Thank you Brumbies

and brotherly love

We have a saying at the Brumbies “that once a Brumby, always a Brumby”, but I thought that was lip service for while after I retired.

I was grateful for everything the club and the game of Rugby had given me, and I can't imagine where my life would be had I not excelled at sports.

But despite that, I felt I’d been cast off and that I was no longer needed. I no longer felt welcome and that I was surplus to requirement, and that I had nothing to complain about because I’ve been fairly compensated for sacrificing my twenties and putting my body on the line.

I highly doubt that was the club’s intention, but for some reason, that’s how I felt.

But when I was in a really bad way at the end of the pandemic, the club was there for me when I needed them most.

Thru the Rugby Union Player’s Association, they paid for me to get professional help, and the team doctor would swing past my house after a long day to check in on me, even though it’d been years since I was his responsibility.

I’ll never forget the support I got from them. Support that helped me bounce back and reinforced my belief that “Resilience is the strength you draw from others“.

It’s the support and energy you get from the people your connected to when the going is tough.

And despite it may appear that some people are “more resilient than others”, no one is resilient on their own. Everyone who bounces back or overcome an obstacle had a team, family or community supporting them behind the scenes.

I know resilience has become a buzz word, but I think that’s because society hasn’t defined it properly, which has allowed some managers to use it to guilt trip burnout staff to carry on. Not cool.

Anyways, I felt like sharing my experience with you so you know what an awesome bunch of people the Brumbies are.

Yes, the club has made many mistakes over the past 10-15 years, but I think they’ve seen the error of their ways, and realise they need to do more.

Going to schools and supporting Canberra Rugby clubs is a given. But they’ve started to support communities outside of the traditional rugby ones, as they came down to support Running 4 Resilience last Wednesday.

Even though it was pretty low key, it was great to have Ben O’Donnell and Hudson Creighton down handing out beers, and it’s a sign the Brumbies know they aren’t just part of the Rugby community.

They play an important part in the entire Canberra community, and I was proud they came down to support.

Despite a couple of recent momentum killing losses, the team has been playing great, but have a huge challenge this week as they host a do or die quarter final this Saturday night against the inform Wellington Hurricanes.

Irae Simone scores in last year’s quarter final win vs the Canes

There’s no secret the club has been doing it tough with dwindling crowd numbers. But if there’s a small part of you that wants to see the club do well, then please make an effort to come out and cheer on the lads.

The Dock will be doing a free bus departing at 6:30pm, and if for some reason, you feel strongly against going, I’d love to know why in a comment below.

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Brotherly Love

I tease my brothers a lot, but this morning I was really proud of my brother Tom for pushing himself outside of his comfort zone and having a go.

Tom has thriving online design business, and started a YouTube channel showcasing his design skills and knowledge.

And if you know him, you know speaking (let alone in front of a camera) isn’t his strong point and his first video sucked.

But he’s kept at it, and what he uploaded this morning was actually pretty good, and made me proud that he’s stuck at it.

Keep going Dingus, but I would have preferred Ocarina of Time. Eerrrrrr.