learning

SCRUM

/ beaumontmichael / 1 Comment

I don’t know about you but I like to watch movies and documentaries that make me think. Sure I like to switch my brain off from time to time and just be entertained too, but lets face it you don’t have to work too hard to find that sort of movie.

Last night I had the great fortune to watch a new short film, Scrum by Poppy Stockell. As an avid sports nut, a movie about rugby had me a little worried, as I have yet to see a film that truly paints the picture of the game. In most cases the action looks contrived and stilted at best.

The film centres around the Sydney Convicts, a gay rugby club competing in the Bingham Cup. The cup was named after a team member that actually tackled one of the terrorists onboard a plane in the 9/11 disaster, who subsequently died anyway.

The film is really about selection, and the emotional complexity of being part of a team. The three central characters in spite of their sexuality could barely be more diverse. I can imagine a lot of people will find the movie quite challenging but the gentle humour sprinkled throughout turns a complex subject matter into compelling viewing.

Without giving anything away, there is a scene between the coach and one of his big burley players that is quite beautiful.

Being part of a team comes with responsibilities that are sometimes difficult to live up to. Rugby is no different to almost every team sport in that regard. However, add to that the complexity of men that have regularly been snubbed and not allowed to join or participate whole heartedly in team sport because of who they are, and the game is changed entirely.

Scrum was a delightful 50 minutes that I feel sure will start a lot of conversations. Poppy Stockell has managed to film rugby without making it look silly which apparently is not easy if history is any guide, and has captured beautifully so many of the issues that make effective team building such a wonderfully complicated art/science.

Gee I hope the people who need to see this short film will get the opportunity or will take the opportunity to watch it.

You could be a dick

/ beaumontmichael / 1 Comment

Twice a year we award worthy Australians with Medals. I get excited on both Australia Day and the Queens Birthday weekend in anticipation of reading the lists. As someone who has spent so much time recording stories and interviewing people it will not be any shock to you that it is the stories behind the awards that I like the most.

This year we have a cracker. The wonderful Dick Smith was awarded the country’s top honour and his is a lovely story, that should resonate with an entire generation.

Mr Smith is an achiever. The Americans would probably call him a winner. From humble beginnings he toiled to eventual business success and now seems to spend his time giving his money to people who need it more than he does.

The part of his story that should have ears burning everywhere, is his schooling. Marked 45th of 47 students in his year, he went through the apprenticeship route rather than to University. Many a young person is led to believe that if you haven’t made your mark academically by 12 or 13 you are up against it in the success stakes.

Dick Smith would have everyone know that he was not good at school but pretty good at business, leadership, learning and (in my opinion) being a good bloke. Personally I find it interesting that school failed to provide him the opportunity to shine. Though it doesn’t surprise me. The point though is that he didn’t let a thing like academics get in the way of success.

I am not teacher bashing either, some of my favourite people are teachers so this is not about teaching standards or anything like that. It is important for young people to know that the bumps and scuffs that almost inevitably occur during a young persons schooling are not an excuse to give up. In fact they should be providing the motivation to dig a little deeper and work a little harder. Dick Smith’s story shows there is more than one way to skin a cat. We need to be creative in the way we look at success, the way we approach hurdles and the methods we use to shine the light on the big world. Thank you Dick.

A puppy on the way

/ beaumontmichael

There is a dog on the way. We have been pet free for almost a decade and have enjoyed it immensely, but it is just not the same. Over the course of the next few months no doubt I will be writing about the way this hound has changed our lives. I hope I am writing about the joy and not the tears, but inevitably with pets there is a share of both.

It is not just any dog either. It is a fauve. The Basset fauve is an interesting breed that looks a little like a cocker spaniel and a little like a basset and a little like a lot of things but has its own distinct look. Hardly a succinct explanation but Im sure once you have seen a picture you will agree. When most people talk about fauves the first thing they say is “their ears are painted on” and that was the thing that instantly grabbed my interest. My poor long suffering teachers used to say the same thing to me in school. So instantly we have a fair bit in common.

Our pet free decade has included a few overseas trips and a few spontaneous weekends away, all of which will come to a screaming halt when the hound arrives. We have vaguely puppy proofed the house but not with any real zeal so no doubt he/she will find the most valuable item left at eye level to chew on. I say He/she because even though we have committed to owning the hound, the breeder is yet to allocate animals to buyers.

The litter consists of four girls and one boy. We initially said we were interested in a girl, but so is everyone else, so we have also said that we don’t want to miss out. Interestingly several people in the group have said the same thing. So this weekend we wait, holding our breath to discover if we are fishing around for a few suitable boy names or girl names. We have in the past had boy pets including Simpson the Labrador (famous for eating an entire worm farm, all three trays, in one sitting before requiring the local vet to pump his stomach). So perhaps it’s time for a girl but time will tell.

No doubt my witty son and even wittier bride have a long list of clever and beautiful names on a notepad somewhere waiting to be short listed. We have a six hour drive to meet the new family member and the same return so my first wish is that he/she travels well. I feel sure the name will settle almost instantly.

We have put our adult son in charge of training. As he continues to battle his way through the rigours of chemotherapy, his no nonsense approach to training everything (including me) will be put to perfect use. I am looking forward to the widening of our social circle as is the way with owning an animal in the inner city. Parks and routines become the catalyst for making new friends provided of course you do not own a killer.

I am also living in the hope that owning a dog will have an effect on my ever burgeoning waistline but I suspect the laziness that is clearly the root cause of the problem may be the very thing that causes the hound and I to cross swords. Im sure it wont be long before he/she looks up at me as we re-enter the house as the thought bubble hovers over his head saying “really that was not much of a walk bubble butt”.

I am genuinely excited about the new family member and look forward to sharing our adventures with you.

The grumpy old man was me

/ beaumontmichael

A few years ago now, in the middle of what up to then had been a very ordinary day, my bride tugged at my shirt sleeve and asked me why I was always so negative. It was a complete game changer. In that moment I realised I had become the very thing I most passionately did not want to become. I was a grumpy old man.

It instantly gave me heart palpitations and a general sense of unease that quite quickly turned into anxiety bordering on panic. What have I done? What have I become? It instantly dragged me back to the same feeling I had, when as a fifteen year old I saw the girl of my dreams kissing my friend. Completely gut wrenching. A stock take was needed instantly.

It only took a few minutes to realise that in the last week, just about everything I had said about the outside world was a criticism. I held up everything to my judgement. The news, politicians, journos, drug traffickers, teachers, bosses, world leaders, neighbours, pop stars and pretty much anything that came into my view. While there may not be too much wrong with that per se, I was only seeing the bad, the imperfect, the fault, the weakness or frailty in them all. Worse than that though I was saying it out loud.

It was time I had a good long look at myself.

It took months of self-examination and introspection to realise that it was a defence mechanism. Not a good one mind you. Because of the work I was doing back then, I was constantly required to stand up and take a position on things, say things and write things from within a very small world that was full of negative, grumpy old men. As a result, I copped a fair bit of criticism for everything from my haircut to my politics. My way of dealing with that criticism was to belittle the source. Which quite quickly developed into a hair-trigger response to everything in the world. I had let that mechanism take me over like one of those jungle vines you see that slowly covers and eventually strangles the life out of a once solid tree.

Frankly, being negative is easy. The newspapers have been teaching that for as long as we have been able to read them. Particularly in Australia where the Tall Poppy syndrome is inculcated into our culture. We are taught to be suspicious, look at people with caution if not derision, question the status quo which only supports the negativity of course. I am not blaming anyone else here by the way, least of all journos that are only out there making a living, taking on that behaviour was all my own stupid doing.

Breaking that behaviour pattern is tough. Recovery is a rocky road. The good news is I had not always been like that. In fact many people through my other jobs had highlighted my positive can-do attitude as a signature ethos. So surely with a few hints, a bit of support and a bit of a game plan, I could undo the hair-trigger and get back to being a cheery nice guy.

My bride had already rung the alarm bells. It is simply not nice to be around negativity all the time and particularly not at such close quarters. I was pretty determined to change and pretty motivated to make the change a lasting one.

The first step was to take some action, not just thinking, but some physical action so I determined to go for a walk by myself each morning and fill that walk with good thinking. I discouraged my bride from coming along (as politely as I could) so that I could devote the walk to better, clearer more positive thinking. I promised myself I would not spend the time gritting my teeth with anxiety or letting negative thoughts into my head. It didn’t always work, but over time as I caught myself getting dark, I tried to work my way through the feeling in a bid to pop out the other side.

Walking really helps. I would get home and do a few quick weights as a way of signing off on that part of the day and I find that bit of exercise combined with good thinking makes a huge difference. On the walk I try to remind myself of things I am grateful about. My bride, my home, my friends, my lifestyle, my wonderful children, my music, my writing, all sorts of stuff that I was pretty happy with. Occasionally I would try to find solutions to things that were worrying me, but often I found that to be a gateway into doom and anger. I try to think of things I could build or people I could support rather than things that were not fair or people who had been cruel or rude.

My walks are still a source of therapy that I need to do. I don’t do it every morning but I know I should. Finding just 30 minutes to go for a walk and get my head straight makes such a big difference to the people around me that I should be thinking of it as a gift to myself. As you can see it is still a work in progress, Even at 55 I am still a work in progress and that’s fine by me.

People under pressure

/ beaumontmichael

Hospitals bring out the best and the worst in people it seems. The ward I have been visiting recently is a prime example. It provides temporary respite for an elderly fat fussy gentleman without a single manner to his name. He has a regular female visitor, a neighbour or helper, perhaps a housekeeper or carer. The relationship is not one of great friendship, and definitely includes some financial component as they spend a bit of time each visit working out what is going to come out of “the account.”
Neither of them was blessed with the “whisper” gene either. This communication method is particularly useful in places like hospitals when you want to talk about financial movements or bowel movements or your genitals. Apparently though, it is not for everyone. He is rude to the nurses, the doctors and his regular visitor. In the two days he shared the ward with my son, I didn’t hear a single thank you or please.
I know more about him than I care to know, and yes that includes all the movements and the other details mentioned above. His every malady seems to be someone else’s fault, or problem. He hates the ward, the hospital, the staff and you won’t believe it but even the food is not up to scratch.
Well, guess what chubster? I have news for you, no-one wants to be there and it’s called hospital food for a reason. The doctors and nursing staff are battling to save your life. They are not turning up to work just to listen to you bitch and grizzle about things that they can’t change. (Bless those wonderful staff)
It was a great reminder to me that if you surround yourself with misery, you get miserable. My son is a terrific cheery young guy, facing a pretty tough medical challenge and being forced to listen to this egocentric fat fool is just bringing him down. And it is so important to be able to whisper.

Where is Mr T when I need him?

10 things you learn being a scooter rider

/ beaumontmichael

I am a scooter rider, albeit a big scooter, a 500cc beast that most car drivers think is a big touring motorcycle. I am also fortunate enough to live in an inner city suburb of beautiful Sydney, and ride my scooter throughout the state in the course of my job, but most often to and from the office in the heart of town. This is the third scooter I have owned and it has just clicked over 100,000 kms which is a lot of time spent on two wheels.

Scooter riders are so fortunate to be able to enjoy our commute to the office when for most travellers it is drudgery or even a necessary evil. However to stay alive, we need to be able to maintain focus, be quick learners and flexible thinkers, so it’s not for everyone. If scooter riders fade off and fail to maintain focus on the task at hand, even for a few seconds, we don’t stay scooter riders for very long.

Here are a few other lessons I have learned that resonate through everything I do

Lesson 1. Most people, most of the time, are doing the very best they can with the tools they have at their disposal. You can yell at them or curse at them or shake your fist or your head as much as you want, that wont help and they will never improve. Most of them think they are pretty good drivers, and the occasional lapse in concentration that has them swerve across lanes or fail to indicate, is no true indication of their ability. Like it or not there is a wide bandwidth of capabilities on the road at any one time.

Lesson 2. Some people are on drugs. That may be something recreational like a bit of weed, or something a bit more serious like steroids that will cause them to take outrageous risks and drive very aggressively. Action and consequence is not something that computes with them, better to just stay out of their way.

Lesson 3. No-one wants to get involved in an accident, but some people simply don’t understand how dangerous their actions are and how close they come to causing a problem. You don’t know what you don’t know. The guy on the scooter almost always finishes off the worst for wear.

Lesson 4. It’s not how you get into the shit that matters, it is how you get out of it, so you need to make sure you have a way out of it. Don’t put yourself or your scooter in a position where there is no way out.

Lesson 5, Even if it isn’t your fault, you are partly to blame. If you were not there in the first place it would not have happened (see lesson 4)

Lesson 6. There is no intelligence test to drive (or parent for that matter) Closely related to lesson 1. But a good reminder.

Lesson 7. Life is full of little beautiful moments, suck them up, live them, make the most of every single one of them.

Lesson 8. You will die. But then everyone else will too. The trick is not to die while riding. Two wheels are inherently less safe than four. Just because its more fun doesn’t mean you can sit and relax, you need to stay focussed.

Lesson 9. Car drivers (or at least many of them) genuinely believe that bikes should not be on the road. The roads belong to cars, therefore they are doing you a favour just letting you share it with them.

Lesson 10. It’s really nice to be right, it’s better to be alive.

Once upon a time I would get really really upset about the injustice of bad luck or circumstance. Scooter riding has taught me a lot about rolling with the punches, being pragmatic, separating function from emotion. It may not be for everyone, but I love every minute of it.

5 Things I learned about parenting when my son got sick

/ beaumontmichael

I understand that each and every parenting experience is necessarily different, personal, private and unique in its own special way, there are themes that I see keep popping up in the parenting experience. A friend of mine is going through a similar challenge, though with very different roots. Her son was hit by a car while riding his scooter to work, resulting in some broken bones and weeks off work.

My own son is struggling with Lymphoma, similar result in the end as he will in all likelihood make a complete recovery but needs a few weeks off work as an invalid. Both young men spent a little time in hospital and are recuperating at home and then some medium to long term recovery plans. The two young men do not know each other which makes the comparison even more interesting from a spectators point of view. The parenting issues are still the same.

Lesson 1. There is a time to step forward, and a time to step back. I am not completely convinced I have learned the lesson well, but it is a constant challenge with adult children, and parents of my generation. We parents want to demonstrate our love in all the ways that our parents failed to do with us. We hug our children, we tell them that we love them, we are happy to have them around. However, we can’t protect them all the time, things will happen to them outside of our control and we have to learn to let them invite us in to assist.

Lesson 2. Though you never stop being a parent, your children can actually make decisions without you. I know, crazy isn’t it? My adult son, can actually look at the available information and make an adult decision without my input. When did that happen?

Lesson 3. Sometimes they want their partner, not their parent around. This one is a complete shocker. How can a young attractive girlfriend possibly give the sort of comfort that a father could? Hang on a minute, I think I see what’s happening here.

Lesson 4. It’s OK to cry about your children in public. Every person on the planet cuts you a bit of slack when it’s about your kids.

Lesson 5. There is a balancing act around discussing your children with others. Lets face it, listening about someone else’s children is boring. But then, if someone’s children get sick or injured that rule changes in an instant. Letting people know what is going on is actually really important in the scheme of things.

Parenting is such a wonderful art form. Constantly changing, perpetually imperfect. It has given me so many grey hairs and wrinkles as well as laugh lines and beautiful life changing experiences. My boys are amazing. They help me grow up. Watching them suffer is one of the toughest, perhaps the toughest part of being a parent.