‘If only I was normal, she wouldn't have to go through hell.’
MARGARET and I have been together for ten years, if you can call it that. She is a widow without a body to mourn over. Most of the time I have known her I have been on the inside.
But when we have been on the outside we have had a great time together. I simply wouldn’t toss that aside for the sake of shooting some ratbag, then driving him to hospital, then hiding the gun in my own back yard.
She is still with me in spirit, still sticking with me through all this heartbreak.
We’ve had a few tiffs. In fact, we had one big blue over my gambling. She threatened to leave. She ranted and raved and threw a few punches at me. I threatened to leave. She said: ‘You don’t have to leave me. I’ll leave you.’
But I walked over and started to take the guns off the wall. When she saw that she knew I was serious. She started to cry and said: ‘If you leave, can I come too?’
I love her, but I can’t understand why she still loves me.
After all those years of waiting for me, Margaret is still loyal and still in love. Don’t ask me why. I would have left Chopper Read years ago. I still don’t know what it is that Margaret sees in me, or why she loves me, or what makes her stand by me through the fires of my insane life.
She is tougher, stronger, harder and more solid than I ever will be. She was in her early 20s when we met, now she is ‘thirtysomething’ and more rock solid loyal than ever before.
Margaret grows stronger, not weaker, as she gets older, and she seems to get better looking as the years pass.
I believe that I am a lucky bloke to have known her at all, let alone have her by my side. In return, all I have ever given her is pain. Margaret is a mystery to me. I have said it a thousand times before. Thanks Bubbie, I love you.
I am a tough bloke, but when I saw her leaving Risdon jail to go home to Melbourne with tears in her eyes, I felt broken hearted. If only I was normal, she wouldn’t have to go through hell.
