Shouts From Down Under

Little Boy Lost searching for his Dad

Here is a Once upon a time story that is true, real and fact.

When I was a teenager, my Dad was still shearing sheep, as he'd done for years, especially in the New England ranges of NSW Australia. If you look on a map, find Brisbane, then trace south and west, about a fingernail width into the state of NSW. Find Guyra. Find Warialda. Find Glen Innes.

That's where my Dad drove, from the farm in the Pilliga Scrub, at Coonabarabran where we lived then, up to Glen Innes to shear sheep for a week or two; then he'd drive the 3-4 hours home again, on Friday night.
Mum always worried, but I never did. I knew my Dad would be ok. Kids have that way of thinking. It's all simple to them.

My dad was a shearer, and he shore sheep one day with a young man called Stephen Walls. This young man was once a little boy.

He was lost. A Little Boy Lost.

This story is about a little boy who searched for his Daddy who he said was lost, but that became a matter of perspective.

http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2010/02/07/2812490.htm

Video and song.




Chords, Tabs and Lyrics.

http://aussie.totaltabs.com/tablature/Johnny_Ashcroft/Little_Boy_Lost_Chord_1470...

My dad used to tell us that the boy would hide when planes flew over looking for him. He was a good shearer too, Dad said.

I'd ask my Dad more about the boy, but Dad's away again. He's not shearing this time. He's doing the hard yards in a different struggle. Radiation therapy.

I'm wondering if life is so simple now, and if I could just have the same child like faith as I did back in the late 1970's. Dad's a retired shearer, still a tough cookie, able to handle things life throws at him. Drought. Flood. Bush fire. Burry sheep that resemble pin cushions, except the sharp spines all aim at you.

Government paperwork. Wasps Nests. Electricity Bills.

He could always handle cattle in the stockyards, branding, cranky sow's with litters, doing away with wounded animals when the situation demanded action, caring for mum when she was bed ridden with migraines.

Flat batteries in tractors never bothered Dad when there was a hill to run start it down. (Hmm yes, the grammar can stay the way it is, was and will ever be in the 1970's)

My story about the dog Coke is true, and is a tiny bit of flavour of those times on the farm.

STATIC

The resurrection of Coke  (E) Dad's dog who died. His name was Coke. He lived again. Word count 794 #1932141 by Sparky

If you wonder why the cover pic on this item is an empty garden with a tiny sign saying "beware of the dog" it's because there's no dog. Just a bit of the feeling when something isn't there any more.

But my Dad'll be right. I know it.

He's just lost at the moment. I'll go look for him in my memory.

Post Script. After posting this blog, I was walking back to the car to drive to my parent's home, when I thought of a bit of scripture.

I looked it up, and it's the second epistle of Peter chapter three verse one; the part that came into my head was "stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance"

So, apart from that spiritual meaning and context, in a more ordinary Sparky / today sense, I think it explains or states the effect of nostalgia. I'm not sure on the pure mind bit, but I do get stirred up by way of remembrance.

And the memories are reassuring, as was the verse.

Sparky

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