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A Tragedy Of Sorts

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

There was a huge commotion in the backyard late this afternoon. Birds were screeching. Ama launched herself at high speed hoping to join the fray. My True Love beat her to it. One of the three magpie chicks had caught its wing in the dog fence, possibly trying to escape our big dog, Makea. Maybe the chick was already trapped before Makea arrived on the scene to complicate matters. The other magpies were screeching overhead and swooping to fend off the attackers. My True Love untangled its wing and popped it over the dog fence but it was injured and unable to fly.

In Canberra, we have this marvelous system where all vets provide a community service by treating injured wildlife. I was in two minds about whether to separate the maggie chick from its family and take it to the vet. It was pouring rain, the little bird was sodden and hurt, and of course, there was Clyde, our neighbour’s evil, cat to worry about. So My True Love and I reluctantly boxed it up and took it in. All going well, the chick should go to the wildlife carer tomorrow before being released back in the vicinity when it fully recovers. We hope its parents accept it back into the family again.

We are all in shock. We wonder whether we are now off the magpie family’s Christmas card list and will become swooping targets in future. Maybe the chick will become a swooper due to the trauma. Maybe I shouldn’t worry so much about evil Clyde and worry more about my own evil hounds. It is notable that Fynnie, our male dog, remained inside during all the commotion. As far as he is concerned, traipsing around in the rain is strictly for the birds.

How shattered ma and pa magpie must be right now! It breaks my heart. What song could possibly convey that? I dunno, but I am going with Lullaby of Birdland, performed by Andrea Motis, Joan Chamorro, Scott Hamilton and Ignasi Terraza (the latter playing a very special introduction).

Take care, everyone. Try not to worry.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

RDP – Under the Weather

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Landing It

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

To travel to my home town, the place of my birth, would take a number of days by car. For a family with small children that journey would likely stretch to over a week. When I was a child, the cost of plane fares was also exorbitant, hence our family rarely visited our relatives in Far North Queensland. I remember a special occasion when our family did make the trip by plane. Perhaps it was my first plane trip. It was very exciting.

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Numbers Down

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

Canberra’s coronavirus restrictions were eased slightly at the end of last week and will be further eased at the end of this week. Some restrictions will remain but we can now connect again with friends and family, albeit in small numbers. Stay-at-home provisions have applied since Delta arrived here nine weeks ago. During that time, I have taken great comfort from the competent, calm, compassionate and informative approach of public health officials in our local government. The health team and the government could not have been any clearer about what they needed us to do, and because no sector of the community were given preferential treatment over another, Ken Behrens* largely did what was asked of us. I think it is fair to say that at times our Chief Health Officer, Dr Kerryn Coleman, outshone others in the spotlight. I’m such a fan.

One of the many strategies to help us open safely has been to get as many Canberrans vaccinated as quickly as possible. Just prior to lockdown, approximately 48 percent of the Canberra population over 12 years of age had had one dose of one of the Covid vaccines, while just shy of 25 percent of us were fully vaccinated. Now 98 percent of us have had one dose and 83 percent of eligible Canberrans are already fully vaccinated. Howzat! Thankfully the rest of Australia is not far behind us. Unfortunately, a small number of Canberrans have died over this period and our hearts go out to their families. The vaccines are very effective but as we have learned there still can be breakthrough infections. There is also likely a growing group of Canberrans whose vaccine protection is waning and who, therefore, will need to get a top up quite soon. It does sound like there will be no rest yet for the public health team and frontline health workers who have been working so tirelessly to keep us safe.

Today, my shout-out is to Canberra’s health workers, and Dr Coleman in particular. Thanks for caring. As Dr Coleman is originally a sand-groper (that is, someone from Western Australia), I thought I would choose my Friday song from a singer/songwriter from that state. Today, I have chosen Andrew Winton, performing his song Number’s Down. How apt, don’t you think? The chorus is very easy, so sing it with me.

Take care, everyone.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

* Each day over the last nine weeks, members of the ACT government have held a press conference to keep Canberrans informed of how the Delta outbreak was unfolding and the necessary steps to keep us safe. During one of these press conferences, there was a sub-titling error that referred to Canberrans as Ken Behrens and henceforth the name has been adopted wholeheartedly by the Canberra community.

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A Time For Everything

Welcome to my regular (and early) Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you. Today, I am going to get nostalgic.

I can’t remember a time when the house wasn’t dilapidated. The house sat upon tall timber pylons three storeys high, but there was nothing underneath it. The story goes that there were plans for a shop below the house but those plans never came to fruition. To the passerby, it might have looked like a giant birdhouse. This was fitting because two older ladies lived in that house. The younger was my grandmother, the elder was her mother, my great grandmother. My grandfather lived up the road. That was odd, but odd is normal for us.

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On Creating A Myth

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

For reasons that I am ashamed of now, I decided not to send my children to our local primary school. Instead, I decided to send them to a school out of area. Anyway, for entirely different reasons, it turned out to be a good decision. At first it seemed that we might not be able to get our eldest child into our chosen school. This was quite distressing for our son because he wanted to go to the school with the rocket in the playground. My husband and I also checked out the Catholic primary school in the same suburb as some of my child’s friends would also be attending that school. I was upfront with the principal of the Catholic school about our lack of religion. I explained to him that my child was interested in dinosaurs, planetary science and, you know, evolution. The principal was quick to reassure me that the religious education was only a small component of the curriculum and that the bible was not taught as some literal truth but more as guiding stories. I thought that was very enlightened. I can’t imagine getting that type of response these days. However, at that time, almost half the children who went to Catholic schools weren’t actually Catholic. In the end, a place came up at the rocket ship school and so a temper tantrum was avoided and I did not have to deal with my own internal conflict.

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Shake It

Welcome to another Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

It’s been a newsie week which leaves me with many options for this week’s Friday song. We had the sudden announcement of the Aussie government’s cancellation of its French sub contract, and instead the government will purchase you-beaut US nuclear-powered subs. Oh wait, the French have nuclear-powered subs but we didn’t want nuclear subs at the time. Did we even give the French a chance to bid for the new contract? Maybe not. Consequently, and apologies to the French, ABBA’s Waterloo and Fat Boy Slim’s Weapon Of Choice, immediately popped into my head!

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I Guess We Have To Try

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

There are no winners in this pandemic. Today I would like all of us to spare a thought for our friends with loved ones who are currently undergoing medical treatment for life-threatening illnesses. Now just imagine that you couldn’t be with your loved one in hospital due to Covid visitor restrictions. Next, imagine that hospitals and emergency services are so overwhelmed with Covid patients that medical treatment cannot be provided in a timely fashion for all those in need. That would be unbelievably traumatic. It’s happening. My heart goes out to anyone in that situation.

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Soft Voices

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

Music when Soft Voices die (To –)
by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory—
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heaped for the belovèd's bed;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.

My music selection today is Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A Major, K 622: II. Adagio, performed by Thomas Friedli. For J.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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Walk In Their Shoes

Welcome to a little bit of everything – my Friday Song day, the Lens-Artists (Keep Walking) and Last Photo (for August) Challenges.

I jokingly said to someone recently that I like my solitary walks because when I go walking with my True Love, he always points out some small, fast moving creature that is off before I ever set eyes on it. Then, I feel like I’ve missed out on something. Over the years, I’ve found that is a feeling I have to let go. In any case, there’s always so much else to see if only I care to look. Do you feel that you must bring a photo home from every expedition? Do you always expect a medal for something good that you’ve done? Maybe we should focus on participating rather than the prize? If I can’t snap the small, fast moving creature, I am perfectly happy with a tree. Trees – there should be more of them.

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Child

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

I’ve been distracted recently by world, domestic and local crises over the past few weeks. This week, however, I would like to return to my musical journey around the world. Shall we go the Philippines today for a song about misspent youth and family reconciliation? In some cultures, children are expected to rebel, in other cultures it is the reverse. Rebellion is kids’ way of saying, “I’m not you.” Anyway, the song is Anak (meaning child), written and performed by 70s folk singer, Freddie Aguilar. Lyrics in Tagalog are included in the video so that you can sing along. Enjoy.

Be gentle, everyone.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.