Australia Day rolls around and I feel two things at once.

I feel proud. And I feel… careful.

Proud, because I love this country. Not in the loud, chest-thumping way. In the quiet, lived-in way. The way you love the place that gave you your first breath, your first scrape of gravel on a knee, your first job, your first heartbreak, your first mates, your first “how ya going?” from a stranger who meant it.

Careful, because I know there will be protests, and I know the words will be sharp: “Invasion Day.” And I get why people feel pain. I’m not blind to history. I’m not trying to sandpaper the past into something comfortable. I know settlement wasn’t always kind. I know terrible things were done. I know Aboriginal people have had a hard go of it since western settlement, and that’s putting it politely.

But here’s the hard bit for people like me: I didn’t do that.

I was born here. So were my mum and dad, my birth mum and dad, and my adopted mum and dad too. I didn’t arrive on a ship with a musket and a flag. I didn’t write the policies, run the missions, make the removals, or sign off on the “experts” who thought they were doing good while causing damage they didn’t understand.

And, I know something else that doesn’t get said much: history can hurt more than one way, to more than one group, for more than one reason.

I was adopted. And there were hundreds of white kids taken from white mothers too, because once upon a time it wasn’t acceptable to have a child out of wedlock. Authorities

thought they were doing “the right thing.” Same story, different uniforms. It came with consequences no one wanted to look at until much later. Pain doesn’t check your skin tone before it arrives. It just arrives.

My pain, your pain, doesn’t cancel anyone else’s pain. It doesn’t compete with it. It just sits alongside it and says, “I’m here too.”

And then came more people. The Chinese. The Afghans. Yes, the camel men, the ones who helped open up the inland and left a legacy most of us never learned properly at school. Those camels are still out there, tough as old boots, so good we even sell them overseas now. Then the ten-pound poms. Then Greeks and Italians. Then Vietnamese, the people who came here after we’d just fought a war with their homeland… or a “police action,” depending on who’s writing the headline.

All of that is part of us now. That’s not a threat. That’s the miracle of it.

So when someone calls me an invader, I don’t get angry first. I get confused. Because, I’ve spent my whole life trying to do what I thought Australians do.

I thought being Australian meant you were a bit of a larrikin but you turned up when it counted. Brave when you had to be. You stood up for people who couldn’t stand up for themselves. You looked after the sick, the weak, the lonely, the person who didn’t fit. You said please and thank you. You gave everyone a fair go, until they betrayed you, and then you said, “Sorry mate, can’t do it,” and you moved on without carrying hate around like a backpack full of rocks.

I thought we were the people who tell the truth and still be mates afterwards.

We built things. We explored. We farmed. We grazed. And we farmed and grazed in some of the harshest country in the world; and we thrived. We carved towns out of dust and stubbornness. We also built the kind of country where someone can have a laugh about a big guitar, a big prawn, a big boot, a big merino! Where I live we even had a big orange that went broke. Honestly, these things are so Australian they should be on the coat of arms next to the kangaroo and emu. We can’t even keep our giant fruit financially stable, but we’ll die trying. That’s our brand.

We also fought wars. For allies, for mates, and sometimes because we were told it was the right thing to do. We defended our own northern shores. People died. Good people. Young people. People whose names still sting when you read them on a plaque. We remember them “at the going down of the sun”… and in the morning too, whether anyone’s watching or not.

So, why do so many of our young people now look at service in defence, police, emergency services, even community leadership and go, “Nah”? Maybe it’s more complicated than one reason. But, I do wonder if part of it is this? We’ve become a country where you can get shouted down for loving the place that raised you. Where pride gets treated like a crime scene. Where people who never carried the weight of service are sometimes the loudest voices. Voices, telling everyone else what they must say, what words they must use, what feelings they’re allowed to have.

And that leaves blokes like me, and plenty of women too, feeling a bit lost. Not hateful. Just… lost.

I’m a self-funded retiree. No concession card. No special deals. No freebies. I am not whinging here just stating the facts. I worked, I paid taxes, I put a few dollars away. I wanted a quiet retirement and to give something back. Not because I’m after applause, but because I’m grateful. I’ve served as a cop, 38 years, my youth gone on years of shift work and missed

Christmas lunches, walking the New years eve street breaking up fights not raising a beer, birthdays, my kid growing up and a few days in hospital getting stitched up. I’ve served in the community because I saw the purpose of duty and fulfilling an oath. I now serve as a local elected member on our local council. Yeah, I get paid. I worked out the hourly rate for the hours I do and it works out to be about. $3.50 an hour. And I don’t reckon I do enough. I put up with the jibes, derogatory comments, attacks and complaints from those that have never served. The parochial who’s depth and breadth of their experience doesn’t extend beyond the next town.

I’m not asking for a medal, because I never got those either. I’m just asking to feel welcome in my own home, my own town, my own country.

Because, I can’t feel guilty for something I didn’t do.

I’ll never apologise for somebody else catching influenza. I will say a heartfelt, “I’m sorry you’re going through that.” How can I’ll help you get better if you’ll let me. That’s what mates do. That’s what humans do when they’re at their best.

And that’s what I want Australia Day to be.

Not a day to deny the past. Not a day to weaponise the past. Not a day to point fingers like we’re all standing in some moral courtroom. But a day where we can say:

• Yes, some things were wrong.
• Yes, some people carry pain that deserves respect.
• Yes, we can tell the truth without tearing each other apart.
• And yes we can still love this country.

Because loving Australia doesn’t mean pretending it’s perfect. It means believing it’s worth the effort.

I want a country where Aboriginal kids feel proud and safe and strong, not just “acknowledged.” Where culture is treasured, their communities are supported properly, and their voices are respected, not used as political footballs.

I want a country where migrants feel like they belong without having to erase who they are. Where difference isn’t feared, but it also isn’t forced into categories that divide us for sport.

And, I want a country where people like me can stand up on, January 26, or whatever day you choose and say, “I love Australia.” Because its not the date, it’s the sentiment that matters. And suing those words does not mean you are treated like a villain.

Because Australia Day, to me, isn’t about conquest. It’s about celebrating our home.

It’s about the weird, stubborn, generous, flawed, funny family we’ve become and the choice we have, right now, to keep choosing each other.

So this year, if you’re celebrating, celebrate with kindness. If you’re mourning, mourn with truth and forgiveness. If you’re angry, aim it at the systems that failed people not at the bloke next door who’s just trying to understand where he fits.

And if you see someone who looks like they’re walking around with a bit of quiet sadness under their smile, maybe just do the most Australian thing you can do:

Say ‘G’day mate, how ya going”. Offer a chair and have a chat.

Have a beer. Have a laugh. Tell the truth gently. listen more than you speak.

And then together let’s get on with the job of being Australians who smash it, not by shouting over each other, but by lifting each other up.

Because the past matters.

But so does what we do next.