Novelist Fiona McCallum writes about a deeply personal journey in her book The Long Road Home
Acclaimed novelist Fiona McCallum dives into the impact of expectation and gender roles for men and women in a deeply personal new book.
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I was born near the end of 1970 at a time when the roles of men and women were still quite separate — certainly in the rural area of South Australia I grew up in.
I understood from the outset that being born female meant my future lay in becoming a wife and a mother and that farmers’ sons would follow in the footsteps of their fathers and grandfathers and eventually take over the family farming enterprise.
I was also raised to not question the way things were.
I have a brother, so while we were both treated equally in being taught the jobs of the farm growing up and required to contribute similarly, running the farm wouldn’t be for me, no matter how much I might want to.
My brother didn’t work well with my father so left to work elsewhere. If my father hadn’t died a couple of years later, when I was nineteen, I like to think I might have had a chance to take over instead of my brother …
These are the kinds of issues faced by the two main characters in my new novel The Long Road Home. Alice would have loved to take over the family business, but instead she’s increasingly estranged, making a new life far away from her country town home. Rick, Alice’s ex-husband, has never felt at home as a farmer, but feels the obligation to continue his family’s farming legacy.
Like Alice, I married a farmer and hoped we’d work shoulder to shoulder on the land. And we did, but only to a point. Just as in a lot of industries and businesses, even to this day, as a woman I was considered knowledgeable and useful enough to work hard, but not to take charge or make any major decisions.
As both a relative outsider, due to my gender, and part of the inner sanctum, as a worker, I saw a lot of young — and not so young — male farmers like Rick withering under the pressure of also not having true autonomy thanks to overbearing fathers and grandfathers insisting on doing things a certain way. While unhappy, these men were also unwilling to leave due to the promise of one day taking over; that their time will come. They didn’t want to have cashed in their chips too early.
And in a place where everyone knows everyone and their business, there’s also the looming weight of a fear of what people will think — having a son leave would create gossip and bring shame to their family in the eyes of the wider tight-knit community.
It’s not just men on the land who feel the pressure of societal expectation around the gender role they were born into. Pride and fear of disappointment and change keep a lot of people in circumstances they might otherwise leave. Many in our cities and towns are stuck in jobs they don’t necessarily find fulfilling in order to uphold their self-respect, the ideals of society as the breadwinner and also to avoid the stigma attached to having a female wife or partner who earns more.
When my marriage ended and I was branded a failure and an embarrassment by my family, their disappointment was a burden so heavy it took me to the brink of suicide.
Apparently not having children means I’m also considered by many in the wider community to be a failure as a woman too. I’ve experienced shocked looks and utterances of consternation akin to saying “How dare you?” and plenty of patronising clucking, stopping just short of, “Oh, you poor thing.” I’ve even been told, more than once, that I’m selfish for not providing my mother with grandchildren!
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In The Long Road Home, the happiness and emotional wellbeing of Alice and Rick rely on them discovering who they really are at heart, what they truly want out of life and choosing a satisfying way forward — even if it means ultimately going against their upbringings.
It’s my own journey. I learnt the hard way that contentment comes from within and that trying to live up to the expectations of others is a recipe for misery. Through my fiction I hope to inspire others to find the same courage I did.
The Long Road Home by Fiona McCallum ($32.99 RRP) is published by HarperCollins and is now available in paperback, e-book and audio.
STRONG WOMEN, TOUGH CHOICES
Our book of the month for April is Leah Swann’s Sheerwater — a stunning novel placing a mother in an impossible situation when her sons go missing as she flees an abusive relationship.
You can get it for 30 per cent discount at Booktopia with code SHEERWATER.
And please join the Sunday Book Club group on Facebook to discuss both these and more with like-minded lovers of great reads.
Originally published as Novelist Fiona McCallum writes about a deeply personal journey in her book The Long Road Home
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