Category: Uncategorized

To the lighthouse

Attribution: This photo is taken from the Lighthouse Art residency application form

Rarely do I receive an unsolicited email that I decide to read. This one, however, came from the Hunter Writers’ Centre and it piqued my interest. It was advertising a fresh round of residencies at Nobbys lighthouse in Newcastle. The photo was enough to make me want to apply. Imagine spending a week on the stunning Nobbys-Whibayganba Headlands looking out onto the Pacific Ocean!

No sooner had I decided to apply than I talked myself out of it. Why would they offer it to me? There were much better writers out there. Who was I to think that I was worthy of this opportunity? Luckily, I saw this chatter for what it was – a self-limiting belief that didn’t deserve the airtime it was getting. So, I shut down the megaphone in my head and applied anyway.

I was thrilled to receive an offer letter for a week in December. From 8 to 4, I will have a desk in a room with a view. Pedestrian access along Macquarie Pier is the only way to get there, and the walk is long and in parts steep. It is exposed to the elements. In Awabakal language, Whibayganba means ‘the place of the one who makes it windy’. I have been forewarned.

I am very grateful to the Hunter Writers’ Centre for the chance to dedicate a week to a final edit of my memoir. It will also be a chance to ponder what lies ahead in 2025 and beyond. Few of us ever dedicate time to profound self-reflection.I am committed to make the most of this opportunity and look forward to a week, where my only distractions will be the vagaries of nature and awe-inspiring scenery.

The National Library: A Sanctuary for the Curious Mind

Stained-glass window by Leonard French

One of the delights of living in the capital city is access to the National Library. While I can’t borrow items to take home, I can request anything from their collection which has more than 7 000 000 items. It also houses a delightful café and a bookshop that I can never resist. As a Friend of the National Library, I receive a 10% discount at both the bookshop and the café which makes it a desirable place to visit.

The National Library and I share a birth year. However, time has been kinder to the grand lady on the lake. She has grown into stately resplendence and made her mark on the landscape. Her wide steps invite us to enter a modernist cathedral built to venerate history and knowledge. This is echoed within the building by the tall stained-glass windows on either side of the foyer, which functions like a church narthex.

Once the foyer is traversed, a sentinel verifies the visitor is fit to enter the hallowed halls. From there on, a hush descends. It is one of the few libraries that still has rules about eating and drinking, remaining quiet and using mobile phones. No-one complains.

Today, I spent two hours in the library reading. I observed students, researchers, members of the public accessing the latest issues of magazines. I love that in a world of user pays, this facility is free to use and available to anyone in Australia. You don’t need to be an academic or a writer, just someone who is curious to follow a line of enquiry.

The National Library is a cultural treasure, a gift to the country. There are always interesting exhibitions; currently there is one about migration. In August there is a webinar on family history for beginners, a lecture on Aboriginal perspectives on landscape and a book launch of Australian flora, to name a few. There are collections focusing on maps, oral histories, performing arts, Australiana and Australian writers, and many more. You can access many resources through Trove, a library database owned by the National Library at https://trove.nla.gov.au/.

Road Sage: Self-Help Adventures

Image generated by ChatGPT

Audiobooks keep me sane on the road. I am a kinder and somewhat slower driver when I listen to books. It means I arrive at my destination fuelled by dopamine rather than norepinephrine. In case you were wondering, norepinephrine is the neurotransmitter responsible for emotions such as anger. Just don’t ask me to pronounce it.  

I’m a self-confessed self-help junkie on the road. Luckily, breathalysers don’t register this drug yet, otherwise I could be in a bit of strife. Like people who assiduously follow their horoscopes yet don’t believe in it, I have the same relationship to self-help. Luckily for me, there are a couple of authors in this game who are equally sceptical, which makes it fun to listen to them.

Recently, I discovered Jon Acuff with titles such as ‘Finish’, ‘Soundtracks: the surprising solution to overthinking’ and ‘All it takes is a goal.’ Like all American authors writing in this genre, his books are padded with stories and every step is broken down into micro steps to reach the word count of the book. At the heart of each book, there is a good idea that’s explored which, if acted upon, has the potential of significant benefit. However, these authors know that good intentions rarely make it past the starting block and so they write a new book to motivate the reader to have another go. At least Jon Acuff sees his own flaws, makes dad jokes and puns, which keep me amused as I hurtle down the freeway. And there’s always a gem or two to hold on to.

One exercise in his book is to make a list of your best moments. There are a few reasons he suggests this. First, when you see all your best moments, you can’t help but be grateful for all the wonderful things you have had in your life. It also focuses your mind on what you value and what you would like your life to be like. He then asks the reader to categorise these best moments into experiences, accomplishments, relationships and objects. Whichever list is the longest will let you know where your values lie. For him it was achievements, for me, experiences. Rarely, if ever, do you find people whose best moments centre around objects. This makes sense intuitively, yet Western culture is predicated on convincing us to consume more.

Here are a few of my favourite moments in random order.

  • Laughing with friends
  • Writing
  • Walking the dog
  • Drinking a cup of hot tea
  • Helping others without them knowing
  • Playing board games with my family
  • Going on a retreat
  • Visiting good friends
  • Coming across cows at the bus stop in Switzerland
  • Listening to birds
  • Falling in love
  • Finishing my memoir
  • Smelling the pages of a book
  • Snow crunching beneath my boots

What would make your favourite moments list?

Moonlit reverie

Photo by Michael on Unsplash

The moon is pregnant with celestial fire.*  Her belly is full, round and luminous. I can’t stop looking up, admiring her ability to put on this heavenly show every twenty-nine days.

Yet the full moon messes with some people’s minds. Sleeplessness, sleepwalking, and feeling emotionally overwhelmed are some of the negative effects people can experience at this time of the month. It is no surprise that lunacy means madness; people believed the moon was its cause. As is often the case, there is a kernel of truth in this folklore. Recently, a link has been found between symptoms of bipolar disorder and the phases of the moon.

Luckily, I don’t suffer from any of these negative consequences. I am an unashamed Selenophile and could spend hours admiring the moon’s beauty. In ancient times, the Greeks venerated Selene as the moon Goddess. Her name means moon, light and brightness. Had I been born during the Antiquity, I would have worshipped her at every full moon, standing in a field with my hands raised to the heavens. Instead, I signal my adoration by tilting my head towards her belly and let awe course through my body with soothing calmness. I never tire of her beauty or mystique.

However, my fanciful flight into metaphor and personification only works in languages where nouns have no gender or where the moon per chance is considered feminine, such as in French. Had I been writing this piece in German, where the moon is masculine (der Mond), I would have imagined him as a lover, a sentinel or my nighttime companion who would inevitably leave me every twenty-nine days.

*  Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard by Thomas Gray

The gift of friendship

‘Come and stay whenever you like,’ I tell my friends. And this week, I had the pleasure of four friends at my doorstep, each having come a long way to see me. I know these women from different times of my life and and their loyalty is astounding. I have moved hundreds of kilometres away but we still stay in touch.

They are all outstanding educators of one kind or another, yet I’m not sure they’d have much in common other than their teaching careers. I guess if they met, they would talk shop. However, I have a much deeper connection to each of them. I find a different side of me emerges in their company, not because I am trying to impress them, but because they speak to a part of my personality that resonates with theirs.

Michelle and her friend Claire’s visit brought out my rambunctious side. We could speak without a filter, mercilessly tease each other, drink gin, and laugh through the night without a care. There is something to be said for letting your hair down without worrying about the consequences when you know your friends have your back. Spending a night with them was like stepping into my carefree early twenties. Years and cares melted away. Yet they too have their share of hard times, but we can forget these for a while when we get together.

Lizzie was the next to arrive. I have known her for over twenty years, and she has been a loyal friend through jubilation and sorrow. Thousands of cups of tea have infused our friendship. Although her children are older than my daughter, we have shared our struggles and joys of motherhood, marriage and work life. I have always admired her loyalty to friends far and wide and her ability to find time to produce quality teaching resources, which she freely shares. There is also a deep spiritual side to Lizzie, which connects heart to heart. Her friendship has buoyed me over the years, and I feel blessed to be counted among the people she loves.

The last friends to visit were Kath, her husband, and their gorgeous Labrador, who simply wanted to play zoomies with my standard poodle. We don’t see each other that often anymore, but whenever we do, we feel nourished and affirmed by each other’s company. I worked with Kath for two or three short years, and they were the best years of my working life. She is thoughtful and generous, always inclusive, and gives the best hugs. Kath works harder than anyone I know and has made many personal sacrifices to run a high school with its fair share of complexities an hour and a half from where she lives. I have so much respect and admiration for her resilience, and I count myself lucky that she finds time to see me.

Seeing this many friends in a week is very unusual. As an introvert, I can get quite overwhelmed when I see too many people in quick succession. I was quite surprised that I didn’t feel drained at all. In part, this is because I have been on holidays, so I don’t have to juggle other commitments whilst having visitors. However, the other reason is that my friends have been so nurturing and aware of my needs that it hasn’t felt like hosting visitors at all. Each, in their own way, has filled my cup to the brim and beyond with love and warmth. My hope is that we can keep enjoying these precious times for many more years.

A bubbly legacy

For 20 years, I didn’t drink a drop. Then, out for dinner with a man who would grace my life for four short years, I succumbed to a glass of red. It was delicious. Tart, intense and astringent, I enjoyed every mouthful.

I have never been a heavy drinker. Admittedly, I went through episodes of binge drinking in my early twenties, but that was mainly to overcome social anxiety. Once inebriated, I took advantage of my impaired control and began to enjoy parties, rather than be the wallflower hanging out in the kitchen counting tiles. But that was a long time ago.

When I began to drink again, I would only do so at dinner and never at every dinner. Then Roger introduced me to the glass of champers on a Friday evening to celebrate the passing of another week. His philosophy was simple – celebrate if you have had a good week and celebrate if you made it through a tough one. Either way, you are a winner.

When he ‘shuffled off this mortal coil’, as he liked to quote, I was left with an unusually large glass vase filled to the brim with champagne corks. It was years’ worth of good and not so good weeks he had lived through, with and without me. I neither wanted to keep them, nor throw them away. In the end, I reached a compromise, took a photo of the full vase and kept perhaps 30 of the corks. They remind me of a life well-lived.

Now I carry on the tradition, at least most weeks. I can’t drink a bottle of bubbly on my own, but I can enjoy a piccolo, which is 200mL or almost two standard glasses. It is a perfect amount. I raise my glass and salute Roger, and the passing of another week. Cheers!

A capital fog

Canberra is located at the foothills of the Snowy Mountains, within the Great Dividing Range. Its altitude is 577m above sea level, which may not seem like much by South American standards where cities often sit above 1000m, but it is quite high compared to other cities in Australia and Europe. In fact, Canberra’s elevation is 168m above that of Zürich.

The elevation and the fact that it is a relatively sheltered valley near mountains, allows cooler air to sink and the warmer air to form a blanket above it, especially when there is little or no wind. These are perfect conditions for thick fog to occur. On average, there are around 20 heavily foggy days in winter.

I relish these foggy days which give the city a magical air. I love walking in it, not knowing what is in front or behind me, just focusing on one step at a time. I don’t even mind driving in it, although I admit that I prefer driving in fog when I know a route well. But then I have had years of experience driving in the Blue Mountains, where fog can envelop a valley even in summer.

Canberra airport was built on one of the lowest lying areas in the city. The result is that many flights are delayed and cancelled, especially after 10am when incoming flights can’t land due to the lack of visibility. It does seem like a huge oversight to have located an international airport in one of the worst affected areas in town.

Where I live is only 9km from the airport and it shares its propensity to fog. There are mornings when I can only see shadowy outlines of the trees across the road. When I walk the dog, she disappears ahead of me, and I can confuse markers ahead for people coming towards me. It is a strange, fairy-tale landscape where both time and space seem to conflate. It is muffled and eerie, yet stunningly beautiful and comforting at the same time.

When I worked at Blackheath in the Blue Mountains, I often watched the fog roll in like hay bales on a farm. One would roll up the main street and gather moisture and momentum as it shrouded everything in its path, white as a freshly washed sheet. I’d look out onto the playground and play a game of ‘now you see me and now you don’t’; 350 children there one moment and gone the next.

Fog is an enormous doona spread over the city to make all of us more aware of our senses, to hone our navigation skills and to remind us of the things we can’t control.

It is also a lesson in awe and wonder inviting us to pay close attention to our surroundings. Fog is the winter coat I wear gladly. Wrapped around me, I feel peaceful and lovingly enveloped.

Frost

Canberra is the coldest city in Australia, even eclipsing Hobart in mid-winter. Early morning temperatures are often in the minuses, with heavy frost or fog being quite common. Frost often occurs on days with clear blue skies, which makes the contrast even more alluring.

Walking the dog on this sea of grey-white is a wonderous experience. The dog, energised by the cold, slips and slides as she bounds across a field. She stops to lick the grass, roll on it, before leaping around with feet going every which way. Her joy at this winter wonderland is infectious. I can’t help but laugh and run after her. I make a mental note to take her to the snow this winter to see her reaction.

The field is like an old man’s closely shaved beard; patchy, grey and uneven. The grass’ reaction to the cold is to go dormant and conserve the energy it has until it becomes warmer and more conducive to growth. It is a reaction with which I empathise. Getting up early to take the dog for a walk is getting harder with each degree that the temperature drops.

Yet once I am out here, my nose numb and hands firmly planted in my pockets, I know I am alive, ready for next marvel the world offers. As the sun’s rays reach the frosty grass, I notice a shimmer as if fine glitter were strewn across the landscape. I look closely and discover that tiny frozen dewdrops are melting, refracting the sunlight. A soft white glow surrounds these droplets, which I have discovered are called Heiligenschein even in English. It means halo, but I much prefer the German word joining holy and glow. There is something otherworldly and awe-inspiring about these tiny droplets. The more I walk along this path, the more I realise that each morning offers up a novel experience. This is what makes rolling out of bed worthwhile.

From barren to blooming

Costa Georgiadis argues that no space is too small for a garden. On Gardening Australia, he has presented stories of magnificent indoor gardens and balcony gardens. I never took much notice as I neither had a balcony nor much light inside my house to grow indoor plants. The truth is, while I enjoy visiting beautiful gardens, I am not a gardener. I’m impatient, get frustrated with weeds and find the whole never-ending process akin to cleaning. A boring chore.

One feature I like about my townhouse is its miniature courtyard. I also like the balcony upstairs, but I immediately bequeathed it to the cat, so she had a place to escape from the dog. There was only one problem with that. It looked so desolate with only a cat litter tray and her little trampoline, and I don’t cope well with desolation. It lacked what Germans identify as Gemütlichkeit or what Danes call hygge. No-one bar the cat would want to spend any time there.

I may not enjoy the work that goes into making a patch of green space, but I do value the benefits it brings. Sure, the nature reserve is only across the road, but it turns out I needed something closer than that. I knew there were health benefits that come from spending time in nature and that cities that have more parks score higher on measures of well-being. Maybe that is why Canberra ranked second in the world for a city with the best quality of life. While that is reassuring, I still felt I needed to transform my barren balcony into something more pleasing. As Danielle Shanahan from the University of Queensland said, ‘There is plenty of evidence that you will get a range of benefits even if all you can manage is putting a plant in your room or looking at trees through your window at home.’

Plants don’t have to be sourced from expensive nurseries. I kept a look out for second-hand plants and nice pots and spent a day last weekend driving to people’s houses. I met a woman who propagates proteas, someone else who is moving house and then migrating to Spain and a suspicious person who left me standing in the cold, locking the screen door, while she retrieved the plant from inside. It was an interesting study in human behaviour.

This weekend, I purchased some shoe racks which I am using as plant stands. I cleared the area and began my arrangement. It is still a work in progress, but I am pleased with the results. Now when I look out onto the balcony from my desk, I see freshly planted pots in the foreground and the trees across the road in the nature reserve. It is a perfect place to write.

Crafting dreams

https://www.instagram.com/foxyfine_furniture/

The moment I saw Thomas Fox’s work, I knew I this was a young man with a passion for creating beautiful, tactile objects. I was taken by the simplicity of his plant stands, the careful joinery and ingenious design which allowed it to be packed flat and reassembled in seconds. I found myself drawn to his exquisitely crafted coffee tables and inlaid cutting boards. Online, I discovered that he also created larger furniture pieces like sofas and desks, always maintaining a balance between form and function. I bought one of his larger plant stands, which fits perfectly in a gap between some bookshelves and a cabinet in my lounge. It brings me much joy to see a well-crafted object add to the aesthetic of the space I in which I live.

What struck me most, when meeting Thomas Fox, was his youth. Much older men who have had a lifetime of practice normally work with wood at this level of competence. Thomas looked to be in his 20s and was deeply passionate about his craft and wanting to make a living from it. When I suggested a retail outlet she should approach, he replied it was a place he was aspiring to, but wanted to perfect his craft before he approached them. I thought he was much too modest.

I kept thinking about this young man and wondered why he had captivated me. I realised it was his passion for his art and that he was willing to put everything on the line to live an authentic life. On Instagram, I discovered he had given up his day job for this dream. That was well over a year ago, and he is still working on what he loves best. I thought about his courage and determination, his work ethic and belief in himself. I realised then that I had much to learn from the way this young man lives his life with purpose.

There was also a thread running back to my late partner, Roger, who was a self-taught carpenter. In fact, we met over a handsome chest that he sold me here in Canberra many years ago now. He also made beautiful tables which he sold at markets. He was never happier than when he had a piece of wood in his hand and an idea of how to transform it. The moment I met Thomas, I knew what Roger would have said. It was as if he were standing by my side. Roger would have congratulated him, taken his card, and immediately set about to drum up business for him. That was the kind of man he was.

I am now seriously thinking of commissioning Thomas to make me a desk. I saw the photo of one he made for a customer, which was simple, stylish and yet a little quirky. That ticks all the boxes for me. I also know that if I wait too long, I won’t be able to afford his work. This is an artist who is going places.