Old Town

• Madelyn Gardiner, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2014

Right before the Second World War, Doltam was an old and worn, self-sufficient town. While being one of the neighbouring towns of Alice Springs, it wasn’t as well-known as it could have been, and not nearly as quiet as it should have been. From dawn til’ dusk you could hear the birds either singing their sweet old tunes, or screeching em’ up high in the trees.
Locals prided themselves when they produced good crops from their own little backyard veggie patches, (though most backyards were bigger than the actual houses). While the land was harder than diamonds most days, some folks were struck with a generous amount of luck when their soil sprouted abundant amounts of cabbages and other produce.
There were two types of people in Doltam: those who grew fresh and those who bought fresh. My family bought. Though it was a small town, somehow it’d come to be known as a place that everyone wanted to live. If you were a stranger, you wouldn’t be for long. Course, Doltam had its fair share of caution and secrets as well. By day it was a close-knit community, while passing someone on the streets it’d be rude not to remember their name. But at night all bets were off, because no one went out after dark.
People were funny that way. As a kid I’d never understood the seriousness of the situation. Or how one minute everyone could be all smiles and full of laughter and the next they would be turning out the lights and not even making a sound. If I ever tried to speak when this happened, I’d get a mouthful of hand for my troubles.
But when the children were allowed outside to play, the weather always decided to be either blistering hot or bitter cold, never in between. On the days when the air was thick and sticky, the children would climb up into the brown-leafed trees and play in the shade it provided, telling stories in their make-shift treehouses or making up new games that would challenge their skills in stealing sweets. While the children played, the men and women would simply supervise their children from inside their cool homes or tend to their gardens when the rain decided to water them.
When the weather turned frigid, the children would alternate between their warm homes and the cold outside where they could run free. The crisp air did nothing to prevent them from wasting the day. Sometimes when it was an especially cold day, parents would distract their restless children from going outside with treats of fresh cake and biscuits.
Whatever the weather, the days were always long and adults had little to do but work. While the children played, women would busy themselves with minuscule tasks and household chores to chase away the boredom while their husbands worked the long hours.
While most were content with a simple life in Doltam, there were a few, as there always is, who wanted to find their place in the world elsewhere. Sometimes they did. But most always ended up returning back to the comfort of the old and worn town of Doltam that they had known their whole lives.
By Madelyn Gardiner