KEITH Wilson never had a birth certificate; all he wanted to do was “belong”, said his surviving daughter, Sharon Harris.
Mr Wilson, 76, who grew up in an orphanage, with his foster mum Ethel, and then in Balwyn Boys Home, would have enjoyed his poignant funeral send-off by family and friends in Noble Park last Wednesday.
He would have been touched by singer Janene Joy’s perfoming the country-western tunes he loved, Ian Arell on bagpipes farewelling his coffin and the spoken tributes of three generations – daughter Sharon Harris, grandson Raymond Harris and great-grandson Jayden Harris.
Mr Harris and late wife Helen were stalwarts of Dandenong North in another time.
He was a “gentle giant” and handyman with a penchant for ‘liquid nails’, living in a backyard strewn with garden gnomes and sculptures.
In that time they walked down the street and everybody seemed to know everybody.
As a long-standing worker at VicRoads and the Country Roads Board, one of his proudest days was to be his first to drive on the Dandenong-Frankston Road overpass.
Ms Harris said her dad eschewed the offer of driving over it in a “flash car”, preferring to travel the crest on his trusty bulldozer.
Known for his pristine memory, Mr Wilson only had happy recollections of his boys’ home upbringing from the age of 10.
He love the boys’ home reunions but outlived his old buddies.
Tough as old boots, he outlived many doctors’ prognostications of doom in 2009 when he walked through glass causing extensive brain bleeds and fractures.
When he survived, the family were told he’d never speak or walk again and that he’d be confined to sitting at the end of a bed.
With painful practice, he retrained as if starting out as a baby.
To his surviving family, it was that strength that endured.
– CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
