The army has a way of changing people. For Paul Blackwell, joining the regular army as an 18 year old at the height of the Vietnam war saw him go in as a young boy and three years later, emerge as a much older man.
Vietnam was one of those wars that impacted on many lives at the time. National service was at its zenith, young lives changed immeasurably on the fall of a ball.
As a regular, Paul was looking for a career. The army offered that in the signals corp but it also thrust him into a war that ultimately served little purpose. His role was transmitting messages between the battlefields and Canberra and as a cryptologist, coding scripts before the advent of modern computer technology.
The more sober side of the role was to convey details back home about those that had been injured or had succumbed on the battlefields.
Paul spent twenty years in the army, completing two tours of Vietnam and then completed a three year posting to Australian military headquarters in London.
He has continued his links with his former military service, working as a volunteer advocate and running the Goulburn Valley Veteran Services helping the next cadre of former service men and women navigate the department’s changing regulations.
This Anzac Day will be different in many ways. The march will not take place, the dawn service will not be attended by former servicemen and women, the older cohorts are being kept confined from another invisible and perhaps even more insidious enemy.
Yet while the tradition of remembrance may not be visible, the community as a whole is acting in the spirit of the Anzacs and we will remember them.
