“Too often I wasn’t there. I missed a lot but I had a job to do. And you will have your jobs to do and you will make your choices and live with your regrets.”
Listen to those words. Each night I would drive past the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney, wind down my window and yell those same words.The Garru were Dad’s father and his grandfather. They spoke to him in our language and they told him it wasn’t his time. There was more he had to do.My father – your Pop – was in the neurology ward, he had lost his speech and his movement. He had taken a heavy fall and suffered a severe brain trauma. The bleeding had formed a clot.
Pop has got scars all over his body: scars of survival. Scars from the boxing tents; scars from the sawmills; scars from the coppers. Then there are scars we don’t see; scars he keeps hidden. Scars of the soul that don’t heal. Your Pop is scarred from Australia. “You don’t know what it is like to be hungry, or to watch your mother go to the charities and ask for help,for food. I’m glad you don’t have my memories. And I’m glad I don’t have my dad’s memories.”Your Pop has given you the most wonderful gift. He has given you our language. Because of him, Wiradjuri is protected and preserved forever. He’s written it all down in the Wiradjuri dictionary. A whole generation of people speak our language now because your Pop saved it.
Remember how I told you about the land? You would look at the rocks and the hills. I told you how the land dipped into a valley and rose on the other side: that side was home. You watched how the sun hit the trees and how the earth flattened out and how creeks cut across it like blood veins.
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