Ripples of care
Cath Parsons
5-minute read
It was a conversation across a table at a restaurant with National Accompanist for the AMWChoir, Sylvia Wang, that started Build a Circle rippling around in my head. Now hang on, it actually started on a tour through the Australian War Memorial (AWM) guided by one of the AMWChoir’s founding members, Amita. We sang for the Last Post Ceremony in the AWM Commemorative Space the day before and Amita’s tour of the memorial, highlighting the women on the memorial walls, was inspiring. Along that tour, a quote by Sapper Curtis McGrath, OAM, caught my attention and I took note of it.
The Invictus Games was 18 months away. The AMWChoir were looking at singing for the opening ceremony and a song came looking for me. It turned out to be a musical theatre overture and tells a story of children, partners and colleagues forming ‘ripples of care’ around serving members of the Australian Defence Force (ADF) who experience active service. I would later learn why Curtis McGrath was quoted on the wall in a corner of the war memorial and that he was an ambassador for the 2018 Invictus Games—the ripples were reaching out.
In talking with Amita about this idea, she suggested I have a conversation with Sharon Bown, an ADF serving member who had overcome crushing injuries after a helicopter crash. We met at Poppies, a cafe at the war memorial. Surrounded by beautifully displayed images of Australian Service personel, I asked Sharon how the people around her had helped in her recovery. I wanted to know for writing the song, but I wanted to know as someone supporting ADF members.
Sharon related the experience of her first venture into the community during her recovery. Friends had taken Sharon to a shopping centre and when Sharon froze, unable to continue, her friends asked what they could do to help. Sharon told them she was petrified that someone would bump in to her—the fear of the pain that would result immobilised her. The friends formed a guard around Sharon and walked with her so that no one could bump into her. She felt safe. Sharon’s experience is noted in Build a Circle when we sing:
We will walk along beside you … form a guard so they feel safe… we are here we’re really here.
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During the first weeks of pandemic separation in 2020 (another form of separation to add to our ‘military wife’ toolkit) we were determined that our connection through song should be maintained. We moved AMWChoir rehearsals online and we sang with each other from the safety of our homes. We joined hands in a new kind of circle, a virtual circle, and with inspiration from Pub Choir’s Couch Choir we recorded “Build a Circle” as a virtual choir project.
It has been five years since AMWChoir singers first gave Build a Circle its debut at the AMWChoir National Workshop held around the Invictus Games in 2018. Those ripples of care continue to reach out and touch the lives of women and their families as they sing to ‘scare away their woes’. Hundreds of hands have joined this endeavour. It is truly humbling and inspiring to be associated with women and girls connected to currently serving members of the ADF who love to sing.
This year also marks the tenth anniversary of the ripple of care that inspired the AMWChoir. But more than that, the ripples of care can now go beyond boundaries we thought impenetrable ten years ago, reaching women in remote posting locations who can join in singing from wherever they might live.
If there’s a silver lining from the pandemic, that would be it: that we were able to build a circle of song with ripples of care that reached further than we ever imagined.