Alyssa Walker, The Buloke Times

When people talk about Australia Day, it can often be difficult to figure out which one they’re referencing – for, with the ever-growing discussions about said day, it really feels as though there are two different occasions that share the same name.

On the one hand, there is the celebration of mateship and national pride, the honouring of Australia and its citizens in all their diverse and wondrous splendour.

On the other hand, there is the wounded anger and mourning for the commemoration of colonialism, as Australia’s First Nations people would know.

This emergence of two different Australia Days has created a divide between the very citizens the Day is supposed to be for, at its core. People see these two different viewpoints and think they have to adopt one or the other, instead of being able to hold both.

In order to hold both, though, one has to be able to understand both – and right now it feels as though a lot of people are stuck on one fence or another, with no idea how to begin bridging a gap.

I cannot fully understand things outside my personal experience of the world, but I can certainly speak of grief – the hurt of wounds so deep, it sometimes feels as though healing them is impossible – and of joy. Let’s use an analogy.

When people lose a loved one, their loss is a tear in your heart and world – yet though it hurts, you would not change having known them for even a heartbeat. Funerals themselves are not only a time of heavy sadness for a cherished heart’s passing, but also a celebration of that person’s life, all they gave, and the people of all circumstances they brought together.

But when the celebration of that person’s connection and the honouring of their life are just as an appropriate response as the mourning of their loss, who is in the right?

Just as people are not wrong to mourn, nor are people wrong to celebrate – for there can be a lot of joy to be found in the diversity and connections of all the people brought together – but they should also understand that not everyone is capable of celebrating.

At a funeral, people also have different relationships with the deceased, for example. For those who were closest, the loss is more acute, the wound cutting deeper, and the healing feeling harder. And when that pain is so much, how could you even think of celebrating? But both acts are done out of love.

The people who mourn do so out of love, just as the people who celebrate do. It is this deep care that unites us more than anything – and though people wish dearly for only happiness, because sadness hurts, just like at a funeral, those closest to the deceased need the space to feel the loss before they can begin to think about celebration.

But a grieving soul tends to have a support system to help them in the pain.

For the people who honour the deceased by celebrating and coming together, despite desperately wanting to comfort and support, they oftentimes hold back, for fear of making the hurt worse. In comfort and support, there is empathy – but when you feel your own experience with grief cannot even begin to match up with the other person’s, it can seem a very daunting task.

But in the same experience with grief and loss, wouldn’t you rather someone try to offer a place of understanding, rather than not at all? And, eventually, once the wound has been given the acknowledgement and the space to heal, and the pain isn’t as gut-wrenching, it makes it easier to believe that a celebration is possible again, too.

I do not profess to hold answers – and even then, they would merely be an answer based on my own opinions and perspective anyway – but these are my feelings.

The past cannot be changed. Nor can it ever become the present again, as much as we would like it to be sometimes. There is only ever what we create in the now.

And I believe that both celebration and grief are possible.

Celebration can come, but it will take time, and will come at different times for different people. Grief does not soften overnight, but one day at a time, with support, it gets easier to carry. Though the celebration might seem different, the grief will not be as heavy either, and people will be able to be all that more unified.

It’s just one step at a time.

This article appeared in The Buloke Times, 23 January 2024.