Picture a pink gum-tree in the corner of a backyard. This is a suburban eucalypt sprouting more green in the lower regions than usual, and a tree-house hammered into the first fork. A stunted tree, but a noteworthy one in our suburb. I live with my wife Hazel and two boys Geoffrey and Mark in a suburb of white fences, lawns and tennis courts. It has its disadvantages. On Sundays drivers persist in cruising past, to peer and comment as we tend our gardens. I wonder what their houses are like. Where do they live? Why do they drive around to see the work done by other citizens? Let me say I am concerned and curious about these things. 

Last Sunday was a day of warm temperature; pure pleasure, really. Tennis sounds filled my ears, and the whine of weekend lawnmowers. There was smoke from burning autumn leaves. I went down to the back of my yard, waited, looked around, and climbed to the tree-house.