Yesterday, I went for a 6km walk. Instead of visiting the usual bush lookouts, I kept to the streets. My destination: the war memorial next to the community centre at the head of Galley Road. It’s a nice, quiet spot. The monument squats in the corner of a tennis-court-size lawn, one point in a triangle in which each of the other two corners is marked by a park bench, both in need of paint.

The car park was dominated by a large red truck, an Australian Red Cross mobile blood transfusion centre, left there for a few days so that the locals can do their bit. Donors came and went. They included a youngish Asian couple with an old collie. The man ducked into the truck while the dog, slipped from its lead, sniffed around. The woman called him a few times but, deaf or indifferent, he ignored her.

“He likes to take his time,” she said.

“Showing his independence,” I replied. She smiled, barely.

When she put him back on the lead, I reflected that, in human terms, he was probably about my age. For a moment I wondered how it would feel to be totally dependent on her.

Communing with the dead isn’t really my thing, but they are unobtrusive and therefore congenial company. Some of the names were familiar—Windybank, for example; and strange: one surname was “Sustenance”. I sat there for nearly an hour. What would I say if someone I knew saw me? “What are you doing here?” they would probably ask, to which I would reply: “Dwelling on the past is melancholy; I prefer to contemplate my future.” Not everyone appreciates droll gallows humour.

The centre houses a branch library. I called in to browse. As I was leaving, I noticed a young female librarian who hadn’t been at the front desk when I arrived. She stood with her back to me, absorbed in her work. She had long blonde hair and her black top and jeans showed a pleasing figure.

As I walked past her, I turned to thank her with what I like to think is my charming-and-totally-unleering old-man smile. It must have faded quickly. The lower half of her face was obscured by a blue surgical mask. Above it, her eyes were wide and bright, probably because she was smiling back at me and acknowledging my old-fashioned courtesy. The eyes were lovely but, deprived of their proper facial context, looked slightly deranged.

On the way back, before turning into Cockatoo Road, I paused to peer into the bush. Close up, it’s a confusion of fine green brush strokes (she-oaks, etc) and bold brown lines (tree trunks—thin and, below their canopies, mostly branchless). A bit like Jackson Pollock’s Blue Poles.

Along Cockatoo Road, two of my female neighbours—one walking her dog, the other returning from the shops—were deep in conversation. Continuing the old-fashioned courtesy theme, I raised my hat as I approached and intoned “Ladies”, just as one of them said “…and then I had diarrhoea.” Spoiled the effect somewhat, I thought.

I’m facing downstream;

Upstream is for the Oedipal,

Those who are seeking answers to the mysteries of life:

Who am I? Why am I here? What’s it all about?

The answers are not at the source,

They are in the flow

And you must catch them as you drift;

And I have drifted far enough

To want to pause, to feel the current

Push against the tide, suspend my animation long enough

For me to think about

The answers I have learned,

Before the river pours me

One last time

Into the forgetful sea.

So there we were, Saturday night, having a family meal at Ayothaya (excellent Thai restaurant on the Pacific Highway opposite Berowra Station) when who should arrive but Geoff Mack, Tabby Francis and their niece and her husband. Geoff and Tabby (who live locally) looked well though understandably frail (Geoff is 92). For those who don’t know, Geoff, in the late 1950s, wrote the perennial hit “I’ve Been Everywhere” which has been covered more than 130 times by artists including Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton and (after a fashion) Rhianna. I don’t know Geoff personally and recognised him only because I’d once seen him in the audience a couple of years ago at a Steve Passfield gig at the Berowra Tavern (Steve said hi to Geoff from the stage, then proceeded to do his own inimitable version of the song). Outside the restaurant, I struck up a conversation with Geoff’s nephew-in-law (if that’s the proper term). He mentioned that he and his wife had taken Geoff and Tabby to Tamworth in February (for non-Australians: that’s the nation’s biggest country music festival) and he described, touchingly, how Geoff and Tabby had “come alive” at the event, buoyed by the atmosphere, great memories and the recognition, affection and respect of everyone they met.

Two good lives, well lived.

Geoff Mac in his heyday (source: Geoff Mack website)

 

 

One of the best nights out we’ve had in a while in downtown Berowra was seeing legendary Aussie bush poet Murray Hartin perform at the local pub on May 18. Muz has local connections: he’s from Moree in northern NSW but went to school in Hornsby, just down the road from here. Bush poetry is not terribly fashionable among Australia’s metropolitan literati, but what do they know? Bottom line: if you don’t understand Australia’s rural culture and traditions, you don’t fully understand the Anglo-Celtic experience in Australia; and, far from being parochial, these traditions are old, rich and diversified enough to say a lot about the human condition. Here’s Muz’s justly famous “Rain from Nowhere”:

It’s a beautiful late autumn day here in the best suburb on earth, and it’s a Sunday, so there’s time (a little, at least) to appreciate the moment. Rather than try to capture it in my own inadequate words, I post here a locally-themed work by great Australian modernist artist Margaret Preston who lived here for a while from 1936. It’s called ‘I Lived at Berowra’ and belongs to the Art Gallery of NSW. Credits and link below. Enjoy your weekend!

© Margaret Rose Preston Estate

Notes from the Art Gallery of NSW web page: “In 1936, Margaret Preston moved with her husband to a new home at Berowra to live in a house surrounded by bushland a couple of kilometres from the Hawkesbury River, north of Sydney. ‘I lived at Berowra’ is among a number of works, including ‘The brown pot’ and ‘Grey day in the ranges’ that were painted within a three year period. They are characterized by a simplification of form, flattened perspectives and a reduced palette of earth-toned colours reminiscent of natural ochres found in the landscape, a visual expression of Preston’s increasing interest in Aboriginal art.”

© Australian Art Department, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2000

 

 

Here’s a playlist of videos by Berowra residents that give a flavour of what it’s like to live in the best suburb on the planet.

Spirit of Berowra