Today was the fifth anniversary of the passing of my Dad (Robert G Bowman) who died at age 51 losing a fight against cancer. It is also 1 week after my mum sold our house at Cornubia, our home for over 12 years.

Photo taken at my 21st birthday, June 2001.

I have so many memories about my Dad that I obviously can’t say all of here. What I will say about my Dad, and about my parents in general, is that they always helped me with every opportunity in life. Regardless of what I wanted to do, they always supported me.

After years of being in the Greyhound racing industry in Australia as a trainer, steward, radio announcer and grader, he left a life which would have made his father before him extremely proud, to pursue his own dreams of starting his own business (Bowman Video Productions)

Just to give you a run down of some of Dad’s other achievements:

* Was a Journalist with Melbourne newspaper The Age
* Was a Newsreader/Sports Announcer with Gold Coast radio 97.2MW
* Sports (VFL & QAFL Football, Greyhound) Column writer for Gold Coast Bulletin & Brisbane’s Courier Mail
* Level 2 Australian Rules football coach - Coached juniors between 1988-1993 at Logan City Cobras & Mt Gravatt Vultures.

Starting a wedding video business in 1992, Dad now found his new passion and was getting paid for it. After a rocky start, lots of techinical problems and a very steep learning curve to the professional arena, Bowman Video Productions was born. As a young teenager, I was always interested in what Dad was up to, I went to all the trade shows, technical exhibitions and product launches which Dad had to attend to get up to speed.

Going into high school as a bony 13-year-old, Dad always trusted and appreciated my comments and opinions about the venture and particularly about the technical aspect of the business. I spent long hours studying video cameras, techniques and processes to help my Dad with his endeavours. Now, any other kid would never be so involved, but Dad always welcomed my input and I also appreciated that he let me also live my own life. This was also the last year dad coached football.

eing a Victorian, Dad was always a fanatical AFL football supporter. Originally following the Melbourne Demons, his new team would be the Brisbane Bears who are now the Brisbane Lions. As a founding supporter of the new club in Qld, Dad and I went to every practice match before the start of the club’s new venture. We then proceeded to go to every match that was played at Carrara. I remember when the lights were first installed… They still look out of place compared to the size of the stadium! The Bears would become almost an embarassment of the sport, a team full of veterans who were well past their peak of excellence. Owned by the late Chistopher Skase, the club was always embroiled with controversy on and off the field. It just goes to show that money can’t buy everything in life, not even success on a football field.

Dad was finally rewarded for all his passion for the club as the the lions made it to their first ever grand final which was to the be the first of four consecutive grand finals and the first of three premiership flags. One of my biggest regrets was not being there to see my dad’s face when the final siren went to signal the victory over Essendon at the MCG in 2001.

Always wanting to make my parents proud, I always excelled in things that I did. Whether it was on the football field, in Athletics or at school, I was a bit of an over achiever. Having partly an asian background, I also felt the need to give as little excuses for kids to tease me for not being born in Australia (I was originally born in the philippines). I did this by being the best in everything I did. I didn’t know this at the time, but looking back on it now, I believe it was always a subconscious motivator. I represented both Brisbane and the Gold coast in junior football, I represented my school, district and region at state athletic carnivals. I was also general all-rounder at school and towards the end of my high-schooling won a prestigious award for excellence in art.

During all of these achievements, both Mum and Dad were there to support me, whatever i needed. They trusted my judgement in terms of necessary equipment, training and coaching. They always made themselves available for big events and to drop me to and pick me up from training. Of course there were a few times that I took advantage of my power like suggesting I needed “Nike” running spikes instead the cheaper “Puma” ones- but it was with these “Nike” spikes that I set a new school record for the 200m dash. Mum and Dad always trusted my judgement in life, even now mum trusts me with my new endeavours with business.

I’ve never really spoken to many people about the day my dad died and I think i’ve never really let myself think about it too much the years afterwards. I always kept myself busy enough to not have time to let myself mourn properly. I thought that If keep my head down and work hard, that when I come up for air the world will be fixed of this sad tragedy.

Unfortunately for me and the people closest to me, not going through the motions as maybe my other siblings may have, it was only this year that I’ve given myself the opportunity to embrace my thoughts and emotions of my father’s death. Up until now, I don’t think that i’ve opened up to myself and to others and I think it was because I wasn’t ready for it previously.

I first found out about Dad’s death on the telephone whilst I was at Hayden’s 21st birthday bbq at his parent’s place. I remember the drive home as being the start of a long road ahead of uncertainty. On the radio was the Robbie Williams song “Better Man” and ever since it’s always struck a chord inside which reminds me of the drive home and of the sadness of the whole year Dad was sick.

I’ve always taken that song as a reference to the struggles that my Dad endured during his fight against cancer, but I’ve also taken it as a reference to my own struggles in life. Not knowing the road ahead, meant that I always felt that I can’t control what may appear in front of me. Becoming a “Better Man” becomes extremely difficult to learn if the only man that looked up to was no longer around. I really do want to be a better man and it is only now that I realise that to become a man and to be mature, responsible, respectful and all the other traits that a man has, that you have to commit yourself to living life. Unless you consciously do that, I don’t believe you can be all of those things and appreciate what life has to offer. Being a man means you deserve life because are commited to living it, regardless of past events or the expectation of good or bad things which may yet occur.

I’ve heard lots of stories from some of my female friends who have been through some really tough relationships with guys, and more often than not, I attribute these wrong doings to immaturity. Guys that do things like, “He rang me up drunk and was saying all this shit”, or “He got angry at me for asking him why he didn’t want to do this” or even “He has been going through my phone and emails” etc. These are typical examples of immaturity. A mature person knows and understands that people have their own lives and everything doesn’t revolve around them. These people do not know their place on earth which means they cannot know their place in a relationship. I have behaved like this in the past, but I’ve learnt my lessons in this regard.

I read an article about Gary Neiwand, the former Olympic cyclist who was given a suspended jail sentence for stalking his ex-wife but then put into jail for breaking an intervention order that a new ex-lover had put on him for stalking her. Apparently he did things like shout sexually explicit abuse to his ex-wife in front of children at the primary school she taught at, but also sent sms messages to his ex-lover’s boss saying things like, “she’s a slut” and things like that. This 40 year old person, regardless of age, phsyical build or life achievement is not a man. He is a boy in a man’s body. A man would not only know not to do those things to his ex-wife, but also would have at least learnt from the mistakes made and not continued the same behaviour with a new lover.

Over the last year I’ve been through quite a lot, and I think i’ve experienced some real “lows” in my life. At times that I thought that all hope was lost, there was always a small sparkle to let know that there is light at the end of the tunnel. I’ve always been a big opportunist, where if I saw something that I truly believe could be an opportunity to reach new heights in my life, I would focus and direct myself towards it. My whole career is based on opportunities I created. These lows in life really affected me this year, but there was always seemed to be an opportunity that arose around the corner. This leads me to believe that I couldn’t be who I am without experiencing those lows. It seemed so much easier at the time to be negative during those periods of my life, but looking back on it all, I’m glad I perceviered. Through a lot of the things I’m doing now didn’t always seem possible back then.

I hear lots of stories and read biographies on people who time after time always respond when asked, “When did you know you knew this is what you wanted to do in life?”, usually it occurs just after a significant event or emotional low in their lives. This has been typical for me thus far in life.

This year, i’ve learnt more than I’ve ever learnt in a single year and I’m no longer going to university. I truly believe that before we can learn about the specifics of life, we need to learn about life itself. I started my journey in learning more about life by learning about myself.

I went through a phase of learning how to pick up chicks, I read biographies, self-help books and watched dvd’s etc to get over an ex-girlfriend and wanting to be more attractive to women. The one thing that I learnt from all of it is to learn to be yourself and enjoy life. Women are extremely responsive to people who are confident, fun and outgoing. Unfortunately you cannot fake that, no pick-up line, or technique can make you become those things. You need to BE those things, girls can pick up on pretenders without even meeting you.

If ever you’ve been in a situation where your life seems to be so good but something still seems missing, usually it has to do with your family, personal relationships and finance. You can have the rest of your life perfect but if any one of those is not in order, it affects the rest of your life quite significantly.

I now mark this day as the first day of the rest of my life. There are new chapters being opened and even my mum and siblings are also opening a new page as we look forward to moving on in life. I now have the tools and level of understanding of my own being and of life to become a “Better Man”.