My great aunt, Bessie Maher, was a woman ahead of her time. The youngest daughter from a dairy farming family who had emigrated from the lush green of Nenagh in Tipperary to the dry brown hills of western New South Wales, she was a dynamo of energy and intellect.
Like many women of her generation, the love of her life was killed in the carnage of the first World War and she never married.
One of Bessie’s sisters, Eileen, had married Roy Jackson, who had been a teak-tough front-row forward with the Balmain Rugby League club in Sydney.
Later, Roy became the head of the Shipwrights Trade Union on the docks of working class Balmain.
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My father’s mother, Mary, was the third formidable Maher sister. He lovingly described them as “the three riders of the apocalypse”.
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When Roy needed a secretary to run his office, the Maher sisters kicked into action and Bessie got the gig. Family lore says Roy didn’t get a vote.
However, it proved to be an inspired decision because Bessie developed into an administrative dynamo, which began a long journey into the heart of Australian politics.
A few years later, Roy was elected as the Labor Party representative for the seat of Balmain in the New South Wales state parliament. Bessie followed as his head of staff. Together, they were fierce advocates for the needs of working-class people in Balmain.
Several decades later, her nephew Michael Maher was also elected as a Labor representative to the New South Wales parliament and eventually on to the Federal Parliament in Canberra. Like his Uncle Roy, he chose his wise aunt Bessie to run his office.
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She smoothed the path with her knowledge, network, humour and charisma.
As the youngest in my family, I knew Bessie in her later life. A long time watcher of her nephews and great-nephews playing rugby and rugby league, she would attend my rugby matches as well, along with my grandmother, and scrutinise my school reports.
Like the matriarch she was, she held high standards and expected all in her family to meet them.
Inside her small inner western Sydney home she lived with two close companions.
One was a schizophrenic cat named Arthur, who in Bessie’s presence was a docile playful kitty. When Bessie walked out of the room, Arthur transformed into a hissing and murderous feline.
The other unlikely companion was a sheep she kept in her backyard named Old Baa.
When I was eight, my Dad and his brother Clem, both former rugby players, marched me into Bessie’s backyard and informed me that I had tackling practice against Old Baa.
What is now exceptionally troubling is that, at the time, I did not think any of this was odd.
I folded in half like a collapsed deck chair
Before you get upset at any description of animal cruelty, as it turns out, sheep have far better footwork than eight-year-olds have tackling skills. My missed-tackle stats versus Old Baa were ugly.
At a later date, ahead of one of these tackling sessions, I remember my father and uncle giggling as they encouraged me to take on Old Baa.
That day, the sheep was standing his ground. So I walked forward, which was a very bad move. Old Baa, my once-friendly playmate, charged me.
Like Zinedine Zidane’s headbutt on Marco Materazzi in the 2006 FIFA World Cup final, the sheep delivered a powerful headbutt to my stomach.
I folded in half like a collapsed deck chair.
As you can imagine, this story of me being beaten up by a sheep has been retold at family gatherings many times.
What I later learned was that, in fact, there was not one unique Old Baa but a series of lookalikes. Being a city boy, differentiating the facial features of sheep was low on my list of priorities.
What I did not know was that Bessie’s cousins, who still ran the farm out west, regularly sent down a sheep to be butchered and distributed across the family.
What I learned much later in life was that this particular version of Old Baa was different from all the earlier versions because he had two very large testicles. The more tackle friendly versions of Old Baa did not.
I am not sure how modern parenting culture would categorise childhood sheep-butting in the learning of decision making, but as I lay on the ground staring up into the crocodilian eyes of Old Baa, my lesson had just begun.
Amid the gasps of hysterical laughter coming from my uncle and father, Dad made my situation clear: “You’ve got to get yourself out of there.”
I had to restrategise. Old Baa delivered a few more butts before I landed under Bessie’s peach tree that was so full of fruit some had dropped to the grass.
Old Baa still towered over me, but stopped to sniff the sweetness of the peaches, quickly snaffling one up.
As I lay on the ground, I pushed a few more peaches towards Old Baa’s hungry mouth. When he turned his head to scoop them up, I leapt to my feet and sprinted out of the yard, past the tears of laughter running down the faces of my father and uncle and into the lesser evil of Aunt Bessie’s living room and her sociopathic cat.
The learning I took from that unusual childhood experience I now refer to as “The Old Baa Principle”. Never underestimate an opponent you have beaten in the past because they may have developed new tactics.
Leo Cullen’s boys would do well to acknowledge that, like Old Baa, Northampton have grown since they last met
Teams enter into a contest with a game plan. The American military philosophy is that no plan survives first contact with the enemy. While I am sure the US military were not referring to a testosterone-driven sheep, the principle still stands. In some matches, reality forces tactics to change.
Northampton are the same club Leinster defeated in last year’s semi-final. However, they are not the same team.
So they may appear like a familiar lamb, that in the past has been slaughtered.
Leo Cullen’s boys would do well to acknowledge that, like Old Baa, Northampton have grown since they last met and have developed a game plan based on all-out physical intimidation and attacking skill. Similar tactics have seen Leinster undone in the past.
They must remain tactically agile and adapt to Northampton’s attacking and physical nature.
Leinster should prevail in this Champions Cup semi-final. However, like Old Baa, Northampton have some new tricks that the men in blue will have to deal with to claim a spot in the final.
