10 sounds every home made that you’ll never forget

A little while ago, I went back to the house where I grew up and almost everything had changed. The garden was different, the renovations had transformed most of the place and the backyard where I’d spent countless hours playing cricket barely looked the same.

But then I heard it.

The original back flyscreen door was still there, just pimped up a little with a fresh lick of paint and maybe some new screws.

But it made exactly the same bang and spring-loaded rattle I’d heard thousands of times growing up. In a heartbeat, I wasn’t a bloke in my 50s anymore. I was a kid again, bursting outside with a cricket bat under one arm while Mum reminded me for the hundredth time not to slam the door.

It’s funny. We spend years looking through old photo albums hoping to relive our childhood.

Sometimes all it takes is a familiar sound.

How many of these can you still hear?

The bang and rattle of the back flyscreen door

Every Australian home seemed to have one.

It announced someone had gone outside, someone had come home or someone had forgotten to shut it properly… again. Or the dog was bursting out to play with the kids.

Parents pleaded with us not to slam it.

We all did anyway.

The click-click-click of the Hills Hoist

Before you even saw the washing, you heard it.

Click… click… click…

Mum winding the Hills Hoist up another notch before hanging out the sheets.

Not long afterwards, those same sheets became cubby houses, hiding places and race tracks as kids darted between them pretending they were invisible.

Dad trying to start the Victa

Saturday mornings had a soundtrack all of their own.

One pull. Nothing.

Another pull. Still nothing.

Dad would crouch beside the mower, fiddle with the choke, press the primer a few more times, check the fuel, maybe even dip the spark plug in a little  petrol like he was performing open-heart surgery.

Three more determined pulls.

Silence.

Then came the words every Aussie kid remembers…

“You BLOODY BASTARD!”

One final angry yank…

Brrrrrrrrmmmm! And the Victa burst into life in a cloud of blue smoke and the smell of two-stroke fuel drifted across the neighbourhood.

Saturday had officially started.

Cicadas on a scorching summer afternoon

The hotter the day became, the louder they seemed.

That deafening chorus meant school holidays, bare feet, burnt lawns, cricket, icy poles and trying to stay outside until Mum finally called you in.

You don’t just hear cicadas, you feel summer.

The sprinkler ticking across the lawn

Tick…

Tick…

Tick…

Every sweep across the grass was another invitation to run through it.

Nobody worried about wasting water and it was simply the cheapest water park in Australia.

The crack of a tennis ball off the middle of the bat

No leather ball required.

One clean crack and suddenly every kid nearby wanted to join in.

The rules changed from one backyard to the next, but “one-hand one-bounce” and “over the fence was six and out” were almost sacred.

The neighbour’s windows, however, were always in danger.

“Diiiiinnnnnneeeerrrr!”

Long before mobile phones, Australian mums had the most effective communication system ever invented.

She’d step onto the back step, cup her hands around her mouth and call…

“Diiiiinnnnnneeeerrrr!”

The first call was your warning, the second was your last chance and if she got to a third, you knew you’d pushed your luck.

Somehow, her voice could travel further than modern technology.

The music of the Mr Whippy van

You always heard it before you saw it.

That familiar tune drifted through the neighbourhood and every kid instantly stopped what they were doing.

The race to the house began.

“Mum… can I have 50 cents?”

Sometimes the answer was yes.

More often it was, “There’s ice cream in the freezer.”

The whistle of the kettle

Morning tea.

Afternoon tea.

Unexpected visitors.

The kettle seemed to whistle all day long.

It was usually followed by one simple question, “Who wants a cuppa?”

The answer was almost always everyone.

Kookaburras laughing as the sun went down

As another summer day came to an end, the birds took over.

Kookaburras laughed, the magpies warbled, and the air finally cooled. It was nature’s way of saying another Australian day was almost done.

Some sounds never leave you.

Honourable mentions…

Australia is a big country, and every region had its own soundtrack.

If you grew up near the coast, you might remember waves crashing in the distance, seagulls arguing over hot chips or yacht rigging clanging against masts on a windy afternoon.

If home was Far North Queensland or Darwin, perhaps it was cane toads croaking after summer rain, geckos chirping on the walls at night, palm fronds clattering in the breeze or tropical downpours hammering the roof so loudly conversation had to stop.

Country kids probably remember tractors rumbling to life before sunrise, cows calling across the paddocks, sheep bleating, cockatoos screeching overhead or rain drumming on a corrugated iron roof.

And wherever you grew up, chances are there’s one sound we’ve missed. Maybe it was the milk bottles clinking on the front step, the clunk of the letterbox, or the ABC news theme at 7pm, or even Dad whistling for the dog (or the kids…. or your mum).

In closing…

Photographs help us remember what things looked like.

But sounds? They have a way of taking us back.

Back to bare feet on hot concrete.

Or backyard cricket.

Back to Mum calling everyone in for dinner. Or back to a time that somehow feels both a lifetime ago… and only yesterday.