I am sitting alone on the top deck of the Olympic Stand awaiting the start of the Collingwood/North Melbourne game. I’m recovering from a hangover. I haven’t exactly covered myself in glory over the past few years. I have been a terrible son and sibling and have been entrenched in a soulless bean-counting job for which I have no interest or aptitude. It does allow me to write poetry though. I sit in a corner all day and scribble my rhymes. No one is the wiser. To be frank, no one really knows or cares what I am doing: I have several bosses who are more concerned with their place in the company hierarchy than whether or not I am being properly utilized. So I just play dumb. I was employed merely to tick off the boxes of some corporate agenda – I am part of the so-called ‘graduate program’ of this large public company. All I have to do is show up. Though I have no real work to do, the nine to five requirement has helped to provide a sense of discipline to my writing endeavours: I am halfway through a novel and have almost completed a poetry collection. I’m wondering how long I can get away with this for. I’ll happily march out the door when they get me.
So here I am all alone for this Round 22 dead rubber. The last game of the season. The Pies have been very ordinary under the tutelage of Tony Shaw. Our adored premiership captain is starting to lose the faith of the faithful. Whenever the team is struggling, he seems to overreact by dragging both the Rocca brothers, as if to prove what a hard arse he is – but there’s not much they can do with the ball coming in the way that it is. They are scapegoats.
From my position on the top tier of the Olympic Stand, I spot my old man and my little brother in the crowd down below on the second level. They can’t see me, but I can see them. I am too proud to approach them. There is a sick feeling in my gut. This is what my life has come to. I have driven in from Coburg after crashing at a mate’s joint following a big night on the town.
About half an hour before the game, there’s a newsflash on the scoreboard: Princess Diana has been killed in a car crash in Paris. I am shocked. Not too long after this sad announcement, a group of youngish dudes nearby exhibit their disgust at this piece of news. ‘Who gives a stuff?’ ‘This has nothing to do with us.’ ‘Good riddance,’ are just some of the remarks I overhear from this unruly mob. They then stand to their feet and start singing Advance Australia Fair.
It’s about at this point that some older men standing at the back of the stand are alerted to what is going on. They drop their drinks and make their way to the unruly dudes who are singing the anthem. Without delay they lay into the singers with a series of savage blows. The singing stops.
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About Damian Balassone
Damian Balassone is a failed half-forward flanker who writes poetry. He is the author of 'Strange Game in a Strange Land'.
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Shows how the royalists behave when one of their icons is laid low.
In 1974 Mungo Macallum called it the “Singing Election”, where Snedden, Anthony and groups of middle aged men lustily sang God save the Queen whenever they had an election rally. How dare anyone change the national anthem! No wonder it took ten years. As someone who witnessed first hand the thuggery of the Liberals in 1975, and heard stories of Tony Abbott”s mates threatening people in Warringah, the attacks by the royalists wonkas do not surprise me. So far the anthem is the only symbolic change we have made towards independence. Royal head of state and British flag still remain and are likely to do so for my lifetime and that of my kids. For all our independent bravado we are still lackeys to the English and the Americans.
Princess Margaret, Prince Andrew, King Edward VIII, George VI. The royals are 2 long lived quoonies away from
major scandals engulfing their overprivileged lives. They have no useful purpose other than opening bridges, a function that could be performed by David Beckham and his wife. Their justification, breaking parliamentary deadlocks, could be performed by a supreme court judge. Their incursion into our political system, in 1975, was an unmitigated disaster. But their is hope. In 1997 every TV channel was tuned to Lady Di’s funeral, except SBS, who showed a spaghetti western. When the last Empress of India, the queen mother breathed her last, hardly anyone bothered to televise the funeral, similarly the last royal wedding.
Tony Abbott and his royalist mates will soon join Joh Bjelke Peterson in the dustbin of history. There will always be royalists, but their irrelevance will become more obvious.
I was there that day too Damo, in the Southern Stand. Listening to the radio on the way down, we’d heard of the crash and that Diana’s boyfriend had died but she was expected to live. So it was a shock to see her death posted on the scoreboard. John Barnett kicked the sealer from memory, would have been his greatest moment in black & white. Can recall Richard Osborne playing well that day and not much else.
Nice yarn DB.
I was in the Ashgrove TAB. The old punters were quite upset by the news, a silence descended on the room, apart from the backbeat of SKY Racing.
I was there to back our own mare, Courting Pleasure. She was on her last legs and the jock was given license to take her to the front and see how long she led for. She won!
So those two memories coincide.
Driving to a semi final 3.5 hours from Perth to a town called Kukerin to play Kukerin-Dumbleyong in the Upper Great Southern League. Carful of rowdy footballers suddenly went silent. I couldn’t believe it.
I was watching whatever game was on Ch 7 Adelaide that afternoon – I see the Crows were away to Essendon so that was probably it.
Your opening paragraph struck a chord with me.
I had similar experiences in a couple of my early accounting gigs around that time.
Thanks all, it’s fascinating to hear everyone stories from that day. Regardless of your political views, it was huge news that shocked.
Luke, my recollection is that Paul Williams, who was hot in 96-97, burst out of the centre square, had a few bounces and kicked the clincher. I could be wrong. Strangely, we seemed to have a decent record against the Roos circa 1996-2000, even though they were a vastly superior side.
Greg, it’s good to hear I wasn’t the only one. It’s another story, but I remember at the end of ’97 I was called into the Financial Controller’s office and was expecting to get my comeuppance. I thought they finally got me. Instead, I was congratulated and told I was getting a promotion.
Good work Damian. I was in Birmingham when Lady Di died so found out much later than my Australian friends.
I was at the abovementioned Bombers v Crows game. The crowd spent most of the match in hushed silence, stunned by the news that Mark Ricciuto pinged his groin, which led to a second half Adelaide fade-out and kept him out of the 1997 finals. What a tragedy.
Hi DB
Sounds like dark times for you back then, thinking about this reflection and your last one, our lives really do go through incredible cycles. I love how you give us enough information to follow the various threads in your story but not quite enough for us to know what happened next. That’s cool.
I was at Matty Qs place, about to watch the Bombers Crows game, there was a couple of other guys all top shelf comics. So you can imagine the wit flying around. Until the Lady Di news broke. That floored every one of us. None of us with any attachment to the absurd notion of royalty. Just the sheer shock of the moment.
Cheers
Thank you Barry, Swish (lol!) and Rick for your stories. And thanks for the kind feedback re cycles Rick – spot on.
The Forrest pub had burnt down. So it goes. Until they built another, they jerry built what felt like a Maccano shed, complete with milk create seats, pot belly, and, from hazy memory, a dusty floor. It had no license so you brought a raffle ticket and swapped it for a beer.
I was playing for the Bay at the time. Every other game, bar Lorne, involved a half way stop at that pub on the way home. The tin shed was magic. I liked it better that way. Raw, locals, a bit of a secret. All of us, full of life, crammed in together.
Most of us went silent when the news came on a small, shitty telly, wedged between wall and ceiling. Only Sparrow Harrison had the common sense, and guts, to call it as he saw it; “Fucking good riddance!” I secretly admired him for that. ‘This is what I think, and damn the torpedos!’
Very Aussie, I thought.
I’ve mellowed a bit since then. Nobody should die. But, yeah, who cares and stuff the hype. If I had been at the footy with you that day, no doubt I would have come in swinging for the young ‘uns.
Great yarn, Matt!
Love this, DBalassone.
And like Rick I love it as a companion piece to your https://www.footyalmanac.com.au/almanac-life-advice-from-reuben-pelerman/ from last week.
I read this two days ago and I’ve read the comments.
What strikes me like a thunderbolt is that I have NO CLEAR MEMORY of this event at all. That seems odd. Similarly, I have pretty good recall of VFL/AFL grand finals up until 1994 but not much from 1995-2000. And quite flimsy memory from 2000-present. For me there’s a thick, dense haze over the period that includes this event.
So I wonder about that.
Your recollection here has me wondering on the nature of memory and on my own memory in the years immediately after my brain injury (January 1995). Maybe there was physiology at play. Maybe I had different priorities.
Life is amazing. Thank you.
Recently arrived in Perth as a public hospital CEO I had scheduled to meet local MP Mark McGowan for the first time that Sunday morning. I was nominally a somebody having worked in Canberra politics and health policy. He was a weedy ex navy lawyer and relative nobody.
He had a fierce determination and work ethic. I had a bad punting habit and a relationship in tatters.
I remember little about the meeting other than a brief “bit sad” condolences to LDi then onto business.
I still look back on it as a Sliding Doors moment, where I could have/should have hitched my wagon to his ambition.
He became rich and powerful. I became poor but eventually happy.
“Good judgement requires experience. Experience requires bad judgement.”
PB -Ever etched in my life PB. On my way to watch Pakenham play Drouin in a football match.
Interesting how we can remember certain dates but not things like wedding anniversaries, kids birthdays. JFK, Darren Millane (Freemantle wharf), Mark Taylor’s retirement (historic house in Tasmania, friends wedding (I was at the greatest GF ever Hawthorn v Geelong. It is in my book!). Stay with it PB great to see you are so happy and not grumpy!!
Loving hearing these personal recollections of the event, keep em coming. PB, it’s interesting how such throwbacks make us re-examine personal circumstances at the time, often with the clearer eyes and the benefit of hindsight – your quote re ‘experience’ resonates with me.
Thanks for the kind words ER, it’s amazing but quite telling that you have no memory of the event. I can’t even begin to imagine what you went through 1995-2000 after your accident, and subsequent brain injury. Memory may be flimsy, but one thing that never left you is the spirit of the poet. And thank god for that!
Like many I was about to watch the Crows and Bombers in their final round clash when the news broke. The commentators on 7 wondered if the players would be told ahead of the match, and I thought what other events would warrant insertion into a pre-game address. I can’t imagine Blighty telling the Crows.
Thanks Damian. Really enjoying your series of memoirs.
Thanks Mickey. Seems like a lot of people were tuned into the Crows/Bombers clash, at least on this thread anyway. I can’t imagine Blighty mentioning it either, but then again we’re talking about a bloke who once conducted a training session with an imaginary ball, so you never know.