break three hours.  Would it be the Americans, Doris Brown or Cheryl Bridges, or that English lass, Rita Lincoln?   Might young Estelle Raines, an unknown from Down Under, be an outside chance? 

‘The popular consensus was that women couldn’t run that far or that fast.  It really pissed me off.  Fortunately, dear old dad understood.  Anyway, anger is a great motivator.  It sure spurred me on.  I was determined to prove those jocks wrong.  I started competing in men’s races, much to the disgust of many people, sheilas as well as blokes.  Wasn’t long before I became recognisable in the public mind and started pulling publicity for my novelty.  Or notoriety.  The press had a field day with their cheap puns:  More Fireworks from Golden Raines or Stella Reigns Supreme or Steely Stella Stars!  My times were steadily getting lower, which drove me on.  Yet I still needed a purpose, specially for all that relentless training.  My coach, Bob McIntyre, obliged by always setting me a target time, always explained the reasons for my diet, which races to enter, which rivals to watch out for.  In fact, he often complained I was too driven, going way beyond the mileage he’d instructed.  Secretly, though, I think he was proud of the fact.’

Estelle’s body slumps.  She is brooding again; lips puckering with bitterness.  She is speaking in a monotone, almost inaudibly.  ‘In 1976 the wheels fell off.  I tore a calf muscle and injured my foot.  Jumped on the shadows of a small slippery boulder in the middle of a stringybark creek.  That bloody tumble marked the end of my Olympic preparation for Montreal.  For ever, as it turned out.  I guess I never expressed myself in the same way again.  But I always strove to give my best shot.  I was still running ten or twenty miles a day in my mid-forties, but it felt like running on empty.  Then, of course, that horror car smash killed off my capacity to walk upright, let alone run.

‘To break the stranglehold of boredom, for I was always restless and itching to be up and doing stuff, I started going to church.  Strictly for social reasons.  No, to break the monotony of boredom.  I’m not fanatical.  I believe in the Church, not its dogmas.  Not even its followers, to be candid.  More important, I can cadge a lift now and again.  You see, I can’t manage the steps on the trams.  Rather, I can, but it would take an eternity to board and with all those eyes gawking at me.  Strangers who’d never heard of me.  Couldn’t imagine what ordeals I’ve had to endure.  So I help church members feel good about themselves by giving me a lift, which I much prefer to a hug.  But deep down, I loathe all this fuss, this lovey-dovey hogwash.  It’s so fake.  Why does everything these days have to be fun?  Even churchgoers expect to be entertained on Sundays.  Whatever happened to self-discipline, a serious sense of purpose, true grit, putting your potential to the test, reaching out for that goldmine in the sky?’  Her forehead creases.  ‘Now who sang that?

‘There’s this guy who drives me to the Sea Baths at St Kilda.  Beautiful old shell of a building on the seafront.  It’s changed a lot now, of course.  It’s big business:  gourmet restaurants, snappy bars and all the rest of it.  But I regularly used to go there because I enjoyed the sensation of wet heat and needed to sweat, not just to relieve the soreness in my joints but to help my circulation and clear my mind.  That’s what I loved about running my heart out – clearing my mind of every distraction.  Just focussing on times and distances and finishing lines, whatever was needed to win the race.  I hated losing.  Nowadays I hardly ever allow myself to reflect on those long, lost golden summers when my life held so much promise.  I never re-live those long, long runs.  That was someone else.’ 

The life of Estelle Raines still drags on.  From time to time she remembers the stack of videos recording her golden days, but can’t latch on to anyone who knows how to operate her video player that’s long out-of-date.  Frequently, out of boredom or panic, she’s hopping on the phone to some odd-job man to tighten up a wheel on her walker, without which she is a prisoner in her own home.  Or to organise a drive to the nail salon or hair stylist’s.  Or to have a regular massage from a man in his mid-fifties, whom she’s happy to harangue, a former naval man with saucy tattoos on his forearms – obviously, she misses intimate contact with her late kinesiologist.  Or to her solicitor about the ratty behaviour of the Kiwi lodger who refuses to leave the adjacent ground floor flat after she pleaded for Raines to take her in.

‘Then she goes and accuses me of always spying on her.  Calls me a stinking old witch.  What sort of low life speaks to you like that?  She’s a nasty piece of work, that one.  Prue Whyecross.  Be very wary if you ever come across her.  Forty-two years old and thinks she knows it all.  Always accusing me of staring out the back window, checking up on her.  Well, yes.  ‘Cos I don’t trust her an inch.  Try to help someone in need and they take advantage.  Gave me some hard-luck story about losing everything in an earthquake.  She’s gone to both the council and her solicitor’s to lodge a complaint against me.  Claims I’ve threatened to poison her dog.  Lying bitch.  But I told her, I didn’t want a dog running round on my property in case I have another fall.’

In effect, Estelle has retreated to her front room, gloomy and sterile as it is, its décor and accoutrements a throwback to her golden age.  Threadbare armchairs that the ponderous mover cannot sink into, but requires a straight-back chair with hard seat and sturdy frame to lean on.  In huddled proximity lie a massage table, an exercise bike and a plain fold-up card table laden with multiple tubes and jars of body elixirs for dry skin.  On the walls hang faded anatomical charts:  Osteology of the Human Skeleton; The Heart colour-coded:  scarlet for the aorta, great veins sky-blue, nerves yellow; Articulation of the Knee-Joint; and charts of nutritional values.  Not one image of grim-jawed Estelle Raines bursting through the pain barrier.

When she remembers to eat, she takes s a plastic bag of fresh cherries to the back window, sitting on an old metal chair, waiting for something, anything, to happen.

                                                                                                Michael Small

November 4 - December 13, 2016