Point Quobba, Western Australia

Little patterns have settled as we move across the country. I wake first and get coffee, the boys stretch and groan and creep up to where Sandi still lies and crawl in around her. Little patterns. We have sandwiches for lunch and Frank doesn’t have tomato but Eddie does. Little patterns. We do a grocery shop and we each have our own sections (I’m on meats), while Sandi remains as the literal mother ship to which we each orbit as she slowly meanders down each aisle. Little patterns.

Of these, some are expected, extensions of our everyday domesticity. But others are not, including Frank’s obsession with goal posts. Whenever we travel through a town, from small dust caked, two dog hamlets to humming capitals, Frank has his face against the window, eyes wide open, searching for the four toothpick uprights, two tall and two shorter, that make the distinctive shape of a set of Australian Rules football goalposts. If spotted, there are two immediate consequences.

First, a declaration.

‘That’s it,’ he announces ‘I could definitely live in Humpty Doo for the rest of my life.’ Or Darwin or Roper Bar or Halls Creek. Frank could happily ensconce himself in about 30 odd towns around Australia so far.

Second, a request.

‘Dad, can we stop and kick?’

At once, I feel that cold trickle of guilt. I glance quickly at the clock and do some mental arithmetic, which somehow always ends in a poor result for Frank, and with an automatic reflex utter that infamous two-word escape phrase.

‘We’ll see,’ I respond and drive on.

There have been times I have spotted posts and he has not, and I have resisted running an active decoy, somehow finding something fascinating about the bland, light industrial area on the other side of the car. But just as I am formulating the fictional history behind the specialist metal machining and bolt shop, he spots them, declares his plans of living in Mataranka for the rest of his life and pops the question.

Despite the poor conversion rate, he persists and his resolute determination is rewarded occasionally.

We have been running around Carnarvon for several hours shopping, getting water and attending to some minor mechanical issues and are finally heading back to the caravan park. We are hot, tired and in need of a shower when the posts appear. I check in the rear vision mirror and he locks eyes, with a pleading stare that skewers a huge nail with ‘shame’ etched on it side through my heart, so we turn in and fall out of the car.

Eddie and Frank run across the field shrieking in joy as if running on for a grand final, and I walk after. The grass is soft and cool under my bare feet; the breeze ruffles across the field. The zephyrs pick up the boys voices, both of which mimic the tone of excited sports broadcaster as they individually commentate their actions. Currawongs softly gargle in the distance and the town creates a comforting hum as the sun dips.

The boys kick and romp and they give that beautiful gift of capturing a moment, reminding me that life can be caught in a single kick as it soars of your foot and into the sky. You can be anyone, you can do anything!

We stay for longer than the ten minutes I promised agitated and rushed, and I wonder why my response to Frank’s question is often no. All these times he has asked, all those moments he has pleaded, he has actually been trying to give me something that one day I won’t have. I see me in the future, sitting on a chair in a room and with eyes filled with tears, looking at a picture of the boys kicking.

‘Dad,’ they both yell, and I snap back to now just in time to mark a lovely drop punt that has sailed through the posts. The boys’ hug and high five and I laugh and adore without boundary.