Post by mipela on Aug 4, 2016 8:22:28 GMT 10
The Bush versus the City.
Being a boy from the bush, I eschew city life. Cities and our larger regional towns remind me of meat ant nests, they’re busy, busy, busy, ants going every which way. If you pause and observe the surface activity on a meat ant’s nest, invariably you come to ask yourself, why ? Why all the hectic activity, the urgent, hectic movement of the inhabitants, why ? Closer observation will show that some inhabitants pause in their passage, they twitch their feelers as though checking their sat-nav devices and then, memory apparently restored, away they go again in frantic haste. On what mission are they bound ? What is their purpose ?
Recently we motored to Brisbane. As we approached Ipswich, ‘busyness’ became much apparent. The density of motorists increased as the density of suburban sprawl increased. People coming, people going, it was all ‘go, go, go’. A crow, sitting atop the Storey Bridge watching the two way flow of cars must think humans utterly stupid. Those from the north side of the river want to cross to the other side and the southerners all have urgent business on the northern side. No doubt the crows ask each other, why ?
I return to my theme, the difference between ‘Bushies’ and ‘City Slickers.’ To me, there seems to be a large gap between these two groups. I read where city bred kids think milk comes in cardboard packets.
There seems to be no appreciation of how and why milk comes in packets and ditto for all other edibles.
Country kids seem to have a wider appreciation of life in general and specifically, why milk comes in cardboard packets.
The landscape of Australia is basically unchanged from the time the First Fleet arrived, most of it being harsh, dry and challenging. The makeup of Australia however, has undergone vast change since those early times. As our urban areas grew, appreciation of what I’ll call ‘The Bush’ has been in steady decline, the achievements of the past in conquering this land becoming irrelevant to today’s consumer society.
However, we observe social niceties from the past, to wit, Sunday (yesterday) was Fathers Day. This prompted articles in the media and much activity in the commercial retail sector. I was a beneficiary, I received a new book entitled ‘Banjo, the story of the man who wrote Waltzing Matilda’ by Paul Terry. A lifelong fan of Banjo Paterson, I was enthralled with this work that covers Paterson’s. life. As I read, I was taken back to many of the circumstances of the young Paterson and glimpsed the background of the many stories he penned describing the life he knew and times he lived in.
Of the many, many stories he wrote, I feel an uncanny bond with his poem ‘Clancy of the Overflow’. This romantic poem of the longing to be away, out on the plains, living the carefree bushman’s life, it pulls at my heart like a magnet. It epitomizes the choices one has in life and it describes the longing to depart the city life for that of the wider world where every man is freed from suburban constraint.
The stanza that to me, particularly emphasises the void between the city life and the bush is this:
I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all
I wonder what Banjo would think if he could see today’s Sydney, the urban sprawl, the skyscrapers, the high-rises, the endless traffic and humanity, the smog and pollution and the wall to wall traffic lights ?
Banjo, rest in peace. Your works will live forever and one day, maybe our young-uns will discover your stories for themselves.
Bunyip Brown, 8 September 2014.
Being a boy from the bush, I eschew city life. Cities and our larger regional towns remind me of meat ant nests, they’re busy, busy, busy, ants going every which way. If you pause and observe the surface activity on a meat ant’s nest, invariably you come to ask yourself, why ? Why all the hectic activity, the urgent, hectic movement of the inhabitants, why ? Closer observation will show that some inhabitants pause in their passage, they twitch their feelers as though checking their sat-nav devices and then, memory apparently restored, away they go again in frantic haste. On what mission are they bound ? What is their purpose ?
Recently we motored to Brisbane. As we approached Ipswich, ‘busyness’ became much apparent. The density of motorists increased as the density of suburban sprawl increased. People coming, people going, it was all ‘go, go, go’. A crow, sitting atop the Storey Bridge watching the two way flow of cars must think humans utterly stupid. Those from the north side of the river want to cross to the other side and the southerners all have urgent business on the northern side. No doubt the crows ask each other, why ?
I return to my theme, the difference between ‘Bushies’ and ‘City Slickers.’ To me, there seems to be a large gap between these two groups. I read where city bred kids think milk comes in cardboard packets.
There seems to be no appreciation of how and why milk comes in packets and ditto for all other edibles.
Country kids seem to have a wider appreciation of life in general and specifically, why milk comes in cardboard packets.
The landscape of Australia is basically unchanged from the time the First Fleet arrived, most of it being harsh, dry and challenging. The makeup of Australia however, has undergone vast change since those early times. As our urban areas grew, appreciation of what I’ll call ‘The Bush’ has been in steady decline, the achievements of the past in conquering this land becoming irrelevant to today’s consumer society.
However, we observe social niceties from the past, to wit, Sunday (yesterday) was Fathers Day. This prompted articles in the media and much activity in the commercial retail sector. I was a beneficiary, I received a new book entitled ‘Banjo, the story of the man who wrote Waltzing Matilda’ by Paul Terry. A lifelong fan of Banjo Paterson, I was enthralled with this work that covers Paterson’s. life. As I read, I was taken back to many of the circumstances of the young Paterson and glimpsed the background of the many stories he penned describing the life he knew and times he lived in.
Of the many, many stories he wrote, I feel an uncanny bond with his poem ‘Clancy of the Overflow’. This romantic poem of the longing to be away, out on the plains, living the carefree bushman’s life, it pulls at my heart like a magnet. It epitomizes the choices one has in life and it describes the longing to depart the city life for that of the wider world where every man is freed from suburban constraint.
The stanza that to me, particularly emphasises the void between the city life and the bush is this:
I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all
I wonder what Banjo would think if he could see today’s Sydney, the urban sprawl, the skyscrapers, the high-rises, the endless traffic and humanity, the smog and pollution and the wall to wall traffic lights ?
Banjo, rest in peace. Your works will live forever and one day, maybe our young-uns will discover your stories for themselves.
Bunyip Brown, 8 September 2014.