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One day in 1950, North Korean farmer, Lee Che Con, his wife and six children sat down at the side of the road for two days waiting for a miracle. And not just any old miracle either. The family’s paddy field and sole hope of surviving the oncoming winter had been mined by retreating North Korean troops. Many pursuing UN troops may have driven up, one look soon convinced them to drive on. Someone with a knowledge of explosives was needed. As luck would have it, in this mayhem, along came an explosives expert–a long way from his home near the ‘tap o’ the hill,’ in Dundee and a young Private from Spring Creek, Tallangatta, Victoria, who both then spent an hour expecting every second to be their last, defusing that field.  I felt quite sad today that I wasn’t able to get the usual local newspaper remembrance notice for that explosives expert—my dad—who died 27 years ago today, when he more than went out of his way to do what he did all these years ago.

Let me tell you it certainly wasn’t  for want of trying on my Mr and my parts. But I think I can tell you that my dad would have been the first to say that  a company that sends forth ‘respectful’ reminder letters in the middle of a pandemic when  the letters are clearly ‘spew outs’, their ‘open’ offices  are shut  and then expects you to listen to the complete works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on hold,  at three times the already exorbitant cost of that notice, is  a company to give the finger to. Not in these exact words of course.

But I sure have the memory of everything he taught me, his peony roses in full bloom right now and plenty stories to tell the grandies who I am pretty certain he’d have adored.