Author's note: This was going to be a short story between my series of Hillsman series.
This is the first story that I've written that hasn't been seeded by a dream. I had to think about this whilst awake although one could say that it has come to me in a daydream. I guess you could call it a forced fiction.
It was only going to be one short story but my mind went overtime as it developed. I'll publish more chapters if you like. Please let me know if you'd like to read more of this story.
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Was this the right career choice? I don't know. I was one of three women out of 180 students studying for a Bachelor of Surveying degree. That was in the first year. In the second year, I became the only woman, out of a 150 students, studying surveying and as time went on, the number of students dwindled to eighty who graduated. The other women went on to study Marine Science. Maybe that's what I should have done. It's not easy being the only woman in a male dominated profession.
The idea of spending half my time in the field and half my time in the office was appealing. However, I didn't realise that I couldn't choose those periods and ended up spending some time in the field in the freezing cold, penetrating gusty winds or drying heat waves. Oh well, I was going to be a professional so that should be rewarding, until I found out that surveying was the lowest paid profession in the world. Of course prostitution was the highest paid profession but I didn't want to do that. I wanted to choose who I had sex with.
I, of course, had many suitors. At least eighty of them, but none seemed genuine boyfriend material. They all seemed eager to fuck the one woman surveyor and add that to their curriculum vitae. There were some nice men in my classes but they weren't what I was looking for. Most were married or had a girlfriend.
There was one surveying student who seemed nice. He was caring and polite. I tried to date him but it turned out he was a closet gay. I hoped that I didn't make him that way. We were friends: discussing assignments, having lunch together, discussing men's bodies. My being with him kept the creeps from pestering me and helped his closet gayness closed off from prying gay haters.
Year three was the biggest challenge. I had to spend at least six months with a surveyor mentor and then write a five-hundred page report about that experience. Finding someone to take on a woman surveying student was hard. The University placed every other student except for me, until the last moment when I had to head out to a small town working for the state government's, road building department.
I thought that it would be a good experience. I wasn't prepared for the misogynistic behaviour of my fellow work, so-called, mates.
Hugh, the surveyor that became my mentor, was well behaved but I couldn't help thinking that he felt burdened by having to tread lightly around the issues of gender differences. It was mostly okay: one field-hand, Ian, was over chivalrous. He tried to do everything for me. It was... cute... at first, but then it became irritating. Ian wasn't very smart and I ended up telling him to just let me do it and for him to get on with what he was supposed to do.
The other field-hand, Kell, was downright belligerent. He would make comments, not directly to me but to Ian, that a woman couldn't do something or, if she could, she couldn't do it as well as a man. Of course, that made me want to prove him wrong so I worked hard to do 'men's work'.
Hugh made the field-hands behave but then I became 'teacher's pet' and the snide remarks from Kell became more aggressive and hidden from Hugh. Kell insisted that I should help with clearing the blackberry bushes, 'because a woman can do what a man could do', and I did. I didn't mind hard work. I did mind the comments about my breasts getting in the way as I swung the brush hook, even though I'm a B cup and my breasts were in no way in the way.
It wasn't all bad. It was fantastic working in the open, country air: no pollution, crisp cool mornings, fantastic nature -- although, the snakes weren't very nice -- and beautiful views.
I think that Hugh was surprised at how well I used the theodolite. Miscloses were limited to less than a very respectable two millimetres and I was quick to read the vertical and horizontal circle, and distance values. I was very observant and found old pegs, lockspits, reference tree-holes and drill-holes.
I learnt a lot about finding very old peg-holes, et cetera. The use of eight-gauge, fencing wire to define peg-holes was fun but using urine to find soil differentiation wasn't. I had to walk a kilometre back to the truck to get my water bottle and by the time I walked the kilometre back again, Kell had pissed on the ground and found the rotted out peg.
One Saturday, I had a barbecue lunch with Hugh's family. Emily, Hugh's wife, was a lovely lady, although she was burdened by a toddler and an ankle-biter who's names I can't remember. Emily asked me, as she was calming the youngest and out of Hugh's hearing, "What do you think of Kell?"
I sucked in my breath, wondering if I should tell the truth.
When I hesitated to answer, Emily said "I find him a misogynistic, arrogant, belligerent prick, but that's just me."
I agreed with her but said "He's manageable."
Emily laughed and then said "Don't tell Hugh what I said. He sticks up for his team members, no matter how horrible they are. I suppose he has to work with them."
I then wondered if Hugh had to put up with me?
I observed Hugh's, apparently, happy family. I decided that motherhood wasn't for me, well at this stage of my life, anyway.
I finished my work with Hugh and the others, handed in my report, received a credit for it and passed my surveying course. Mum and dad made a detour, from their big caravanning lap around Australia, and came to Sydney for my graduation. It was one of my proudest moments and I was sure that my parents were also proud of me.
Getting a surveying job, even with a degree, was difficult, to say the least. I managed to get a job as a field-hand [a surveyor's helper] in another outback town. It was one of the state's, road building, divisional offices so there were more people but I was still the only woman in a man's field.
The only other woman in the office was the receptionist. She was nice but a bit too feminine for my liking. She wanted to go shopping or have a spar day, which wasn't my thing. I'd prefer to go bush walking or have a barbeque. I was probably influenced by my tom-girl childhood.
Again, there were a lot of potential suitors but I didn't want to get a reputation as the office bike, so I stuck to the social events with many people rather than dates with individuals.
There was one draftsman that... well... we fucked, to put it bluntly. We became friendly at social gatherings and we then went to movies, had dinners and did other things that people do on dates. He seemed nice until I found out that he was bragging at how he nailed me. For some reason he didn't understand why I dumped him.
I rented a small flat on the third storey of a small unit complex, there were no big developments in a small town. It was clean; well insulated; well ventilated, I preferred to have the windows opened when the weather wasn't too extreme; the air-conditioning worked well and the rent was reasonable. My next door neighbour, next to the stairs, was a typical red-necked jock. On Friday nights he watched the football at full volume, both the telly and his cheering.
~~~
It was a few weeks before I met my neighbour on the other side. She was petite and nice. We bumped into each other as I was returning from putting the rubbish in the skip.
"Hi." she said, as she walked past me while I was unlocking my door.
"Hi." I answered.
I watched her unlock her door and I said "My name's Jessica or Jess, is easier to say." -- Australians always seemed to shorten people's names unless they were single syllable names, in which case, a 'y' or an 'o' was added to the name -- "Apparently we're neighbours."
She looked at me, smiled and said "Yes. I've seen you around. My name is Stacy."
We shook hands. Just then there was a shout from my other next-door neighbour's flat. I groaned.
Stacy said "I know it's not nice to point this out but I'm glad that he's next to you rather than me."
I laughed and said "Yep, I bet you are."
Stacy pursed her lips and said "Look, if he gets too boisterous come over to my place. I can only hear him when a goal is scored, or whatever getting points is called in those sports."
I instantly liked Stacy. She obviously had as much interest in sport as I did. I liked playing sport but I didn't like watching it and any type of thugby just looked like an excuse for men to legally hurt each other. Of course, not following sport was very un-Australian, but I'd developed thick skin over time and didn't care what others thought of me. I said "I'll keep that in mind. Bye."
"Bye." answered Stacy and we entered our respective units.
~~~
It must have been a grand final or some other big game. My next-door neighbour roared at irregular intervals and I was getting annoyed. I slipped on my shorts and a tank top -- I wasn't dressing for a good look. I stormed out of my unit and stared at my neighbour's door. He had probably been drinking. He might get upset if I said anything to him. He could even hit me. I calmed down. I turned to enter my unit -- the games only lasted an hour or two -- and then I remembered Stacy.
I grabbed a recently opened Coolibah cask and walked to Stacy's door. Should I knock? Maybe I should go for a walk. No, there could be some revellers or, worse, supporters of the losing team who might wish to take out their frustrations on me.
I knocked on Stacy's door. I waited. I was just about to knock again when the door opened. Stacy was wearing a fluffy, white, terry towelling, dressing gown. She said "Hi... um..."
I was about to remind her of my name when she said "Jess."
