Between the golf course’s pine trees, I could see the vast trotting track complex. I thought about what had happened over there. For me it was never about horses — trotting, cantering or otherwise. I continued to run along the fairway.
The trots used to happen on Tuesday nights. Officially, it was a harness racing club, although everyone called it the trots. It was a significant industry for Kapunda, and I remember going there with Dad when I was in primary school. He worked behind the bar. It was run by George Hutton, the Sir John Franklin hotel publican.
I knew the four Hutton boys and played cricket with the blonde twins. With his deceptive swing bowling, Craig took a hat trick one afternoon at Lyndoch. George’s mountainous frame and fierce face always encouraged my best manners and best attempts at invisibility.
A roller-skating disco happened one Friday night on the asphalt inside the betting ring. It was the winter of 1979. Lots of kids were there. I had never put on a pair of skates — roller, ice or otherwise. Mum dropped me off in the green Ford Falcon. The DJ was moustachioed Tarlee farmer, Tony Clarke.
For me roller-skating was staggering about going clunk, clunk, clunk and lunging desperately for the safe harbour of a pole or bookie’s stall. I had no idea how to start and less idea how to stop. I was not alone. I spent most of the night instigating or receiving collisions.
There was a game of spin the bottle. I won. Arms flailing like a drowning man, I wobbled over to Tony Clarke and his turntables to collect my prize. The fifteen minutes which followed were a highlight of my brief life. I instantly found a minor celebrity — at least among Kapunda High kids.
Yes, dear reader, I had won Racey’s new single Some Girls. You know, the UK pop band. That’s right. It was their follow-up to Lay Your Love On Me. I think my fame lasted longer than Racey’s despite lyrics like these:
Some girls will
Some girls won’t
Some girls need a lot of loving
And, uh, some girls don’t.
Waiting in the carpark to be collected, the black vinyl single was handed around like a diamond. Year 9 and even Year 10 girls I would normally never dare speak to were impressed, saying things like, ‘You’re so lucky’, ‘This is really cool,’ and ‘How fantastic are you?’ Actually, I made the last one up. But I was sure this record would change my life.
Sliding into the green Ford Falcon a few minutes later, my fame dissolved into the night sky above the trotting track.
*
In the misty morning, I slip back through the golf club fence and pause by the footy clubrooms. Although I know what’s behind the windows, I gaze through them, before finding a veranda bench.
Footy clubrooms are about so much more than footy. They enter our lives through the game, but over time they become places for so much more. For many, they’ve become a kind of church. I wondered about the equivalent buildings in other countries. Village halls, school gymnasiums, even pubs.
I remembered my cousin Boogly’s 21st one July evening, and driving back from the West Coast for Paul O’Reilley’s, too. There were others.
At Boogly’s there was a table by the door groaning with cards and gifts. Lots of wine and spirits bottles. I was inspecting them when somebody pointed at a small plastic item and smirked, ‘I got him this.’ Boogly was on a government-initiated sabbatical from driving but would soon be back behind the wheel. Giggling, I replied, ‘That’s funny.’ The gift in question was a set of plastic P plates.
Paul and Sharee White’s wedding reception was held there in the early 1990s. Driving home on Sunday, I remember going through Yacka and despairing that I still had over four hundred kilometres to go. Maybe that final glass of shiraz was a mistake. I nearly had a yak in Yacka.
The oval was still deserted although the rain had ceased. Looking up to the trotting track with its vast bumpy interior, a succession of jumps had been set up for the Horses in Action. This was the second day of the Kapunda Show.
In June I had gone to the footy club for the funeral of my dear Uncle Des Ryan. Trucks were a big part of his life, and they were on this day too. We all stood outside watching and listening as a prime mover slowly rumbled off for his final drive.
There were speeches and stories that made us laugh and cry. Cousins I hadn’t seen in years were there. Hands were shaken and hugs were offered. It was a funeral, of course. It was also a reunion.
*
When Claire and I planned our wedding reception the only choice was the Kapunda Football Club. We spent the Friday organising fairy lights and table decorations. As the wind picked up, we wondered how the ceremony weather might go on the Kapunda High School lawns. Saturday was blustery and there was early, slashing rain.
After the photos, Claire and I arrived at the footy club around dusk. I remember the welcoming cheer not for its volume but rather the enveloping warmth and triumph. There was music and dancing, speeches and pizza. The clubrooms were largely as I remembered them as a little kid. I was glad they hadn’t changed much.
Ours was a wedding reception many decades in the making. From the moment we met at thirteen during a Kapunda Primary School fete. Claire’s speech was exquisite. It concluded:
Michael Craig Randall, whether it was as young sweethearts, or as the best of friends, I have loved you. But we just had to wait. And we waited well. With faith, love and grace in our hearts.
Dutton Park was the theatre of so much of my young life, my Kapunda life. It had borne quiet witness to our unfolding lives. In its caring, if sometimes rowdy way, the village had done its duty. I smiled at all of this. It was great to be home.
Standing up from the bench, I glanced one last time at the distant scoreboard and jogged back to our sleeping cabin.
If you missed part one, here it is! https://mickeytales.com/2026/11/08/dutton-park-at-dawn/
