"I get knocked down, but I get up again"

When my Dad died, friends who didn’t know him asked me about him. “What was he like?”. Thankfully, I knew my Dad well…or so I thought until I started reading about “writing a great memoir” and seeing that one of the reasons for doing so is so that someone can really know you.

I know my Dad added tobasco to almost every savoury meal. He liked “Lunig” cartoons. Dad would talk to anyone about pretty much anything because he loved “having a yarn” (Australian for a long chat) with anyone willing to engage in it. Dad loved “the underdog” and was inspired by people who started with nothing, then became successful business entrepreneurs or scholars or famous…Dad loved knowing there was hope of a better future.

But I don’t know why my Dad became a painter. Did he study at College? Did he choose that profession or was he made to do it just to pay bills? What was my Dad afraid of? What did he worry about? What did he dream about and aspire to be? Really?

Dad loved cheesy romance songs. I don’t know why, though. Dad was big on English humour. Jay and I grew up with episodes of “Steptoe and Son”, “Monty Python”, “Faulty Towers” “Hancock’s half hour” on the telly. Dad roared laughing at his favourite episodes and had a wry sense of humour. Why were these his favourite shows?

Dad was especially proud of being Australian and had the thickest, most “Occer” (Australian word for “next level Australian”) accent. You would never tell he grew up in Ipswich, UK. But I never knew why Dad embraced being Australian so passionately. What made he and Mom move to Australia of all places and why the very tip of the NT?

I would have loved to have read my Dad’s Memoir, you know. I wonder if Dad kept diaries? Did he journal?

This inspires me to keep going with my manuscript. I hope to have in print the person I am and why I am the way I am.

If I die, someone can read about my hopes, dreams, fears, experiences and struggles. Someone who reads it will know me for who I really am.

I hope they’ll like me.

If anyone read my Dad’s Memoir, I definitely think they’d like him.