Leaping into the unknown

 

No Opera House or high-rise office towers in 1960!

 In Ingmar Bergman's marvellous cinematic performance of Mozart's Magic Flute, Tamino and Pamina set off hand in hand to undergo the unknown perils of their ordeal. Wendy and I felt rather like those two young lovers when we left the comfort and security of the doctor's home in Mile End. We were so reckless! We had no idea what would become of us, and it could have ended in catastrophe. In 1960 we lived in Sydney on my slender savings, and although I worried about our current situation and uncertain future, Rebecca and David were at delightful stages of development and we all had great fun getting to know the beautiful city of Sydney.

 Between weekends of family fun exploring Sydney, I worked very hard, mainly self-directed learning (the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at the University of Sydney was intellectually uninspiring).  I learned everything in the curriculum and a great deal more, especially in behavioural and social sciences.. I began also to explore psychiatry, a journey of discovery that in the end went on for about 25 years and in some respects has never ended. I was closing a major skill gap I had become acutely aware of when I was a family physician. I'll discuss this further in a future post. I studied in the well stocked library of the School of Public Health, and at our rented cottage, 93 Rainbow Street Randwick, by day in the sun room over Wendy's shoulder in this photo of the family at our front gate one morning as I set off for the university.  I did well academically and before the end of the year I was awarded a traveling scholarship - with a stipend and travel funds intended for a single man - to spend a year with Jerry Morris, the eminent epidemiologist who directed the MRC Social Medicine Research Unit in London.


Playing on Sydney beaches was more fun than the sand pit


The year in Sydney in 1960 gave me a good opportunity to widen my professional networks among public health specialists, mostly working for the Commonwealth Department of Health or the NSW Health Department, and occasional overseas visitors from the UK, the USA, Japan and elsewhere. I met and got on very well with Ron Winton, editor of the Medical Journal of Australia, wrote reviews and editorials for him, and through him met Sir Theodore ("Robbie") Fox, the eminent editor of Lancet.  I wrote occasional reviews and "Annotations" for the Lancet - brief commentaries that appeared in those days on the editorial pages. Later when I wrote my first important original epidemiological paper, "The Iceberg: 'Completing the Clinical Picture' in General Practice," it's possible that Robbie Fox gave it more of his personal attention than he might have done if we hadn't already met and clicked into the same intellectual wavelength. All things considered, 1960 was a most productive year, a credible launching pad for my new career. Equally important, Wendy and I proved to each other that we worked very well together. She especially and emphatically demonstrated what a tower of strength she was beside me, how cheerfully she could make do with very limited resources.  That year, 1960, was also when we "adopted" a wonderful latchkey kid, Kerry Edwards, then about 8 or 9, who attached herself to us each afternoon, rather than hanging around alone after school until her mother came home. Kerry became our lifelong friend. Our reckless leap into the unknown had so far turned out well, much better than we had any right to expect.  

David climbing the ladder to the slippery-slide in the park opposite our cottage, steadied by Kerry's arm, just after climbing unaided to the top, and falling with a splosh into the soft sand below; when that happened, he blinked, didn't cry, and set off immediately up the ladder again.

Kerry Edwards with Rebecca and David, Maroubra Beach, Sydney