Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Spunky Margaret Tanner and Her Good Luck Charms




As well as being a Spunky Senior, Margaret Tanner is a multi-published author of historical romance with Whiskey Creek Press and The Wild Rose Press.










Margaret's novel, The Trouble With Playboys, published by The Wild Rose Press is partially set in Singapore and Malaya during the 2nd World War.

The buy link for The Trouble With Playboys is


Margaret has some stories about good luck charms to share with us here.




SPUNKY SENIORS AND GOOD LUCK CHARMS – Margaret Tanner

Being both a spunky senior and a recent retiree, I thought I would blog about lucky charms and let you be the judge of whether they work or not. Let’s face it, we are more inclined to believe in these things as we get older. I know I do.

I always scoffed at magic or lucky charms. If I couldn’t see it, I didn’t believe in it. Well, that is not until I visited my Dad’s sister, a sprightly old dear in her nineties. It was the 30th anniversary of my father’s death.

After a watery, milky cup of tea and some stale cake, that Aunty said she had baked the previous day, but I think it could have been the previous week, she started telling me about the silver boomerang, which we had found many years ago amongst my late father’s war medals. (A boomerang is an Australian aboriginal hunting weapon). The boomerang bore the words “I go to return.”

It was a good luck charm, and my father apparently wore it throughout the 2nd World War.  There was magic in the boomerang, the lady who had given it to him was convinced of it, as was my aunt. Whether Dad believed in it or not, I have no idea.

The original owner apparently survived the carnage of the 1st World War.  So, did the good luck charm live up to its name the second time around?

Australian soldier of the 1st World War -a memorial for Australian war dead.  
In March 1940 Dad felt duty bound to answer his country’s call to war. When the Japanese poured into Malaya he was there as a member of the 2/29th Battalion of the Australian 8th Division, (most of whom ended up dying as Prisoners of War).

Wounded in action in Malaya, and transferred to an Australian Military Hospital in Singapore, my father was blown out of bed, but survived the Japanese bombs which took the roof off his ward.  The British forces fell back across the causeway into Singapore. Day and night the fires burned.  The bombers came over spreading their destruction. Shattered shops were left to the mercy of looters, bodies rotted in the streets, and packs of marauding dogs gorged themselves with little resistance, as a pall of black smoke hung over Singapore. The giant British guns that might have saved Singapore were embedded in concrete and pointing out to sea. Useless to quell the invaders who came over land through the jungle.

All aircraft and ships had departed loaded with civilians, nurses and wounded, and after this desperate flotilla sailed off, those left behind could only await their fate.

In the last terrible days before Singapore capitulated in February 1942, trapping 80,000 Australian and British troops, a small boat braved the might of the Japanese air force and navy, and set off, crammed with wounded.  Only soldiers who were too incapacitated to fight yet could somehow mobilise themselves, were given the opportunity for this one last chance of escape.

With a piece of his back bone shot away, and weakened from attacks of malaria, Dad had somehow made it to the wharf with a rifle, and the clothes he stood up in. As the boat wended its way out of the Singapore harbour, littered with the smouldering debris of dying ships, a Japanese bomber dived low over them, but the pilot obviously had more important targets on his mind.

They drifted around in the sea for several days until they were finally rescued by a passing allied ship and after another couple of weeks, Dad finally made it home.

So, was their magic in the boomerang? I don’t know, but my aunt’s story certainly sent shivers down my spine. 

Margaret Tanner


Please welcome Margaret Tanner to Spunky Senior Authors and Talents by Leaving a Comment.



18 comments:

  1. Welcome, Margaret, and thanks for sharing your story of the boomerang. I enjoy reading about the strong women of the WWI generation, who persevered and held things together during those years and the trying years following.

    Terry
    http://terrysthoughtsandthreads.blogspot.com
    Visit my blog to get the discount code for a FREE download of Multiple Sclerosis an Enigma. Only one hour left!

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  2. Hi Terry,
    Thank you. Those women of a bygone generation deserve all the accolades we can bestow on them.

    Regards

    Margaret

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  3. Wow, talk about goosebumps. What a story. Don't know if that was a good luck charm, but it sure as heck was a miracle.

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  4. What an shivering story, Margaret. Thank you for sharing it. I loved getting to know a little more about my Aussie friend, and I hope one day we'll get to meet in person.

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  5. What a great story! Your description of Singapore was so compelling, I felt as if I was there!

    Hugs on the weak tea and stale cake. Some elderly women (way older than us, of course!) seem to have a talent for baking cakes that taste stale from the moment they come out of the oven!

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  6. Welcome to Spunky Senior Authors and Talents, Margaret!

    I have to say your book certainly has a striking cover!
    Sounds like a great story.

    Morgan Mandel
    http://morganmandel.blogspot.com

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  7. Hi Margaret,

    Your father was a lucky man to survive the horrors of that war. Luckier after all of that to still have the silver boomerang with him! What a riveting read.

    Dora

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  8. I hope you still have that boomerang. I'd carry it with me everywhere I went! These days even the highways can feel like a war zone with people zipping around you on all sides and yammering on their cell phones.

    oh hell. I sound old.

    Well, maybe spunky and old.

    Enjoyed the story, Margaret!

    Maggie

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  9. Hi Morgan,
    Thanks for inviting me to spunky Seniors. Nice place to be enjoying comaraderie with other spunks.

    cheers

    Margaret

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  10. Hi Maggie,
    Thanks for dropping by. My brother has the boomerang. He was in the naval reserve, so we figured it might bring him some luck if his ship was ever sunk.

    Regards

    Margaret

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  11. Thanks Dora, for dropping by. In some ways my Dad was lucky that he escaped with his life when so many others didn't. But his experiences left scars until the day he died in 1983.

    Regards

    Margaret

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  12. Hi Sally,
    Thanks for dropping by. I visited Singapore a couple of years ago, different place then when Dad was there. I had access to his letters that he wrote to my mother during the war, also over the years he used to tell us kids a few things, which came in very handy for my novel.

    Regards

    Margaret

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  13. Hi Ginger,
    My friend, I would like nothing better than to meet you in person. When we get the big contract, we can fly 1st class to the halfway mark and meet up.

    Cheers

    Margaret

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  14. Hi Roseanne,
    Thanks for dropping by, I appreciate it.
    I alwazys say I don't believe in lucky charms, but.....

    Cheers

    Margaret

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  15. Thanks for sharing this great story, Margaret! I normally don't believe in lucky charms but I'm open to "Yiu never know!"

    :-)

    Mayra

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  16. Margaret,

    Your dad's history sent shivers down my spine. I grew up listening to stories of the second world war. An early memory is of a visit to Madame Tussaud's in which there was a replica of a Japanese Concentration camp that also sent shivers down my spine.


    Rosemary Morris

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  17. Hi Mayra,
    Thanks for dropping by, I appreciate it. I am still not sure that I believe in lucky charms as such, but there again, I wouldn't say I don't, not after what happened to Dad.

    Regards

    Margaret

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  18. Hi Rosemary,
    Thank you, those Japanese POW camps were certainly horrendous. Most of my Dad's army mates were taken POW when Singapore fell. I think he always felt guilty that he escaped and they didn't.

    Regards

    Margaret

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