An extraordinary life

Ray McCasker is a bit of an Aussie larrikin. He doesn’t mind a practical joke or spinning a good yarn to get a laugh from folks.

But his own extraordinary life story doesn’t need any embellishment and now the 66-year-old grandfather has published a memoir, titled “To Whom Do I Belong”.

Growing up in a loving home, Ray had “the best father a boy could ever want”, recalling holidays spent working on his parents’ house at Phillip Island – they built the first house in Sunset Strip in 1965 – or boogie boarding with his dad at Smiths Beach.

Life with his parents and four sisters was incredibly normal he said, until his father died of cancer when Ray was just 13.

“When he was dying, he asked me to look after mum, and his tools.”

He took the request to heart, doing his best to fill the man’s role in his family.

But with his dad gone, Ray said things were different – “I was very close to my father and he spoilt me”– and then a night out with his cousin, at the age of 21, changed his world for ever.

By accident, Ray found out he was adopted, and the man he called Uncle Roy was in fact his father.

His cousins were actually his sisters and the four sisters he grew up with, were his cousins.

He learned his biological mother had died before he was born, collapsing from a pulmonary embolism, with doctors performing an emergency caesarean and reviving her baby.

As Ray casually puts it, the first 21 years of his life were “pretty interesting”.

Discovering he was adopted had a devastating impact.

“I was a fake, a fraud, a counterfeit child,” Ray writes in his memoir.

“I’d lost my rightful position in the McCasker family – the one thing I held close to my heart.”

The book, which covers his childhood, the shocking revelation of his birth, his journey into adulthood including a marriage he describes as “the biggest mistake of my life”, as Ray attempted to make sense of where he fitted in the world, is an absolute page turner.

Ray hopes the incredible tale, which is practically begging to become a screen play or film script, will help other people who struggle to find their place in their family, especially those who are adopted.

Although he currently lives in Darwin, Ray still owns the family house on Phillip Island and gets back here when he can.

At one stage, he lived on the island for seven years, running a successful smash repairs business and three of his five children were born here.

This trip, he’s hoping locals and visitors will grab a copy of his book, read his story, and find something in it to help them on their own journey.

As for Ray, he’s at peace with the choices, good and bad, he’s made in his life.

“I’d like to be thought of as a person who’s prepared to have a go.”

Copies of “To Whom Do I Belong” are on sale now at Turn the Page Bookshop, IGA Cowes, Cowes Newsagency, NewsXpress Newhaven and the San Remo Newsagency.

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