3a and 3b Nairn Street. Probably the first ever photos of me, taken around 57 years ago, were taken on the front verandah of one of these properties. I’m not sure which one, as my grandparents lived in both of them over the years.

They rented these tiny places. Typical workers cottages, small lounge-room at the front, two small bedrooms, a compact dine in kitchen with wavy floorboards and an outside laundry and dunny. What may be the last photos of Nan and Grandad were also taken on the verandah.

Nowadays, I work and socialise in Freo, but I would struggle to afford to live here. I often wander down Nairn Street and pass the old place, on my daily walks, getting out of the office to clear my head, take in the sights, sounds and smells (bloody sheep ships) of the city.

This was the place I spent so many of my childhood Sundays, playing in the tiny back yard with my sister, sometimes my cousins, careful not to cut ourselves on the shards of glass, embedded into the convict built walls separating the yard from potential escapees from the Freo jail and talking to Grandad’s pink and grey galah, “dance cocky, dance”.

After rain, us kids would head next door to the, usually empty, carpark on the corner of Pakenham Street and float “boats” in the puddles. It’s apartments now of course.

Most Sundays included time at the Newcastle or the Esplanade hotel. They were very different pubs in the 70s. At the Esplanade Mum, Dad, Nana and Grandad would enjoy a drink or several, while we pretty much had the run of the place. Sitting out the back on empty kegs or out the front on Paddy Troy’s donated benches “Up the workers Comrades”. We’d sit on those benches with a lemonade and a packet of chips and count the carriages on the freight trains running along the other side of the Esplanade. I’m sure there were more of them back then. To get your Cicerello’s fish and chips, you had to take the long walk up, across and down the raised walkway to get over the train line.

Back in the pub, drinking for the men occurred mostly in the front bar. It was smaller, darker and broodier in there than the lounge bar where the ladies were more likely to be found. The front bar had a pool table, the lounge bar had a juke box. Kung Fu Fighting, Billy Don’t be a Hero, maybe something by Smokey, Suzi Quattro or Dr Hook.

In the evening it would be the short walk back to Nairn Street, to watch the Wonderful World of Disney in the lounge-room, then later we’d sit around the chrome and rose coloured Laminex table in the kitchen and listen to Grandad, several drinks in, crying along to The Green, Green Grass of Home or Take a Letter Maria. These nights would often finish with a little Creme de Menthe. “Can I have a sip Grandad?” “Go on Padla, give ’im a sip. The Pope drinks it”. Thanks Nan.

It wasn’t all beer and skittles, well, not all skittles anyway. Grandad, technically, he and Nan were my step Grandparents, was an old school, tough as nails wharfie, so was his son, my stepdad. They were shaped by the culture of the wharf. It was a place for “real” men, for blokes, for staunch unionists, for smoking, swearing, and outside of work, drinking and fighting as well. The fighting often spilled into the pubs and the homes of those who worked there, and it certainly spilled into the lives of our family.

So, for me, Nairn Street was a lot of things. It was, sometimes a darker place, one of sadness and an undercurrent of anger or fear but mostly, I remember it as a place of fun and laughter, love, characters, and afternoons watching John Wayne films. It was gold and red flocked wallpaper in the hall, Grandad pulling his own tooth with fishing line and a fish hook, and accidentally lodging the hook in my forehead (more trauma). It’s Nan’s sandy, home grown silverbeet, she never quite got all the sand out. It’s the Esplanade hotel, the Newcastle Hotel, the very dingey front bars of the National and Federal hotels and it’s the fish tanks at Cicerello’s.

Now, of course, it’s a vastly different place. It’s no longer a city for “workers” in that old school sense. The wharfies live elsewhere, they probably don’t swear, drink and fight as much as they used to, here’s hoping. Remarkably, most of the pubs are still there but charging $13 for a pint. It was “pony or a middy mate?” in the 70s. Money on the bar, looking down at the beer mat, a penny for your thoughts mate? No chance. Drink it away… and do it quietly.

The new Freo suits me. My life is so far removed from that of my grandparents my parents and my childhood. I work behind a desk, in a shiny office building. I order craft beers, Margaret River wines, tapas (Is it really tapas) and the “feed me menu”, sometimes right next door to the old place, at Strange Company.

Unlike the olds, and I’m in that bracket now but in denial, I am constantly conscious of the history of the city. The devastation wrought on the original inhabitants, the pain inflicted on those transported here against their will, but also the tenacity of those who built this place. I see the disparity in terms of wealth, the trauma on the faces of those who wander our streets or gather in and around the High Street mall and Walyalup Square. What a great decision to replace “King’s” with that ancient name, Walyalup. Kudos to those who championed the change.

I also see the kindness of people in Freo. As I’m in the middle of writing this, waiting for the 532 to arrive outside the markets on South Terrace on a busy Saturday, I witness two police officers approach a woman sleeping in the street. She is clearly living the hardest of lives. They know her by name, they’re gentle, kind and caring as they wake her up to check on her welfare, suggesting she moves further back from the road and the bus stop. She doesn’t talk or comply, instead, she moves closer to the bus stop but she’s not harming anyone, just sleeping, so the police wish her well and move on.

I see the people in venues who offer free food or a coffee to those who need it. And where else do drivers still come to a stop in the middle of a busy street to let pedestrians meander across the road?

I love to witness the excitement of tourists who flock to the city, standing up as the train passes Leighton beach or crosses the soon to be replaced, rail bridge. I love seeing Honkey Tonk on a Wednesday night, packed with 20 and 30 somethings boot scooting to John Denver. I once sang Take me Home Country Road with friends, Father Christmas and everyone else in the place. I was the daggiest kid in the world when I was listening to John Denver in the 70s, now he seems to be cool. Is cool, cool? Either way, I’ll leave the boot scooting to others.

Of course, I’m not blind to reality. The multitude of new venues in the city, that bring the cool, the vibes, and the crowds, are great but there are also the empty shops, and the social challenges. I don’t love every change, every new building but a never changing city is a doomed city so I I’ll embrace the changes I like and live with the ones I don’t. Here’s hoping the right balance can be struck and this great little city by the sea remains the same vibrant, diverse, quirky place that I love.