Smelling Death as a Child

Georgie reflects on her lifelong interest in death

The smell of decomposing flesh was not unknown to me as a child.

I (pictured) was brought up on a farm in remote Australia and so it came with the territory. My day might start with decomposing kangaroo, often more than one. My mother was in the habit of dragging their dead carcasses off the highway on the way to school. She felt the endless squashing of their majestic frames by passing road trains was undignified.

Then I’d get to my primary school and sit through Class News. Johnny King would be standing triumphant at the front of the class nursing a clump of bloody rags. “Bet youse’ll never guess what I got?” he’d smugly brag. Before we could answer, he’d be off doing a re-enactment of his fearsome fight with a deadly snake that ended when, “I swung it over me head and bashed its bloody brains out!” Yeah right, we’d yawn, tipping back on our chairs, like we can’t see the tyre marks, idiot.

At lunch time we might crowd around the body of a broken bird that had fallen from its nest, transfixed by the bugs dismantling its small body. We were country kids so we didn’t pull away. The whole death into life thing was pretty familiar to us. When the rains came, our farm would be half under water and when the floodwaters receded the smell of death would fade in and out as you wandered along the river bank. One time I could smell death but couldn’t see it… until I looked up. A dead cow was slung across two branches of a gum tree with a crow pecking its swollen belly. The weirdness of that scene totally trumped any disgust. Life into death into life.

Being comfortable with death

We were also pretty familiar with the inevitability of death. When our mother’s chickens refused to lay eggs, we knew their days were numbered. She took a dim view of laziness. The wounded birds we rescued were also disappointing patients. They were usually goners within a day, despite our suffocating attention. Or, perhaps, because of it. When our mother’s horse took a dreadful fall, we knew how it would end. As she witnessed it thrashing in pain, its leg broken, she whispered in bitter sorrow, “If you ever see me like that, take me down to the home paddock and shoot me”. Which we did. To the horse, I mean, not our mother.

When it came to burying our dead, there were certain protocols to be followed. We’d silently present the stiff bodies of our guinea pigs to our mother who would walk solemnly to her Sewing Room before returning with a suitable ‘coffin’. She was an experienced undertaker given our menagerie of pets. Any ‘client’ needing anything bigger than a shoe box, was wrapped in a shroud. This was usually one of my father’s old cashmere sweaters that were kept especially for this purpose. All except for my mother’s terrier, Rufus. As her favourite companion, he was wrapped in her best silk scarf that carried a gentle whiff of her perfume. I can still see her kneeling down, her face shattered with grief as she gently placed his little, silk wrapped body in his dusty, bush grave. Witnessing a grief so raw made me step back a bit.

A country childhood where death was an everyday event

We also kept our dead close. We had a pretty compelling precedent given the previous owner had buried their child in our garden. I suppose, looking back it was a bit spooky, but we didn’t see it like that. It just meant the garden was a rather like an early version of a Natural Burial Ground. A fair amount of detached consideration had to be given when new trees were planted or flower beds were created. “Didn’t we bury Sam there?” my mother would quiz my father, referring to our long dead half dingo/half Labrador, or “Come back another foot otherwise you’ll hit Waffles,” my favourite guinea pig. Occasionally I would be gripped by the curiosity to dig them back up after a couple of weeks “just to see” but never acted on the impulse. I knew that would cross some societal boundary; I didn’t want my parents thinking they’d raised a psychopath.

One of the great gifts of a country childhood is not the space or the fresh air. It is the fact that from a young age you witness life and death stripped of sentimentality. So when others ask “When did you get so comfortable with death?”, the inclination is to respond, “You’re a city kid aren’t you?”

If you’ve enjoyed this blog and think interest others please do share on social media.