No Bad Weather
by Miranda Luby
Miranda is one of our Writer's Residency finalists and will be published in our upcoming Anthology. Read more about the program - and meet all the finalists - here.
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There’s no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing. Wise words - and predictably stoic coming from a man who didn’t blink at the sight of a huntsman creeping inside his one-man canoe while he paddled the bushy bends of the upper Yarra River. Nature, after all, isn’t out to get us. It isn’t good or bad. In fact, nature is often completely indifferent to us in the most humbling way. One encounter with a swift-moving storm at high altitude, minus a waterproof jacket, will teach you that life lesson - if you’re lucky.
Early on in his life, my grandfather (stoic huntsman man) made a pact with himself: never leave Australia. Granted, this was before the era of frenzied flight sales and friends’ far-flung weddings. Still, he had the chance. But he didn’t take it. He was an outdoorsman and saw the idea of travelling abroad when there’s so much to experience right here as blasphemous. For him, the natural world was God, Kathmandu zip-offs his cassock and the well-thumbed pages of the latest Australian Geographic his bible.
I wasn’t around for most of his adventuring, instead bearing witness to his glory days of wonder and wandering from beneath the covers as he perched on the end of my trundle bed near the end of his life and imparted his wisdom. You’re never too young to learn about planning ahead in the bush (drive in and bury cheese and wine at the overnight stops of a multi-day hike).
My grandfather died 20 years ago now. But lately I’ve been thinking about his pact and spending more time in nature - for obvious reasons.
We’re a nation of travellers, a backpacked bunch of international adventurers, and we’re grounded. Last year our cities became off-limits and our office environments were even more of an existential threat to our wellbeing. Suffering aside, my grandfather would have been delighted. I can hear him now. “Right," he’d say, “here’s your chance to get at what’s important. It won’t last long. Don’t bloody well waste it. Nature,” he’d say, “is calling us back to it.”
It’s easy to forget, but we were born barefoot. We entered this life sap-stained and screaming, in awe of the world around us. We were designed to sleep under stars, to smell storms approaching, to sense time in sunlight. And while this country was stolen from those who first called it home — and although many of us put on shoes and suits and built cities — it’s never too late to find respectful ways to connect with and learn about this land. Stepping outside and being reminded where we all come from can make our current country-wide grounding feel less isolating and more, well, grounding.
For me, it’s the red-tailed black-cockatoo. They seem to follow me around Victoria’s Surf Coast like shrill siblings, demanding my attention and unconditional love. Reminding me that we share a house so, please, don’t burn it down. I’d recognise their call anywhere. It gets inside my skin and prickles the back of my neck. It’s a child-like wonder. It’s a deep, mindful breath. It’s home.
What calls you home? Pour yourself and whiskey or tea, sit down by the campfire and share it with me. I want to know you through the ways you come to know yourself. We’ve got all the time in the world. Out here, letting go of the things that don’t matter fosters connection, not just with the wild but with the people in it with you. It’s a space where the sacred silence between words means as much as what we say to each other, where a shared sunrise can solder two people together. What better balm for wounds from a lonely era?
I wish I could explore the great outdoors with my grandfather, now that I connect with it in the way he did when he was alive. But I know we have a bond through the bush that transcends space and time. Like the call of the red-tailed black-cockatoo, his memory follows me on hikes and down rivers, demanding I pay attention to what matters most.