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By Dwain Duxson

End of message - I'm going to go over my normal four paragraphs today, and for good reason. On Saturday, we lost a great mate, Don Murphy (pictured with our son Raleigh), aged 85. We talk about our bush characters a bit, well, Don was right up the top. He was a unique individual who loved people but didn't care a stuff at what people thought of him. 

As I sit back and analyse his life, it truly was a remarkable existence. His great strength was that he knew how to live life. He had a big belly and no bottom, with skinny legs, and he was very reliant on his belt, and he was forever undoing it, lowering the strides and tucking himself back in; it didn't matter who was around.

He was the longest-serving Dalgety/Landmark/Nutrien Agent in Australia; he was still doing the odd deal and was still heavily involved with all his former clients, mainly as a supporter and a mate.

He was a generational Agent. Agents have their list of customers, and that is it. Not Don, he dealt with families, generations of them. In some cases, three and up to four generations. He was as loyal to you as you were to him. It was remarkable the way it unfolded.

He had a wide range of industry knowledge as a Sheep Agent. He was a judge, although I wouldn't call him a great judge, but a judge all the same. But he had an opinion, even if it would sometimes leave you scratching your head.

His superpower was his follow-up and administrative work. He had that covered like no other. It's been many Agent's downfall, not Don. He was all over it and delivered every time.

He was an old-fashioned Agent in that he did his work during the day, went to the pub for a dozen beers after work, and then went home to catch up on all his phone calls. It was a skill a lot of Agents had, and with Don, very rarely things got missed.

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He loved a drink, smoked heavily in his day and was the sort of punter the TAB loved. His drinking style was unique. He would only ever take one mouthful of his beer, that's all it took, straight down. He liked wine too and drank it the same, quickly. His wife, Carmel, would pick him up at the pub, toot the horn, Don would be out the door in seconds, beer finished, and the glass tilted over.

He carried a dozen or so packs of chewy in the Car and would have a pack in his pocket. He would always offer a chewy to all the kids of his clients and friends. Before long, on arrival at the Farm, the kids would run to the Car, and before he could get out, the kids would be saying, got a chewy, Mr Murphy. Those kids eventually became his clients and mates. He was mates with people, 30 odd years his junior.

He loved the punt, and any Stawell race meeting was like Christmas to Don. He was a TAB man. He didn't bet with the bookies much. They don't do trifectas, quinella, quaddies, pick fours, and he could have five bets per race. His pockets were a sea of tickets, and I'm sure he didn't know the winning ones from the losing ones. At the races, he had his game face on; it was the place where he zoned in. You could walk past him, and the best you would get is a grunt, definitely no chewy's. When in full concentration, his cigarette would just run from one side of his mouth to the other as he chewed gum like Viv Richards with his ample jowl, moving like a wave with each chew. Once the races were over and the tickets were sorted, it was back to the normal Don.

He took many a generation of Farmers to the Wool sales in Melbourne, and he'd make sure it was a day out for the clients. Drinks at the Wool store, then into the city for more and sometimes a meal on the way home in Ballarat at Dyer's Steak House, his favourite. They are still trading today. 

He had a unique way of finding a park. If the event or destination was over here, Don's Ford would always be parked the closest. Walking wasn't high on his list.

He had an interesting and long relationship with his wife Carmel, who was a nurse and one of the best. He was short and rotund, and Carmel was lean and tall. Son Linton inherited his father's punting gene, and they lost their lovely daughter Fiona to illness.

Don loved his Garden and loved talking about Gardens to the Farmer's wives. It was fitting in the end, that his heart took its last beat when he was in his beloved Garden on Saturday afternoon, just a couple of hours before that he was at the pub with all his mates.

Don was a character. He was unique. He lit up the room and had a bit of mischief about him. He was fun to be around. He had idiosyncracies that were all his own. One was he replaced the word "think", with "sink", and he would call his great mate Peter McBean's daughter "Face", when it was "Faith."

I stole the phrase "End of message" from Don. I think he loved the fact that he had passed it on.

If there are lessons to take away from Don, it would be to live life, have fun and don't worry too much.

End of message, Don. Reply to dwaind@farmtender.com.au