Swift and Sure

As I sit in my study in 2024, in the autumn, if not the winter, of my life, I often reflect on how it all happened.

I was born in the coal-mining town of Greta but avoided the pits when my parents moved to Sydney. I started school in Glebe, which, at the time, was a very working-class suburb. The high school I attended finished at the end of the third year, and I imagined working as a clerk.

Then life changed when my parents were granted a Housing Commission house in North Ryde, and I transfe...