Grace Brennan on her dependable dad

In year eleven English I was set homework of writing about idiosyncrasies. I remember sitting at my desk in my bedroom and staring at a blank page. Idiosyncrasies.

Then, I heard the key in the door downstairs: Dad was home. And so began the familial ritual of Dad arriving home from the office. I jumped from my swivel chair and grabbed his corduroy slacks and woollen jumper from his ‘brothel’ (a messy walk-in wardrobe in Mum and Dad’s room) and dropped them from the landing to the stairs below. “Thanks Gracie,” he called, and disappeared into the bathroom to change out of his suit and tie.

As the evening unfolded, I began to type what I heard downstairs. Adding a dash of salt and pepper, but mostly I stuck to the script of Dad’s interactions with Mum, us kids, the neighbours, their yappy dogs and dinner.

Long before The Castle made dinner-table commentary folkloric, we learned to anticipate Dad’s doting praise for Mum’s meals — with the exception of his ongoing distaste for flavour enhancers like garlic and onion. Mum’s bolognese had nothing on Granny’s savoury mince: no tomato, no garlic — I’m not sure what actually was in her grey mince but that’s not the point, because Dad’s appreciation for his mother’s cooking lay in what was left out of it.

He has always been a simple eater. In the 90s as Thai food took off in suburban Sydney, the local waiter would bring Dad a plate of chicken wings without him having to order it. They knew he wouldn’t eat the curries or the stir-fries his kids had ordered. In the early 2000s Dad quit smoking and, as his taste buds recovered, his appetite expanded wildly to include chicken and cashew nuts, which Lilly, the owner of the local Chinese restaurant, refers to as ‘Leigh’s chicken’’, so called because it’s the only thing Leigh orders.

The sights and sounds of our household that I scribbled hastily onto that Year 11 English paper made my teacher erupt with laughter as I read it aloud in class the next day. “Stop!” she cried, then gathered herself. “Okay, go on.” At the end, she asked if she could print it out to show to her colleagues. I knew it had nothing to do with my writing or my grasp of idiosyncrasies and everything to do with the curtain she had just peered behind.  My home. Our family. Dad.

Maggie Dent, an Australian author and parenting expert, believes young men need to be marinated in stories of good men. There are enough bad news stories, she says. Dad makes a bloody good marinade. Which is ironic, because he’s been avoiding marinades all his life. As I listened to Maggie Dent explain why we should celebrate good men, for a split second I thought of my paper, pinned to Ms Davis’s wall for months after I submitted it. I felt the need to read it once again. To explain it to her. Because what was comical to my teacher was dependable to me. And dependable is underrated.

The scratching sound of the key finding its crevice in our front door still triggers a feeling of calm in me. It signalled our household was whole again. But it was more than that. Dad would bring with him through the door an energy, rooted in confidence. A determined clarity he shared with us.

Dad knowing who he was, unequivocally, meant I too knew who I was. He has always known who he loves and who loves him. And how fickle it is to seek more from life than that.

Grace Brennan founded the Buy From The Bush campaign. She lives near Warren in western NSW with her family.