Frozen… Friday Fictioneers: 8th December, 2023.

“How could I even attempt to walk in their shoes? While I’d always thought myself a good shoulder to lean on and capable of great compassion, their suffering was so far beyond comprehension, that I was frozen to the core. Every pair of shoes had been worn day in day out not by a religion or a creed, but by a living, breathing human being deeply loved. In this preserved farmhouse near Kraków, a Jewish family was slaughtered by heartless hate. Their boots are all that remain. How could I ever understand, when I’m only someone looking back at history?!”

…

100 words PHOTO PROMPT © Ted Strutz

This week I stepped very much into Rochelle’s territory as the prompt reminded me of piles of shoes I’d heard about in the concentration camps…horrific. Ever since we studied “To Kill A Mockingbird” at school, I have loved and lived by this wonderful quote:

“You never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them.”

— Harper Lee

However, some things are just too horrific to comprehend and perhaps we can’t ever really step into someone else’s shoes, but we still need to keep trying. There’s a memorial beside the River Danube in Hungary has 60 pairs of shoes representing Hungarian Jews who, in the winter of 1944-1945, were shot on the banks of the Danube River by the members of the Arrow Cross Party:  https://www.yadvashem.org/articles/general/shoes-on-the-danube-promenade.html

I also recently listened to an interview with William Waller, a holocaust survivor who concealed his Jewish identity and managed to survive, although he was still sent to Auschwitz but managed to survive. He ended up moving to Melbourne where he became friends with my friend’s father who had been a Polish bomber pilot in the RAF during WWII. They were both high up in the textile industry in Melbourne, and after my friend’s dad had a heart attack it was Bill who used to go walking with him to help him out. Roland’s father was Catholic, but his uncle had been a partisan and maybe helped Jewish people escape I’m not sure. Apparently, members of their family died in Auschwitz. Anyway, here’s a link to Bill’s story and I highly recommend listening to it.

Anyway, if you’d like to read more of our stories or even write one of your own, please join us at Friday Fictioneers hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields,

Best wishes,

Rowena

Natural Justice…Friday Fictioneers

As far as George Bates was concerned, “the only good Indian was a dead Indian”. Yet, his wife was always nagging him with the words of that blasted do-gooder, Atticus, from To Kill A Mocking Bird:”You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”

That was how he found himself spending a week out in Cherokee territory, sleeping in a tee pee and mingling with their people.

However, George was a slow learner. Had to be taught a lesson instead.

….

99 Words

As an Australian who has never been to America, I found it difficult to grapple with the Native American theme in this week’s prompt. From where I sit, it seems that Native Americans are largely invisible and it’s very rare that you see Native Americans on TV or discussed as part of  the political process. This has concerned me for some time and aroused my curiosity. I had to do a fair amount of reading tonight before these ideas started peculating through. I was quite shocked to read that “the only good Indian was a dead Indian” is line from Laura inglus Wilder’s  Little House on the Prairie.

I read in Wikipaedia:

“An important moment concerning Wilder’s depiction of Native Americans occurred in 1998, when an eight year old girl read Little House on the Prairie in her elementary school class. The novel contains the line, “The only good Indian is a dead Indian”; and this caused the girl great distress. Her mother, Waziyatawin Angela Cavender Wilson, a member of the Wahpetunwan Dakota nation, challenged the school on its use of the book in the classroom.^[15] This prompted the American Library Association to investigate and ultimately change the name of the Wilder Award, an award named after Laura Ingalls Wilder, to the Children’s Literature Legacy Award.^[15] This award is given to books that have made a large impact on children’s literature in America.^[16]”

I knew none of this before so feel I’ve learned quite a lot tonight.

This has been another contribution to Friday Fictioneers hosted by Rochelle Wishoff-Fields, where we write up to 100 words to a provided photo prompt. PHOTO PROMPT © Renee Heath.

Best wishes,

Rowena

Walking Through Christina’s World…A-Z Challenge.

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

As you might be aware, I’m currently taking part in the Blogging A-Z April Challenge, and my theme is Writing Letters to Dead Artists. Yesterday, I wrote to American artist, Andrew Newell Wyeth regarding his iconic masterpiece, Christina’s World.

What I discovered, has been a Eureka Moment. Indeed, I’ve not only jumped out of the bathtub, but also leaped out of my skin. You see, I live with a muscle wasting disease called dermatomyositis, and a complication which causes fibrosis in my lungs, leaving me short of breath and prone to infection. My situation is extremely rare and even world-wide, there are only a handful of people who walk in my shoes. So, it’s also equally difficult to meet anyone who gets my situation from the inside out, without having some kind of medical training. Clearly, this isn’t something you can bond over with a stranger at the bus stop.

Andrew Wyeth, Christina’s World

However, then I stumbled across Christina’s World. Not only is there the connection with Christina and her muscle weakness, but very late last night, I found out Andrew Wyeth experienced a chronic lung condition. What the??? I was absolutely gobsmacked!  Somehow this painting had brought about this very intense cosmic fusion between artist, subject and observer. I’m not even going to estimate the chances of this happening. They’re so infinitesimal, that you’d need a microscope to find them.

So, clearly you could understand why I was so excited about finding this work of art. It was like I’ve been travelling along the road less travelled forever, and suddenly meeting  two fellow travellers, and having someone to walk with. Not that I’ve been alone, but you get my drift.

That’s why I’ve come back to Andrew Wyeth today. While the whole point of this challenge is to visit a new artist every day, I felt this connection deserved so much more than a fleeting, one-off letter exchange. That the three of us needed to sit out on Christina Olsen’s front step, or which ever step it was, and chat. Or, simply inhale and exhale the same air, and not even say a word.  Me being me, I’d have to add a sunset. I’m not sure whether we’d be facing the sunset in real life, but sharing a Ginger Beer with two dead people is hardly what I’d call “living in the real world”. So, I can paint the sky any way I please, even neon if I get the urge. Well, that is, unless some of these Wyeths feel like giving me some painting lessons, or doing the job for me.

However, while we shared these struggles, we also shared our strengths. None of us were victims, who let circumstances chew us up and spit us out. Rather, we are survivors, battlers to the very end.

Despite her great mobility difficulties, Christina was out in the field picking blueberries and getting herself around without a wheelchair. She wasn’t sitting on the porch waiting to die.

As a young boy, Andrew Wyeth was frail and too unwell to go to school. However, encouraged and taught by his illustrator father and brought into his wider circle, he painted and mastered his craft trying various techniques until he found his own voice in egg tempera. Yet, his lung deteriorated further.  In 1951, he had major surgery to remove a portion of his lung. He survived two near death experiences, and they even had to cut through muscles in his painting arm. This would’ve devastated many. Wiped them out. Yet, within a matter of weeks, Wyeth was back at work again. Indeed,  Trodden Weed (featured image) was completed in March and if you’re familiar with Wyeth’s paintings, there’s all his usual attention to detail in blade after blade of grass. He didn’t slack off.

Of course, I don’t know for sure what Wyeth was really trying to say in Trodden Weed, which has been described as an “unconventional self-portrait”. However, based on my own experiences of medical setbacks, it could well signify that he’s back on his feet, even if he is wearing Howard Pyle’s boots. That he’s going places, and that his heath problems aren’t going to hold him back. Indeed, he certainly didn’t paint himself sitting in a chair out on the porch. No! Here is an artist, yet a man of action, much like Rodin’s The Thinker, if not so muscular.

This sense of perseverance is something I’ve experienced myself, and I’ve pushed myself in ways that defy logic. I’ve always been a writer and photography has also been an omnipresent part of me. Yet, since my diagnosis I’ve also taken up the violin, done some adult dance classes, and even gone skiing. Each of these activities defies logic. While I’m certainly better than I was, I still have days when I even struggle to walk around my house, and my lung problems aren’t trifle either. So, I’m not superhuman, but it does show that there are forces at work which we don’t understand, and it’s worth getting out of our comfort zones to stretch what is possible as far as we can. I’m just mighty grateful that Australia’s largely flat, and I’m not living in Switzerland!

So, it is little wonder that alongside Christina’s World, I also relate to Brendan Graham’s modern hymn: You Raise Me Up, in such a personal way. For, along with Andrew Wyeth and Christina Olsen, I have also conquered mountains. Mountains beyond the physical and into the spiritual realm and I know I haven’t merely done this on my own strength. (By the way, I actually had the privilege of meeting Brendan Graham when he came to Sydney.)

Anyway, the day is done and I still have to move onto today’s artist…Guo Xi, which is starting to look like a very brief encounter indeed.

Andrew Wyeth, Master Bedroom.

So, I thought I’d let Andrew Wyeth have the last word. You see, it’s a great irony that after spending most of his life in the shadow of death, that he somehow managed to live a very long, full life and passed away at the grand old age of ninety-one. How did he do it? That’s a side to Andrew Wyeth’s genius, that I’m truly wanting to pursue further. Was it something he did? Luck? The will of God? When I get to heaven, I’ll be lining up Andrew Wyeth and Stephen Hawking side-by-side and asking questions… “Please explain!”

Have you ever had an experience like this with a work of art, or a book perhaps where the artist, writer, whoever knows your innermost struggle in such a personal way? Please share it in the comments.

Best wishes,

Rowena

PS I just wanted to mention someone who walked with Andrew Wyeth in a very personal and unique way. That is Joyce H Stoner, a Conservator who worked with him on his paintings for the last 12 years of his life. Here’s a link to her reflections http://samblog.seattleartmuseum.org/tag/joyce-hill-stoner/. She talks about him in such an illustrating, personal way that even if you’d never seen his paintings, you’ll enjoy it.

She also appeared in this this detailed interview of his works.

 

Weekend Coffee Share – 4th March, 2018.

Welcome to Another Weekend Coffee Share!

Hey, so what’s been going on in your neck of the woods this week? I had a virtual visit to London catching up with  Geoff Le Pard and Dog who ventured out for a walk in the snow where Dog was a bit sensitive about show getting in between his paws. Next, I scooted off to Birmingham with  Suzie81 Speaks and froze through  Snowmageddon. Meanwhile, it’s been hot and sunny here in Sydney, but not as scorchingly hot as it has been.

I know it doesn’t sound very exciting, but I am still fighting off Fergus the phlemmy cough and sinus infection. Consequently, I’ve been sleeping a lot and trying to stay home as much as possible to fight it off. It has been making me a bit grumpy, but it’s given me the chance to read.

Atticus (played by Gregory Peck) and Scout in To Kill A Mockingbird.

Read…That’s right I am re-reading Harper Lee’s: To Kill A Mockingbird. Have you re-read it since you studied it at school? Or, perhaps you haven’t read the book at all. I’d been meaning to re-read it for a few years, as one of my favourite all-time quotes comes from the book:

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

However, it’s simply been phenomenal to re-read the book and read the action around the quotes and truly understand what they were fully intended to mean within context. That’s so much richer, yet perhaps more limited, than when the quote appears all by itself drifting through space without a base.

Another quote also really resonated with me:

“I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.- Atticus Finch”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

This quote appeared in reference to Mrs Dubois who’d become addicted to morphine and was went through the horrors of withdrawal not because it would save her life, but because she wanted die free of the drug. After Atticus explained what she did, Jem and Scout came to respect her courage and understand somewhat why was she so cantankerous and difficult.

I also relate to this quote myself in terms of my health. I keep on fighting and keep staying a few steps ahead. This doesn’t feel like bravery or courage, but those qualities aren’t born out of hardship and mess and not a bed of roses.

This week has also had a few triumphs for the kids. Our daughter has an audition coming up which requires playing a musical instrument. However, she hasn’t touched her violin for over a year, but fortunately she has another week up her sleeve and much to my pride and irritation, she’s already playing Fur Elise better than me…the good old reliable tortoise. Meanwhile, at sailing our son was helping another young man who’d just got his Flying Eleven and it was his first time out. I was really stoked that the club thought Mr was good enough to go out with him. That was a really positive sign of confidence and respect. Better than winning a race…Well, almost!

Mr at the Sailing Club.

In terms of my writing this week,  I participated in Friday Fictioneers again. This week I based my flash on the story of Australian boxer, Les Darcy who tragically died young at the age of 21 in Memphis, Tennessee. I’ve added some bio details as well as a link to an excellent piece of writing by Australian author, Ruth Park who wrote his biography.

Oops. I almost forgot to mention that we had had a bit of local excitement this week. A small sailing boat was beached during some heavy rain and with it came all the questions of how did it happen? Who owned the boat? And, perhaps the ultimate question…could she be saved? I know how much our boats have meant to us and this boat was vintage with timber trim and had character. Since there are no secrets around here, it didn’t take me long to find out who owned the boat and how it came to rest. Beached Yacht, Ettalong, Australia.

Anyway, that’s about all for now. How has your week been? I hope it’s been a good one.

This has been another contribution to the Weekend Coffee Share hosted by Eclectic Alli.

xx Rowena

 

 

Quote: Living With Yourself.

“but before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.”

–Atticus Finch in Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird

As hard as it it to live with someone else, perhaps the most difficult person to live is ourselves.

After all, we live with our selves twenty four hours a day seven days a week from birth right through to eternity. That’s way longer than being stuck in the same lift with someone…anyone!!

When I was younger, I used to get frustrated when my Mum would think she knew me better than I knew myself. Who did she think she was? She wasn’t me. She wasn’t walking in my shoes. Indeed, she had her own shoes and she could jolly well step straight back in them and leave my shoes alone!!

However, I have lately come to appreciate that we only know ourselves from the inside out.. through our own eyes, our own experience and let’s faceit, when you’ve only been on the planet for 5 short years, your understanding of the bigger picture and wider world is extremely limited.

Those around us, particularly who know us well but also have a broader experience and knowledge of life, can not only see us but also where and how we might fit into the overall scheme of things. They can see abilities in us we might overlook or downplay as well because so many of us are our own worst critics. In putting ourselves down or aiming for a perfection we can never attain, we can completely dismiss our strengths and fail to become all we were meant to be.

Returning to the quote, however, that deals more with our conscience. That it doesn’t matter what other people think or hold dear, we must be true to our own values and conscience. Stand up and be counted…even if we are the one…that lone voice calling out through the wilderness.

After all, only we need to live with ourselves…and our actions and inactions. No one else.

As Edmund Burke wrote:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

Moreover, for those of you who are a bit like me and feel you can’t do much, he also wrote:

“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.”

Edmund Burke

It is so much easier for us to point the finger out, instead of pointing it in and asking: “What is my role? What do I need to do? Not someone else…just me.

What are your views? Please share. I’d love to hear from you!

xx Rowena

I would like to thank Merril Smith for sharing the quotes from To Kill A Mockingbird, which inspired this post. You can read her post here: https://merrildsmith.wordpress.com/2016/10/12/walk-and-talk/

Q: A letter to Qu Yuan Chinese Poet (340 – 278 B.C.): A Journey of “Circles” and “Squares”.

Dear Qu Yuan,

I am writing Letters to Dead Poets travelling through the alphabet from A-Z where each letter is a stop along the road.

In so many ways, we have formed something of an arranged marriage.

You see, I didn’t know any poets starting with Q and found you through a random Google search. So, instead of going through more traditional avenues to meet, we met online. Naturally, this is quite a different experience but does it make it any less valid? I don’t know. After all, is it destiny or chance which has brought me here, travelling back in time to Ancient China 340 – 278 B.C.?

That’s why I’m here. I need to find out.

Kayaking Through LI SAO (The Lament).

Lacking a time machine, I’ve boarded my kayak and I’m travelling back in time along your epic poem: LI SAO (The Lament). I understand that you probably wrote Li Sao while living in exile South of the Yangtse River. There is some debate about what LI SAO means. It’s been interpreted as: “encountering sorrow”, “sorrow after departure”, “sorrow in estrangement” while others claim it was the name of a certain type of music.

In any case, your poem is bringing us together, carrying me across the boundaries of time and place.

There is a quote from modern literature, which I hold very dear:

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

So, although we live so many, many worlds apart, why couldn’t we swap our skins and get a feel for what it is to see through each other’s eyes, walk in each other’s shoes and wear each other’s skins? Trade places and breathe in each other’s air? Sing each other’s song?

I know it sounds crazy, impossible and even ridiculous. Indeed, I can picture us now in a change room, trying each other on in front of the mirror and just how weird it would feel. It wouldn’t surprise me, if I am a lot taller than you and that you’d look something like the saggy baggy elephant lost inside all those folds of skin. On the other hand, your skin would be stretched as tight as a drum and would inevitably rip as soon as I tried to sit down. That would be particularly hard to explain. Yet, perhaps the biggest hurdle of all is how we’d adjust to life in our different worlds. Fast forwarding and reversing over 2000 years, would have to be the ultimate head spin!

I wonder how far you would walk in my fabulous red shoes…

So, here we are. I’m in my kayak and you are the river.

What are the words you speak? Even though our meeting has been designed, arranged or even forced, can we find some common ground or will this “marriage” immediately end in “divorce”?

I don’t know.

Indeed, I’m very conscious that we’ll barely have a chance to meet before I’m forced to leave. My time is brief and LI SAO (The Lament) has 373 lines and about 2400 characters. Unfortunately, I can’t simply stop and contemplate the wax and waning of the moon. I must move on. So, I can really only dip my toe in what really is a vast expanse.

Yet, even on this very fleeting encounter, I immediately found common ground, even though  we’re man and woman living over 2000 years apart in different lands:

Excerpts from LI SAO (The Lament)

In swift succession spring and autumn passed;
The fallen flowers lay scattered on the ground,
The dusk might fall before my dream was found.

                                   …..

I marvel at the folly of the king,
So heedless of his people’s suffering.
They envied me my mothlike eyebrows fine,
And so my name his damsels did malign.

                                  ……

In sadness plunged and sunk in deepest gloom,
Alone I drove on to my dreary doom.
In exile rather would I meet my end,
Than to the baseness of their ways descend.
Remote the eagle spurns the common range,
Nor deigns since time began its way to change;
A circle fits not with a square design;
Their different ways could not be merged with mine

“A circle fits not with a square design.”…That line really spoke to me. Bound us together as one. Indeed, we have a modern phrase: “you can’t fit a square thing in a round hole”. This is most definitely me. While I can’t be entirely sure this phrase wasn’t in effect “added” via the translation but no doubt at least the meaning was there.

While our experiences of exile have been different, I know what it is to be a circle. So many of us do in our own way, which I guess makes us a community of circles. While we might not stack up as efficiently as the squares, is efficiency more important than creativity and imagination? That ability to think outside the square to create and innovate?

You probably know my answer.

Besides, while we circles might not stack, we definitely roll. Move. Grow. We’re not all stacked up on one top of the other filed in alphabetical order.

It’s quite difficult to budge a square.

It’s been really interesting to see how much two random strangers can have in common, even when there is seemingly so much difference between us. That there is a common thread of what it means to be human extending from the distant past and heading off into the future. That is a beautiful thing.

Alas, as much as I’ve relished our journey together, the train whistle’s blowing and it’s time for me to leave.

Perhaps, you would like to visit me and raft along my poetry some time. We could even go for a walk along the beach and contemplate the waves. It would be wonderful to pause with you when we could simply stop.

Warm regards my friend,

Rowena

 Sources

LI SAO (The Lament) translated by Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Sao

http://www.shigeku.org/xlib/lingshidao/hanshi/quyuan.htm

 

 

 

Racist Attacks on Adam Goodes: The Tip of a Very Ugly Iceberg?

During the last week, what I hope is most Australians, have been rocked by ongoing racist remarks leveled at Adam Goodes, a much loved and honored Indigenous Aussie Rules (AFL) footballer and who was also named Australian of the Year 2014.

Many have come out strongly supporting Goodes, including setting up the hashtag #IStandWithAdam.

However, there are still some pretty vocal critics.

Adam Goodes (born 8 January 1980) is a professional Australian rules football player with the Sydney Swans in the Australian Football League (AFL). Goodes holds an elite place in VFL/AFL history as a dual Brownlow Medalist, dual premiership player, four-time All-Australian, member of the Indigenous Team of the Century and representing Australia in the International Rules Series. In addition, he currently holds the record for the most games played for an Indigenous player, surpassing Andrew McLeod’s record of 340 games during the 2014 AFL season.

I don’t know whether this story has made international headlines but it has reignited race debate here and personally, I think it’s about time racism made the front page and wasn’t hidden in the small print. Whether you believe that booing at Adam Goodes was racist or not, that doesn’t deny that our Indigenous Australians as a whole, cop what is often vile racist abuse. That what happens at a football match is just the tip of a very ugly iceberg. That there is endemic discrimination against Aboriginal people here and it has to stop!

Adam Goodes, Australian of the Year 2014

Moreover, you don’t have to be an Indigenous Australian to see this. You just need two eyes, two ears and a heart…values. Even the smallest child has probably heard of the Golden Rule: Treat others as you would like to be treated and that certainly doesn’t include calling anyone an “ape” or saying they “belong in the zoo.”!!

These racial taunts have been leveled at Adam Goodes from the crowd at games and it is nothing short of a disgrace!

I am not going to address the details here as you just need to do a quick Google search to get the run down.

However, here are a few links:

http://www.smh.com.au/national/in-a-dark-place-adam-goodes-the-nation-and-the-race-question-20150731-giolfa.html

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/aug/01/noel-pearson-on-adam-goodes-booing-australia-is-looking-into-the-abyss-of-despair

The story started out back in 2013 when a 13 year old girl at a Swans match called Goodes “an ape” from the stands. Goodes confronted the girl and she was removed from the stadium and interviewed by Police. Goodes didn’t want her charged and she later apologised to Goodes and made amends. However, there are still rumblings from the sidelines about this. That Goodes was unfair to expose and out her and whether a 13 year old knows what is racist. This has taken the issue way beyond Goodes and the girl concerned and has launched a wider debate. Not so much saying that the girl should be charged but that Goodes made the wrong call.

Since then, there have been other racial taunts directed at Goodes as well as a lot of booing from the crowd.

On the way to see Swans vs West Coast Eagles at ANZ Stadium in 2009. Mister played on the field with his team at half-time as part of the junior Auskick program.

I’ve been to a number of AFL matches and am a Sydney Swans supporter myself. I’ve heard that kind of booing at matches and know how a crowd can get carried away, However, even then it struck me as poor sportsmanship and this booing at Goodes falls into another category altogether. Even if it wasn’t intended to be racist in the past, now that it is being perceived that way, that’s what it means. It needs to stop!!

Somewhat friendly banter between opposing supporters at the Swans vs Essenden match July 2007: my husband and I!

What I also find quite intriguing is how people talk about this girl being an “innocent 13 year old”. That she didn’t understand what she was saying. What it meant to call anyone a “ape”, even if she didn’t understand what that reference means to Aboriginal people in particular.

As far as I’m concerned, she knew exactly what she was saying. You and I both know that if anyone called a kid in the playground a ape, at the very least, they’d be labeled a bully…not an innocent. So what’s the difference here? Just because Goodes is older than her, that doesn’t give her the right to be racist!

Just to emphasise this point, while I’ve been working on this post, my daughter approached me and said: “How could she not know that calling someone an ape is racist?” Miss is only 9 and she knows!

My kids are incredibly proud of our Indigenous people and actually thought they were Aboriginal. You see, my aunt’s partner is Aboriginal and they simply know him as “Uncle Darryl”. Darryl’s children are my step-cousins and while we don’t see them often as we live on opposite sides of the country, the kids really became attached to Uncle Darryl and believed they were Aboriginal. Even when I tried to explain to them that we were related to my aunt, it simply didn’t sink in. They couldn’t grasp genetics and all of these scientific explanations. Darryl was their uncle. He is Aboriginal. They were Aboriginal. There was such beauty and love in this. One day my daughter finally asked me: “So we don’t have any Aboriginal blood? Not even a drop?” Both kids are very disappointed!

I don’t just attribute this pride to our family situation. Rather, our school has built close ties with the local Mingaletta People and they learn Aboriginal painting and stories at school. Indeed, Aboriginality is truly celebrated at our school and not just given lip service either! It is interwoven in so much of what we do.

A few weeks ago, my son even attended a didgeridoo playing session at Mingaletta with his friend from school and I know that moved him deeply inside. It was a spiritual experience for him.

A few weeks ago while we were catching the train, he also told me that he would be proud to be Aboriginal.

These weren’t things my kids have said or done to be politically correct. Their love and respect for Aboriginal people just flows from the heart as a mark of respect, love and I some sort of connection which defies explanation but I do hope that this is something which will nurture and grow.

My kids, imperfect as they are, show what is possible not only through education but through knowing Aboriginal people in our family, at school and in the community and also being taught over and over again that we are all equal regardless of race,gender,disability or class.

My question and what I see as the ultimate challenge, is how do we reach adults who espouse racism and the like in our community?

Quite frankly, we all need to periodically scrub our brains out with soap and clean out the crap. Acknowledge our own bigoted biases and change the way we think. This doesn’t just relate to racism but also just to plain snobbery. Thinking that you’re better than someone else just because of where you live, what you drive and where your children go to school NOT who you are on the inside and your own actions. We don’t need to knock other people down to build ourselves up.

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

So along with the rest of my family, we step out firmly supporting Adam Goodes. More than that. We cheer him on for taking a stand against racism and also for all he has done to encourage, develop and support Indigenous Australians while promoting greater acceptance, understanding and connection among all Australians…and all peoples!

It is a noble cause which echoes the words and deeds of many of the world’s greats but the words of Martin Luther King particularly come to mind:

“I have a dream that one day right there in Alabama little black boys and little black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”

Martin Luther King, Jr.

xx Rowena

You can read here how fans have come out in force to support Adam Goodes: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-08-02/sporting-stars-and-fans-support-adam-goodes/6665834