Short Story 4 - "You are all Urgers!" (Roy Richard Maloney 1908-1984)

 

1908-1984: “You are all Urgers!” [1]

 

Roy Richard Maloney was born in 1908. In so many ways Roy never grew up and was still a child when he died in 1984.

 Roy, the second of six, was the handsome one, a fact and an asset that went to his head early and meant that his World would always revolve around his needs, his thoughts, and his views.

Roy, aged 21 years

 238 Lygon Street Carlton was a household where the males were revered and treated as little Princes. Granny Barker was the Queen Mother, and she ensured, perhaps even decreed, that, despite the household income coming mainly from the labours of the Aunts and the contributions of the paying Lodgers, despite the difficulties of Wartime, the boys were to get whatever meal they wanted and however they wanted it.

 From an early age, Roy wanted a breakfast of two fried eggs served on a large plate. He would stand above the plate and sprinkle salt snow-like from the height of his shoulder before agreeing to sit and eat. Roy wanted this dish and routine every morning of his life, and the Grannies Barker and Cartwright, and Aunty Babe, provided the meal.

 Then one day in 1972, when he was 64, there were no women left in the house, and Roy decided not to eat eggs again. Roy tackled the problem in his normal way of seeking the simplest solution – no eggs, therefore no snowing salt, therefore no more breakfasts. Indeed, this simple solution was so good that he decided that from then on, outside the use of the Toaster, he would not eat any meals unless they were cooked for him.

 Mantra 1 - “Food makes you fat” was his oft-announced dogma conveyed with a sense of satisfaction and completeness to any nephew or niece within earshot. “No point in being fat. You don’t look any good”.

Roy had simple solutions to most problems.

 Mantra 2 - “Everything can be found in Carlton. Why would you want to live anywhere else?” Roy and the suburb of Carlton were a life-long marriage – “Best weather, best pubs, best mates!”

 

Mantra 3 - “If you are going to help anyone, help those who you went to school with.” So, in 1946, Roy became lifetime Secretary of the St George’s Catholic Primary School Old Boys. He created their only function – a Communion Breakfast held on the Sunday before Cup Day each year. The function centred on an 8am Mass, then a breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, and beer – a very pleasant Sunday morning for the blokes. Naturally, the Church’s Women’s Group did the honours with the cooking and serving.

1953 Communion Breakfast.Roy at front left of second table

 

 Even though a Catholic Primary School had served the Carlton Catholic families from 1856, Roy really wanted the attendance to reflect the 1911 to 1930 period when he and his 4 brothers were pupils. Maximum effort was given to maintaining those contacts – “The others sorted themselves out.” To assist in the sorting themselves out, he appointed assistant secretaries for the decades of pupils following. “Everyone likes talking to their own mates.” He was probably right!

 

Roy’s brothers, Ron, Ray, Rex and Keith, attended the annual event, partly through tribalism, and partly through guilt feelings if they were to let Roy down.

 

However, attendance was not without its problems. Being Catholic was a family thing, but regular attendances at Sunday masses or the Sacraments were not always a priority. Indeed, my Dad, Ray, was so neglectful that he went to Confession once a year at St Francis’ Church (“They don’t know you there”) at 6am on the Communion Breakfast mornings. This was a kick-in of the Catholic guilt. It meant he could take Communion  with a clear conscience two hours later.

 

In time, Ray passed on the lurk of the 6am Confession to his brothers and his best school mates – mates that included Jimmy Davis (the brickie), Alka (the spy), Jimmy Hannan (North’s Treasurer), Bob Edgecombe (Edgy) and Bob Wallace (Hoppity Bob). By the 1950s, the Confessor Priest on early Sunday duty at St Francis was always surprised to find two rows of “very sorry” 50 year-old men, uncomfortably dressed with ties, sports jackets, and pressed Fletcher Jones trousers, who all promised to “go and never sin again”.

 

1952 Boys - Roy in Centre. Jimmy Davis the bald one 3rd from right

That Confessional lurk went well until one Sunday, Dad, the brothers, and the Mates, let Jimmy Davis be first in the queue. Jimmy was apparently still getting over a big Saturday night when he knelt on his bad knee in the dark confessional. 

 

The Boys in the pews heard the voices as the shouting got louder and louder, until the young Franciscan Priest threw open his confessional door and stormed off towards the altar yelling “I do not have to put up with that!”

 

A minute or two later, Jimmy emerged, rubbing his knee, and fighting on with “Silly young bugger didn’t know how hard bricklaying is!”

 

Ray, Ron, Rex, Keith and the mates took Communion later that day without the benefit of a full confession and absolution – and Jimmy was always put last in the queue after that.

 

Roy did not marry. He did briefly (some months) go out with Bunny, the girl from the Tivoli. Apparently, she was a good tennis player. The womenfolk of the family saw it as a positive and were in the kitchen discussing Bunny as a possible bride when Roy entered. He asked, “Who is she marrying?” Family expectations were lowered.

1943 - Roy & Bunny

 

Roy believed that he was not suited to work, but that he was much better suited to playing sport and to sunbaking. So a series of jobs – backstage at the Tivoli, packing lollies at Allens, and sorting boxes in his brothers’ businesses – paid most expenses, and allowed him maximum time to play tennis and footy, watch his beloved Blues, and spend summer days at the men’s Middle Park baths.

 

1936 - Roy in centre, Ray on right

Roy did not bother with Invitation formalities (outside of the annual Communion Breakfast). He decided all by himself which brother he would visit each week. Arriving unexpectedly and generally on warm days, Roy would turn up at the brother’s residence, let himself in, take a beer to the back yard with one of the bathroom towels, and sunbake or rest until his brother finished work and could join him for a drink and a chat. The brothers accepted this. Roy accepted this. Perhaps the wives were not so happy.

 

By the time Roy was 70, and now living on his own in a Carlton Housing Commission flat, he had simplified life even further. Despite regular gifts of clothing from wives of his brothers, and offers of washing by his only sister, Bonnie, Roy decided that only 2 of each were needed in all clothing and underwear. Two items of any apparel would get him through any week until the Sunday arvo. Then he would deliver the whole lot to his 80-year-old female Italian neighbour for washing and drying. He would remain in his brown flannel dressing gown until she returned the laundered items on a Monday morning. Her payment was a good bottle of plonk (not allowed by her children or doctor). Quite satisfactory result all round. Unnecessary problems solved, and the gifted clothing remained in its packages.

 

Eventually, the brothers became very concerned by Roy’s indifference to food. Rex, as the family Sergeant, called a meeting at the Dover Hotel one Thursday evening. He convinced Ron, Ray and Keith that drastic action needed to be taken, and that collective pressure was the way to go.

 

1979 - from left Ron, Roy, Rex, Ray, Keith, Bonnie

The following Saturday morning the Brothers 4 arrived in a Hughes Hire Car at Roy’s flat. Sergeant Rex said to Roy at the opening of the door “Tilden[2], come with us. We are going to get you some food.”

 

Roy simply smiled, and now the Brothers 5 scrambled into the Hughes Hire Car and were driven to the only supermarket Rex had ever visited – the one in South Melbourne.

 

There, all bundled out and Roy was led into the supermarket, given a trolley, and told, “Tilden, go up and down every aisle. Get whatever you want. Money is not a problem. We are taking care of that. So, let yourself go!”

 

The Brothers 4 stood by the checkouts and waited. Some ten minutes later, Roy appeared pushing the trolley, the contents of which were a packet of crumpets and a block of butter. No amount of talking (collective pressure) could convince Roy to return to the aisles.

 

So,  the Brothers 5, plus the crumpets and butter, returned by hire car to the flat. There Roy handed each brother a can of VB beer and said “Thank you. It is lovely to be all together.”

 

Rex was not yet satisfied. He turned on the very old oven griller and put two crumpets on the tray. Rex noticed immediately that there was a gap of at least 6 inches between the tray and the griller flame.

 

“Tilden, this is not heating.” Rex exclaimed.  Roy just looked at him and said “If I am having toast or crumpets for breakfast, I get up, put them on the tray, turn on the griller, go have a shave and shower, and when I come out, I turn them over, and boil the kettle for a cuppa. It’s perfect. That’s the problem with how you have all become. You want things to happen now. You are all Urgers!”

 

That Saturday morning, the Brothers 5 shared more beers and all the slow toasting  crumpets and the butter. Roy’s simple solution seemed to make sense, even to Urgers.

 

Roy died two years later. He had had a fall in his flat. His neighbour called an ambulance and Roy was taken to the Royal Melbourne Hospital on a Saturday afternoon. The Doctors were concerned that he was badly malnourished. They told him that they would  keep him in hospital until the Monday, when the hospital dieticians and psychologists would come on duty.

 

Roy died in that Carlton hospital that Sunday. It seemed the simplest and best solution.

 

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[1] Written by Warren Maloney – 15^th December 2019

[2] Roy had a boyhood family nickname of “Tilden” – named after the great Tennis player, William Tatem (Bill) Tilden 1893-1953) – “The Great Tilden”. It seemed appropriate.