Generations united and lifelong bonds forged at St. Joseph’s

Tucked around a table in the back room of Cosmo Café in Bombala, five women – laughing, gently reaching out to one another, sharing tea and slices – are in a world all of their own.

“Do you remember the amazing concerts we used to do?” Jan Farrell asks, her face glowing with joy at the memory.

“We learned how to dance, we got dressed up, we had the most wonderful time. The nuns were so clever with all the artistic stuff!”

“Sr Bernadette would tuck her dress up into her knickers and teach us ballet all up and down the convent,” Kay Adamson adds, as the women around her dissolve into delighted giggles.

“I can still see her dancing down the hall in her ballet shoes.”

Jan and Kay, along with friends Ros Hood, Eily Elliott and Laraine McIntosh, meet every week – sharing lives that have been firmly entwined ever since their days at St Joseph’s primary school.

“I went when I was 8 years old in 1951,” Ros said.

“It was wonderful. I just loved it. I never wanted to leave. We had three sons, and they all went there as well. We were always involved with committee things and fundraising. It went on and on, and we are still doing it. My mum went there too. It has just been a family tradition.”

“I was one of three non-Catholics at the time, which was a big thing back then,” Kay said.

“The nuns were absolutely wonderful. Their main aim was to give us an education and a decent outlook on life. My mother had gone to the same school, just for music, and our two boys went through as well. I didn’t hesitate to send them to the same school. My memories of St Joey’s are terrific, and the boys would say the same. We all had the time of our lives.”

Eily started at St Joseph’s in 1942, when she was just 4 years old.

“When I left, I had completed my intermediate and had certificates for bookkeeping, shorthand and typing. I had done music, and I felt I was very well-educated,” she said.

“I remember school fees were two shillings a week. The nuns were marvellous, and as the other girls said we had concerts and outfits and everything. We had a school choir that sang at Mass every Sunday. There were big 15-year-old boys at school then too, and the little nuns had their work cut out handling them. Sometimes, they would have to go and get the Irish priest to come and bring them back in line!”

Eily said a ball was held each year to raise money for the nuns.

“If you had something to spare at home, you would take it to the nuns,” she said.

“The amount of vegetables children took to the nuns was quite amazing,” Kay agreed.

In Jan’s family, five generations have attended St Joseph’s, from her mum to her own five children and all the way down to her great-granddaughter, a current student.

“We were taught about so much reverence in church, and I remember putting a handkerchief on my head because I wanted to pop in for a visit. We would always get so dressed up – dresses with frills, hats with flowers – because you never knew what fellas were going to be there. It wasn’t all reverence, I suppose,” she says, throwing a cheeky smile at her friends.

“Stations of the cross, benediction, we learned all sorts of things to do with our faith. I just love being a Catholic and everything about Catholicism. It isn’t just these friendships – which are too deep and too wonderful to put into words – but going to St Joey’s for all those years. It is a special place. I owe it all to the nuns and my mother.”

“I’m so proud to call these girls my friends,” Eily agreed softly.

“I don’t have any family here in Bombala, but it is lovely to have this support here. It is lovely to feel secure like that, to know you’re never really on your own.”

Jan reaches out to touch her gently on the shoulder, and the room is filled with warmth.

“There’s no such thing as being lonely when you have friendships like these,” Kay said.

“There is always someone around.”