‘Maybe Tomorrow’ By Boori Monty Pryor and Meme McDonald

BOOK REVIEW By Kate Beth

Surprisingly, I found myself at a loss as to where to start with this review. Due to the emotional content and subsequent mental processing of my reaction to Monty’s story telling, I have struggled putting my fingers to the keyboard.

I had to began Meme’s forward a few times as I kept catching myself forgetting to take notes so I followed her lead and “put my pen away and simply listened”. As with the commencement of the story from Boori’s perspective on page 9, I gave up trying to stop the emotion and just tried to absorb the confronting, yet never self-pitying, words of a man I feel I now know.

Even though the awareness and subsequent compassion I have gained on the journey of unravelling and understanding my own ignorance and implicit bias regarding our first people began many years ago, a new level of consciousness and heart aching clarity seems to have manifested itself in my bones upon the commencement of a university unit with Gary Foley, and the reading of ‘Maybe Tomorrow’.

“my purpose is to be a storyteller”

Completing ‘Aboriginal Tradition and Policy’ with Rebecca Gerrett-Magee at the start of this year and learning about the stories of direct experiences from casualties of the Stolen Generation (as opposed to statistical academic essays), amplified my empathy previously dulled by apathy and disconnectedness. I was repeatedly horrified and amazed hearing about all the heartbreaking and phenomenal true legacy of this country. Due to the absence of historical truth and denial of critical thinking in our school system, I’ll never know if I could have been capable of this level of compassion and understanding earlier in life. I felt angry and cheated.

“if you tell anyone they are hopeless, they become hopeless”

Monty’s personal stories of racism repeatedly confirm that our detachment and otherising (diabolically and expertly engineered by the elite) continues to flame the fire of ignorance. Keeping covert genocide general and ambiguous, never exposing people to direct, specific examples of a real victim’s plight and using controlled media to support and reinforce the idea of victim blaming and the later mentality; that the Indigenous populace need to assimilate and ‘get over it’, makes it easy for sheeple to maintain indifference and degrees of racism.

“their pride has been kicked out of them”

Among the plethora of things white people don’t understand is:

- Initial and continuing literal and cultural genocide has caused such severe damage to Indigenous civil liberties in preserving land rights, culture, sense of identity and basic human rights, the success of effective resolutions has become overwhelmingly complex and conveniently impossible for the Australian ‘government’ to rectify. Inability to acknowledge responsibility by the government for Aboriginal people’s present circumstances is at the root of the general public’s lack of concern, and the government’s insignificant progress and focus with corrupt priorities purposefully stagnates retribution.

- The overwhelming evidence of corruption involving the government prioritising self interests over Indigenous land rights is not only hindering solutions for the Aboriginal people but also damaging and displacing it further.

- Destroying culture removes the foundation of identity, which is reinforced by ceremony, initiation, time spent with elders and on the land; and is imperative to a sense of belonging. Not understanding of the importance of culture and connection, the white man becomes threatened by it. These fears are what justify colonisation, the audacity of white ‘civilising’ black when we are the true savages.

I agree that the average Australian cannot comprehend the concept of identity because we have none; or a weak material, artificial and superficial character in place of. If the average bogan could comprehend that Aboriginal ties to specific territories are imperative for preserving traditions and culture, which in turn protects their independence, identity and well being, we might not be considered a nation of racists. If we were taught the truth in school then white Australia could perhaps understand that displacement and the absence of Indigenous rights is at the root of soul-destroying reliance on welfare (if they even receive it), and continuing urbanisation (or integration to the migaloo world) is a direct cause of the familial destruction that comes with forced low socioeconomic living.

To anyone who demonstrates bias, especially implicit, I pose the question; How many deaths in custody, how many alcoholics, how many incarcerations, how many stolen children, how many juvenile delinquents were there in the indigenous community prior to invasion?

“All black mothers – have to bear so much”

Continuing reflection on the awakening of my own white privilege, I noted as Monty outlined; statistics, no matter how horrifying do not seem to inspire true understanding the way firsthand stories have resonated with me. This awareness and reminder is important to me as a sociologist (NOT anthropologist!), people are more than just statistics. The emotionally wrenching stories of the Stolen Generation, of precious lives lost to suicide, by provocation by the goolaji, and all the direct and indirect ways the colonisation of this country has perpetuated a cycle of genocide, wash darkness over your heart. If you have any shred of decency in you, it will change you forever.

I can’t stop the referred, sentient maternal paroxysm of the millions of indigenous mothers losing their babies (young and grown) releasing cortisol into my veins. I can’t escape the velocity of my deepest fear being inflicted as a plague on my sisters, and it’s still happening right now, right in our own stolen backyard.

“If you fight fire with fire, everything burns”

As I absorbed his wise words describing how he and his people have dealt with their righteous anger, channelling so, so much continued heart smashing destruction of every aspect of the life they are forced to endure into beauty, graciousness and the black fulla humour, I found myself caught up in Monty’s calm, sagacious energy. More effective for me than any self-help book, the divine example of Aboriginal people’s gentle, unwavering strength and generosity flows through the writing and into your core, it will weigh heavily on you, regardless of how informed one may be. I feel personally grateful for the nudge by Meme to put all he has accomplished into print, as she could clearly see the great importance and effect of its worth.

The theme of ‘not being angry’ shames your perspective, rearranging it by continually reminding the (white) reader how lucky we are. The benefits of a privileged life are so shamefully underappreciated and the trivialities we distract ourselves with prove insignificant amongst the inspirational example set by Monty and his stories. Like Marcia Langton (COCONUT!!) said in ‘Secret Country’, the fact that “we are not angry often frustrates our white sympathisers”, is a lesson in profound grace.

Monty relating how he redirects his anger using sport, drawing strength from love and loved ones, and describing the safe place in his heart that he retreats to when his pain becomes overwhelming, showed me the way to manage my own frustrations a little better. After I stopped feeling so emotional, I felt closer to achieving my own inner peace and I thank Boori and Meme for this.

“You are needed, and you are wanted”

Monty’s stories reconnect disconnection, create links where there are breaks, the opposite of what the white man has done which is divide and conquer. Simplifying the explanation of the 230 year holocaust in this country is another necessity in initiating understanding to break through white entitlement. Boori and Meme succeed in this. Like Monty says, “the ice-cream needs to be eaten slowly”, digested in stages or you’ll get a brain freeze. The book unfolds in layers, gently reinforcing the reader’s ingestion with story upon story that strips you down and then builds you back up by sharing the wisdom, strength and secrets of Monty’s coping mechanisms.

These comparisons and metaphoric scenarios are another theme visited frequently throughout the book and is an effective tool to elucidate and educate, a highly effective one would be the Anzac/Invasion day example. Allegories and a mental forced-perspective can resonate with the right combination of example paired with the appropriate human experience, as the mother’s perspective has resonated with me. Suggesting to forget about the honoured Anzac day memorials is an apt way to compare failing in acknowledging the atrocities of Australia’s true residents.

“Those are the people with restless spirits who don’t love this place”

I explored and pondered how thoroughly the complete blackout of indigenous culture and history had so successfully left wide, dark voids in my knowledge and understanding. Disturbed upon reflection of my past implicit bias/indifference, I was living proof that the sub par education system is generated to incite ignorance toward the apartheid. This is why Boori’s idea of each school having an indigenous room or library is completely valid and could pave the way for reconciliation with a new generation.

Indigenous people warrant the right to manage their own people and begin their healing.

Indigenous people deserve control over their own affairs and be enabled to begin the huge task of unravelling an entire population’s misperception. In order to gain back their freedom, they are burdened with this task of educating their oppressors. The spiritual benefits of an indigenous education alone, would be invaluable to the souls of a nation who are lost in an artificial world. Aunty Val was spot on (p.181). Oneness, ascension, finding God, however you see it, is achieved through higher consciousness and is our birth right as human beings. We futilely search and sometimes even grow, without realising the first Australians were already there, and could have shown all of us the way. Kite hawks and kookaburras, connection with the earth and the cycle of life, synchronicity and love for the creator/universe and of all life.

“Reconciliation starts with yourself”

Reconciliation is possible, if restitution occurs first; in order for equality to happen, equity needs to transpire before that. And until first Australians are on an even playing field socially, psychologically, physically, legally, financially etc. with the ability to manage their own land, youth, health, healing, education, social structure and the freedom to develop and recover all that encompasses their culture, white Australia might begin to come close to ‘making up’ for what can never actually be made up for. Lives lost and time gone.

Does Boori Monty Pryor realise the immeasurability of what he has contributed?

I know he receives the letters and the love from the people whose lives he has altered and steered onto paths of awareness and enlightenment (and that’s just from the ones who put pen to paper), but does he actually realise how this book moonlights as a source of self help? And that it arms people with the passion and knowledge to spread his word. Like branches on a eucalypt tree of truth sprouting new growth, each person who reads this book will indefinitely pass on something they have learnt to another, I doubt Monty will ever see the full reach of this tree he waters daily, but I hope he knows it is there and ever-growing.