May Mundt a Biography

Chapter Two

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts . Winston Churchill. Farming, Cows, Mathematics and Words Wednesday 5 th April 2023. 10 am This morning May woke up feeling restless and sad. She felt weighed down by life, the world, her existence. She reached for her phoned and texted her long term friend from Wynnum. Her words, “Tell me something good. All my friends are dying”, were prompted by one of her friends from the Aged Care Centre being taken to hospital yesterday, possibly never to return. Life is like that when you get to a certain age. But we sat down black tea with two sugars for May, and white tea with no sugar for me and went back to Witta, that suburb in Maleny, in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast. After May left school at the age of 14, she worked 24/7 on the farm. There were no holidays, few breaks. She was her dad’s right hand man”, except she was a woman. A woman who had brains but could not pursue loftier ambitions at school and yet could do a ‘man’s work’ on the farm. Her dad, John Francis, was also known as “Pinky’ due to his tendency to burn at the slightest hint of sun. May’s typical day on the farm began at 5 am with manual milking of the cows. After that, she had to separate the cream from the milk with the use of a Churn. Then it was cleaning up, washing up and inside for breakfast. May’s mother, Violet Florence, was strict and whilst there was no actual education into coping with the emotional aspects of life, she did teach May to cook, wash, clean, iron

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