A Story from Boys to Men

From boys to men
source :BY KERRY WILLIAMSON
Last updated 10:44 22/09/2009

This story isn't so much about the boy, but more about the boy I used to be.The sun will never set on Waitete rugby club

It's also about who I am now.

I just spent the weekend in the place where I really grew up.

It was the first time I'd returned to the ramshackle King Country town of Te Kuiti in close to 15 years. It's the sort of town that most people blink and miss as they drive through on State Highway 1.

But for me, it's much more.

As with most small towns, little had changed. Time moves a little slower there, and sometimes that's a good thing.

My old flat was still standing, above a shop on the main street. The paint was peeling and the old red bricks looked a little worse for wear, but I could feel the memories just by standing outside.

The rugby club was the same too, filled with many of the same old timers talking bull about how the old days were so much better.

It was a good feeling to see the same old faces standing at the leaners, drinking handles of Waikato and talking about when King Country ruled the first division.

Some of my old friends left town long ago, but a few of the best ones are still there. They are all almost the same - a little bigger, a little rounder, each one a little wiser and a lot less wild.

Most of them are family men now - we've all somehow found wives that are too good for us, and kids that happily listen to our stories no matter how many times we tell them.

It's funny to think of how we were back then, young men in our late teens and early 20s, all six foot tall and bullet-proof. And it's surreal to think of how we all are now, settled down with mortgages and children and jobs we're ambivalent about.

Deep down we're all still the same though, just better versions of our young and irresponsible selves.

I was only 18 when I moved out of home, packing my few worldly possessions into the back of my old Nissan Pulsar - the immortal Silver Bullet - and driving south.

I'd been offered a shot at my first real job, a reporter at a small newspaper. I had no idea what I was getting myself into and after just a few days, I wanted to go home.

I boarded with a crazy old lady and her rambunctious German shepherd in an old state house west of the main trunk line. We once ate roadkill when my land lady hit a wild turkey with her Holden Kingswood. The rugby clubFor a kid from Auckland, it was a difficult initiation.

I knew nobody in town, so I joined the local rugby club. I needed to make some friends and as with most small towns, Waitete was Te Kuiti's heart and soul. Still is.

There, I met a front rower who was in a similar situation to me. It's a great friendship that lasts to this day.

Clem found us a pokey little flat and we moved in to 9B Lawlor Street. My bedroom could only fit a single bed and not much else, we had a single bar heater to keep us warm in the lounge, and Clem quickly realised that I was a hopeless flatmate.

I couldn't cook, I rarely cleaned and I never did laundry. Every few weeks Clem would throw all my wet clothes in a black rubbish bag and dump it in my room so I'd get the point.

We were always broke and we spent most of our money on booze. There wasn't much else to do, other than play rugby and drink.

The rugby club became our second home. I still love that place, always will.

On Saturdays we'd arrive there an hour or so before the game, and stay until the early hours of the morning. We'd sing Midnight Special five or six times. On Saturday night we found our old team photos on the wall and laughed at how young we all looked.

I lived in Te Kuiti for close to three years. Me and Clem eventually got a bigger flat on the main drag, which we shared with a rag-tag of other flatties. Then he moved away, and six months later I did the same.

I loved and hated the town. But when I left, I was a very different person than when I arrived. A better person, I'm sure.

I'd been planning on returning for a long time.

Me and Clem rolled into town on Saturday just in time to see the mighty King Country lose to Mid Canterbury. And straight away, I felt like I was home.

The Gellatly boys were there, forearms as big as tree trunks. Our old prop Umu is now the club vice-president. Our mate Snowy now coaches the senior team. Ox, who would have been an All Black but for a crazy jetski accident, is helping out King Country.

Skip and Terry are still knocking about, both in their late 60s and doing rural delivery runs for a bit of beer money. Their ever-patient wives still put up with them.

Meadsy is still on the farm, and the Strachan brothers are still around. Jason Reihana, another of our props, isn't there of course - he's in prison for double murder. But his photo is still on the wall.

We got drunk on $3 handles at the clubrooms and talked about old times. We watched the ABs thrash Aussie, but the next morning we couldn't even remember the score.The trophy cabinet

We wrestled, hassled the crap out of each other, and I got snubbed by someone who I thought was a friend but had held a grudge for 11 years because I once didn't buy a round.

The grudge was news to me and he wouldn't even shake my hand. That's how it is in a small town.

We got back to Eddie's house about two in the morning and cranked up the barbie so we could cook up some sausages and talk some more.

But with Sunday came hangovers and reality.

Clem had to get back to help his lovely wife look after the kids. Eddie had to go pick his son and daughter up from his baby-sitting parents. And I had to get home to the wife and the boy.

In the old days we would have cracked a few more beers, maybe gone back down to the rugby club to help clean up from the night before. But now we're all dads, and things have changed.

Me and Clem left to drive across the Kaimais, and I flew out still feeling a little hazy. I brightened up when I saw the wife and boy at arrivals. It was good to see them - I'd only been gone two days away, but I missed them.

I hope I get the chance to take my boy back to Te Kuiti one day. We'll head down to Waitete and share a leaner with whatever old mates are still in town. We'll head out onto the hallowed turf and have some kicks. I'll show him where I scored a glorious try against Taumarunui.

He'll probably think it's lame, but he'll just have to indulge me. It's an important part of who I am, and that will never change.

Bro Thanks for a great trip down memory lane. We can only hope that there will still be rugby clubs with great culture like Waitete when our boys start playing club rugby, thats if their mothers let them play.

I can smell the sweat and feel the machismo. I recognize the raspiness in your voice from too many beer and cigarettes. I got a lump in my throat, missing hearing your awesome tales!! I hope all three of you are doing well.

p.s. . use to be my old stomming ground to . Memories !! and we lost that cup to the aussies !!! i can just see the boys in the club with the tears falling into their Beers !!

Till we meet again -Regards - edmondsallan