129 – Cancelled, Part 4: 27 December 2024

This is a photo of Chris Reilly at our housewarming in 2001.  Chris was the husband of the beautiful Sue Marshall who came to the housewarming with Chris.  Chris Reilly was an honoured guest at out barbecue on 26 January 2021.  He was sitting next to me when Anne Ryan ranted about Australia Day.  Chris Reilly eagerly joined the Cancellation Crew organised by Anne Ryan.  He attended Margaret’s funeral but refused to speak to me and I became aware he was present only when I accidentally met him after the funeral had finished.

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This photo shows Chris Reilly and Sue Marshall at the 2001 housewarming.  Sue always had a beautiful smile for everyone she met, even after she was given her terminal cancer diagnosis.  Chris Reilly always found it much harder to be welcoming to any people except Sue.

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Margaret and I loved each other from the first moment we met.  This is us at our housewarming.

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This is a copy of the letter dated 27 January 2021 that I sent to Anne Ryan on 28 January.  This letter was the excuse used by Anne Ryan to cancel both me and Margaret.  Anne Ryan also ensured that all of our friends – whom she knew only because Margaret introduced them to Anne – also cancelled both Margaret and me.  

At the date of the cancellation. Margaret was expecting to die in the immediate future and she had just finished 6 weeks of chemotherapy and radiotherapy which we hoped would extend her life by perhaps 2 months.  That made no difference to the cancellation.  The cancellation was ruthlessly enforced.

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Wednesday 27 January 2021   Dear Anne,   Re: Why I Have Decided Not to Walk At Morialta   I am supposed to walk with you and Mary at Morialta on Friday 29 January but I have decided that I will not walk with you at Morialta on Friday.  I would prefer to verbalise in your presence, what I say in this letter and I have seriously considered trying to say this to your face, but I know my emotions would get in the way and the words would all come out wrong.  As an alternative, I will try and explain in writing in this letter. Yesterday, you were an extremely welcome guest at our home for an Australia Day barbecue.  I was outside on the decking doing the cooking when you arrived, but you came outside and sat at the outside table talking to me and Chris Reilly.  While you were outside, you raised the topic of the date of Australia Day and the fact that some people prefer to call it invasion day.  Amongst other things, you said that the concept of Australia Day dated back only to 1994 and that you thought the date should be altered to a different date from that on which the First Fleet arrived in Sydney in 1788.  I said that I had lived in Australia all of my life and that Australia Day had always been celebrated on the same date throughout my lifetime.  You then said that celebrating Australia Day on 26 January was similar to the celebration of King Billy’s Day in Northern Ireland on 14 March (I may have that specific date not quite correct).  I said that I could not see the similarity because King Billy’s Day celebrated a military victory over the Irish by English forces and the triumph of the Irish Protestants in Ireland.  I said that Australia had not experienced an event similar to this on 26 January 1788. To my complete shock, you then said “I am not going to listen to this”, stood up and went back into the house. There was another occasion in late 2020 when your behaviour also shocked and surprised me. On the last occasion that I was able to walk with you and Mary at Morialta, we were in the car and nearly at Morialta.  In general conversation I said that I liked the Premiers of New South Wales and Queensland because they did not try and use their gender but simply did the job they were elected to do.  Your immediate response to this was to claim I had said something “sexist” because I would never have said this about a male politician.  I replied that you had been listening to ABC radio too much and you should broaden your range of listening. You then spoke about the troubles of Angela Merkel in Germany and Ursula von der Leyen and the difficulties based upon their gender that they had when they began doing their respective jobs.  For the record, I had never heard of Ursula von der Leyen apart from being vaguely aware she had something to do with the European Union.  I again commented that you had been listening to ABC radio too much.  I also said that what I had said about the Premiers of New South Wales and Queensland was in substance the same as what you had just said about Angela Merkel and Ursula von der Leyen, but that you had “dropped on me from a great height” for saying the same as you. I was extremely upset that someone I treasure as a close friend should accuse me of being “sexist”.  I was about to tell you to stop the car so I could get out, but before I could do this, you realised you had upset me and said you were sorry.  I believe you had no idea why I was upset and that you just felt you needed to defuse an uncomfortable situation. I did not really enjoy the walk that day.  I now feel I should have told you of the impact your behaviour had on me, but I did not do so. Now to return to what happened yesterday. By walking away and saying that you were not going to listen any more to what I was saying, you were in effect saying that if I say anything that you disagree with, you have the right to claim that you are upset by what I am saying and I must in future take care never to say anything that you disagree with.  This is called censorship.  Put another way, even though you perhaps tell yourself you are a champion of free speech, you are only prepared to let people speak freely if they say things you agree with.  If I ever say something you disagree with, you will close down my views by refusing to listen and by claiming that you find them personally upsetting. For the record, this is a vile tactic and I refuse to co-operate with it. In addition to making me feel that a treasured friend has decided my ideas are so worthless they should not be listened to, your actions in choking off my ability to voice my thoughts also had a direct physical impact on me. You may or may not be aware that I have suffered considerable physical discomfort during the weeks and months since Margie was diagnosed with Ampullar cancer.  This discomfort was particularly acute over the 7 weeks that she underwent radiotherapy and chemotherapy.  My physical discomfort has manifested as severe diarrhea, periodic shortness of breath, sudden, severe bloating and severe discomfort caused by the bloating.  When I get the bloating, hard experience tells me I will not be able to get any sleep that night. Until yesterday, the bloating, diarrhea and shortness of breath had drifted into the past (it was about 3 weeks since my last episode).  My 3 weeks of relief from these symptoms came to an abrupt end about one hour after everyone had left our place yesterday.  The diarrhea started again.  Adding some spice to the mix, I also got an optical migraine.  This is like a migraine but without the headache.  It sounds harmless enough but it can be quite debilitating.  I get pressure on the eyes and visual symptoms - usually jagged lightning bolts obscuring my vision.  Then the stomach went into full bloating mode.  It swelled and I started burping and continuously hiccupping.  Later that night, I didn’t even hear the phone ring when my son Chris rang to say hello.  I was too busy hoping that I would send only bowel contents (and not parts of my bowel) down the toilet. I did legs up the wall for 15 minutes at about 9:00 pm hoping it would settle my body down.  It did help but not for long.  By 1:00 am I was still awake and hiccupping continuously and realising that it would be yet another no sleep night and that if I stayed in bed, it would simply guarantee that Margie got no sleep either.  So I got up, closed the bedroom door to try and insulate her from my noise and tried dozing on the couch. I did finally drift off on the couch at about 3:30 am and woke at about 5:20 am. Telling you about these physical consequences is not meant to try and get sympathy.  I am trying to point out that there are physical consequences for everything that every one of us does.  You might think claiming to be offended at what I say it is a reasonable way of silencing views that you disagree with.  I do not.  I profoundly believe that every person who is not expressing support for violence has the right to say whatever he or she wants.  I believe that the world is a far better place where people are able to say what they think because in the middle of the babble of views, deep truths may emerge.  No matter how unlikely you think it is that you might be wrong, much of what you and I think, has a high chance of being wrong.  When one person accurately points out reality, the reality being pointed out does not cease to be true simply because everyone else in the world thinks otherwise.  Reality does not depend on whether or not other people accept it as “true”.  Reality always remains “true” no matter how many people genuinely believe otherwise.  None of us see more than a small slice of the whole of reality. Your preference to avoid views that contradict your own, reminds me of lyrics from an old Monkees song.   With slight amendments, the lyrics reflect your apparent attitude to views that differ from your own. “Why don’t you cut your hair? Why don’t you live up there? Why don’t you do what I do?  Think what I think when I care?”   So that is what I have to say.  I can’t walk at Morialta with someone who thinks my views are so worthless that I should not be allowed to express them.  This is profoundly upsetting for me, but I am not willing to do things that might well result in more emotional distress for me and create a real possibility of more horrible nights like Tuesday night.   John

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By 8 February 2021, both Margaret and I were cancelled.  Margaret is now dead.  I am alive but I remain cancelled.