A Hollywood movie should be made about blokes like 'the Don'.
Real, funny, affectionate, larger-than-life, fun-to-be-around, family blokes.
I knew Don from when I was a whippersnapper.
He looked tall to me back then...
tall and lanky and full of grins and snappy jokes.
...
He was always to be found at the woodchop arena, competing, urging on his many family members in their events, talking up the young guns chasing his tail as 'the man to beat'.
He was the one on the mike, geeing up the crowd, coaxing donations out of the onlookers to help 'pay' for the schoolkids picking up woodchips and off-cuts between woodchop events.
He had six children, innumerable nieces and nephews,
many many grandchildren.
He adored them all.
He just liked people - he was charming as hell but dependable too.
Happy and a good listener.
A champion storyteller.
A great mate.
...
This week, the sprightly 73-year-old was competing at another show (it happened to be the very town he began his woodchopping careers so many years ago). He and his brother had just got into the final of an event ('not bad for a couple of old codgers', I can almost hear him quip) and after posing for a photo with an old friend, he was lining up with axe in hand to the block. He never took that chop. Surrounded by his friends and family, he was instead helped into an ambulance attended by his niece.
And it was there he took his final breath.
Quickly, without fuss, he left.
...
Yesterday they buried him.
It was not without fuss.
I wasn't there, so my descriptions are second hand.
Bear with me. I have heard such vivid recounts of the day that I feel I might have been standing there too. Hopefully the emotion won't blur the accuracy too badly!
...
They laid his body to rest in an old cemetery on his cattle property, set in picturesque hills amongst the Great Divide, his beloved Santa Gertrudis cattle dotting the hillsides.
More than a thousand people trailed in beside the old homestead,
the SES volunteers guiding cars off the highway,
assuming all traffic on the main road was attending this heavy-hearted event.
(They were right.)
Apparently it was kind of like a show.
Same people, different reason for gathering.
There because they loved and respected this wise-cracking 73-year-old.
All his grandchildren lined up with special treasures to lay on his coffin.
A bowl filled with mandarins,
(always on hand for a snack when Don chopped)
The whip he always carried over his shoulder when he mustered,
(he said he felt a bit naked without it)
And the girl who mustered with him brought his horse,
bridled and saddled as if to ride.
Then, as they said their farewells, she uncinched the girth, slid the saddle and cloth from his back, and unbuckled the bridle. The horse galloped (they say) off from the crowd, and down to a mob of cattle in the paddock nearby. It rounded them up, around and around, as if it's master were still astride.
There wasn't a dry eye in the crowd.
(And just quietly, there's not one to be found at this computer either!)
...
But in his inimitable style, Don's wit shone through the sadness.
It was announced that he had requested to be buried feet first...
'So he could see which of you buggers actually made it to the funeral!'
And I imagine the ripple of laughter of a thousand people drying out the tears.
If I had been there, I reckon I would have thought about his influence on my family.
I would have recalled him encouraging my brother to weild an axe, to hone his craft, to enjoy his new sport.
Then the image of him, quietly applauding my son in his imitation of the 'big boys' at a hacked-at block beside the arena, might have come to mind.
I would have assured his loved ones (in their grief) of something they already know:
that his legacy will live on.
In the woodchop arena. And beyond.
R.I.P. The Don.
Just a great bloke.
