16 December 2018
Having just finished peeling the vegetables for our roast pork lunch, I sat down with my reheated coffee from breakfast to listen to the radio. Weather updates on the cyclone up north were coming in on the ABC and I wanted to find out how much rain we were supposedly to get. Somewhere up north they were getting lashed about with over 100mm in one hour and I was quietly very thankful it wasn't here. But the rain was coming south, it was just a matter of time before it hit. It was called Cyclone Owen apparently. The summer storms have arrived early in Queensland this season, with our infamous tropical lows brewing up over the Coral Sea.
The city of Townsville was in line to get hit hard and I was thanking my good fortune again that I no longer lived in that place. But I did have family up there. Last year when Cyclone Debbie came through in March 2017, I'd just left Townsville to begin my journey south to my new life here on the farm. I still remember watching the black clouds chase me down the M1 to the Sunshine Coast. After I arrived and set up camp in the caretakers cottage the rain hit, dumping over 230mm in 4 days. It filled the dams completely, and left me pretty damp around the edges in cottage as well.
So far nothing remarkable has occurred, just lots of thunder overnight and the trees are just enjoying a thoroughly good soaking. The bull frogs are chorusing in full volume around me too.
Then the radio announcer went onto his next topic, an interview about local charity volunteers from The Smith Family. This is not an individual family but a well known charity in Australia that sponsors children from disadvantaged homes. I listened with interest and a memory popped into my head of a time when I witnessed true poverty and depravation. Thankyou PTSD.
That time had occurred on the Kuwait/Iraq border, when I was on deployment with the British Army in early 2004. Travelling south, from our base camp at Shaiba Logistics Base, in some of the driest conditions (with irony not lost with current wet weather), we passed from one country into another with barely a blink, But it was the children on that border I will never forget. Dusty and filthy conditions greeted the border crossing, but within another 5km south we began to see green again. The irony of moving into an oil rich country that radiated wealth through irrigated motorways. Yet only a short distance behind us were half naked, malnourished, nomadic children. And none of them we were permitted to stop and help. None.
So listening to the radio broadcast about underprivileged children here in Australia, not getting anything for Christmas, really gave me a sense of sickened guilt. I couldn't help those poor wretches on that border crossing in Iraq, so why should I help them here? Because here they have a stable government and welfare handouts, over there they had no clothes on and looked like they had never been washed in over six months or more, with militia patrolling that border crossing daily subjecting them to abuse.
I still feel the guilt from not helping those children. But I was not permitted to. And this is the same for many veterans from war zones that come into contact with civilian children.
The rain is getting heavier now, and the dogs have come into shed to curl up under my desk.
Another time while I worked in the base camp prison, I was put in charge of chaperoning family visits for the prisoners. Watching the poor wretches wailing for their fathers, who would most probably be murdered (and many were) upon their release, would leave me feeling drained of energy and depleted of emotion. All I wanted was to get home to my children, aged 9 and 4 at the time. Being separated from children is not a memory I would wish upon anyone.
So as the rain is now setting in for the afternoon, I'll finish up with a donation. Because even though my cynical brain says those charities don't pass on the cash to those who truly need, a part of me will part with it, despite how this PTSD makes me remember things, I don't wont to. I will donate something for Christmas, and hope that somewhere out there one of those nomadic children has survived, all those years ago. Somehow.
Having just finished peeling the vegetables for our roast pork lunch, I sat down with my reheated coffee from breakfast to listen to the radio. Weather updates on the cyclone up north were coming in on the ABC and I wanted to find out how much rain we were supposedly to get. Somewhere up north they were getting lashed about with over 100mm in one hour and I was quietly very thankful it wasn't here. But the rain was coming south, it was just a matter of time before it hit. It was called Cyclone Owen apparently. The summer storms have arrived early in Queensland this season, with our infamous tropical lows brewing up over the Coral Sea.
The city of Townsville was in line to get hit hard and I was thanking my good fortune again that I no longer lived in that place. But I did have family up there. Last year when Cyclone Debbie came through in March 2017, I'd just left Townsville to begin my journey south to my new life here on the farm. I still remember watching the black clouds chase me down the M1 to the Sunshine Coast. After I arrived and set up camp in the caretakers cottage the rain hit, dumping over 230mm in 4 days. It filled the dams completely, and left me pretty damp around the edges in cottage as well.
So far nothing remarkable has occurred, just lots of thunder overnight and the trees are just enjoying a thoroughly good soaking. The bull frogs are chorusing in full volume around me too.
Then the radio announcer went onto his next topic, an interview about local charity volunteers from The Smith Family. This is not an individual family but a well known charity in Australia that sponsors children from disadvantaged homes. I listened with interest and a memory popped into my head of a time when I witnessed true poverty and depravation. Thankyou PTSD.
That time had occurred on the Kuwait/Iraq border, when I was on deployment with the British Army in early 2004. Travelling south, from our base camp at Shaiba Logistics Base, in some of the driest conditions (with irony not lost with current wet weather), we passed from one country into another with barely a blink, But it was the children on that border I will never forget. Dusty and filthy conditions greeted the border crossing, but within another 5km south we began to see green again. The irony of moving into an oil rich country that radiated wealth through irrigated motorways. Yet only a short distance behind us were half naked, malnourished, nomadic children. And none of them we were permitted to stop and help. None.
So listening to the radio broadcast about underprivileged children here in Australia, not getting anything for Christmas, really gave me a sense of sickened guilt. I couldn't help those poor wretches on that border crossing in Iraq, so why should I help them here? Because here they have a stable government and welfare handouts, over there they had no clothes on and looked like they had never been washed in over six months or more, with militia patrolling that border crossing daily subjecting them to abuse.
I still feel the guilt from not helping those children. But I was not permitted to. And this is the same for many veterans from war zones that come into contact with civilian children.
The rain is getting heavier now, and the dogs have come into shed to curl up under my desk.
Another time while I worked in the base camp prison, I was put in charge of chaperoning family visits for the prisoners. Watching the poor wretches wailing for their fathers, who would most probably be murdered (and many were) upon their release, would leave me feeling drained of energy and depleted of emotion. All I wanted was to get home to my children, aged 9 and 4 at the time. Being separated from children is not a memory I would wish upon anyone.
So as the rain is now setting in for the afternoon, I'll finish up with a donation. Because even though my cynical brain says those charities don't pass on the cash to those who truly need, a part of me will part with it, despite how this PTSD makes me remember things, I don't wont to. I will donate something for Christmas, and hope that somewhere out there one of those nomadic children has survived, all those years ago. Somehow.
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