It was 1952 and my sister Leonie and I were both home alone in Bruce Street Cooks Hill at the time of this particular incident. I would have been eight years old, so that would have placed Lee's age at five. From time to time our parents would go to the movies for the 5pm session, arriving back home at about 8pm. I never saw this as a big deal, as it was quite infrequent. While it did require us to have the evening meal at 4pm, there was an added bonus, for we got to share a large chocolate block between us while our parents were away. Wow! We could hardly wait for them to leave.
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On this particular night, it was mid-winter, so it was dark by 5pm. That was OK as we had a radio to listen to, and the lights were all on throughout the house. However, no one had allowed for the storm that was brewing just after our parents had left, and the impending rain, lightning and thunder. It was a fairly nasty storm, I recall it well, and vividly remember the sudden huge thunderclap, the shaking of the house - and all the lights going out.
I was scared, and Leonie would have been doubly so. The only illumination at the time was the flashes of lightning outside the house. Without that lightning, it was just pitch black. The street lighting was also out, and the two hotels at the corner were in total darkness. No light - absolutely nothing. I can recall now that I had lit a candle, so somehow, I managed to know where they were kept, and matches were always on the gas stove.
At last, the storm was abating, and I suppose that the easing in the weather occurred at about 6.30pm. My little sister was in a panic, was crying, and could not be placated. I was not too far behind her.
Now, I had an idea. However, when I thought about it in later years, it turned out to be a not particularly great one. The simple solution would have been to go to the next-door neighbour's place if we were scared, but I decided on something a little more complex. But that's history. I knew that our parents had gone to the Civic Theatre in the car, and that was only a little over a mile away, so I thought that we should go there for I knew where the car would be parked. I remember getting Leonie her big coat to put on, getting both of us to the front door with the use of the candle, blowing out the candle, and off we went. Today I can recall that I had to make a decision as to whether to leave the front door either locked or unlocked, but cannot recall just what that eventual decision was.
However, no one had allowed for the storm that was brewing just after our parents had left.
Without any streetlights, moonlight or starlight, it was black, and I mean pitch black, with the only lighting coming from cars as they passed from time to time. The entire suburb was in darkness. We headed north to the inner city, stumbling through the blackness.
We got to the corner of Laman and Auckland streets, and joy oh joy, the town hall clock dial was illuminated, the streetlights were also on in King Street, everything here seemed to be right with the world! We ran through Civic Park, clutching each other's hand and headed towards the lights, those most welcome lights, and into Wheeler Place which acted as a carpark. There was dad's Vanguard - we checked each door several times, but they were all locked.
This had always been the plan, to sit in the car and wait, so I had no backup plan and just did not know what to do. Eventually we went inside the Civic Theatre through its side door, and sat on the lounge in the foyer, waiting for the current session to end.
Someone, I suspect from theatre management, spoke to me as we sat there and asked me some questions, no doubt about our welfare. I have no memory now as to what those questions were. We were allowed to sit there without any interference by others, but I could sense that the usherette had been instructed to keep an eye on us.
At last, the session finished and out came the patrons, in dribs and drabs, about two dozen of them. Of course, mum and dad were shocked to see us there, and dad scooped up my little sister in one motion and we hurried out the side door to the car. We went home to the darkness, to the pitch black of Bruce Street as the power was still out.
Now this story has never been meant to be an 'allocation of blame', for this was what I would call another time, a time where it was perhaps considered that young children could be given some sort of a sense of responsibility. Afterall, this was not the first time that our parents had gone to the 5pm session at the movies, and those previous times had been without incident. But on this occasion mother nature had intervened, and no script had been written for that. I cannot recall my parents ever saying to me after the event that it was not to be spoken about. It just wasn't. I sense that we all understood that perhaps others in the community may see some opportunity here to be critical of a perceived example of bad parenting. But I have never seen it that way.
So, I have never spoken of this for 70 years. It was just something that had happened and was put behind us. However, there was never a repeat performance by our parents going to the movies in the same scenario after that, so I sense that that says something about how they felt about it all.
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