Thomas Markus Schindlmayr

 

 

 

Ladies and Gentlemen, Family and Friends

 

The Schindlmayr and Kent family (and I) welcome you here today to celebrate the extraordinary life of Dr Thomas Markus Schindlmayr.  He was a special person in all our lives and today as we bid him farewell, we will recognise that he will not only live on in our hearts and memories, but in the hearts and memories of many around the world.

 

In being here today and paying tribute to Thomas we are expressing our continued love, friendship and admiration for him and choose to remember his passing in New York on April 26^th in a loving and meaningful way.

 

The event of loss unites family, friends and colleagues together as no other experience can. It should remind us of the fragility of our relationships to others, and of the special and unique ways in which we meet people in our lives and choose to relate and nurture these meetings throughout our life time.

 

In this service today you will hear how Thomas did just that. He was an individual who with great strength and determination overcame many difficult obstacles and who throughout his journey, contributed to and changed the lives of so many who crossed paths with him. The work that he did, did not only benefit him but will benefit others for future generations.

 

So as we grieve the loss of such a remarkable individual today, let us remember the life of Thomas with love and gratitude.

 

Peter Kent, Thomas’ brother-in-law, will speak on behalf of Thomas’ parents.

Craig Sayers, a long time friend of Thomas will now speak.

Edith Gray a former colleague will speak on behalf of Jack Caldwell, Thomas’   mentor.

Iwu Utomo, a close friend of Thomas will speak.                            

 Inge Kent, Thomas’ sister, will speak on behalf of Julia, Thomas’ wife.

 

 

 

I invite you all now to read with me the reading that you will find on the back of your program. This was written by a very dear and close friend to Thomas who spent the last few months of his life supporting him and preparing him for the journey that he is now on:

 

 

 

So at this time, bearing in mind the 38 years Thomas spent amongst us, it is fitting that we should reflect on his life and how it touched us in different ways, at different times, at different places and with different emotions. We should consider the effect of Thomas’ life on each of us and the better persons we are for having shared his life.

Let us now pause and reflect together for a short time the life that was Thomas Schindlmayr.

(To the Music of : What a wonderful world)

Thomas your life we honour, your departure we accept, your memory we cherish. You are resting now at the end of your days. Your work is done. You will always remain deepest in the hearts and minds of all who love you.

As Peter said before, Thomas’ wife Julia was his rose. The rose that he planted for her represented everything good and perfect in his world and in this spirit we will remember him by creating a rose garden here today.

Peter will now outline how the rose planting will take place.

 

Welcome everyone, thank you for coming and to wish Thomas a “Good onward Journey” and say a last “See you again, somewhere, sometime.” Thomas’ family are totally overwhelmed by the sheer number and intensity of responses from all over the world.

 

I will begin with a short plotted history of Thomas’ life.

 

Much to his regret Thomas was born in Germany just before his mother and father migrated to Australia: he would have so loved to have dual citizenship like his younger siblings, Inge and Wolfi, but in the end he was proud to be German at heart, happy to call Australia home and feeling most comfortable as a citizen of the world.

 

In a sign of things to come; Thomas at a young age was soaking up junk data and essential knowledge like a sponge.  He drove his parents and teachers mad with mischievous questions as to the capital of Bhutan or the National anthem of San Marino. Quickly his peers nick-named him the “Wheeling Encyclopaedia”.  He excelled in all subjects other than arts and music. We will all be suffering the consequences of Thomas’ poor choices in music later in the service.

 

From the age of 8 years, Thomas became an enthusiastic part of a spirit of equally handicapped children and adults, that strove to outwit disability through individual and competitive sport.   Through state, inter-state and national competitions, he gained a tremendous self-confidence in his own near-unlimited abilities. To name just a few examples to be proud of: Thomas –at the age of 13 - was the first Australian youngster under 20 to push 100 miles in less than 24 hours; he was Australian Junior Champion in Table tennis and breast stroke swimming and he played wheelchair basket ball in the National Junior Basketball Team for years. This self-confidence stayed with him and powered him for all his rich life.

 

After moving back to Germany, Thomas was enrolled in the European School Munich for the remaining high school years: Thomas loved it. He convinced the ES-Board in Brussels that he should jump a year (probably very easily); he made teachers view physical disability with different eyes; he participated with in-depth engagement in mock sessions of the European Parliament and of the General Assembly of the United Nations,  

 

After one year of studies of economics at the overcrowded Munich University; he left and headed with his car and gear for London, much to Inge’s delight. It is hard to find out much information about what happened in the 4 years Thomas was in London. I think that this was a bit of a “What happens in London stays in London” sort of thing. However after this stint in the UK, Thomas moved back to Australia, to Canberra, much to his mothers delight. 

 

At the ANU Thomas started his PhD and found others to sharpen his intellectual claws with on a daily basis, much to his father’s delight. It seems that Wulf was finding himself more and more on the loosing side of his sharp argumentative wit and tremendous factual knowledge. Wulf was proud and in awe of him at the same time, everyone was.

 

Only at this stage did he introduce Julia to his family, the best kept secret of his London years. She moved to Canberra, very much to Thomas’ delight.

 

At the ANU Thomas, finished his PhD, and later topped it with a Master in International Law. Then, in late 2001 he suddenly found himself faced with too many job offers, from the EU, from the UN in Geneva and from the UN in New York.

 

Before leaving for the UN Thomas and Julia married in the gardens of Parliament House. During their wedding waltz there was not a dry eye in the room.   He once told me that this was one of the few times that he regretted being in a wheel chair. I think that this says a lot about Thomas. It would be very easy for someone who lived with a disability from the age of 4 to adopt a very negative, life has dealt me a dud hand, view of the world. Thomas always made the most of his life, and through his life made the world better for others.

 

During the time Thomas spent in hospital and at home before his passing, he reflected with his family on the deeper meaning and purpose of life in general and his life in particular. He found comfort in the thought that the accident, which had left him a paraplegic as a child, was meant to be, to prepare him for his mission in later adult life, to improve the fate of other people living with a disability.

 

Last Monday in New York the UN held a special ceremony marking the entry into force of a treaty of Rights for Persons living with Disabilities.   Making this treaty a reality was Thomas’ work at the UN, in some regards it’s his legacy. One of the reasons that Julia, Edith and Wulf are not present today is that they were asked to attend this ceremony in Thomas’ stead, as a tribute to his achievements.

 

Amongst Thomas’ many passions there was one that stood out, Julia. To him Julia was his rose. Thomas planted a rose for Julia in the lawns of old parliament house. The rose represented everything good and perfect in his world. In this spirit we are going to create a rose garden for Thomas here today. Through this garden we will remember him. The sights and the smells will remind us of his beautiful soul, the thorns of more prickly aspects of his personality. More than this though the rose garden will remind us of everything that is good in the world. This is what Thomas worked towards and wanted each of us to see in all of us.

 

I have a sister, when we were very young and our Grand Parents passed away, she coped by reminding us that they were still alive in pictures. At the time this philosophy helped, and it still does. 

 

May Thomas always be with you, his spirit alive in your both in your pictures and memories.  

 

 

18 May 2008.

I will never forget the first time that I met Tom. It was back in 1981 and the spinal staff organised Tom to come and visit me while I was a patient at the Austin Hospital. Being the new kid on the block Tom started to tell us how we should do things at my home as he already had 8 years of experience in a wheelchair. 

Tom was involved in Paravics – Junior Wheelchair Sports & he tried his hand at almost everything that he could do from basketball to table tennis and swimming to athletics. As you can see he was very versatile and would give anything a go to test himself.

Sport played a big part of Toms’ younger years and Tom competed in several national competitions doing very well for himself. Tom also competed in fund raising event for Paravics. One of the events was a 24 hour Wheelathon @ Collingwood Harriers Athletics Track where he wheeled himself around the track lap after lap, hour after hour for 24 hours with short breaks on the way. He was very determined to finish the wheelathon. Through the night his father rode his bike with Tom and at the end of the 24 hour period Tom was total exhausted but thrilled with his achievement I am sure his father was pleased to be going home for some hard earned sleep. 

As I previously mentioned Tom competed in swimming events & his pet event was the butterfly, which he mastered. Not sure why though as I found swimming very difficult.

Throughout his sporting career Tom set numerous records in his class which I believe still stand today.

Tom also enjoyed the social side of after competitions functions where he could let his hair down and dance the night away

As you can see Tom was an achiever and did not let anything get in his way to success.    

In 1986 when the Schindlmayr family returned to Germany, Toms sporting career finished and he found Uni & Girls. 

In conclusion I would like to tell you a short story which has been told to me by Noelene Cooper who works at the Austin Hospital. Noelene was the team nurse on a trip to Broken Hill for Regional Games between NSW, SA & VIC. On the way one of the guys, mid 20’s made a comment about the moon shining and 10 year old Tom quickly corrected him saying that the moon does not shine & I am sure you can imagine what Tom would have said.

Thank you

 

 

I knew Thomas well in the 1990s and the beginning of the present century. He was not only the best research assistant I have ever employed but also a colleague, so we wrote papers with equal authorship. He was very bright, very capable, and interested in everything. Our long conversations over meanings and the analysis of the data were the kind of thing for which the Australian National University was originally established. Given his physical handicaps, it was amazing where he could get to and the obscure but important sources he could locate.

 

My first major contact was when I examined his PhD thesis. His was a large and perceptive analysis of the global economics of the family planning movement. The subject is surprisingly complex but he dealt with it in a masterly fashion. I have rarely spent as long in examining a thesis and put so much time into asking questions for my own education rather than correcting the author.

 

Thereafter I recruited him as a somewhat over credentialed research assistant. Many of us had been working around the world on a project of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population collating estimates of regional populations over time. The more we did this, the more suspect we became of accepted historical figures of regional and global populations. So, when Thomas turned up, we began a long period of intensive work tracing all the estimates provided and their sources, as well as the sources of these sources. It transpired that the critical estimates had been made in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and were dominated by publications available only in German. Not only did Thomas work from the German texts but so did his mother and grandmother. We may have added confusion to what had previously been regarded as a simple story, but that confusion was soundly based and should prove to be starting point for other researchers.

 

Then we turned to the fertility transition that occurred in the industrialized societies between the 1960s and 1980s, frequently called the “Second Demographic Transition”. The situation was also somewhat confused, and we did our best to clarify the position by writing a paper called “Explanations of the fertility crisis in modern societies: a search for commonalities”. Both these papers appeared in the world’s leading demographic journals.

 

Thomas is also represented in our book Demographic Transition Theory. He was pleased that it was published by the leading German publishing house, Springer.

 

But all this rather misses the point Thomas Shindlmayr was an extraordinarily nice person. He was interested and sympathetic to everyone’s problems and resourceful in suggesting solutions. He conversed humbly but often brilliantly on all aspects of population change and beyond to a far broader range of subjects. He had other specific training, such as international law, which proved invaluable.

 

I was sorry but also very pleased to see him appointed to the United Nations Population Division in New York. Later, of course, he moved to another subject area of that international organization employing his demographic, legal and statistical skills to contribute in a masterly fashion to an area that he knew only too well, that of disabilities. He could, and should, have gone far, but, sadly, that was cut off in a most untimely fashion. 

 

He well deserves the felicitations being offered in these commemorative services. I must apologize for not being present, but I am prevented by increasing disabilities, experienced more justly in advanced old age.

 

Jack Caldwell

 

 

 

 

 

 

For My Beloved Husband

 

One of my biggest regrets when Thomas and I married was that I didn’t give a speech on our wedding day. I had wanted to tell everyone at the reception how much I loved him and how proud I was that he chose me to be his wife. A short while before Thomas died, I told him about this regret and that I wanted to rectify it by speaking at his service. So, I stand before you today to honour my promise to my Thomas.

 

Thomas always accused me of summarizing too much. He couldn’t handle it when I asked him to summarise his long-winded tales; he was always left wanting when I told him anything short on detail! While I could chat on endlessly about what I think was fabulous about my darling Thomas, I thought you may benefit more if I stay with tradition and keep this short and sweet. So, I want to tell you a story that I think sums him up.

 

In the last weeks of Thomas’s life, his body deteriorated dramatically, he was unusually lethargic and extremely weak. One afternoon, Thomas awoke from sleep and said to his father “I want to get up into my chair.” Wulf, a little surprised, nonetheless kindly obliged and went to fetch his wheelchair and me to help him up. I thought it curious and went to ask him if he was sure. He looked me directly in the eyes and said in all seriousness, “Yes, I need to go shopping.” I was stunned! So, I probed further: “What do you need to go shopping for, honey?” He responded, “I want to buy gifts to show my love and appreciation.”

 

And that was Thomas all over. He always wanted to show his love and appreciation to his friends and family and he did this by giving. Always giving of himself, giving his time, giving gifts, giving his shoulder to cry on, sharing his knowledge, giving his opinion(!) Thomas always wanted to help people. He loved people! And he always wanted people to feel special, loved, appreciated. Even in his last moments he was still trying to give.

 

I don’t know if I will fully understand why Thomas had to be taken from us so early. For now, I choose to believe that he completed what he came here to do – he enriched our lives in so many ways, he showed us how to overcome adversity with style and grace - and now he has returned home to be rewarded for a job well done. He taught us some beautiful lessons, maybe it’s time for him to step back and let us spread our wings.

 

 

 I would now like to share with you a prayer I wrote for Thomas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I thank you all for coming here today and sharing in the celebration of Thomas’s life. I am overwhelmed by the love and respect you have been showing to us, Thomas’s family. You have honoured the memory of Thomas more than words can describe.