I come from a long line of farming families, on both sides. I grew up on a farm in rural NSW and had one of the best childhoods a kid could have. We’d spend hours climbing and gorging on mulberries from the tree out the back of the Colwell’s. Mum would make the most impressively decorated birthday cakes that we’d share with our family friends down at the riverbank. We’d make mudslides into the river, hide in the marshmallow grass and play in the cubby house Dad made for us. We had more horses than was necessary, and there’s one photo of myself, my sisters and the two boys that lived next door standing in marshmallow grass up to our waists pointing to a vivid rainbow splashed across a grey sky.
The outback is a beautiful place. When it rains.
It’s November of 2019, and we’re currently living through the worst drought in living memory. I am so thankful that when I was 1 years old, my Dad decided to sell our property. We continued living on the place, but he and my Mum went into the workforce and we were no longer a farming family. We eventually moved towns and they currently live on a hobby farm – they couldn’t cope without a little bit of land – but they aren’t reliant on the land for income, unlike so many struggling Australians today.
It absolutely breaks my heart that it just will not rain.
We can blame global warming, and our government, and ourselves, but placing blame isn’t going to solve the problem. There is literally nothing we can do to make it rain. Mother Nature can’t be coaxed.
I live in Melbourne now, and we’ve had some consistent rain over the past few months. I wouldn’t say it’s a great season, but it’s definitely green in most parts of Victoria. Much greener than the grey and brown of NSW and many other places right now.
A few months ago, I drove back to my hometown with a friend for our High School reunion. We left Melbourne in the rain, and the further north we drove, the drier and dustier it became. When we came back, it literally started spitting rain as soon as we crossed the Murray River – the border into Victoria. It just isn’t fair.
My friend told me to listen to a new song she had discovered a few weeks ago – Water on the Ground by Brad Cox. I have cried every time I listen to it.
“Thank you for life on the land,
Water on the Ground by Brad Cox
Family and friends,
Not the fact that I ain’t seen a cloud since 2010.
Still not raining again.”
It makes me feel silly to be so upset and feel so hard-done-by considering my family and I don’t rely on the land anymore, but I think it stems from the fact that we could so easily have been in the same sinking ship (pardon the ironic pun) as so many others if my Dad had decided to keep the farm. And yet when we talk to our family friends who are still out there, day in and day out hand-feeding stock, they’re still hopeful. I won’t say they aren’t putting on a brave face, and they aren’t struggling in every way possible, but it astounds me to no end how resilient and sturdy they are that after so many months and years of hard work and hardship, they still get out of bed each day and get on with it.
There is nothing like a farmer in drought. I don’t think anyone has a harder job.