TheBanyanTree: Tales of a Woodcat - Aroona

[Roger Pye]

Spirits of ‘Aroona’

‘Aroona’ is a grazing property of some 500 acres in an area of low 
rainfall within the Snowy River region of New South Wales. Settled in 
the mid 19th century, ‘Aroona’ has ever been conventionally farmed and 
stocked with cattle or sheep according to the wishes of its various 
owners and its soils have suffered much the same decline in nutrition 
and quality as is evident in other dry, arid parts of Australia. In 
April 2003 the owner, Jay, called on me for remediation advice. On my 
first visit it transpired that a benevolent spirit dwelt within the 
oldest part of the homestead which is said to date from 1860. The rooms 
there were very cold when I entered. Using a simple shamanic-style 
ceremony I released the spirit from bondage and gave it the option of 
going or staying; it chose the former.  Within minutes the temperature 
had risen significantly.

I next visited the farm to begin the remedial process. During the work, 
I told the owner that I had received an impulse to perform a full Reiki 
treatment in the room where the spirit had dwelt. In return I was 
advised that Jay missed having the presence around.

In my motel room that night I learned the spirit’s name was Enid . . .
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Enid’s Tale

In those days there were no fences - all the land was free and fertile 
and the flocks and herds grazed without hindrance. There was abundant 
rainfall and sunshine and the rivers and creeks ran clear. The people 
did not know how lucky they were, that within little more than half a 
century the flocks and herds and human greed would have grown so much 
the land and rivers would be dying.

Often Enid would stand at the window of her mother's room, looking out 
across open landscape to the ridge where the land began to fall away to 
the creek below. A hundred metres out from the window there was a rough 
track winding up from the ford which lay to the east. The track was 
never easy, always deeply rutted by the iron-shod wheels of drays hauled 
by teams of straining bullocks which travelled the hundreds of 
kilometres from the south coast, possibly even to the Kiandra goldfields 
high in the Snowy Mountains - carrying supplies up country and wool and 
fleece back to the coast for shipment to Sydney Town and the world.

All this she had learned at her mother's knee, year in, year out, not as 
a story but as snippets here and there. She was not sure, never sure, of 
where her father was, or even if she had a father, but it was not a 
subject she could discuss.

At that time Enid was as old as the property which was sixteen, almost 
seventeen years, and the year was 187_. She was slim and pretty as her 
mother had been at that age, or so she was told by the boys at the 
dances in the hotel at the village not far away eastwards who always 
vied for her attention. Her special friend, however, was Mike who lived 
on a selection not far from the escarpment of Brown Mountain in the 
Great Dividing Range. He rode his horse over to visit her two or three 
times a month and they would go riding across country, happy in each 
other's company. There are few secrets in small communities, of course, 
and so it was probably common knowledge what was happening to them.

Late afternoon it was when she last saw him in the flesh. It was a 
Thursday; he had ridden into the yard in the morning in great 
excitement, full of a tale of a coming battle that afternoon between 
'the law' and a band of bushrangers camped on the far bank of the creek 
over the ridge. How he knew of it as far away as the mountain he didn't 
say. Nor did she try to stop him from joining in for how could she? He 
would just have laughed and gone anyway.

They had brought him back to the homestead about three in the afternoon, 
up the track from the ford, slung face down across a horse. With 
difficulty they carried him across the verandah, through the front door 
and into her mother's room and laid him down on the bed which ran 
parallel with but a little way away from the only wall with a window in 
it. She and her mother cleaned him up as best they could though that 
wasn't much. Then they knelt on each side of the bed, Enid with her back 
to the wall, and just looked at Mike in despair.

For his left thigh was shattered by a musket ball and a terrible slash 
ran across his face. Though his body was twitching constantly she 
thought him to be unconscious for he was very quiet except for the 
occasional groan but suddenly he said very clearly "I love you Enid, 
hold me close!" Smiling tremulously, her hands went out as if willed by 
another, the right to his head, the left to that awful leg.

How long she stayed like that, Enid, crying now as she felt his 
lifeblood, warmth and energy seeping away, had no idea - until there was 
nothing left and she wailed, staggered to her feet and rushed from the room.

(<Before you released me> Enid continued <when I stood at the window to 
look out, as I did most of these long years to see whether Mike was 
coming, I would see a tree directly ahead which branches out from just 
above ground level; ten metres onwards there is a small gate shrouded by 
a hedge. I know that a little distance further on there is a bigger gate 
leading to the track which still winds up from the ford but now carries 
vehicles very different from the cumbersome drays. There are fences 
everywhere and many, many more buildings than when Mike and I rode the 
paddocks in harmony. Even the homestead itself has doubled in size.

<Harmony is something I have lacked in all my long years since that 
terrible day. When I awoke from the confusion which befell me after my 
mother dosed me with sedatives to quieten me down, I found weeks and 
weeks had passed. Whenever I mentioned Michael's name there were dark 
looks and people spoke in hushed voices or changed the subject quickly. 
Thus I never knew whether he had died that afternoon - though I supposed 
he had - or if he had, where they had buried him.

<So I stayed here in confusion, afraid to leave in case he returned 
while I was gone. I have seen many alterations while waiting for him to 
return, seen the land wither and die much as he did, seen people come 
and go, some caring of the land's needs but most not.

<There has been a great change, though, since he came back . . .>

to be continued .................

woodcat