At the age of 20, Ruaridh Nicoll was sent half a world away by his dying father. Now, with a son himself, he returns to that remote corner of Queensland to imagine his lost, younger self – and wonder at the remarkable decision his dad made
The red earth of Northwest Queensland is tough country to get rough news. Full of copper, lead, zinc and gold, it supports little other than snappy gum, turpentine, buffel grass and a cassia capable of piercing car tyres, or your shoes.
In February 1990, I was standing on that red dirt crying. A coltish boy of 20, I was surrounded by the detritus of an exploratory mining camp: accommodation block, humming aircons, tricked-out Jeeps and, somewhere, my boss in his beloved T-shirt showing a crouching man with the caption: “I’m so happy I could shit”. Next to me was Yvonne, a geologist a few years older than me on whom I had a crush. A second geologist wandered over, a rangy fellow in his 30s. He asked what was up. When I didn’t reply, Yvonne told him I’d just heard my father had died, half a world away in Scotland. The man thought about this, then said: “Don’t worry, death is just nature’s way of telling you to slow down.”
