Charlie and Dot Cox are a Lismore couple who have been in love for over 70 years. They are also amazing gardeners and have won many competitions over the years. Denise Alison of Humans of Lismore spent the afternoon over a cuppa chatting to this beautiful couple to bring you this week's Sunday Profile:

Dot - “I was born in Maclean but we came here when I was a baby. I’ve lived in Lismore all my life. On the 2nd April, I’ll be 88. Before I was married I was on the telephone exchange and our home where we lived was where the BWS is now near Central. That used to be houses.

I worked until I married but in those days married women didn’t work. I used to do housework all around the area for other people. If I wanted a washing machine, I’d go and work for it. I worked in Woolworths and Kmart and did all sorts of jobs in between kids. We had a dairy farm too. I met Charlie when I was just 16. I was friends with his sister before we met.”

Charlie - “ I’ll be 89 on 9th July. I was born in Lismore but we lived at Cowlong which is out near Macleans Ridges. I was there till I was 17 then we moved to Tregeagle. Mum and Dad were dairy farmers. I met Dorothy and we got married. We married young on the 19th of November 1950. I was 18 and a bit and Dot was 17. People got married younger back then.

We lived with Mum and Dad for 3 years then rented a house in South Lismore for 3 years before building our own home in Nielsen St, East Lismore. Right up until a few months ago it was a beautiful home and was kept immaculate but now it’s a mess from the people renting it.

Anyway, we only lived there 3 years and we bought the farm in Booerie Creek. We ran the farm for 53 years. We didn’t dairy all that time but we did for many years.” 

Dot - “It was a catch 22 situation where Charlie couldn’t stop home and work the farm until the farm was paying for itself. The farm wouldn’t pay for itself until he could stop home and work it. Charlie was a traveller for Vita Brits and a cigarette brand. He never smoked.” 

Charlie - “We have 3 sons and a daughter. There’s Terry, Christine, Stephen and we lost a little girl when she was 5 months old. Her name was Sharon. After that, we got a little surprise and that was Ron. Our daughter lives at Bowen, one of our son's lives at Stanthorpe. Terry lives at Lagoon Grass and Ron lives at Jiggi.

We have 8 grandkids and 5 great-grandkids ageing from 1 to 22 years old.” 

Dot - “Sharon died from cot death. The doctor said she’s sicked up her milk and more or less drowned from it. I was still breastfeeding her. It was so devastating. The sad thing was we never ever got a photo of her. We didn’t own a camera at that time.

Our friend came out to take photos the Saturday before she died actually and she was sleeping the whole time. Charlie’s mother used to say that baby is a little angel, she’s just too good. My friend said I’ll come out another day and get her while she’s awake so we never got a photo of her.

I loved our farm. We had 2 1/2 acres of garden on the farm and we really loved it but as Charlie said, we couldn’t keep it up. We had divided our farm up and given it to our children. We kept a 4-acre block for ourselves. Anyway, it broke my heart when we had to sell up and I was not happy for a long time but now I’m happy.” 

Charlie - “Once I retired our garden just kept growing. I had a tractor so I could get rocks. In 1997 we won the Champion of Champions Garden of the year. We’ve won a lot of prizes over the years. We bought this house in East Lismore 9 years ago.

When we bought it there was no garden at all. Dot’s just about to plant her veggies.”

Dot - “I always love to have a Spring garden with all the Annuals in it. I think I’ll still try and do that until I cark it. We are getting old but we are still so busy. Next week we are out every day of the week. I have a judges meeting. I retired from garden judging last year but they still invite me as an advisor. Tuesday I’ll be playing cards, Wednesday we are going out. Thursday we have our Lismore Garden Club meeting and Friday we catch up with old neighbours where we used to live.

I used to crochet but my silly old hands shake. They don’t shake or ache (shows me) until I pick up and want to do something. Charlie has to peel the pumpkin for me now. I thought I was getting Parkinson's but they are steady all the other time. 

We travelled around Australia in 1988 for 15 months. The reason we did that was because Charlie got cancer and had to have a kidney removed. We didn’t know how it would go so we both retired, me from Kmart and Charlie from Kirkland's Buses. We didn’t have much money and we weren’t on the pension or any benefits.

We ran out and got jobs picking grapes. We worked for a family called Andrissci. They lived in a little town near Mildura. We ended up picking for them every year for 10 years. Those 15 months were the greatest time. We loved everything and had a wonderful time.

"Both Charlie and I reckon we’ve had a very good life.”

Charlie - “We were never well enough off to travel overseas but we loved the outback. We weren’t interested in going to Sydney or Melbourne so we’d go bush. We did that for years and years. I remember working for Kirkland's driving people with all their suitcases out to the airport, and they’d be going to China or Bali or wherever.

I’d say, have you ever been to Ayers Rock or the Kimberley's and they’d say no. I couldn’t believe all these Australians who’ve never seen their own country.” 

Dot - “It’s magic out there. We were lucky when we did you could still do everything. We are lucky we’ve seen so much of Australia. We used to get frustrated because we couldn’t take a flight over the Kimberley’s or a flight over the Rock so we used to walk it. We did everything.

We would work 6 days and have Saturday off. A group of us workers would go travelling on that day to the wineries and pick up a bottle of plonk and some cheese so through the week we’d have a wine and cheese night. When we were working in Central Australia, we were living in Dongas, pruning and winding the vines on. The weeds were coming up and I’d say what are those weeds Charlie? He didn’t know, they were thick weeds.

They were Marijuana plants sprouting from the seeds of the pickers smoking while they worked. We’ve had some adventures. We’ve been to Tasmania, Norfolk Island and Lord Howe Island and we’ve had a trip to New Zealand. We did 67,000 kilometres on our Australia trip and we reckon we could do that again without crossing our tracks. So much we haven’t seen.

When you have someone good to travel with, it’s fun.

"We are still very much in love.

My friends laugh because I still call him my lover."

When I was young we used to have an autograph book. Somebody wrote in my book, May your life have just enough clouds to make a beautiful sunset. I thought that was lovely and that’s how it’s worked out for us. We’ve had lots of ups and downs and as you can see, we’ve never been rich but we’ve never been poor.

"We have been rich in what matters.”