Seeing Without Looking

Copyright © 2016 by Phillip Hounslow.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016901709

ISBN:   Hardcover            978-1-5144-4539-6

             Softcover             978-1-5144-4540-2

             eBook                   978-1-5144-4541-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

This book is based on the true life of Phillip and Pamela Hounslow. To protect the rights of those whose paths have crossed the author’s, all characters and some events have been altered, and all names, dates, and places have been changed. All cautions have been take to eliminate all errors in this text because the events recalled were limited to the memory of a blind person. The author is not liable for any degree of inaccuracy in this book. Gender dysphoria and sexual abuse were key factors that influenced the writing of this book.

Rev. date: 03/04/2016

Xlibris

1-800-455-039

www.Xlibris.com.au

720810

CONTENTS

Preface

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1—This Was the Very Moment in Time and Place …

Chapter 2—The Unwanted Christmas Present; Introducing Phillip Junior

Chapter 3—Introducing Pamela

Chapter 4—Early Life

Chapter 5—School: Dread and Despair

Chapter 6—Little Drummer Boy

Chapter 7—Confessions

Chapter 8—Pamela Introduces Working Phillip

Chapter 9—Five Acres

Chapter 10—Moving On

Chapter 11—Music

Chapter 12—Weaving a Career

Chapter 13—Soul Mate

Chapter 14—Better Times Ahead

Chapter 15—Professor Louise Newman

Epilogue

References

This book was written for the glory of God and is dedicated to my darling wife, Mrs. Chicken, who is my soul mate: The more time I spend with you, the more I love you. You have been blessed with real inner beauty. I know we are all sinners with faults, but to me you are perfection personified.

Preface

Recording a life story is always difficult. The need to remember, review, and reflect on the path of long life is made harder when the story is one of trauma and adversity. This book is such an account. Phillip Hounslow has worked to provide an honest and powerful account of his childhood experiences in institutional care and the impact these have had on him. Now in his later years he can think about the past in a different way and tell us much about resilience and the human capacity to survive their experiences.

This is not an easy story to read. No matter how much we now know in an intellectual sense about child abuse and neglect, hearing an individual’s account makes this very real. It is, however, very important for those who can to tell their stories in the hope that we all listen and commit to protecting children from such experiences.

Phillip Hounslow has been able to tell his story, and it is a privilege to those who have known him for many years, as he has shown determination and drive in this recording. The legacy of his account is powerful and benefits us all.

I am very pleased that a portion of royalties from this book will be donated to the Centre for Women’s Mental Health, Royal Women’s Hospital, Melbourne, to support research into the prevention of child abuse and maltreatment

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all the people I have met throughout my life who believed in me and encouraged me to write a book—you know who you are.

I would like to thank Professor Newman for putting her heart and soul into this book.

Also, thanks to Beth Campbell, Angela Griffith, and Charmaine McLeod-Warner for their unwavering assistance in writing and research.

CHAPTER 1

This Was the Very Moment in Time and Place …

Situated on the north side of Sydney NSW was a large old mansion that had been converted into a school for blind boys.

February 1954 was five years later than most non-blind children started their schooling, but it seemed now was the time for me, Phillip Hounslow, to start.

We made our way to the entrance, where two enormous wrought-iron gates swung from two large sandstone pillars. Attached to one pillar was a large letterbox. When we entered, the gates closed, making a clunking noise that was very similar to every slamming gate I had ever heard on any radio serial where prisons were involved. We walked along a pebble driveway that made an interesting crunching noise. On a previous visit for enrolment, I felt this noise could have been used as an ingenious tool to prevent being surprised by somebody creeping up or running away from you while playing. However, this time it told me that it would be the very factor that would alert the people inside of my escape, should I wish to do so.

We were greeted at the door by a young Brother who spoke in an awkward, unnatural sort of way. His responses seemed patronising and barely tolerant of my parents’ questions and presence.

Instead of going into the parlour, we just milled around in a foyer or entrance hall. After a few uncomfortable moments of conversation, I was aware of Dad patting me on the head and Mum kissing me on the cheek, saying something like, I’ll see you Friday.

A second later I heard the wire door close, which seemed to act as an emotional trigger. It felt like an implosion inside me. I was consumed with the urgency to escape. My mind raced with considerations: How many people were between me and the door? There could be more than two. I knew the parlour was on my left, but I could not remember what was to my right. Was there a door or window or avenue of escape behind me? I’d only had a brief and incomplete tour of the place on a previous visit and could not remember much. I was angry with myself for not being more observant. If only I could see! If only I weren’t blind!

Of all the hundreds of questions that have been asked of me as a blind person, not one person has ever asked, When did you realise you were blind? Was it at the very same time that you realised the ramifications and consequences of it?

Perhaps you were the one person who would have asked this question. My answer to you is, This was the very moment in time and place.

It was at this point that my mind seemed to divide into two. One half was organising the escape operation, the other was occupied with the arrival of blindness.

If only I weren’t blind!

I think that was the first time I had mentioned the blind word as relating to me. It kept recurring in my mind, each time bringing an even bigger and worse reality. Blindness was a blank nothing: neither light nor dark, far nor close. This was further reinforced by a lack of knowledge of the existence of anything. It often left me feeling devoid of choice or selection. Blindness makes one feel vulnerable—in danger—with an inability to defend. I had not been warned or prepared about having to spend time in this sighted world, where I might never feel accepted or properly catered for. Thinking about my blindness was like hearing a combination of a dictionary’s definition of being blind mixed with a judge’s death sentence. The thing that stood out for me was the ugly, horrible word blind. So horrible that even some sighted people refused to use it in conversations with you. They would say things like, How long have you been …? Have you always been …? Can you see anything at all? Are you totally …? Sentences would always be stunted or were designed to avoid the use of the word blind.

At this time it occurred to me that perhaps sighted people only perceive things by looking with their eyes, disregarding what is happening in the brain, where it is actually processing the information to be understood or seen. This may be why we use sentences like, I see what you mean, and I will see what I can do, I will see you later, I see that is going to happen," etc. So out of this thinking came the title of this book, Seeing without Looking.

My concentration in the school’s lobby was broken by a voice and a bony hand that held me firmly by the arm. I must have inadvertently been attempting an escape—I was a couple of paces closer to the front door. This was confirmed when I heard the door close (clunk!) and then lock. The hand let go of its grip and my arm fell by my side.

From somewhere above I heard the sickening sound of what I thought was flesh being hit again and again. I had heard of two-storey houses but only in fairy tales like Goldilocks and the Three Bears and Little Red Riding Hood. I was sure they did not exist in real life. Where could this sound be coming from? What was happening and why?

At eight o’clock I hopped into bed and noticed it had a very good quality spring mattress, somewhat better than my lumpy old kapok one at home. With nice starched linen sheets and good quality blankets, it should have made one feel he was in an important and expensive place, but it didn’t. I lay there hypnotising myself, saying, Don’t go to sleep, don’t go to sleep, and don’t go to sleep. As I lay there, a deep, strange, indefinable feeling came over me. My penis was firm and erect. I was compelled to stroke it.

I was in the process of doing this when I received a sharp poke in the chest, and a horrible, creepy voice said, Stop that, you dirty animal. I will deal with you in the morning. The owner of the voice moved six paces away, waited for thirty seconds, and then returned.

Throwing back the bedclothes, he dragged me from the bed, across the floor, and into his room, where he locked the door. He instructed me to stand up and take my pyjama pants down. He took my penis in his hands and manipulated it to the point of ejaculation. I felt moisture on my feet and suspected it was urine. I thought it might be blood and was very worried.

The whole experience had been so horrific, and I felt two conflicting emotions: 1) I had felt physical release causing pleasure; 2) I had been sexually abused and invaded. This coincided with the fact that I was ten years old and on my first day away from home, in a boarding school environment. I was so confused.

What made these assaults even more terrible was the fact that they were done by a man who was an ordained Christian, one who was expected to complete God’s work rather than do terrible things to vulnerable children.

Another example of what soon became a ritual was him burning my penis with a cigarette (or it might have been a lighter). By ritual I mean that this treatment took place once a fortnight or so for six years. He would complete this torture by beating me with an old-fashioned strap.

Sometimes oral sex would occur. I found it hard to come to terms with how something that, under different circumstances, might have given me great pleasure was now something really bad, dirty, and obscene. The Brother always spoke in a horrible sneering, sarcastic, and slimy way, and under these conditions the sound of his voice made the whole experience even worse. When these acts took place, just when we were getting to the point of ejaculation, he would ask me if I enjoyed it. I would try to answer no, but the pleasure was usually too overwhelming, and I would automatically say yes.

Back then, the Catholic religion really frowned on impure thoughts and actions, and having made this admission was the worst thing I could do, for when the act finished he would then give me a strapping for enjoying it. I began to wonder if it was such a good idea to say I had enjoyed it, as admitting to this would always result in a beating.

Experiencing the physical release via ejaculation whilst being subjected to this distress and pain was always disconcerting, and when hearing it had happened to others, I wondered if I should feel sorry for them or be envious and wish it was me.

Sports took up some time after school, starting at three-thirty. Those who did not wish to participate had one alternative, and that was to do homework. I chose the latter. It was during one afternoon while doing this in the classroom that I observed the head Brother showing somebody around. I decided to follow them. The visitor turned out to be a new member of the Ladies Committee, the group that helped run the place financially.

Brother Bugs Bunny was standing with the woman in a large lounge, half of which was a classroom. At one end was an inglenook, four windows, and a fireplace. See, see? he said, flinging some heavy velvet curtains at the window and pushing the window up.

We’re actually on five acres here, he said. It’s very peaceful and quiet. It sounded almost as though he was getting into a real estate agent’s mode, ready for the big kill. Five acres … nice and quiet, beautiful trees and shrubs on the right-hand side over there, backing onto the road; it’s peaceful and quiet. Not that we get much traffic, mind you, but we are on a corner, he said apologetically.

He continued, Beautiful sweeping lawns down to the neighbours. On the left-hand side over there is the oval where the boys play cricket and football and run around. (He forgot to mention the compost heap at the end that we all fell into.) The oval is actually behind those dormitories over there, but you can’t see it. Those dormitories are actually quite new; they’ve been added to the end of the building here. Come, I’ll take you on a tour. Come over this way, he said as he opened one of two glass doors.

He stepped down onto a tiled area and said, This is a classroom. It actually used to be an outside veranda, but since they have put these Louvre windows in [I could hear him opening and closing them several times to emphasise their existence], it’s quite a good little room. It has a door going out onto the garden.

A door out onto the garden—that is the only other door I remember apart from the front door. What use would that be?

He walked through the lounge and the part that was the classroom, through some heavy chenille curtains that hung at the door into the hallway, giving some pretence of privacy from noise and people peering in. I kept a discreet distance behind them and decided that if I was questioned, I would either be playing or claimed I had gotten lost.

That is the parlour there on the left. This is, of course, where we have our card meetings and discussions with you good ladies.

I knew that just on the other side of that was the front door. Straight ahead were three flights of stairs that turned around and came back on themselves. I thought it was risky to get too close to the Brother and his visitor, since being found on the stairs behind them would be difficult to explain, so I waited until they went right to the top. When I was sure they were clear of the stairs I followed.

By the time I got to the top they had moved into a room, and I could hear them talking. I found myself on a long landing. All it had on it were a few doorways going to different rooms and a very large pedal organ. Heaven knows how they ever got that organ up there; it must have been some sort of a miracle from God himself. I admired the intricate carving on the organ and was very careful not to press any keys. I was aware of the fact that time was passing and they would probably come out soon and were bound to see me there. I would have to duck into a doorway and hope they didn’t choose to go into that room.

I made a lucky choice and ducked in to an old-fashioned bathroom. Although it was old–fashioned, it did have an inside toilet, which was more than we had at home anyway. I thought it was unlikely that they would be interested to look in here. My guess was right. I heard them come out and pass the door. They went into another room. As they did, I hid in the room they had come from.

This was the chapel. Wandering around, I recognised the inglenook shape at the front of the altar, which indicated it was directly above the lounge below. It had six pews (with four slightly better quality pews at the back), a nice and proper little altar in the front. The morning sun came in this room, and it was very hot when Mass was said at seven thirty. It was stifling most times of the year.

The landing at the top of the stairs and the position of the chapel made me realise where I was in relation to where I had first come in. I had been standing directly above where I first came in, which meant the belting I had heard must have taken place on the landing or in the chapel. It made me feel sick to think that one wasn’t safe in God’s own chapel. What sort of people were they who would do things to people in God’s home? I witnessed many beltings, which took place in the chapel before or after Mass. Who had been so guilty? Somebody had perhaps drifted off to sleep, or had not been paying attention, or had been fiddling with something.

The Brother and his visitor went back downstairs and I followed. A long passageway downstairs went off into another square room, which was also used as a classroom. On the left was the large dining room I have previously mentioned. On the right-hand side was a very large, old-fashioned kitchen reminiscent of the one on the show Upstairs Downstairs. It even had a coal-fired water heater at the back.

Above this section were numerous tiny funny rooms and hallways. It was quite a challenge to work out what they might have been and what they were now, how they might have originally looked and how they would have been used. The architecture had an awful, sinister quality to it, which in my mind quite appropriately matched the personalities of some of the inhabitants and caretakers.

To the back door and down two steps, we were now on a wide concrete veranda. This was the end of the old building and the commencement of the new one, which had been tacked on. It consisted of the two dormitories and the bedroom.

I descended a couple more steps on the left-hand side and got back to part of the original building. This used to be the garage, and it was at the end of the long gravel driveway previously mentioned. It was boomerang-shaped and made one imagine how in the old days the driver would have left sir or madam at the front veranda and driven the car all the way around here to the garage. It was now tiled and had a glass sliding colonial door where the shutter would have been. This was now a gymnasium. Next to this was a funny little utility room that was used for basket crafts and handicraft work. Part of this was a funny old shower recess, now out of use. It made one wonder where on earth the person came from to have a shower, as it was miles away from the original building.

In the above-mentioned building there was sufficient space to create three classrooms. All rooms had four doors. Two doors of each room entered into a central hallway. This meant many entrances for Brother Evil to hide and wait, springing out at the last moment, surprising the victim. He would usher one into a room, lock the door, and perform his indecent act, which would culminate in the penis being burnt.

I would like to tell about what I felt was the worst—but not the last—sexual abuse. At bedtime he would require one to go to the medicine or linen room where there was an operating type table-cum-ironing board. One would be instructed to lie in the nude on your back on this table, legs spread apart with knees overhanging the end of the bed. He would then come between my legs and place his penis in my mouth. He would stimulate it to the point of ejaculation, which sometimes happened to be completely in my mouth. This displeased him and he would slap my face and say, Why did you not tell me you were ready?

Another disturbing and troubling event took place every fourth Thursday when Brother Evil would set work for us to do at 9:00 a.m. while he went off to entertain the ladies in the committee, the organisation that financially ran the school. He would be there for a few hours, drinking and gambling and smoking with the ladies. From time to time he would come out to check on us.

Alcohol too played a role. The head Brother would entertain the Ladies Committee once a month. Their day would usually begin early, around nine. The head Brother would set us to work while he went off to talk, and more importantly, drink, with the ladies. He would re-emerge some two hours later, slurring and slobbering, taking one of us off to a room somewhere to perform some horrible act in his drunken state. It made the already awful experience even more disgusting.

Having shared my terrible experiences and the abuse, I feel it has somewhat helped lighten my burden in some small way. However, I feel I must quickly move on to a different place and time in my life.

CHAPTER 2

The Unwanted Christmas Present; Introducing Phillip Junior

Monday, the Thirteenth of December 1943

The trams rattled past the hospital, carrying thousands of fans out to the Sydney Cricket Ground to see Don Bradman do his stuff, air-raid sirens permitting. There was a summer breeze blowing through the open window of the un-air-conditioned hospital ward. The breeze blew across the bed and into my lungs, allowing me to take my first breath. It should have