Dal loves his Wilburs
Dal Withers just loves his Wilbur Smiths.
“I had a stroke 11 years ago,” Dal says.
“I was a mess for a while and having trouble communicating but I could read OK. Someone gave me a Wilbur Smith and I’ve been hooked since.”
Dal asked us to keep an eye out for Wilburs a while back. No worries, we said, reckoning we’d have heaps books by the popular author in our store room. But we had to do some down-on-our-knees digging to come up with just three, one of which Dal had read which is probably just as well; it was the size of a brick!
“Thanks,” he said, tucking the tomes into his dilly bag, “I’m grateful. This one here is a follow up to one I read recently.”
Dal came good after his stroke.
“It took me a while to get back on track but then I could read, talk and communicate OK and get around by myself,” he says.
“I still slur a bit at times and need to speak slowly at shops or just talking.
“People often say: ‘You’re drunk, you silly old bugger’.
“They treat you differently, don’t they,” he says, shaking his head, “when you can’t speak clearly.”
I told him about my dad, who was spotted staggering in the surf a few years back and pulled out by Caloundra clubbies who first thought he might have been drunk. Fortunately were astute enough to recognise the symptoms of stroke and called an ambulance and got him to hospital quick smart. Their quick action was acknowledged as having limited the long-term effects of the stroke.
Dal lives in a one-bed self-contained flat.
“Just over there, out the back,” he said, pointing to a brown building within cooee of Tuesley Park.
“It’s close to everything. I walk to Australia Fair every day.
“You’ve got to get out and about; too many people can’t be bothered to make an effort and spend their lives behind closed doors, away from people.”
He’s saying his goodbyes when Brendan Lauritz pipes in from the other end of the table: “Maties, you’ve got more books I’m interested in than the Southport library”.
Maybe they’re just easy to find here, I offer, no need to go wandering through the stacks. “Yeah maybe … but look at all these,” he beams, thrusting an armful at us; us being me and Street Library Working Party member Niamh O’Brien, from Drug Arm.
As well as lending us Niamh, Drug Arm kindly gives us space in Southport to store our books, so we don’t have to truck them to and from our main depot at Marymount College, which kindly loans us a disused classroom.
Just across the way is Victor, looking a bit dazed. He found one of his mates, Shankey, dead at his Southport camp a few days beforehand. Shanky was a regular at Rosies’ lunches and a former resident of nearby accommodation facility Bryant Place.
“He’d been at the camp for a while; Victor said. “We’re not sure what happened. It’s sad to lose a mate.”
Indeed it is, Victor, indeed it is.
Vale Shakey.
“I had a stroke 11 years ago,” Dal says.
“I was a mess for a while and having trouble communicating but I could read OK. Someone gave me a Wilbur Smith and I’ve been hooked since.”
Dal asked us to keep an eye out for Wilburs a while back. No worries, we said, reckoning we’d have heaps books by the popular author in our store room. But we had to do some down-on-our-knees digging to come up with just three, one of which Dal had read which is probably just as well; it was the size of a brick!
“Thanks,” he said, tucking the tomes into his dilly bag, “I’m grateful. This one here is a follow up to one I read recently.”
Dal came good after his stroke.
“It took me a while to get back on track but then I could read, talk and communicate OK and get around by myself,” he says.
“I still slur a bit at times and need to speak slowly at shops or just talking.
“People often say: ‘You’re drunk, you silly old bugger’.
“They treat you differently, don’t they,” he says, shaking his head, “when you can’t speak clearly.”
I told him about my dad, who was spotted staggering in the surf a few years back and pulled out by Caloundra clubbies who first thought he might have been drunk. Fortunately were astute enough to recognise the symptoms of stroke and called an ambulance and got him to hospital quick smart. Their quick action was acknowledged as having limited the long-term effects of the stroke.
Dal lives in a one-bed self-contained flat.
“Just over there, out the back,” he said, pointing to a brown building within cooee of Tuesley Park.
“It’s close to everything. I walk to Australia Fair every day.
“You’ve got to get out and about; too many people can’t be bothered to make an effort and spend their lives behind closed doors, away from people.”
He’s saying his goodbyes when Brendan Lauritz pipes in from the other end of the table: “Maties, you’ve got more books I’m interested in than the Southport library”.
Maybe they’re just easy to find here, I offer, no need to go wandering through the stacks. “Yeah maybe … but look at all these,” he beams, thrusting an armful at us; us being me and Street Library Working Party member Niamh O’Brien, from Drug Arm.
As well as lending us Niamh, Drug Arm kindly gives us space in Southport to store our books, so we don’t have to truck them to and from our main depot at Marymount College, which kindly loans us a disused classroom.
Just across the way is Victor, looking a bit dazed. He found one of his mates, Shankey, dead at his Southport camp a few days beforehand. Shanky was a regular at Rosies’ lunches and a former resident of nearby accommodation facility Bryant Place.
“He’d been at the camp for a while; Victor said. “We’re not sure what happened. It’s sad to lose a mate.”
Indeed it is, Victor, indeed it is.
Vale Shakey.
