I was only 19

Most kids of the 80's would remember this Red Gum Song.  Did you know that the song has been turned into a Children's picture book.  John Schumann works in the building where I work, and to thank me for collecting his mail when he is away he gave me a signed copy of the book.   

John first told me about it I was a bit unsure of why they would do it.  He told me that he had been approached by a children's education book publisher to do it.  He told me that he suggested that they illustrate it as if a grandfather was telling his grandchild the story of his time in Vietnam and the idea really works.  He let me read one of first copies off the press and asked me what I thought.  

The song always gets me and the book was no different I found a lump rising in my throat.  I remember my mum telling me after hearing the song for the first time that she hated being at home during the day during the Vietnam war.   We lived next to Centennial Park Cemetery and the gun salute when they buried the soldiers would really get to her being a young mum and the thoughts of the grieving mothers and all those boys being marched off to war and never to come home.