WHEN CASH IS NOT PRINCE, LET ALONE KING.

My paternal grandparents were in their 20s when Frank McNamara introduced Diners’ Club International, and Bankcard was around for a long time. Despite this, and the fact that my grandfather was still working when ATMs were introduced, my grandfather, until the day he died, held a Passbook Savings Account and didn’t ever have an ATM card. He lived on a semi-remote property, and town water became available, but my grandfather insisted upon having tank water as he claimed that it was contaminated. Although, when they lived in the village, my grandfather would leave for work early every morning to use the flushing toilet for his ablutions, and the shower, rather than the outdoor thunderbox and a strip wash.

I was their second grandchild, but the first to have the Wynn surname, for obvious reasons, and my brother was their fifth grandchild and the second to take the Wynn surname. I clearly remember my brother’s 12th Birthday. I came home from school on the Friday and had a dermatologist appointment, so I had to have a shower and be ready when my mother arrived home. I checked the mail, as per usual, and there was a letter for my brother from my grandparents. My grandmother swore black and blue that my brother’s birthday was March 8, owing to a typographical error in the newspaper, but it is March 9.

When my brother arrived home from school, having played cricket that afternoon, he was in a dejected mood, and was silent in the car on the way to the appointment. When we arrived home, he opened the envelope and found, to his disappointment, a ten dollar note. When I turned 12, three years earlier, my grandparents sent me a cheque for $12, and by this stage, Australia had moved from the $2 note to the $2 coin, and when he rang my grandparents that night, he was told that my grandmother could only send him $10 because you couldn’t send coins in the post. Just as my brother was about to say, “But, Peter got a cheque,” my mother told him to not say anything.

Many a time, if my grandparents gave me money, for instance $20, for Christmas or a birthday, and my brother a present of lesser value, my mother would make me break the $20 note and give him $10. It’s not that I was greedy, I wasn’t, but I was never allowed to feel like a special grandchild.

There’s the inconvenience of not being able to send cash through the mail, but that’s also an excuse to not be honest with somebody.

Don’t get me wrong, I felt bad for my brother, but he had a lot made of him by my mother, and she was also projecting her feelings towards my grandparents onto me.