“Music can have a powerful effect on our emotions and create a lasting impact.”

I  have been asked to describe an experience when I got lost in a single piece of music, and what made it so unforgettable. What I am about to describe is not what you expected, but here goes.

In my young days I would have dearly loved to learn to play the piano. The opportunity never arose.

Later on, in my late life parenthood, Bernadette and I went to the Benalla Show and encountered an Organ retailer.  At this stage in our life we had four children and were soon convinced that it would be a good idea to involve them in music. It didn’t take the organ retailer long to convince us that his “easy to play” organ would be just the thing. So $1200 lighter we took delivery.

The two boys, being approximately aged 10 and 12 at this stage, showed enthusiasm so we arranged with a music teacher, Mrs.Schulz, to tutor them. I would take them down to her McIvor Street home of an evening to get their lessons. I told her of my earlier desire to learn to play the piano and she convinced me that she could teach me to play the organ. So,…at age 50 years…I commenced lessons.

The three of us would go, weekly, for lessons, and …….for a 50 year old…….I slowly learned my chords. Nowhere near as easy as the man at the show ground had told us, so I struggled on.. Our eldest son Anthony took to learning, but to Peter it was a chore.

Mrs Schulz moved house to a farm a number of kilometres out on the Yarrawonga Road. So we would travel of a Tuesday evening out to her farm.  She had a number of students and at years end she arranged for all her students , with their parents in attendance, to give a recital. This applied also to the “old stager” …me!

The children all played to the delight of their parents, showing their talent….Then it was my turn!

After two years I had learned a number of elementary tunes and Mrs.Schulz had fine tuned me  for my performance and so, apprehensively, I commenced to play… Then the worst possible thing happened! All of my fingers became thumbs! Consequently I gave the worst performance of my life. The parents, good naturedly applauded me……but I knew!.... I was no musician.

Here was my experience with a single piece of music. What made it so unforgettable?

In real life I am not a quitter. But this embarrassment was more than I could bear. I quit!

I have not sat on an organ stool since.
 
 
Ray O’Shannessy.
28/11/17.

Right here I am at my 1960’s residence in Clarke Street Benalla.  We built the residence during the year of 1967 when houses were affordable and the interest rate was 3.75%. Our home was considered to be large, 12.2 squares!  Right now it is an insignificant size.

Right now I am in my 86th year.  I am fit, content, comfortable and satisfied with my life. I accept my own mortality  and consider every day a blessing.  I rise at 7.00 a.m. daily and exercise at the Benalla Hydrotherapy Pool for 40 minutes.

My wife is a whiz in the garden and, to  the envy of others, is quite content to mow the lawn.

I am easily occupied with reading,  crosswords  and my involvement in 2 Probus clubs, Rotary and U3A.  I am also chairman of the Cemetery Trust  and still perform a number of honorary audits.

I keep saying that I will go back to playing bowls, but I cannot find the enthusiasm.  Strange, after being an ardent bowler since 1957.

Our land development interest has reached the stage where only two blocks remain unsold. We will shortly  be obliged to depend on our dwindling superannuation funded allocated pensions, and the Centrelink pension, for survival. Nevertheless our financial adviser  has just produced a chart which shows that we are financial  at least until  I reach the age of one hundred and one.

After having had a number of cruising holidays which I always enjoyed thoroughly, I made the mistake of saying that I was ‘cruised out’.  Consequently cruises no longer seem to be on our agenda. We have however, seemingly, resolved to do car trips  of several days duration, around Victoria, and have also booked  a trip to Kangaroo Island through Lakeside Probus  early in the new year.  We will have to reconsider future travel; our daughter-in-law, who is a mobile travel agent, is always ready to assist.

The U3A organisation  continues to stimulate me  as it does with so many other seniors.  I am not as involved as I was early in my retirement and hold no executive position. The ‘winery walkabout’ and ‘armchair-travelling’ sections provide me with relaxation, while ‘singing for fun’ and the ‘writing workshop’ stimulate me.  We have two ‘singing for fun’ concerts coming up next month  and the ‘writing workshop’ always provides a challenge.  I sometimes wonder if the other contributors to the workshop  consider me to be self- centred, but I take the opportunity  to write personal experiences, the writing of which I expect to be able to hand down to my children and grand children.

As an ‘elder’ of the Rotary Club I find my membership very relaxing.  I also feel at ease  in the role of Chairman of the Rotary Paul Harris Fellow committee.

In home life the devotion of  my family gives me  great satisfaction. As one who never had a family life in my youth, the absence of sibling  contact  has made me adamant  that it won’t happen again. Ever since my children left  home  I have made a practice of phoning each one of them every Sunday evening.  There may, at times, be nothing to talk about, but I am, at least, making contact.

Right Here! and Right Now! I am a very fulfilled person.
 
 
Ray O’Shannessy
24th October, 2017.

As I ponder this title, I acknowledge that “Right now” I am 85 years old,  and that “Right here”  I should recognise some of my inner feelings.

Alright!... I am 85 years old; I am healthy; I have come to grips with my own mortality; I am content! I have a wonderful supportive wife; 4 top children; and 10 loving grandchildren.
In a life, which, at times, has been daunting, I have succeeded!

I have learned that every person has good points: that one should accept everyone at face value: and one should be wary of the “holier than thou” person as there are, too often, undertones of hypocrisy.

In my writings for this group, I have, possibly, stressed too much, that my mother died when I was 4 years old,  and, perhaps, understated my father’s alcoholism which caused him to lose his farm , and to his own employee, at that.

After Mum’s death I did not live with my father and consequently, at school became a “loner”. Once I commenced work, I was, for a number of years, a beer drinking “lost soul”. I followed a career with a  stock and station agency business in three different country branches for 16 years. I had no confidence in myself, or fondness for my job.

I had little, or no, contact with my siblings. They had all married very young  and, spread around the countryside, had their own families to care for, and lives to live.

After my adolescent  years had passed  I became a self taught mature age student and eventually  obtained two accounting degrees and then a fellowship. I went into a business accounting partnership in Benalla until retirement  in 1998. My wife and I operated the Benalla Coin Laundrette for seventeen years, and I have been a senior  member of a land development corporation for over thirty years. Before breakfast each morning I do a series of exercises at the Benalla  Hydrotherapy Pool.

Over a lifetime  I have found myself involved in many community service organisations, from the Lions Club to Rotary,  Ballandella to the Cemetry Trust,  U3A to two Probus Clubs,  the Bowls Club to Cooinda, and so on; approximately thirty organisations in total. I have held executive positions in all.

My sporting interests have been confined to table tennis (in my youth) and to lawn bowls for sixty years. In my early days I was recognised as a relatively good lawn bowler, but age caught up and my standard lessened, to the extent  that  my pride now dictates that I retire.

I believe that, despite a slow start, I have defied the odds and led a very fulfilling life. I have succeeded in family life; in business life;  and in community life. I am a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, a Life Member of the Benalla Bowls Club, a Paul Harris Fellow in Rotary, and, above all, an Order of Australia Medalist.

As a motherless child, and the son of an alcoholic, and being somebody who ‘never belonged’, I believe that  in the words of the late Teddy Whitten, I have ‘stuck it right up ‘em’.

Ray O’Shannessy
​October 24, 2017                    .