The McQuarries-Author Andrew Bagust
“Don’t let the facts get in the way of good story”
Growing up in New Zealand in a rural community, I thought adults were boring talking by the hour about nothing. I couldn’t see the point. I loved climbing trees, or creating some peril, to squeeze the last drop out of my toothpaste tube of time, before dinner curtailed my exploits. I think I traumatized my poor sister who willingly entered into yet another scary adventure with me.
By the time I was twelve I sat mesmerized listening to endless passionate stories recounted with arms waving and explosive outbursts of raucous laughter.
For instance when my Aunty Marg came into the room, she knew only too well it was impossible to get a word in edge ways. she stood in command and flung her arms sideways. Almost in military style she cut the air for silence like a Samari warrior. Suddenly the room would fall deathly still, while we waited with bated breath for her majesties announcement.
As I listened to a hundred bizarre tales of their lives, I considered it possible that my ageing relatives might be aliens off another planet. Their pioneering experiences had little resemblance to anything I could even conceive in my seemingly sheltered world. As I got older I tried to quell a growing uneasiness for me to somehow record these stories. 30yrs in the building industry, doesn’t prepare you to write but I had to acknowledge the growing desire to fullfill a lifelong dream. But how? With a lack of education tugging at my core like corrosion, i secretly harboured emotions of inadequacy. However I reasoned that many times over the years I have enjoyed penning pros, or creating entertaining stories for our three children.
A few years ago while describing our travel adventures to friends and family back home, a few people said “Have you ever thought of writing?”
One day in the library I had a light bulb moment as i picked up a book about writing historical fiction.
Luckily i was ignorant to the thousands of hours of research needed, optimistic about the lengths it would take to actually see a published work completed. I had a naive thought “How hard can it be?” I was inspired to think, “At worst my family might be able to find a little taste of their ancestors between the pages of a novel.
It has truely been a privilege to bring back to life characters from our families who left their own wonderful imprint, in our DNA and footprints on our landscape.
I found myself grateful for the inspiration of untold hours of collective stories, photos and genealogy records provided by my Mother and sisters.
Fortunately I too share a love of history, ancestry and adding colour to the black and white narratives thrillingly passed down to me.
Enough at least to string a few sentences together fulfilling an echo I can hear from my brother, “Don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story”. Good advise if you need to add a little poetic licence to the real facts, creating shape, culture and personality to legendary characters in my own narrative.
My wonderful childhood probably prepared me for all the adventures I’ve personally experienced. Travelling extensively with my family around New Zealand in a caravan, tenting or around this small little blue speck hanging in our galaxy.
I remember vividly my parents setting up camp deep in the bush, under a canvas slung in the tree’s to make a temporary home for a week or so. We’d search again for the rusty coal range plate hidden amoungst the rocks to prepare a fire. Then we’d begin fighting off the ravenous bugs, grateful we had dropped by with fresh blood. Washing was a bracing dive into the icy clear waters of the Nelson lakes or many rivers coming down from snow clad mountains. This basic existence fell far short of the primitive conditions our ancestors experienced on a daily basis.
It seems the norm growing up In a young economy like Australia or New Zealand, to hold some gripping pioneer tale. Stories retold through generations, who left behind security to risk all, sailing out into the unknown. Growing up in the far flung Antibodies, our world view tends always to be looking out to cultures that are thousands of years older than ours.
Crazy to imagine that my great grandfathers left a world with steam locomotives to step into a wilderness, which would take half a century of modern progress to finally see powerful steam trains, ships and tractors.
like my family, If they survived the five harrowing months cramped aboard, they arrived ashore in a bush-clad wilderness. Armed with a suitcase of courage, a little city life experience and an axe to carve out a primitive cottage from the dark rain forests.
The legacy they left, was a gift to us, praying our lives could have a little less suffering.
I remember my Brother reading something profound, “70 years after a person has departed this life almost nothing will be remembered of them” The older I get, the more I’ve realised this to be true. We all have an opportunity to live this life paying it forward for the next generation to leave our unique footprints behind. What will yours be?
The McQuarries-Author Andrew Bagust 