Charlie Pahlman Memorial

Tributes

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A short selection of some contributions, in no particular order, at a family member's request.

It was a lesser wave  Rivers and Oceans  Those feet  Charlie's Smile  That car  Farewell Charlie  Not really an ode  

SubsetTributes selected set
  Bob Makinson

It was a lesser wave 		It was a lesser wave that took our friend.
Not the great one – just a small wave, on a perfect day.
The glory of a coral reef, far away, is richer now for the colours of his life.
And so are we.

Friends gathered in several cities when they heard.
Some have not yet heard.
Some have heard, but are alone.
They are not alone.
We will all gather soon.
Times like this, the mobile phone proves its worth,
but love has a stronger call.

Life comes from the sun and from the ocean, and to earth and air and water we return.
We went down to the sea that afternoon, it seemed the natural thing to do.
Between grief and rage, we wanted to hate the sea, the same sea that took him away, the shining sea we have loved all our lives, a sea that today is as gentle as … as warm as … as blue …
It is the same sea,
and hate has no place here;
we stood in salt water
and added our tears.

Our friend, this friend of ours …
there are a thousand words for what he was, and is,
but there is no single word.
Are people like him so rare that our language has no word?
We must look elsewhere.
Mahatma – great soul.
Who welcomes the stranger
who creates community where was none
who gives vision
who makes the unthought, possible
who makes the possible occur
who is warm
who kindles warmth in others
who gives of himself
who leads others to give, freely, gladly
whose commitment was unshakeable
to peace
to freedom
to love
who gives us strength
and always will.

21 January 2005
  Robin Davidson
Through Community Aid Abroad
Rivers and Oceans 		For Charlie

Rivers and oceans run currents deep
Flotsam sinks for the ocean to keep

But why Charlie?
There are sex tourists trawling the broken coast of Sri Lanka,
while the pickings are even cheaper;
There are thin-hearted men, in suits to feed a village,
who see nothing without counting it,
and what isn’t profit is waste;
Take one of them, not Charlie.

Rivers and oceans run currents deep
Questions and answers the oceans keep

And why now?
While a tsunami of greed engulfs the world, leaving lives in ruin round the globe;
and we who dwell in privilege are left drowning in words
like value-added, profit-driven, collateral damage, internal security,
down-sizing and rationalisation;
and gasp for words like love and justice;
when we need all hands on deck to keep our flotilla of hope afloat;
and your hands were strong, Charlie.

Rivers and oceans run currents deep
Mysteries roll in the seas of our sleep

‘We should see more of each other this year’ you said to me,
As we breakfasted on the first of January;
And I felt the smooth strength in your words, like warm river rocks;
but the mooring rope’s snapped and you’re over the horizon now.

Rivers and oceans run currents deep
Tears are to shed and not to keep

I don’t want to turn you into merely an activist:
a tea towel print of Che Guevara;
you were father, lover, friend, practitioner of yoga, drinker of wine and lover of nature;
but your genius lay in these being all one thing in you:
the same spontaneous gesture of compassion
that produced a demonstration or a hug,
a meeting or a party,
a newsletter or a cup of coffee.

There is a ragged hole in want of filling,
I hold no magic to add more hours to a day,
And cannot live on as little sleep as you;
But by your inspiration
I will try and love harder.

Love and courage run currents deep
And arms hold firm though the hours we weep.

Robin Davidson

  Lynne Mitchell
CUSO Cooperant in Thailand with Charlie
Those feet 		So here I sit in Canada. It's -18 outside and I'm thinking back 15 or more years to sitting in Thailand, sweating, sipping whisky and chatting with Charlie. I remember the noisy house near the Bangkok airport, filled with friends and food and conversations which paused momentarily for the roar of jets to pass. We had wonderful debates about politics and pesticides and usually I debated Charlie's feet because so often he was upside down in a headstand. I think I knew Charlie's feet better than the feet of all my other friends...as I recall Charlie's feet often won the debates.

This is one of those times when I regret not keeping in touch, not hearing how well those marvellous babies have grown, not keeping the exuberance of Charlie closer, not debating his feet more often. But I realize from looking at this website that there are so many of you who came to love Charlie over the years and although I lost touch, there were others who, no doubt, have sipped, and chatted and debated and laughed; who have benefited from, and contributed to, the never-ending exuberance. The pictures on this site show the person I knew and I was so pleased to see at least one photo of Charlie, upside down and those familiar and much missed feet.
  Deb Foskey

Charlie's Smile 		From every photograph

Charlie's smile,
Charlie's love,
bathe us in his light.

This light,
this love,
weaves a pattern across the planet.

It links Laotian villagers
with men in suits,
revealing the connections between us all.

It enfolds his girls,
caresses his partner,
embraces his mother.

It warms his friends
as they taste
the strange new journey
of life without Charlie.
  Alec Bamford
CUSO Thailand
That car 		You can’t remember Charlie with anything but a smile, so here’s one of my memories that will, I hope, make you laugh for a moment, even through the tears. Because when Charlie’s spirit reads this, I know he’ll laugh.

Quaker Services Lao, with a charity that I have to question, had sold Charlie this ancient yellow Volkswagen as the CUSO vehicle. And one day, he was driving me and Chanida and Randy Arnst to some NFE place on the Tha Deua road just outside Vientiane.

Now I can’t quite figure why we put Chanida, by far the smallest, in the front, and me and Randy on the back seat, but we were tootling on quite happily (Charlie doing his ‘I’ll look at the road in the intervals between looking at the people I’m talking to’ routine). Then 2 things were said that you never want to hear in a car.

Randy said ‘I smell burning’. And I said ‘My bum’s getting very hot.’

Charlie slammed on what passed for brakes on this contraption, turned off the ignition and yelled for everyone to get out as fast as possible.

Now those of you who recall Charlie’s physical dimensions will realise that Charlie didn’t get into the Volkswagen as much as put it on. And VWs have only 2 doors. So while Chanida and Randy were piling out on their side, I was sitting with my arse slowly melting while Charlie was frantically extricating his knees and elbows from the steering wheel.

We, and the car, survived. The combined weight on the back seat (and I will be grateful for no further comments on that) had driven the springs so far down that they were shorting the battery. A rubber floor mat was turned into an insulator and we were able to continue our journey safely.

After a lengthy argument about who was getting the front seat.

Photo of the yellow bug
  Clair Boyer

Farewell Charlie 		farewell Charlie

farewell to Charlie
rising up with grace
from the moment of his birth
the world was a better place
he seemed to be immortal
truly divine
he has passed through the godly portal
to drink the godly wine
21 January 2005.

  Kirsty Magarey

Not really an ode 		ode to Charlie (well not really an ode)

So I just want to tell you of my sense of Charlie – and it’s not a formal tribute (Bob & co have done that for me already) but a communication. I need to tell you about it.

In particular I wanted to comment that if anyone ever has given me a sense that there is an after life, in whatever form, it is Charlie. He is just So Not Gone. In a sense he just couldn’t be. He was a life force in his own right. And Life Forces just don’t go.

What’s more I feel he is more than the sum of our memories, however vivid, because he was more vivid even than that, he was more alive, and more engaged with life than one could know. I mean there’s also the facts about him being good, and committed and loving and generous and so many things, but also, and above all, he was so alive. So engaged with life and living it to the full and enjoying it to the limit.

That enjoyment thing is what reminds me of one of my own particularly fond memories. It was a (F)ANTaR weekend at the coast a few years ago. I was heavily pregnant. There was a lot of swimming, and I mean A LOT, and Charlie and I both particularly loved the swimming and the body surfing. Hours and hours. And Charlie thought it was so funny having me swim with my ‘bump’/belly and took great delight in my enjoyment.

And that’s the thing. He took great delight in my delight and in so doing he increased it and folded it back in on itself and through this process we were both just so much the happier. It was a knack he had. To notice others and appreciate with others and engage with others and to bring them out and get them to do the same. To have and to give delight.

It’s also why he was so capable of so many and so profound a number of relationships. Cos he noticed and appreciated. And the friendship thing was never impaired by the number – he had So many and Such loving relationships. So Many and So Deep. And yet was never too stretched but just encompassed them all.

‘A great soul’. I love that line of Bob’s. And it’s a bit embarrassing because I don’t really have or approve of heroes. But there’s no other word for it and when I would try and explain Charlie to people who didn’t know him the only phrase for what I was doing was ‘singing his praises’. I would want to say and really explain how he was special:

He was the only person I thought was capable of handling political life and not being corrupted (and that’s saying something very special).

He was a phenomenon.
A life force and something else again.
He was the epitome of everything I thought a bloke should be.

· He could put my fractious two and a half year old to sleep in record time (an unprecedented skill).
· He could analyse an issue.
· He could make meetings endlessly fun just by being there and bringing out the best in others.
· He could (and did) lead. A natural/born leader without the oppressiveness that can be associated (In fact with a little more difficulty he was also a follower when needed).
· He could consult about those analysed issues. Take advice on those issues, develop plans on those issues and inspire others to help him carry them out.
· He could drink and talk forever.
· And lots of other things.
· And always, entirely, he could keep in mind the plan to change the world and make it more alive.

He was my hero.

And he’s gone. And we are the sadder and poorer and more depleted. … But on the other hand he’s not that gone. It is not logically possible.
Shared Bottom Border

Contact:  
This will go to Andrew (Charlie's brother) and Anna-marie (tech support). 
Mailing address: 36 Upper Cliff Road, Northwood, 2066, NSW.