Excerpts from Neil Murray Tour Diary 2015.
Its quiet here in the desert as the dust settles in Adelaide. Last night we pulled off the perfect sting except for one small hitch. I left the loot behind. Alright it was dark and in the confusion I couldn't find my glasses ok? I hope the Yearlings have got it. Hate to think some fool got lucky. There's no way of knowing. I’ve not seen any smoke signals yet. I got three days to kill before I swoop on Darwin. I may have to finger a few grey nomads just to get by.
And the smoke signals came. The Yearlings didn't let me down. We split the loot on the floor of a lonely cavern. They rode back south and I swung away to the north, saddle bags bulging. I hit Darwin in the dry, disguised as a tourist. I'll pull a job at the Railway Club. The regular crowd there, they know me. They've helped me before. They don't care much for appearances and even less for authority.
The Railway Club fitted like an old coat. Even had Shellie Morris come in and lend a hand. Now I'm on the road to Barunga to join up with my old Warumpi Band partner Sammy Butcher. He was the fastest gun around back in the day. He's slowed up a bit now. Like me, like all of us. But we still got the magic. Don't worry about that. We'll make fire.
Barunga is done and dusted. There might have been bigger names and slicker acts but on the Saturday night by the creek Sammy and I propped ourselves in a couple of chairs and conjured the memory and heart of 1982. "I grew up with your music" the witnesses told us afterwards. In the wee hours of Monday morning, I was woken by a knock on the car window. The moon was high and clear. A figure loomed, a familiar low voice. Sammy was hitting the road back to Papunya. We shook hands in the dark not knowing when we'd meet again. Is there a next time? Never say never.
I drifted back to Alice. One last salute for the faithful at the Totem Theatre before I retreat into the teeth of winter. Then things turn spooky. You can’t tell who’s who anymore. Someone always wants to jump on the microphone. There are posts, sightings and messages purporting to be me when they’re not. I was told I was seen at Kiwikurra. “Really? Well I wasn’t there.” Puzzled faces before me. The allure of myth - a reported sighting in the desert- persists. What hope for truth?
“Was I with anyone?”
“Peter Garret and Mara hook” they said. Those bandits.
“It wasn’t me and I’m talking to you now” I replied calmly.
“Must’ve been your doppleganger” they said.
Each time I mount that stage I have to prove I’m real. Till then I’m making adjustments; checking gear, stocking supplies, polishing my boots, watching the sky. Ready for the blizzard to come.
Back home, snug in my hideout, I burn wood while gales test for loose corrugated iron and squalls toss the heads of she-oaks, gums and wattles. I monitor the passage of stars counting down the shortest day. Dark and sodden they are too, but I plod on with my tree-planting programme- putting native flora back into the ground it loves. I aim to seclude myself within an oasis of forest buffered against a sea of industrialised mono cultural cropping. But then word came down from Queensland. They wanted me. There’s people there that have been very decent to me - I can’t refuse. So I pull out and head north – name check shows at Caloundra, Diddillibah and Cherbourg. I carry a couple old photos of someone I once knew that way.
With a steely Kabi Kabi woman behind the wheel I was given safe and swift passage into Cherbourg – once the last stop on a trail of dispossession for Queensland Murris. All this history was on display at the Ration Shed- a place that once provided food now provides food for thought. Outside, the NAIDOC celebrations continued- the resilient Aunties declaring Cherbourg now a beacon of peace, hope and good will.
Almost froze over night in Kuranda, then was smuggled to the strange and haunting range that is- Black Mountain- where I conferred gravely on the lost years with the venerable Dave Steel deep into the coals of the night time camp fire. Was out of there by daylight to make a one night stand in Port Douglas where a few scattered souls bore witness to my forlorn testimony. Afterwards, three drunken, singing women collared me to drive their car to Cairns while cop cars prowled all around us. I slept somewhere and slunk into the airport early and hopped a propeller flight to Horn Island. Now I’m dreaming in TI. Hoping to stow away on a lugger to an outer island.
This is how I’ve been rolling for more than 30 years. It’s too late to turn back. I managed to dodge the fame bullet, kept a low profile and did raids on the mainstream when they weren’t looking and found a way to survive on the fringe.
Two Island men bundled me into a light charter plane that took off out over a shoal laden sea to the east. Where the hell were we going? We were far from any substantial land. Occasionally I saw dinghies below me in a vast turquoise expanse. “What are they doing?”- I wondered. But then it occurred to me that these Torres Strait Islanders hold the sea like Anangu hold the desert. Finally a prominent lump of land that was Mer (Murray Island) appeared on the horizon. The plane sashayed down to land like a dragonfly on the back of giant Dugong asleep in a dream of aeons. We were greeted with the words “welcome home” by Councillor William Akee. We had come to honour a fallen warrior, a national hero and one of the leaders of the nation we want to be - Eddie Koiki Mabo- the father of Native Title. Cr William guided us to his secluded gravesite where we paid our solemn respects.
Later I stood on Mer’s pristine white beach and took in a languid sea teeming with life. Frigate birds wheeled and soared, terns dive bombed fish, crabs danced sideways through long inky schools of sardines, pelicans cruised sedately.
“They can never leave” said William- “there’s too much feed here”.
I was reminded of the paradox of thinking I had come to the middle of nowhere only to find it is the centre of everything. For one delicious moment I wished I was marooned. Wanted to stay put and let it all just come to me.
Neil Murray Website http://www.neilmurray.com.au/