One of the five Excavator sculptures by Greg Johns at Waterways
Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is a new year and yet like many I feel I have lost a swathe of time since the onset of the pandemic declared by WHO three years ago on March 11, 2020. The absence of this blog for over a year, and many other activities I used to enjoy, concrete examples of how discombobulated life became and how life changed.
It’s like emerging from a time warp and no doubt there will be plenty of science fiction lovers who’ll agree and writers already penning work to add to the existing plethora of novels and films about evil viruses and zombies!
The last three years meld and become easily confused when recounting or remembering events, particularly outings, yet these were normal occurrences pre pandemic. I’m in my 70th year, but the confusion is not all down to ageing or the brain tumour diagnosed in late 2020 and now my constant companion with unpredictable and unsettling effects.
Covid-19 and the variants still developing and circulating a global problem, creating an historical ‘era’ much the same as the two twentieth century world wars or the 60s and 70s Vietnam War. Many of us experienced dramatic changes to routine, lifestyle, family and friendship circles with some changes becoming permanent. History will record and label it!
The cliched tide may have turned, people may be in denial the virus is still deadly, or are too tired to push against the policies and acceptance of ‘personal responsibility’ replacing behavioural rules put in place for the common good. Suffice to say, authorities (and most in the community) have accepted the roller coaster ride ofactive cases and deathsmuch greater now than during the ‘lockdown years’ and the inconveniences of higher than average ‘sickies’, cancellations, and staff and material shortages.
I too move out of my comfort zone more often, accept invitations and attend events when I can, and look forward to catching up with friends. Ironically, any recent cancellations have been due to Melbourne’s mercurial weather and the necessary but often disruptiveBig Build.
Days of extreme heat discourage travelling too far from home or negotiating replacement services and the extra time involved. Even the daily walk with my beloved Josie has had to be cancelled in deference to her poor paws suffering on hot concrete paths, and her permanent fur coat.
Climate change is the other global disaster we have to live with and sadly, a disaster ignored for too long and not fixable with a vaccine, wearing a mask, or socially distancing. But, I digress because this post is an appreciation of still being alive and healthy enough to celebrate the area I’m lucky to live in and enjoy and spend a few hours with a dear friend!
Living bayside has enabled me to use walking and nature as a therapeutic balance to the misery of Covid and climate change and adverse health news!
Another of the five Excavator(2008) sculptures by Greg Johns at Waterways
The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.
Socrates
The weather and health smiled and my good friend Lisa Hillwho organised the outing I wrote about in my last post, researched and organised another fabulous day. On Thursday, we explored some of the public art in the City of Kingston.
Kingston aims for their public art program to reflect and celebrate the area’s history, stories and cultures and sense of place. The public art they fund/commission can be ‘ephemeral, temporary and permanent’. They receive advice from the Arts and Cultural Advisory Committee (ACAC) which is made up of community members with experience and/or expertise in the arts and cultural sector, as well as City of Kingston councillors.
I was a foundation member of Cultural Arts Reference Group, City of Kingston (2004 – June 2005) the forerunner to ACAC so I’m glad to see there is still some form of input from community members involved in the arts – although most people think of visual artists and not writers when you mention public art, evidenced by the Council’s website and map suggesting a tour of twenty ‘easily accessible’ sites; all are murals or sculptures.
As we planned what sites to visit, Lisa said there was a suggestion you could explore the trail by bicycle, walking, or car. I’m not sure whoever put the map together tested the suggestions. Individual pieces are accessible to the public who live in that suburb – some highly visible like the one in Mordialloc that welcomes people if they enter via Nepean Highway, but we could not have looked at the handful of art work we chose without the car. If using public transport, walking or cycling, it would be a long day indeed like one of those tours you pay for shuttling from place to place with brief, timed stops.
Updated suggestions on tackling a tour of the twenty listed on the map could provide information or links to the various routes if walking, cycling, or travelling by train and bus.
Pompeis Boat(2010), one of three sculptures by Julie Squiresat Mordialloc
On the Trail of Public Art
From Mordialloc, we set off for Moorabbin to seek Horscroft Place Pocket Park, home to the impressive Butterfly Renewal murals and The Monarchs sculptures, a project completed last year. Pocket Parks are being developed throughout Melbourne under the Victorian Government’s Suburban Parks Program. Kingston Council received $700,000 to develop Horscroft Place Pocket Park and the final concept developed in consultation with the Moorabbin community who opted for an environmental theme mural for the brick walls along the northern side of the site, a seating area, shady trees and a homage to the Monarch butterflies often seen in the area.
While we were exploring and taking photographs, a man stopped to chat. He shared how much he liked the butterfly theme because ‘you see plenty of them in the area’, but he thought they were called Painted Lady, a species of butterfly mostly found in Australia. It is a similar colour, as is the Red Admiral butterfly too, and both are often confused for the Monarch, which is larger.
Artist Mike Makatron and assisting artists and Damien Vick , the sculptor
Lisa’s car is fitted with GPS, which is just as well because neither of us knew that part of Moorabbin well and the pocket park is a small area, connected via a pedestrian and cycle thoroughfare, to the much bigger and more obvious Moorabbin Reserve, home of St Kilda Football Club. There is also access to a shopping precinct and other facilities on South Road.
We parked in the carpark at the Reserve and a lovely local lady directed us to the art work we were looking for – ‘a short walk away‘. It was out of sight from where we were standing and with the art trail map info fluttering in my hand, we set off!
Horscroft Place is mainly a street of small businesses and factories and there is the ubiquitous high rise development being constructed. The park will be a boon for the workers and new residents – a place to rest, sit, meet for a chat, perhaps eat lunch or morning tea. Once the vines grow on the colonnades it will be an even more pleasant and attractive walk to enjoy.
Perhaps too it will encourage people to value and appreciate indigenous flora and fauna and the importance of breathable, open green space.
Every moment is a fresh beginning.
T.S. Eliot
Bundle of Sticks(2008) by Elizabeth Weissensteiner, on wall of Clarinda Community Centre
Our next stop was in Clarinda to see the Bundle of Sticks on the wall of Clarinda Community Centre that is co-located with Clarinda Library. The Centre opened in 2005 and the Library 2004. The 2008 work by Dr Elizabeth Weissensteiner commissioned and is based on an Aesop’s Fableto illustrate we are stronger together than being quarrelsome and going our own way.
“The design represents the strength of a community that has a shared identity and purpose. The work celebrates the values of the people of the area, multiculturalism and unity.” It is on the wall at the Viney Street entrance and less visible than the photograph on the website suggests because trees and shrubbery have grown.
Thank goodness Lisa had been to an author event held at the library and knew to check all sides of the building!
The art work is visible to passersby in the residential street. There is a parking area at the front of the library and in the nearby shopping centre and the Viney Street entrance an easy stroll. I hope locals and visitors take the time to pause and ponder the timeless message of the artwork and the fable. Aesop’s Fables have a moral behind each tale and were a staple part of my primary education in Scotland in the 50s and early 60s. I have a picture storybook given to me either as a birthday present or a school prize.
The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been concealed by the answers. James Baldwin
We had decided before heading out that with the time available, and expected weather change, we’d make art work neither of us had seen a priority, with a plan to end up at Waterways housing estate to enjoy a late lunch and the lovely view lakeside from The Nest Cafe in Waterside Drive.
Waterways is 8 minutes in the car, and 23 minutes on the bus, from Mordialloc but I’ve only been there a handful of times. Apart from the lovely lake and the super popular restaurant, it is a housing estate with attractive homes but narrow streets. Parking, like everywhere in Kingston is a problem. I visited a friend by bus years ago. She was one of the early residents and for a long time regretted moving from Parkdale to Waterways because she had to rely on her car for work, shopping and medical appointments. Access and exit to the estate, in her opinion, hazardous. I’m hoping the new freeway and extended bypass and intervening years have improved this situation, but I doubt the parking has improved.
C’est la vie, and the story of so much modern development when the demand outpaces delivery and developments go ahead while infrastructure and thoughts on the future, seem an afterthought. However, I’m a water viewing junkie and to me the lake, birdlife, trees, shrubbery and parkland are beautiful, well worth a visit, regardless of the art trail. Location is the selling point for the estate!
Ironically, the last time I visited Waterways was with Lisa in 2019, when pandemic fears were a whisper in some media circles. My breast cancer returned December 21, 2019, but fortunately, after the lumpectomy I bounced back enough to enjoy a delayed Christmas lunch with Lisa at The Nest.
We sat at a table overlooking the water, and could see some of Greg Johns Excavator series, but I paid more attention to the antics of the ducks and moorhens and other birds. This return visit we were taking a closer look at the sculptures, but also seeking new art work and will stroll away from the cafe.
Greg Johns was commissioned in 2002 by the Waterways residential development ‘to create a body of sculptures that responded to the development’s wetland environment.’ He created 5 birdlike creatures, ‘excavators‘, referencing the diverse and plentiful bird-life in the area. He used Corten steel, his signature material because it is a stable, rusted surface that continues to develop as the sculpture ages.
I photographed 3 of the 5 metal ‘birds’ on Waterside Drive in close proximity to The Nest, but snapped some live ones too. The moorhens, ducks and swans friendly and relaxed around people. There have been 105 different species of birds recorded in this area, much valued by Bird Observers Clubs.
We walked to the Westbridge boardwalk further down Waterside Drive to find the Waterways commissioned art work by artist Ken Blum. The 4 carved wooden sculptures reflect the wetlands and history of the local area, acknowledging the Boon Wurrung as the traditional owners of the land.
There are two carvings of birds representing the ancestral spirit of the indigenous custodians and two portait carvings revealing faces of two indigenous people. The portraits are placed as sentries to the wetlands and are primarily carved from cypress logs with chainsaws, axes and chisels.
Large stone platforms sit atop the sculptures to prevent water from rotting the trunk of timber. These 4 sculptures were my favourite – visually striking yet blending into the environment naturally. They belonged but stood out!
When I saw the first portrait I saw resilience through tears of grief and pain, and Lisa commented on the fracturing of indigenous society. We both had a visceral reaction, which I believe is an important purpose of public art, not just to decorate or please.
Art can be subtle, overt, confrontational and nuanced. Woven naturally into the tapestry of our day to day lives, it helps build a culturally rich, tolerant, diverse and respectful society. Not just of people but the natural environment – from my first visit over a decade ago, it is heartening to see how native flora has thrived at Waterways.
Waterways (2008) by Ken Blum
Stories are the secret reservoir of values: change the stories individuals or nations live by and tell themselves, and you change the individuals and nations. Ben Okri, Nobel Prize for Literature
The two birds I believe are an ibis and an eagle but we couldn’t find a plaque. I have read about Bunjil (Bundjil), the Ancestral Wedge-tailed Eagle, the creator and Waa, the Ancestral Crow (Raven) the protector, they feature in many indigenous stories. They are Moiety Ancestors of the Kulin Nation.
The chances of disinformation, propaganda or downright fantasy/lies much more frequent with the changed media landscape. The plethora of social media sites often the ‘go-to’ for information, but not the most reliable. Local libraries are still free and much more trustworthy!
The ambience of Waterways and the boardwalks and paths around the lake made us forget the closeness of the freeway and that at the last census the estate recorded a population of 2,422 because there were so few people about. We had the paths to ourselves.
In order to create, we draw from our inner well. This inner well, an artistic reservoir, is ideally like a well-stocked fish pond… If we don’t give some attention to upkeep, our well is apt to become depleted, stagnant, or blocked…As artists, we must learn to be self-nourishing. We must become alert enough to consciously replenish our creative resources as we draw on them — to restock the trout pond, so to speak. Julia Cameron
The time spent with Lisa exploring some public art in Kingston is a lovely memory day and it has helped me attempt to return to blogging, a pastime I enjoyed because I do love writing and sharing information if I’ve been lucky enough to travel or participate in something special.
However, this first post after a long absence has been a challenge to remember how to format and upload, plus learning and navigating changes and updates to WordPress. Apologies in advance if there is a blooper and well done if you’ve made it this far.
I’ve been writing regularly and posting form poetry and photography on Instagram and Facebook but more often than not it is doggerel or random thoughts needing a lot more work to shape into what I hoped to say but ‘practice makes perfect’ another instruction I remember from childhood and it is lovely to write for pleasure rather than deadlines or to teach.
I wish I had visited Butterfly Renewal & The Monarchs before my last Instagram post because it would have been relevant. I’ll finish with the poem and a wish we all learn to self-nourish and nurture the ability to enjoy replenishing our creativity!
Fleeting Thoughts
by Mairi Neil
Sweltering heat each breath an effort
yet like a floating scrap of paper
buffeted by the hot north wind
you flit, flutter and dance from flower
to flower. Pirouetting from geraniums
to agapanthus, to lavender and rosemary …
a sip of iced water gives me relief, but
my computer screen demands words,
a deadline squeezing joy from a task
begun with passion – before today’s heat.
Time more your enemy with a lifespan of
a week, or months if you are lucky…
with minimum effort you flit and flutter
quenching your thirst, supping nectar
your drinking straw provided by nature –
oh, little butterfly, do you ever flutter
for pleasure in this topsy turvy world of
global warming and indeterminate seasons?
are you constantly searching to lay your eggs
and propagate – diligently seeking perfection?
Some humans become prisoners of work or greed –
but your timetable imposed by Mother Nature…
your exotic, colourful Monarch cousins travel
2000 miles from Mexico to California to breed
the timeline of their migration a line of dead
as farming, pesticides and global warming
extract a toll that you, fluttering in pale anonymity,
Shakesbear and his Complete Works by artist Cat Rabbit
I could count on my one hand the creative events and exhibitions I’ve been to in the last two years and I know I’m not alone.
There was attendance at talks, videos and workshops online, but that’s not the same as the sensations experienced walking around, sometimes touching, smelling, hearing and seeing and most importantly feeling the buzz from emotional connections.
Attending events and exhibitions in person triggers memories and ideas and occasionally controversies. If you have someone to share the experience: to reminisce, laugh, cry, debate merits, discuss the impact and celebrate the success, it is a bonus.
Until last Thursday, the “live” events I’ve managed to experience have been with family – and all this year (the least said about 2020 the better!):
a Hannah Gadsby Concert at Sydney Myer Music Bowl with daughter Anne enabling great exercise of laughter muscles (February)
a fascinating Open House Melbourne discussion on The Great Birrarung Parkland by boat with Indigenous guides sharing their knowledge (March)
a tour of the National Trust’s Labassa and the history of the garden with Anne where we managed to dodge showers (May)
a wonderful weekend away with my two sisters, to see the Mary Quant Exhibition at Bendigo Art Gallery which happened between lockdowns so didn’t have to be rescheduled (June)
a visit to Como for the display of Miniatures and Doll Houses with both Mary Jane and Anne that had been rescheduled (November)
Cat Rabbit: The Soft Library
My good friend Lisa Hill is a prolific book reviewer and alert to events in libraries, writing festivals, bookshops – in fact all things bookish. A few weeks ago she asked if I would like to go with her to The Soft Library , an exhibition by artist Cat Rabbit at the Bayside Gallery, Brighton Town Hall and we booked a date for early December.
Entrance to exhibition
“Cat Rabbit is a textile-based artist living in Naarm/Melbourne. Using felt, recycled and vintage fabrics, Cat hand stitches plush sculptural works of her imagined characters and the worlds they might live in. Her work translates to many formats – from children’s books to large-scale felt installations – always with aim of bringing softness and warmth to the viewer.”
Storytime
How could anyone resist an invitation to an exhibition promising softness and warmth – not only after surviving what we hope is the worst of a global pandemic but anytime!
Lisa is a friend who always goes above and beyond – not only did she offer to drive me but also negotiated with the curators to allow us to visit the exhibition before official opening time so we wouldn’t clash with any school or kinder visit because she worried about my severely compromised immune system when most children are still unvaccinated. The Omicron variant in the headlines revealing the Covid pandemic is stubbornly persistent. Athough no lockdowns and eased restrictions, the adage better to be safe than sorry always applies!
“The soft library is an extraordinary new project by Melbourne-based textile artist Cat Rabbit. The artist has transformed the Bayside Gallery into a fantastical library run by bears, or ‘libearians’, many of who are famous literary characters. Lovingly made by the artist in felt and fabric, the library houses books and animations and a special giant ‘storytime’ bear who invites visitors to sit and enjoy an audio story. This whimsical and delightful exhibition celebrates the freedom found in play and pays tribute to the library as a place of learning and wonder – a home for the endless possibilities of the imagination.”
Advertising blurb
Many of these Story Box Library titles feature in the Cat Rabbit Exhibition.
An ideal place for an art exhibition on the theme of books
Brighton Town Hall is an imposing building with a history dating back to 1885 when the memorial stone was laid by The Hon Thomas Bent MLA, for the District of Brighton and Mayor of the Borough. (Whenever politician Thomas Bent is mentioned someone always adds ‘Bent by name and bent by nature’ and Lisa beat me to that observation! Mr Bent gained quite a reputation when he ‘served’ the people of Victoria and made himself wealthy.)
Above the memorial stone is a plaque dated 1978 when the restored town hall incorporating the central library was opened. Above that yet another plaque dated 1998, when the building became The Bayside Arts and Cultural Centre – Brighton Town Hall.
The design of the exhibition simulates an art gallery display – there are ‘paintings’ on the wall (all made of felt), there is the obligatory marble-look sculpture of a figurehead (made of felt), and the larger than life Libearian and the professional paraphernalia (cards, date stamp, pad etc) laid out on the desk are all felt. A story-teller sits with stories quietly playing on a loop and a circle of soft cushions await eager listeners.
Lisa and I spent a pleasant hour appreciating the imagination, talent and sense of humour of the artist. It is a display ready-made for children’s activities but paved with richness of detail to delight adults. We recognised authors, exclaiming over the craftsmanship and attention to detail and I thought of the various discussions initiated with the children lucky enough to attend.
There are shelves ‘laden’ with felt tomes – the titles wittily clever. Children are given an activity sheet The Great Detective designed to engage them with the exhibits but also to encourage close observation and attention to detail. They are asked: If you could write a bear themed book, what would it be about? What would the title be? (More than children can have fun with this activity and I mentioned to our hosts there could be fun with homophones as well as homonyms!)
I eventually solved a mystery that had been bugging me – I was sure I had heard of Cat Rabbit, even met her somewhere. When I saw the book Too Much For Turtle on the storytime stand I remembered Cat and the illustrator Isobel Knowles had been a guest author and illustrator for The Mordialloc Writers’ Group several years ago when I was coordinator.
Local primary children have participated in workshops with the artist and there is a trolley and shelf with felt books made by Hampton Primary.
There are also gorgeous individual postcards with a QRcode that will take you to digital details of authors and books and the creativity of the artist. QRcodes throughout the exhibition allow further exploration of authors and books. Technology enhances exhibitions by adding or extending interactive elements.
Brighton Libearian Karyn Siegmann pens a lovely intro to The Soft Library confessing her love of books:
“And where is the one place you could get all the books you wanted to read, and for free? The local library of course. That magical place full of stories and ideas and places to curl up and imagine and think…
Libraries have seen so many changes over the years, but they will always be a place of comfort containing infinite stories, both real and imagined. Libraries house characters you can revisit again and again and stories you can learn different things from no matter how many times you read them. It’s a shared place, but at the same time it’s all yours!”
Most of the authors in the exhibition I’d read or heard of but some of the newer children’s authors I didn’t know. However, the exhibits triggered memories of a time in my life I loved when I regularly dabbled in felt craft. From firsthand experience, I appreciate Cat Rabbit’s amazing talent and the effort and hard work to produce such a showcase. I believe craft as an activity and as works of art gained popularity during lockdowns and I expect to see more exhibitions and also more work at open air markets.
My daughters attended a Steiner stream at primary school and craft and creativity interwoven with all subjects. We made tiny gnomes to help gather gum nuts for maths, wove recorder bags to house music sheets and made various animals for the story cloth when the children sat in a circle to read or listen to stories. Along with other Steiner mums I spent months knitting and sewing to prepare a stall at the annual school fair.
I still do some craft for particular projects and each Christmas I place a Nativity at the foot of the tree – my tableau made in felt over 20 years ago needs a make-over but will outlast me!
Christmas Nativity
The Soft Library will be open until mid-January.
The festive season has a way of becoming too busy and after a lull of activities for two years Melbourne has a lot on offer, but I hope people make the time to visit the Bayside Gallery which has other exhibitions running as well – you won’t be disappointed.
And if the warm and thoughtful treatment Lisa and I received from the staff is replicated you’ll join their mailing list too!
This is another post long overdue, and I apologise to friend and author, Jillian Bailey for not celebrating the publication of her wonderful family history before now, but I imagine I’m not the only blogger attempting catch-up after a horror of a year because of the global pandemic whirling a chaotic world close to home.
The above picture from November last year when we received from the printer, in Jillian’s words, ‘the labour of love’ that is The history of a Carrum family. The actual publication followed months of meetings held between lockdowns, copious emails, phone calls, text messages and usb drops in each other’s mailbox to finalise the contents, but as Jillian states in the Acknowledgements, the writing was in ‘progress over the past fifteen years…’
The book has pages of photographs and scanned documents. Many are family photos but there is a 1950s school photo from Carrum Primary as well as photographs of public events and locales. It is usually the inclusion of these photographs and historical descriptions of an area that moves a family history from being important to a select few to interesting for a wider audience. (The Facebook groups focusing on local areas have thousands of members and inevitably the posters who share old photos and memories receive the highest number of likes and responses.)
The process of which images to include became the subject of many discussions and hard decisions because as is the case with most family histories the cost of ‘the labour of love’ is borne by the researcher/writer!
Over the years and even in the months close to finalisation, family members gave feedback on the manuscript and some decided to submit or change a contribution. Writing a family history is not for the fainthearted or impatient.
Jillian initially began her journey into family history to honour her parents and record their legacy and keeping that as the focus helped decide what images and text to include and gave her definite parameters and a beginning and end. The book is a history of her family establishing a home in Melbourne’s bayside suburb of Carrum at the end of WW2, and the house built by her father features on the front cover; a photograph of her smiling parents, Jack and Doreen, brightens the back cover.
Jillian with cover showing the family home in Llewelyn Grove, Carrum
Jillian with back cover showing her parents, Doreen and Jack Bailey, on their 65th wedding anniversary
Jillian’s parents both lived into their nineties, Jack (95) and Doreen(98) and as their carer for many years Jillian took the opportunity to listen to their stories, ask questions, and record their memories with the aim of passing on the history to children, grandchildren, great grandchildren – a permanent legacy.
By taking the time to reflect and document the stories about the family’s history, Jack and Doreen’s life experiences, opportunities and challenges, the joys and sorrows, Jillian has captured her parents’ values and wisdom and their keen sense of humour. The book also provides an opportunity for the reader to learn what it was like growing up in Carrum of the 1950s at a time when the infrastructure and technology we know today, didn’t exist.
We may listen to stories told by parents and grandparents but until someone takes the time to record and write down these stories, the anecdotes and information remain fragmented memories, easily distorted and often accompanied by a bundle of photographs of people with no name or context.
Family histories are important historical documents, they can contain information and photographs more relevant to ordinary folk, who make up the majority, than stories of royalty and celebrities because the majority of people are not affluent, their fifteen minutes of fame if it happens is localised. It is ordinary working people who produce the families that make suburbs grow, who establish the clubs and special interest groups, and the need for parks, schools, libraries and bus routes!
At some time in our lives, most of us are curious about ancestors and where we are from, and the growing popularity of Ancestry.com and TV shows like Who Do You Think You Are plus people paying for DNA testing is significant.
Collating a family tree is important, but families are more than a list of birth and death dates. Stories add flesh and depth to an abstract list of names. The Family Tree in Jillian’s history prepared by a genealogist friend, begins with her grandparents. Jillian’s mother was an only child, but her father was one of six children, so the Bailey family tree has plenty of foliage!
There are interesting inclusions in the book that you don’t necessarily find in other family histories such as colourful Heraldic pics certifying the origins of the maternal grandparents’ name, Watson (meaning son of Walter and dating to thirteenth century) and paternal grandparents’ name, Bailey (or Bailiff – man of great importance, fourteenth century).
Plus closeups of Certificates of Sale of the Highland Titles of Lord and Lady of Glencoe and a small plot of land in a nature reserve, in the Parish of Lismore in Scotland. The titles bought for Doreen and Jack on their 70th Wedding Anniversary. This gift from the family and subsequent ‘knighting’ at the party a great example of the Bailey family sense of humour and fun. In Jillian’s words:
“The family always got together for special birthdays and anniversaries, we loved the thought of a get-together; any good excuse for a party. We had great family parties, Mum at the piano hitting the keys beautifully; our singing not so beautiful, but with gusto and enjoyment...
Mum and Dad’s 70th Wedding Anniversary was extra special. About ninety family and friends came from everywhere to celebrate with them. Joan, who was the flower girl for their wedding in April 1942, came with her husband Alan. It was lovely to see them chatting with Mum and Dad.” (page 86)
the page of Jack and Doreen’s wedding photos – a feast for those interested in fashion but when you think of rationing and mood, it is also a triumphant achievement of planning and joy in the middle of a war.
Jillian’s parents were founding members of the Carrum Entertainment Group in 1955 and the reminiscences about the concerts and plays performed are illustrated by newspaper clippings, scanned programs and photographs. Doreen had her own band that played at all the local Barn and Square Dances held at the Carrum Fire Brigade Hall when it was situated near the Patterson River in Station Street.
Similarly, Jillian’s father was the Captain-Coach of the Carrum Life Saving Club and helped organise the Royal Life-Saving carnivals popular in the era and Jillian writes a vivid description of participating in the 1952 carnival hosted by Carrum. The book is rich in detail about neighbours and the various families involved with the Baileys, and as is often the case when people live most of their life in a particular locality, the friendship circle remains.
The history of a Carrum family is an enjoyable easy read, well set out in six parts with accompanying photographs and scanned documents:
Part 1 – the story of the maternal and paternal grandparents arriving in Australia by ship from England.
Part 2 – Doreen and Jack’s memories of childhood, marriage and children, working life and move to Carrum.
Part 3 – details of grandparents and family friends, stories of cousins.
Part 4 – the story of Jillian and her siblings childhood at Carrum, adulthood, weddings and children.
Part 5 – children’s weddings, grandchildren, family celebrations: anniversaries and Christmas parties, memories and anecdotes
Part 6 – stories relating to the family history published in Mordialloc Writers’ anthologies 2007-2015.
The anthologies Jillian refers to are in the library: A Rich Inheritance, published 2007, Carnival Caper, 2011 and Kingston My City, 2015. (This last anthology is free to download as an e-book KingstonMyCity.epub. and Jillian’s story starts p.74)
I couldn’t attend the launch of The history of a Carrum Family which happened when lockdown 4 eased December 2020. Remaining border restrictions meant family members interstate watched the launch remotely.(Yeah for the Internet!)
Here are a couple of extracts putting the launch in context and explaining the start of Jillian’s writing journey:
In the first essay when Jillian began writing her family history she focused on the first decade – 1949-1959:
“I cast my mind back to 1948 when my parents bought a block of land in Carrum for 50 pounds. Dad and a family friend, Jack Millane, a carpenter-joiner by trade, started to build our house at the end of 1949...
They were tough times and over the next ten years, shortages of labour and building materials meant many people built their own houses, or provided unskilled labour for friends to cut construction costs and delays. ‘Materials were hard to get,’ Dad said, ‘even the nails were like gold. You had to dig deep to find them.’
On hearing about the shortage, Eric ‘Sandy’ McDougall, the local chemist and well-known Carrum identity said, ‘I’llget you some nails, Jack.’ Sandy supplied Dad, and many others, with nails he railed down from Sydney. These nails were made in Melbourne, but were rationed to other states according to need, by the Gold Nail Company and government regulations. Mr Mac (as a lot of people called him), set up a hardware corner in his chemist-grocery mixed business, providing an excellent service for the local community.
Dad worked all week, and at weekends he rode his pushbike from Chelsea to Carrum to help Jack build the house...” (page 114)
The recent upheavals because of the pandemic makes some of this information eerily familiar as does the poignant story of Laurel Bailey, Jillian’s Aunt, born in 1932. Six-year-old Laurel collapsed on stage at the Princess Theatre during a dance performance to become:
“… one of the first Infantile Paralysis cases in Victoria. She spent the next two years in the Hampton Hospital (now known as Linacre Rehab Hospital) paralysed from the chest down inside an iron lung to help her breathe. She had contracted Polio from her cousin, Beryl who had no symptoms at all. Beryl went on to marry and give birth to twelve children.
Laurel was one of the fortunate ones under the care of Sister Kenny, whose healing methods became internationallyfamous for her wonderful work with Polio victims. Unfortunately, Australia lost Sister Kenny to overseas due to the lack of respect and belief in the work she did. She fought the government to get help for polio sufferers for years without success... ” (page 48)
Another snippet of history in Jillian’s book that resonates with today’s news about what you can and cannot do during lockdown is her mother buying a hair salon in Carrum in the late 1950s – the site now occupied by Aldi’s supermarket. Jillian worked there too:
“I started at Venus College of Hair and Beauty Culture in February 1958. It was a fifteen month course, covering everything in hair and beauty work. I really enjoyed my studies and was proud of my qualifications. I worked with Mum in her salon on Friday evenings and Saturday mornings during this time to get some practical knowledge and hands-on experience. Mum eventually sold the business about two years later when I was qualified and had a position in a wonderful salon.” (page 63)
The story of following in her mother’s footsteps to own hairdressing salons and all the accompanying experiences that go with a career where every day is filled with personalities and personal stories will hopefully be the topic of Jillian’s next book when she writes her memoirs!
Until then, after fourteen years of research and writing, she can enjoy the well-deserved praise and gratitude from family and friends for The history of a Carrum family.
We survived all that 2020 threw at us and I’m pleased I had a small part to play in Jillian sharing her story of the strength, resilience and remarkable lives of earlier generations.
If you want to read about others who have displayed Jillian’s determination to publish a slice of history click on the links below:
Four days ago, I received a call from an unfamiliar number. Celtic feyness or a sixth sense made me pick up, instead of my usual practice of letting the call go to Voicemail.
‘I’m Sylvie, a friend of Kay Watson’s,’ a voice said, ‘and I’m ringing to let you know Kay passed away yesterday morning.’
I’ve reached an age where news of illness and death more frequent than I’d like and in recent times coming too often! Kay was one of my oldest students; first attending writing class at 80 years of age and publishing her memoir at 89. She only left when a move to a distant nursing home in her mid 90s made travelling and attendance difficult.
Sylvie informed me that Kay had celebrated her 100th birthday at the beginning of the year and was thrilled to receive the obligatory greetings from the Queen. This snapshot of a grinning Kay in February speaks volumes!
Kay’s 100th birthday card from Queen Elizabeth II
We live in Covid times. The death of a family member, friend, or acquaintance presents difficulties when lockdown dictates funeral rules and visits to homes, especially to those in the aged care sector. So this will be a digital trip down Memory Lane to celebrate and farewell the life of one of the wonderful students I’ve been fortunate to meet during my time as a writing tutor.
Kay was remarkable and touched my life in many ways. The desire to honour her legacy has motivated me to shake off a torpor that’s had me avoid blogs and blogging for several months.
Many of those who follow Up The Creek With a Pen are ex-students or members of writing groups and will have met Kay in class or at the regular Sunday readings held by Mordialloc Writers’ Group until I retired in 2017. When writing, Kay preferred to be called by her Welsh name of Ceinwen, a language she still spoke fluently. Ceinwen was one of the few Welsh speakers in Melbourne, who could also read and write in Welsh, skills she often used on behalf of St David’s Welsh Church when they wanted to welcome visiting Welsh celebrities like the Welsh Choir or celebrate St David’s Day, the Welsh National Day in March.
Ceinwen means lovely, blessed, and fair – well-chosen descriptions of the Kay Watson I knew!
Kay’s memoir published 2010
My association with Ceinwen, inextricably, linked with Mordialloc Neighbourhood House, where we met because of common interests in writing and social justice. Between first volunteering, then being employed as a creative writing tutor, plus running the Mordialloc Writers’ Group and Readings By The Bay, my association with MNH lasted 21 years. Ceinwen attended Monday morning writing class for 13 of those years, also the Sunday Readings and meetings of the Union of Australian Women Southern Branch, which I coordinated. Her memoir launched on the 15th anniversary of the writers’ group, epitomised what local community writing classes and groups encourage and celebrate.
The Monday class at Mordialloc Neighbourhood House, Ceinwen’s beginning as a writer!
Kay dressed in signature orange (to match her hair she always said!) reading one of her poems at Readings By The Bay. She was a skilful knitter and knitted this suit herself!
The Launch of Ceinwen’s Journey, 2010
Good Afternoon – my name is Mairi Neil and I coordinate the Mordialloc Writers Group. Before I begin…
I acknowledge the people and elders, past and present of the Boon Wurrung Clans and the Kulin Nation. I acknowledge and uphold their unique relationship to this land and surrounding sea, a relationship of over 40,000 years. The Mordialloc Writers’ Group believes reconciliation is about recognition and healing with Australia’s Indigenous people. Together, we are Australian, let us bridge cultures and create a just society.
Croeso – a Welsh welcome for those who have specifically come for the launch of Ceinwen’s Journey, Shining in Reflection, a memoir by local writer, Kay Watson. Kay attends my writing for pleasure class here on a Monday; is a fellow member of Mordialloc Writers’ Group, and the Union of Australian Women Southern Branch, but above all she is a friend, so I am honoured to be able to launch Ceinwen’s Journey, which is a super read.
Kay is here today with her son Clive and daughter-in-law Sheila. We are also honoured to have publisher Hassanah Briedis, and I’d like to acknowledge our local member Janice Munt and convey the apologies of Federal member Mark Dreyfus and Senator Mitch Fifield both in Canberra this weekend. Several regular members of our writers’ group who couldn’t attend send congratulations too. Just as well not everyone could attend because we have already run out of chairs!
Before I extol the virtues of Kay’s memoir, I’d like to remind you of the group’s record of achievement – seven anthologies that have enabled 55 local writers to be published – many for the first time. Anthology number eight to be released at the end of this year will ensure our stories, poems, memoir, and novel extracts continue to represent this community’s culture. Local anthologies are valuable historical documents. We are the keeper of your stories as we write our own.
A word or sentence, an object or photograph, a line of poetry, a colour or a memory, and many other triggers besides, inspire writers and the breadth of Kay’s writing provides examples of all of these starting points.
Kay Watson does not suffer from writer’s block! When she first attended writing class a decade ago I acknowledged her wonderful ability to tell stories, and to tell them well. She is blessed with an amazing memory and the stories she wrote in class (and still does) are rich in detail and prompt fabulous discussions, tears and laughter, plus wonderful history lessons when we share lived experiences!
Kay with Heather Yourn (dec 2019), another longterm member of Monday class who came to my classes until 91 yrs of age. Heather wrote insightful stories and poems too. Kay and Heather had a special bond. When Heather moved to Mt Eliza she’d pick up Kay and bringing her to class because Kay lived at Patterson Lakes .
What Kay can’t remember is compensated by her vivid imagination! (Although no made up stories in this memoir!)
Her words flow effortlessly, in class every story seems true and once the excitement of this launch is over, she could produce an anthology of her short stories and poetry. But judging by her look of horror perhaps not – it is stressful putting a book together…
Kay’s memorable contribution is a story of a life spanning 89 years, written with modesty and understatement, yet she lived through the hardships of the Great Depression, the hungry uncertain years of the Great Slump, and the rationing and devastation of the Second World War when she was separated from Arthur, the love of her life. Then came children, several sojourns to Europe and the trials and tribulations of family life in the United Kingdom and retirement in Australia.
Kay triumphs over the adjustments of resettlement, not only from England to Australia at a time of life when many would be reluctant to move from their comfort zone, but an earlier move to England from Wales. This childhood upheaval perhaps the greater challenge because she had to forgo her beloved Welsh language for the scouse accent of Liverpool. (It could have been worse she may have relocated to Glasgow!)
Mind you adapting to ‘Strine’ has not been without dramas – like many new migrants she turned up to gatherings here in Australia with ‘a plate’ because she was told to, never realising it was supposed to have food on it!
Kay begins her story in 1921, a time of oil lamps, and tin baths used once a week before being hung in the yard. A time when wash day did indeed take all day, and children amused themselves with homemade toys, and their imagination, while mothers lit boilers, hand-washed everything, and if lucky, had a mangle to wring out the clothes to be dried in the back garden on a line of rope between wooden poles. The art of washing clothes no mean feat in the miserable weather of the UK.
At home, Kay spoke Welsh, at school English, and often home was a house of women because her Merchant Navy father spent time away at sea. These are memories of a time when the pace of life seemed slower, a time when not everyone had a car, a time when you made your own entertainment. Definitive childhood experiences leave their mark but it is amazing what memories are triggered in writing class.
First Love by Kay Watson
Keith Taylor was 15 years old and sat in the desk in front of me at school He had acne and hair sticking up like a chimney sweep’s brush dipped in oil. Not very tall, he was always straightening his spectacles with a forefinger and constantly sniffing instead of giving his nose a good blow.
I fell madly in love with Keith.
He lived in the next street and we walked to school together. Considered ‘grammar school material’, he helped me with my homework. We went to the cinema on Saturdays, and I watched him shine at football at the local recreation grounds. He was always there for me, saying, ‘You make me so happy you’re my girlfriend,’ and ‘I love your dark shining eyes.’
I gave him a photograph of myself and he kept it in his desk at school. ‘Why do you keep it there?’ I asked
‘To look at you often,’ he said, ‘because I’ll get into trouble turning around in class to look at you.’
No wonder I overlooked that he didn’t have film star features!
Love permeates this book: love of God and church, love of family, love of community, love of travel and love of having a good time. As all of you who know Kay, laughter is never far from her lips.
It has been Kay’s Faith and a keen sense of humour that has helped her through the sad times – of which there have been a few – especially the tragic loss of her beloved daughter, Dawn when only 21 years of age, and the recent loss of her husband and soul mate, Arthur.
You don’t reach 89 without having the rough as well as the smooth and yet this is not a sad book, it is indeed a celebration of a life well-lived.
Writing your life story is not for the faint-hearted. It takes courage. When we write we reveal ourselves, expose ourselves to public scrutiny. We revisit good and bad times and often learn things about ourselves – each sentence can be as much a surprise to self as it is to the reader. It may be cathartic or be a shock but it is a wonderful gift to be able to use our very flexible and beautiful language to connect with others. And it is magic when we get it right – as Kay has done.
Sounds and Smells of War by Kay Watson
The war. Air-raid sirens screech, enemy aircraft drone overhead. Wham Wham! Anti-aircraft batteries and crump ofexploding bombs. We heard these sounds and more sitting on cold slatted wood seats in dank, brick, air raid shelters surrounded by dampness and fear of death. Our five senses overloaded every night.
Glass splintered and smashed, dancing on the cobblestones as windows hit by shrapnel. The suction and compression from huge blasts, pushed us together. We grabbed each other, held tight for comfort because there were no doors on the shelter and we could see the angry red sky blackened at the edges.
City docks aflame. The acrid smell of exploding paint drums and melting rubber in the air billowing smoke and flames from the burning sugar factory, which formed a fiery sheet on the surface of the water. 4.00am. After nine hours, the all clear siren sounded. We emerged from the shelter to the scent of burning wood. Smelly black dust hung in the air. We faced our homes, many destroyed, front doors blown off, shattered windows, rubble strewngardens. Bewilderment. We hugged our blankets and pillows, and small babies in smelly nappies long overdue for changing.
Our kitchen relatively unscathed meant I had a cold wash. How I enjoyed the aroma of Lifebuoy Soap, the luxury of feeling clean and refreshed. We gathered the broken crockery from the red tile floor. An intense smell of soot from the kitchen range permeated upstairs, even inside chests of drawers. The force of the blast had scattered clothes from cupboards. They smelt musty and wet from the fire brigade’s efforts to save the house. Mum stood motionless and stared at the mattress, pockmarked like cinders on a hot face, by the incendiary bombs. Friends invited us to stay until we found a place outside the city, wreathing our faces in smiles. We smelled their coffee. Even burnt toast, delicious in those days.
The bitter days now behind us but the way to the new is in the shadow of the old. I enjoy more pleasant smells, especially seasonal ones, each flower bringing its own smell to my garden. Also the sea and seaweed clinging to rocks, the salt tangy ocean, the red earth of the desert and most of all sounds of birds like a choir of chirping minstrels.
There are interesting photographs in this book too – examine them closely because they all hold stories.
Please enjoy this magnificent achievement, a memoir to treasure and join with me in congratulating and welcoming author Kay Watson.
That day was probably one of the highlights of Kay’s long life and made more memorable by the support she received from fellow students in the class. One of the students, Helen, arranged for her partner to make a magnificent (and delicious) cake, in the shape of a traditional Welsh hat and many people followed the Aussie tradition of bringing a plate (food included, of course).
Kay’s cake
Helen, Kay ,and Leo (cake maker)
Another longterm student of Monday classes was Amelia, in a similar age group as Kay, they shared a close friendship. Both lived in Parkdale and loved writing poetry about the environment, especially the sea. Sadly, Amelia predeceased Kay. I read some of Amelia’s poetry at her funeral.
Kay and Amelia Auckett
I can’t attend Kay’s funeral but will finish this blog with some of her lovely poems that featured in the annual class anthologies where she favoured writing about her memories of the UK countryside. There are a few photographs too, of Kay’s classmates, several who have now passed away. There is also a picture I treasure of Kay with my mother, who was born in April 1921. The pair met a few times at Mordialloc Writers’ events and got on well but sadly, Mum died in 2009, a few months after this picture was taken.
Kay with Mum (Anne McInnes)
It is not overstating, to say everyone loved Kay and her stories never disappointed. During WW2 she was in the WAAF’s Entertainment Unit blessed with a wonderful Welsh singing voice and the actors and entertainers she met in the concerts to entertain the troops filled a list of celebrity who’s who, but I loved her travelogues. She’d bring in pictures of her and husband Arthur’s holidays to Spain and France and write about fascinating adventures.
One travel story sticks in my mind because she had the class in stitches and there were no accompanying snaps. A group of friends had hired a yacht to sail the Mediterranean islands. When the weather turned nasty, they headed for a nearby isle to drop anchor. On going ashore they discovered it was a nudist colony and to use any of the facilities, they had to, in Kay’s word ‘conform’.
I miss teaching writing in community houses, miss the many students who enriched my life with their stories and imagination. I learnt so much and will always smile when remembering the friendship, laughter, entertaining and emotional stories, and the sharing of scrumptious morning tea that were all part of Writing for Pleasure on Monday mornings.
Childhood Homeby Kay Watson
I long to see the old place again, just once on a winter’s day
frost makes white the lonely fields, and skies are silver grey.
I think of our cottage and winter walks down the lane
snowdrops nod their heads, their stems stiff like cane.
Those long dark nights, and cold short days,
the low angle of the sun casting shadow haze
adding form to the landscape and drifting snow,
patterned frozen puddles where summer sunflowers grow.
I shall return in summer and breathe the rustic air,
pause at the stream to rest and reflect on things there –
remember my childhood of long ago – and I’ll sing
of the joy and peace Mother Nature always brings.
Meadowlandby Kay Watson
Warm sun thaws and meadows tenderly lie
beneath the paintbox of sunrise,
the bridle of earth and sky.
Cowslips join waves of ripening corn
to float and dance, spellbound entranced
warming my heart like a cloth of gold.
Ever changing breeze sighs through my hair
like a joyless eye,
it is eventide when sun sinks in the west
and drowsy butterfly folds his wings,
birds fly to their nests no more to sing.
Flower petals close, the daisy asleep
is that primrose buried in slumber deep?
Thoughts scatter in fancy’s flight
sweet dreams close eyelids, till dawning light.
The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude.
Thornton Wilder
Thank you Kay (Ceinwen) Watson for sharing your journey!
Kay signing a copy of her book for Alex at Readings by the Bay, 2010
The ACTU acknowledged the 110th Anniversary of IWD by publishing a report on the challenges facing working women in 2021. The report’s key points are not easy reading: “At the turn of the 20th century, Australia was considered one of the most progressive nations for women in the world. In 1902 we became the second country to win some women the right to vote (it took until 1962 for First Nations women to win the same right) and the first to allow women to stand for parliament.” And yet today, ‘Australia ranks just 44th in the world for gender pay equity. In 2006 we ranked 15th.’
For someone like me, who joined Women’s Liberation in 1971 during my first year at university and who is a longterm member of the Union of Australian Women, I feel it is indeed another example of Groundhog Day, and I can’t believe we are not only still fighting for equal pay, but in some instances, we have lost ground as far as equity and respect is concerned.
I’ve owned the following badges since the 70s and 80s and have marched for equality every year on IWD and at other protests, including the one against Trump where many of us wore homemade Pussy Hats. The article underneath those pictures is from The Age newspaper in the 90s and asks the perennial question – in the struggle for equality, how much has really changed?
Impact of Covid-19 On Women
The ACTU Report reveals that women bore the brunt of losses from the catastrophic changes to society due to the pandemic.
• Women over-represented in insecure and low paid jobs • Women dominated the frontline care, and the caring responsibilities at home • JobKeeper rules unfairly excluded women workers • Over 300,000 women emptied their superannuation accounts to cope during Covid, putting them at greater risk of poverty in retirement.
from Facebook
The reasons why feminism seems to be making little headway in changing deeply ingrained misogynistic attitudes in a culture that prides itself in championing the ‘fair go’ will no doubt continue to be the subject of essays, books, blogs, podcasts, documentaries and film, not to mention the plethora of talk shows and infotainment passing as news we see on television and online, but here is another old cutting from my scrapbook. The date 1999!
From The Age, 1999
2021, we have some high profile female journalists – some even host their own radio or television shows – but it is still men who actually control the boardrooms, the directorships and CEO positions, and who own the newspapers, television stations, and big tech giants of the Internet.
(I can hear people asking: What about Ita Buttrose? However, considering the LNP Federal Governments have cut the ABC’s funding since 2013, and the organisation’s loss of staff and resources, I think we can discount any perceived advantage Ita’s appointment holds.)
And so the struggle continues!
The first photo is from the 2019 IWD rally, the middle photo of IWD in the 70s (the arrow points to me) appeared in the 2018 City of Melbourne exhibition, We Protest, and the last photo is the cover of a book published in January 2000, detailing the history and incredible achievements of the UAW.
Choose to Challenge – Kingston Woman of the Year Award 2021
The stories of the final nominees, all proven leaders in their field can be read online. They inspire others and make a difference through exceptional professional or personal achievements in the following categories:
Courageous Commitment: Women who are dedicated to making a difference to the health, well-being, safety, and/or sustainability of our community through advocacy, campaigning, fundraising, and/or thought-leadership
Excelling in Arts and Sport: Women using their sporting and/or creative talents to represent, motivate and inspire our community.
Inspiring Innovation: Women who are leaders in Business, Economics, Politics, and/or an Entrepreneur.
Success in STEM: Women excelling in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.
Simone Hardman, Woman of the Year 2021 and Joan Bradd, Lifetime Achievement Award
The Mayor, Cr Steve Staikos, acknowledged the barriers that continue to perpetuate gender inequality which is a key cause of family violence and violence against women. “Kingston Council is committed to working towards the vision of creating safe, equal and respectful relationships in our community where family violence and gender inequality are not tolerated.”
The Council, working with Youth Services, launched the Young Women’s Mentoring Program last year hoping to help inspire future generations of young women to achieve their full potential with many of the nominees from past years, and hopefully this year, mentoring young people. By acknowledging their achievements the Council helps encourage positive contributions, encourages women to keep sharing stories, and encourages us to keep lifting each other up.
An award winner from last year, Tara Graves winner was MC. Tara emphasised the importance of support from others and having a sense of community. The mentoring program so important to inspire and help young people and an opportunity for nominees to share their skills and give back. It encourages women to take part and show leadership at Council events, just as Tara is emceeing and it helps emerging leaders, bringing out the best in all participants. Tara hoped, “the nominees this year will participate because their stories inspire and challenge us to make a positive difference in the community.”
A short video of the established Young Women’s mentoring Program heard from some of last year’s nominees and also the young people who joined the program. Messages from mentors included:
The importance of listening
the joy and importance of sharing skills
encouraging the seeking of help for mental as well as physical health
encouraging teenagers to grow into womanhood feeling positive.
Teenagers shared what they got from the program:
Importance of checking-in on a regular basis with those who you love and love you,
important to communicate
realising they are not alone or on their own,
a sense of optimism
it’s okay to be interested in multiple things and passionate about more than one thing
you don’t have to be always focused on one aim,
the value in learning from different life experiences and that it’s okay to be different.
The official guests: Mayor, Steve Staikos, Paul Franklin, Acting CEO, Emma Gierschick Woman of the Year 2019, Keynote Speaker Mariam Issa, June Rea, Woman of the Year 2020
Tell Your Truth – Speak Out – Own Your Story, Design Your Destiny
The keynote speaker was Mariam Issa, an inspired coach, storyteller, and author of A Resilient Life, co-founder of the non-profit organisation RAW – Resilient Aspiring Women – a multi-cultural program to encourage diversity and encouraging women to achieve while healing from personal, physical, mental or emotional trauma and life’s tribulations. RAW supports women’s resilience through intercultural dialogue and exchange facilitated by storytelling, cooking and gardening.
Mariam, originally from Somalia, said her African ancestry believes there is no death. We live in continuous life, and represent all the elders in our DNA. She meditates, and one day she saw a cross, and even although she is not Christian but Muslim, this visualisation she understood to mean the following:
At the top of the vertical line is the storyteller, and at the bottom is the listener. On the extreme left of the horizontal line are our ancestors and past experience, and on the extreme right of the horizontal line is youth and the future.
She asked us to visualise this cross and the description and to add a bubble above the cross and each world we live in is in that bubble. Everyday it is important to realise we are all the bubble amid many bubbles. The story doesn’t belong to any one group – not the past, or future. The story is now and the segment of time we share.
Cultures who don’t share stories die. Mariam is a storyteller and cultures in the past used storytellers to share stories of the past in oral histories, settle disputes, celebrate special times, share knowledge. Mariam considers oral history similar to how we use technology today to process and pass on information.
Language and Rhythm are powerful tools.
Stories give us insights. Mariam considers her life is a safari and she uses stories as a platform to transform experiences through questions. We should use opportunities to be inquisitive, engage, and be inspired and connected. Resilient and inclusive communities bring together diversity and amazing stories.
Humanity is at a crossroads with the world changing rapidly.
2020 – revealed our inability to predict the future and the power of focused presence. Imagination is a lens to create a new reality of equity and equality that must be built into the system and we must challenge the systemic oppression of women.
Mariam’s mother was a weaver of mats and she told her daughter, it was important to change the pattern and your mat because life changes and we must adapt. We must change all the time. Don’t spend too much time looking at past mistakes or worrying too much about the future.
Claiming your rights is claiming your story. People meet the women within when you are faced with adversity and speak up or act.
Mariam was a Somalian refugee and like all refugees from a different culture, arriving in a new country, everything they knew about themselves was questioned. Her culture deflated and it was difficult to retain her cultural identity, especially after 9/11. Fortunately, she kept a journal and reflecting on this she saw a pattern of phases common to many refugees.
Phase 1: Victimhood: They were living in Brighton with feelings of powerlessness and despair. Separated from birth country and culture and extended family, she gave birth to her fifth child shortly after arriving from her war-torn country and a refugee camp in Kenya. She went into post natal depression. It was a dark period of settlement. She struggled but continued to hang on to the dream many refugees have, that one day they can return to their own country and be happy.
9/11 had happened and the media hype and many politicians rhetoric was anti-Islamic. She lived in fear and sent her children to an Islamic school, across Melbourne, expensive to attend and travel to, even when she knew the standard of education and the curriculum at Brighton public schools was better.
Phase 2: Anger: She took her four-year old daughter, her youngest child to kindergarten. Although excited to be part of all kindergarten entailed, her daughter asked, ‘Do they not want me because I am African?” Mariam realised what the fear and victimhood was doing and got angry wanting to change the situation.
The angry phase was better – she made better decisions. She put her children in local schools, she stayed in Brighton and decided to settle in Australia, not always dreaming of ‘going home’. She made a choice to adapt to the community. Her ancestors were courageous nomadic people, they knew how to adapt and she would too.
Choosing to Challenge
It is hard to move forward, she believes you navigate adversity not ‘come through it’. You must challenge yourself – as her mother advised, ‘change the mat’. Mariam’s passion is to unlock the contributions of others and her daughter now joins her as a storyteller and was speaking at a school in Sunshine.
Mariam told the story of the day she decided to change.
On a winter’s day, she sat in front of their only heater clutching a coffee to get warm. Looking out of the window, a vision appeared that remains with her – it gave her inspiration on that winter’s morning. A young woman in lycra went by, holding a dog on a leash in one hand and pushing a baby’s pram with the other. And she wore perfect make-up.
Mariam wondered at this woman’s motivation and fortitude – it reminded her of women she had observed in Kenya who got up at 3.00 am, put a child in a sling and a basket on their head and walked more than half a mile to market. The vision started a curiosity about that woman in lycra, and others who lived in Brighton.
(There was a murmured giggle from the audience at this point in the story – many of us I am sure recalling ‘Karen from Brighton’ and the fuss during the 2020 Lockdowns!)
Mariam started work as a cleaner in Brighton, cleaning homes of the women in lycra, and then worked in aged care. Cleaning the big mansions she met many ‘lycra’ women and was introduced to the coffee culture. She also met plenty of old people abandoned to loneliness in aged care.
Women are at the forefront of culture everywhere but lifestyle did not necessarily bring happiness, nor does isolation. She believes in bridging gaps. Life is happening to us all the time, we must participate and create a life bridging gaps within the community. Working towards goals of inclusiveness and similar goals she created her own business.
She discovered food the best social catalyst and established her own business cooking East African food called Cooking with Mariam, and was even on TV with well-known Australian basketball player, Andrew Gaze.
Then she became an author – writing her book about resilience, and now she has founded RAW (spells war in reverse) believing resilience springs from women. The more women thrive, the more communities thrive.
We Are the System
Choose to change, ponder the stories of other, find the courage to challenge any system oppressing you. Be curious, ask questions. Take the power you have within. Mariam asked Tara what she thought was possible in this space of uncertainty as we recover from the global pandemic. Tara answered: The future is female. Women must be empowered, must be taken more seriously in the workforce and in places where decisions are made.
Mariam is a woman of faith and finds that most faiths regardless of religious persuasion share many similar beliefs. She ended her speech with the following:
Accept worthiness comes from your existence. You exist therefore are worthy.
We are all one – I am because you are. There is no you or me. Accept the fullness of who you are.
Whatever seed you put in and how you nurture that seed is what you plant. The law of cause and effect.
Law of presence – we suffer because of past or future fears but we must focus on now.
A need to promote and create a safe space so the vulnerable can reach out.
The program also included two uplifting, energetic and joyous dance performances. The first from Indigenous Outreach projects and the second from Tribal African drum and dance ensemble by Melbourne Djembe group. Both encouraged audience participation which emphasised we were indeed there to celebrate and not dwell on all that needs to be done.
There will be time enough to harness our Angry Phase!
IWD Rally Melbourne 2018
The Future
As an artist, I never wanted to be fettered by gender nor recognised or defined as a female poet, musician or singer. They don’t do that with men – nobody says Picasso, the male artist. Curators call me up and say, “We want your work to be in a show about women artists,” and I’m like, why? For Christ’s sake, do we have to attach a gender onto everything?
It has been two weeks since my last post, but considering the hive of activity online with free courses, art-related and celebrity freebies, newspapers and journals unlocking paywalls, plus the constant news updates about the coronavirus, I doubt anyone has missed my jottings!
We also had Mother’s Day last weekend, which I enjoyed even if the movie and treats shared via ZOOM on the day because stage three lockdown still operated and Anne couldn’t visit.
The girls and I fangirls of the Victorian Premier who has shown impressive leadership through the COVID-19 crisis.
I have a feeling this will be a favourite number played in every pub/club in Melbourne when Victorians can truly ‘get on the beers‘ and socialise guilt-free!
(My preferred tipple is cider and here I am enjoying one after a day gardening…)
I know I’m not alone in receiving more parcel deliveries during the pandemic than in recent years. The service convenient, especially online grocery shopping, which I’ve found excellent.
If you can’t go out shopping safely, how wonderful to receive deliveries. I’ve loved receiving real mail in the mailbox other than bills, real estate ads and donation-seeking charity blurbs.
Good Things Come In Small & Big Packages
Students from past classes have posted lovely cards and letters asking after my welfare, and my incredible friend, Lisa, sent me a gorgeous box of super healthy fruit!
My sister knitted a Rabbie Burns doll (oh, if I could write like him!) and I’m enjoying the beautiful indoor plant and excellent read (a biography of NZ PM) from the girls and looking forward to next weekend when Anne visits and we’ll play a new board game.
Another dear friend, Lesley dropped off flowers to plant after her husband, Ian did some culling.
A day in the garden aroused Josie’s interest and jealousy. She spent the next three days digging up the cuttings one by one!
Lesley assures me there are more cuttings on the way…
I also gave a batch to Mark, my wonderful neighbour who while working from home offered to clean out the gutters and fix a broken bracket. Jobs he noticed needed doing.
I truly am blessed with the people who come into my life!
I’m fortunate with the view from my window because watching the lorikeets visit to feed is a fantastic start to the day and I don’t notice if there is any work needing doing!
I take every opportunity to laugh these days because, despite the worst-case scenarios not eventuating in Victoria and being a glass-half-full person, there have been days when anxiety about the present and the future has been almost overwhelming.
Living Dangerous
Mairi Neil
We will not forget the year 2020
Coronavirus stories will see to that
pandemic panic and widespread crying
no country free from the sick and dying
people forced to isolate and quarantine
practise social distancing
whether pauper or queen…
Wildlife too, adjusted behaviour
we will not forget the year 2020
many relationships shape-shifted
the Earth a pandemic was gifted…
Wildlife’s observations during isolation
would make any book they published
a headline grabber and selling sensation!
Life as I knew it will return in some form but until then…
A chat with Mary Jane, or a phone call or FaceTime with Anne or a friend always helps calm anxiety, but the best antidote is a lengthy daily walk with Josie, a companion like no other – her unconditional love brightens the day.
When the time suits, I’ll be out walking Josie without creating a schedule.
Whether the weather is the cliched ‘rain, hail or shine’, dressed appropriately I walk the dog – or rather Josie walks me!
Josie loves Mordialloc too, and when we are heading to friend Jillian’s house she breaks into a trot.
Walking and inhaling the beauty of our surrounds – neighbourhood gardens, Mordi streets, the parks, the Creek, the foreshore area… restores soul and energy – and we both know it.
The sea breeze rustles trees, birds sing from branches, insects hum and water ripples – nature’s beautiful chimes announce all is right with the world.
Walking is calming and observing details to write about helps me focus on anything but the troubles the world faces.
If confined to stay at home with no outside stimulation, I would retreat more often to the computer not doing anything productive. Crosswords and games online or scouring Internet articles interesting but not riveting or remotely relevant to current creative projects.
I’ve discovered I can spend the day doing absolutely nothing but going around in circles – literally hearing mum’s voice when she lamented, “I can’t get out of my own road.”
I often think of Mum’s little sayings and they make perfect sense!
I know other friends have shared this experience – truly a sign of these times we are living through. Crises take effort to adjust despite the many ads about the pandemic proclaiming; we are all in this together – it is a shared global experience.
Hopefully, witnessing the effect on other countries, everyone will be more aware of how precious and fragile life on Earth is and the urgent need to address the effects of climate change and inequity – pressing issues BEFORE the pandemic.
The latest news from the USA is not surprising, showing it is the poor who suffer the most in a pandemic. The article refers to New York, but it is a similar story throughout the world – we may all be going through the same storm but are definitely not in the same boat!
I hope when the worst of the pandemic is over there is more effort to ensure sustainability and a healthy world for all living creatures wherever their home may be.
‘How has your day been?‘
This is a daily question from Anne as she checks in on me.
If it wasn’t for the reflections and little ‘happenings’ from walking, I’m not sure our conversation would last long.
I don’t practice formal mindfulness, but when I walk with Josie, I find this is a time of peace and meditation. A time to focus on anything other than problems or worries.
Most days it is answering emails, sorting through old papers or photographs, cooking the dinner, trying out a cake or biscuit recipe, editing a short story or poem, weeding the garden, washing clothes… jumping from one task to another, no rhyme or reason…
Did I achieve or finish anything?
Does it matter?
There is pleasure in the hours of walking, observing, and greeting (from a distance) other dog walkers, friendly strangers, friends, and acquaintances not seen for a while!
People working from home or at home because they have lost their job walk for exercise and are more visible than when in their cars.
(A definite bonus of isolation is meeting people from the past. People I met when involved with Mordialloc Primary School, the Mordialloc Writers’ Group, and who attended writing workshops I’ve held.)
Protecting Wellbeing
Like many people, during the first few weeks of COVID-19 crisis, I had an almost unhealthy obsession with the news – not only of how the pandemic was playing out in Australia but each gruesome detail of disastrous death tolls and the lockdowns in Asia, Europe, UK and USA.
I soon discovered the day much better if I limited the news source to one or two outlets, only once a day or even news-free days.
My daughters agree:
‘Think of your blood pressure Mum’
‘You’re dealing with cancer – one crisis at a time’
‘Let us worry about that – we’ll do the shopping’
… and true to their word, I don’t have to go anywhere except for medical visits and exercise – the latter entails gardening and walking the dog.
Safe and contactless living!
Friends and family I haven’t been able to connect with face to face have stayed connected over the Internet and by phone. The severe social consequences some have suffered because of isolation hasn’t happened to me.
The change in circumstances has made me think more deeply from the perspective of those with disabilities or illness who always have a limited connection with the outside world and must rely entirely on carers.
Let’s hope some creative ways ZOOM and similar programs have been used to provide services will remain and give access to a richer day to those permanently socially distanced!
My walks alternate between Mordialloc Creek and McDonald Street football oval and surrounds plus wandering around the suburban streets.
Joyful as this is, I know Josie will be beside herself when we return to the off-leash dog park and she catches up with other dogs en masse. Dogs are pack animals and not overly enamoured with social distancing.
Josie loves to chase and fetch. When off-leash, she’ll be able to exercise her full potential running after balls thrown from the special holder we have to turn the ball into a long-distance missile.
Seasons Don’t Recognise Pandemics
The change from summer to autumn in the gardens has been delightful to watch. Gardens seem to have been a riot of colour this year and people have worked hard transforming their gardens or homes with imagination.
A house where a couple created a beautiful Japanese-type garden is now up for lease – maybe it is their retirement income. Kudos to them both for putting so much effort into a garden for others to enjoy. Josie and I enjoyed our daily chats and seeing the shrubs, pavers and water feature being installed.
I’ve watched a house around the corner being built and Josie has loved the attention from the tradies.
It has been pleasant to have so few cars parked in the street because of fewer commuters and no U3A classes in the Allan McLean Hall at the end of the street.
Lockdown rules changed after Mother’s Day, allowing small gatherings, businesses and workplaces to open if they can manage the social distancing guidelines. People are visiting friends and family and larger groups play or exercise in the parks or practise sport.
People are resilient, small businesses often adapt – I spotted this van in Albert Street.
But people are hurting and the local Presbyterian church recognises this and has set up a community pantry.
However, not a lot has changed in my little bubble but then apart from the dramatic decrease in traffic and more people walking and chalked pavements from kids being schooled at home, not much seemed to change in Mordialloc at the beginning of the pandemic lockdown.
We are a coastal suburb with plenty of open space and I have been steering clear of busy shopping centres since Christmas because of poor health. Other suburbs will have their unique experiences.
Now to writing:
Where do you go for serenity?
This is something to reflect on and write about – it might be helpful to first record where you goor what you usually do to ease anxiety.
If yoga class is something you do, or dancing or working out at the gym many of these now have classes online you may have joined.
You may favour a room, a church, a friend’s house, or a special tree in your garden.
Or perhaps you indulge in an activity like writing or walking… maybe sewing or cooking…
Your serenity place or activity may be difficult to substitute during the lockdown, or you might have found it easy to adapt.
Do you have a special place you visit only once or twice a year? A place that may hold a strong emotional attachment or memory? Writing about it may help capture the calmness and peacefulness the place represents.
Perhaps there is there an activity or place in your daily routine easily adapted to isolation rules.
Here are more writing suggestions:
Imagine yourself where you find serenity. Why are you there? Has something prompted the visit?
Describe your serenity setting.
Compare at least two visits to your serenity place.
What happens when this place disturbed, or no longer available, or your plans must change?
Do you have an alternative?
Write a poem inspired by the word serenity.
What is the opposite of serenity for you? Is there one particular time that stands out?
Write about how you unwind or handle anxiety – this may have changed over the years.
List the various ways you are meeting the challenge of isolation and practising social-distancing.
Did you ever consider ‘stress’ before it became a much talked about ‘modern’ disease?
(When I recorded the history of our local primary school in Mordialloc on its 125th anniversary, I interviewed many past students and staff. I’ve never forgotten a woman who attended the school during the depression years of the 1930s and coped through the war years commenting, ‘ No one had stress then – we just got on with life.’)
Reflect on the lives of your parents and grandparents. Do you think they suffered stress – even if they didn’t call it that?
Do you know how they dealt with the tough periods of their lives? Were the pace of life and the responsibilities they had really that different from nowadays? If so – how?
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.
In a few hours, thousands of people across Australia will stand in their driveway or pause inside their home to pay respects and remember those who gave their lives in WW1.
This special commemoration of an important day in the Australian calendar for national remembrance is because of COVID-19 and the unprecedented lockdown and social-distancing restrictions placed on the community to halt the spread of the virus.
Mordialloc’s local member of parliament, Tim Richardson MP, sent a special newsletter detailing the celebration of ANZAC Day and paying tribute to veterans.
ANZAC Day Dawn services are still being held without the crowds, so the RSL has asked those who have a brass instrument to play the Last Post for their neighbourhood who will #StandTO as the official service ends with the usual minute silence.
I’ve written other posts about ANZAC Day, not to elevate or celebrate the importance of military prowess but from the perspective that all war is a tragedyand a senseless waste of human life.
WW1 is part of our family history – the trauma is personal. We have genuine heartache and tears remembering those who paid the ultimate price. The uncle buried in Egypt, who fought at Gallipoli, shares the same name as my father.
The details of the grave of GEORGE ALEXANDER McINNES_is here. He is one of over 60,000 who sacrificed their life in WW1.
The Annual Service At The Shrine
sculpture at Soldiers’ memorial Bendigo
I’ve only attended the Shrine Dawn Service once but have never forgotten the emotional experience:
Ten years ago, I booked a seat on the free bus to the ANZAC dawn service at the Shrine, leaving Mordialloc Station at 4.20am. No alarm needed because I toss and turn half asleep, fearful of missing the bus. Warm clothes required for the short walk along Albert Street – especially for my head recovering from the ravages of chemotherapy.
Exhaustion, the chill from the sea air, and discomfort from cancer recovery negligible compared to what my Uncle George and other soldiers endured. I clutch a travel mug of freshly brewed tea and hurry towards a group of shadows hovering at the bus stop.
A blonde in a fur-trimmed camel coat and matching hat detaches herself from the fence and returns my ‘good morning’ with a smile. A mother and teenage son turn away obviously not wanting a conversation – it is a bit early to be chatty. An indecipherable black figure doesn’t move from a post further down the street.
The blonde speaks, ’I wish I’d thought of a travel mug.’
‘One of my better ideas. I never slept.’
‘Nor me, and I went out last night.’
‘Gosh, no point in going to bed then.’
As we laughed a ringtail possum scurried along the electricity wires, ‘He’s probably wondering what we’re doing here in the middle of the night,’ I said.
‘This is my first time.’
‘Me too,’ I say, ‘ it’s on my Bucket List.’ I point to my mauve turban, ‘breast cancer.’
‘Good on you. I’m meeting a friend who goes every year. Her dad’s a vet…’
The bus grumbles to a stop and a dozen more passengers materialise from parked cars in the street and station car park. The night streets are silent as we drive to the city, neon lights stab the inky sky, masking the stars.
At the Shrine, a sea of people merges in the predawn dimness. The number of people takes me by surprise. Such a hive of activity. All ages and genders, all shapes and sizes… a steady stream of buses from rural and suburban Melbourne, drop people off to join the crowd.
The Shrine looms out of the fog. Soldier and media scrum silhouetted against the brightening sky. A handful of lights dot the skyline, making the buildings on St Kilda Road discernible except for a massive glowing cube, changing from blue and green to red and silver, atop a building.
Perhaps Dr Who or Daleks will arrive from this gigantic ice cube to remind that man was made to mourn and peace is an elusive concept for every generation…
Serendipity or synchronicity, but even that light doused when a church service hush descended.
45,000 attend this Dawn Service.
The words and music of Buffy St Marie’s Universal Soldier and John Lennon’s Imagine come to mind just as the public address system fails miserably. I can’t hear what they say, despite gigantic strategically placed speakers.
Silently, I recite the 23rd Psalm in place of whatever solemn speech is being intoned.
To be close to the front, I squelched through grass still soggy from a recent storm and rapidly churned to mud by the crowd. I imagine George sleeping in the trenches and emotion lumps in my throat.
Buried in Egypt, he died six months after arriving at Gallipoli. A working-class boy from Williamstown. He would never have imagined this huge, eclectic crowd, heads bowed, remembering him and others who did not come home.
Colour crept into the sky, a dark red stain obliterating the fog. Two fruit bats hover and fly away, not the squadron of nesting bats a friend complained marred last year’s ceremony.
The flypast invisible because of heavy clouds but the aircraft’s’ rumble and drone a cause to celebrate with a rifle salute that startles me, even although I was prepared. How did George and his mates cope with constant bombardment? No wonder so many came home shell-shocked.
A glimmer of sunlight bounces off the medals adorning chests lined up centre stage and on the chests of people around me. No need for uniforms to remind us this is a military occasion.
The smell of traditional breakfast – sausages, bacon, eggs, toast… a drawcard for many but I have no appetite. I weave through the crowd and climb on the bus to return home, fighting back tears and overwhelming sadness.
George, like so many others, died alone in a foreign land, never understanding what the war was about. His grave never visited by family… Lest we forget.
World War One began in 1914 and lasted for four years; 416 809Australians volunteered for service. 324 000 served overseas and over 60 000 were killed, including 45,000 who died on the Western Front in France and Belgium and more than 8,000 who died on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey.
Many nurses in the Australian Army Nursing Service served on the Western Front. These nurses worked in overcrowded hospitals for up to 16 hours a day, looking after soldiers with shocking injuries and burns. Those who worked in hospitals close to the fighting were also in danger of being shelled by the enemy.
Red poppies worn on Remembrance or Armistice Day, November 11, are often used as a symbol for ANZAC Day too.
The tradition has its origins in a poem written in 1915 by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, a doctor in the Royal Canadian Medical Corps. Lieutenant Colonel McCrae noticed that, despite the devastation caused by the war to towns, farms and forests, thousands of small red poppies began growing everywhere in Spring. This inspired his poem, first published in England’s Punch magazine in December 1915.
Within months it came to symbolise the sacrifices of all who were fighting in WW1.
In 1918 Moina Michael, an American, wrote a poem in reply, We Shall Keep the Faith, in which she promised to wear a poppy ‘in honour of our dead’ and so began the tradition of wearing a poppy in remembrance.
She and Frenchwoman Madame Anna Guérin, known as “The French Poppy Lady”, encouraged people to use the red Flanders poppy as a way of remembering those who had suffered in war.
In Flanders Fields by John McCrae, May 1915
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
Nurses and Doctors Always In the Front Line
During the current coronavirus catastrophe, we have lauded medical staff as heroes. This acknowledgement of their dedication and courage is important. They put themselves at risk and serve the community in peacetime and war.
When I was on duty at the Soldiers Memorial Institute for Open House Bendigo 2019, their historical exhibits and telling of Bendigo stories impressed me. I’ve been to many historical exhibitions and museums commemorating WW1, especially during Centenary celebrations, and I always learn something new or discover another aspect not considered before.
In the recently refurbished building, they present well the stories of Bendigo nurses and doctors who went to war and also Chinese Australians.
The Returned Soldiers’ Memorial Hall grew out of the returned soldiers’ associations that were established throughout Australia during and after World War I. The first such association in Bendigo was established at the home of a local woman but by 1917 the Returned Soldiers’ Association was advocating for the creation of club rooms at the former Hustler’s Royal Reserve mine site, Pall Mall.
Local architect George Dawson Garvin was commissioned to design the Memorial Hall and the Governor of Victoria officially opened it in 1921. They added the Institute building to the Victorian Heritage Register in 1997. Recent conservation works by Lovell Chen have included the removal of past extensions and, as the building is sited over old mine shafts and on a compacted mullock heap, underpinning.
A new gallery, designed to Passive House standards and conceived as a contemporary interpretation of the arcaded loggia, nestles behind the Institute. The external use of a single material for the walls and roof blurs the scale of this new addition, allowing it to read as a single storey building. An entry vestibule at the north end mediates between the inner gallery and an encircling verandah that also provides additional exhibition space. The verandah is timber lined (floor, walls and ceiling) focusing and framing the visitors views constantly outwards through the arcaded openings, in-filled with glass and perforated mesh.
Open House, Melbourne
Seventy-four Bendigo nurses volunteered to serve in Egypt, the Dardanelles, Salonika, France, Belgium, England, Italy, India, and on hospital and transport ships. Their qualifications ranged from infectious diseases, acute care, experience in theatre, ward and hospital management. They cared for the injured and sick with care and compassion.
Of the local nurses who served, two died because of their service, and twelve were invalided home. Four were Mentioned in Despatches, one received the award of the Royal Red Cross and four received the Royal Red Cross Second Class.
Thirty-one doctors from Bendigovolunteered to serve, leaving the safety and security of their positions at the Bendigo Hospital, medical practices, or studies. Some supported the recruitment and training effort in Australia, others went overseas.
The local doctors came from two distinct groups. Fifteen were linked to the Bendigo Hospital; sixteen were born or educated in Bendigo, or had family connections to Bendigo and had practised in central Victoria.
Non-combatant medical officers, they dealt with horrific wounds, grave illnesses and deaths associated with war with constant compassion and dedication.
Of the Bendigo doctorswho served, three died because of service, several were invalided home, seven Mentioned in Despatches, four received the Military Cross, two received foreign decorations, one received the Distinguished Service Order and three admitted to the Order of the British Empire.
Over 200 Chinese-Australians joined the AIF. Almost all were born in Australia. Many were descendants of immigrants who came from southern China to central Victoria during the 1850s gold rushes.
Samuel Tong-Way was born in Ballarat to Chinese-born parents. Despite being initially rejected by recruiting officers in 1916, Tong-Way persevered and enlisted in 1917 when there was an easing of restrictions. After training, he was posted to France in December 1918, just after the Armistice. Before returning home, Tong-Way obtained study leave at the Imperial College of Science and Technology in Kensington.
He returned to Australia in 1920 and resumed studies teaching. He taught at the Violet Street and Gravel Hill state schools and marched every ANZAC Day in Bendigo until the year before his death in 1988.
Whenever I see the honour rolls of war dead, the immensity of the loss to families is always overwhelming. On the Bendigo roll, many surnames the same, and reflect a similar story in other Australian country towns – you ache for the farming families who lost several sons and cousins.
The Honour Roll for WW1 Bendigo and surrounding districts
This ANZAC Day, I hope all those who pass the Gallipoli Precinct at St Nicholas’ Church in Mordialloc, will pause.
Please think of the tragic loss of life in all wars and make a commitment to always champion peace. I know I will when having my daily exercise walking Josie.
Writing Post for Day Five – Count Your Blessings To be Alive
Keeping a sense of perspective and humour amidst all the gloom and doom can be difficult but for mental health – and physical as shown by the fights in supermarkets – it is necessary.
Many people are doing their bit online – sharing jokes, funny memes, clips of singing, dancing, live performances of every creative art and hints, like mine, to ease the anxiety and stress of being cooped up while in quarantine or working from home.
Working at home doesn’t necessarily mean you are alone – especially if children are home from school. Perhaps the only time alone will be in your head! Put those thoughts to good use, focus on ideas (the more positive the better), grab a notebook, and write.
This post is about writing recipes, not for food or cooking. There are plenty of free recipes for that on the Internet and I’m sure with the panic buying and shortages there will be a host of new food recipes doing the rounds.
Not to mention books: How I Survived Covid19 When The Pantry Was Almost Bare…
(I could write that one because I refused to panic buy and with a compromised immune system I’m avoiding the queues in shops!)
Humour & Love Is Needed
I started with my Dr Seuss inspired poem written in a lesson about rhyming poetry to grab your attention. I mean who doesn’t know or love Dr Seuss?
But now, here are some ‘rules’ or suggestions:
Eight Steps For Writing A Recipe To Lift Your Mood
What would your ideal day consist of? Jot points down – often a list is a good format – or maybe even start with the same introductory phrase: Each day I’d love to
Now make a mind map. In the middle of a blank piece of paper write ‘My recipe.’ Here is an example of a mindmap from the Internet from ResearchGate:
These initial thoughts on happiness are certainly relatable!
Now describe your ingredients. Go through them one by one
All recipes specify quantities for every ingredient. Add these to your ingredients on the mind map.
Try adding similes or metaphors to make your recipe more interesting and imaginative.
(A simile is a comparison of one thing to another using the connecting word ‘as’ or ‘like’, a metaphor just is and doesn’t need the introduction. For example:- When my first daughter was born a popular song at the time was ‘A Little Ray of Sunshine’. If I was using a simile, she’d be like a little ray of sunshine, but with metaphor, she is my little ray of sunshine. A subtle but important difference.)
Method of Preparation – it’s your recipe so explore, be daring, be innovative – give readers a window into your soul…
Serving Suggestions are necessary, of course:
(Add a ‘garnish’ to your recipe, these are the finishing touches that present a dish to perfection.)
Add a title – What word or feeling would sum up your recipe? Try and keep it relevant and short. Or call it like it is:
A Recipe For A Good Mood Mairi Neil (2016)
Ingredients:
a chorus of Mary Jane’s chuckles
an eyeful of Anne’s excitement
a cacophony of birdsong
a dash of possum
a snuggle and lick from Aurora
a strong trace of walking on the foreshore
a breath of rosemary and lavender
large helpings of writing time
a ladle of television murder-mystery
unlimited cupfuls of English Breakfast tea
a glass of cider (or two)
a shower of sunshine
a whisper of an autumn breeze
a turntable of favourite music
a reflection on the love of family and friends
Method:
Add liberal dollops of Mary Jane’s infectious laughter
Organise Anne’s surprises to drizzle at intervals
Enjoy Aurora’s daily cuddles and friendly licks
Encourage the possums to nestle in the trees
Welcome the magpies’ morning trill, the butcher birds’ songs,
the wattlebirds’ chok-chok and the doves evening coos.
Wait for the aromatic profusion of rosemary, lavender, geraniums
and roses and rainbow colours of seasonal displays
Embrace the sea air and lapping of waves
Mix and serve daily, in no particular order. Whether sunshine or rain this recipe has my personal guarantee.
One of my Mary Jane’s delightful paper cuts
Try writing another recipe with different ingredients or write a recipe for a friend, a family member, based on what that person likes:
Or perhaps a recipe based on current affairs (especially if you have a solution to the current catastrophe – remember we’re focusing on a good mood but absurd is okay), the perfect holiday, a travel experience…
**And if you are not into poetic -style recipes whatever is stirred up and remembered can be written in prose – another life story, or piece of fiction!
There Are Benefits To using A Mindmap To Brainstorm Ideas Before Writing
A mind map is a diagram that uses words or sketches to note ideas linked to a central keyword. (This is often called theme in creative writing. A piece of writing can have many themes but often there is an overarching one.)
A mind map gives you the opportunity to explore many different concepts and shows the process of developing them. There is no limit to size – if you want to be expansive grab a sheet of butcher’s paper!)
Mind maps are useful for generating, visualising and organising ideas. They are often used to make decisions and solve problems in the corporate world, but for creative writers, we generate ideas for stories or poems, and to recall memories.
What Does Your Ideal Day Consist of?
Prepare the mindmap –
Favourite season
Favourite sounds
Favourite time of day
Favourite place
Favourite colours
Favourite hobby & activity
Favourite weather
Favourite smells
Favourite animals
Favourite books
Favourite films/TV shows
Use whatever interests you, add extra categories.
Write examples next to all or chosen categories – there may be more than one answer. (Go with your initial one perhaps)
When describing your ingredients go through them one by one.
What words would you use? Think of associations with your central ingredient and write them around that. Think of descriptive words that you could use along with similes and metaphors.
Let your mind roam freely, don’t think too hard or edit yet. Try not to judge one word as being better than another at this stage.
Repeat for as many ingredients as you wish and if you use the senses in the description it will help to make your recipe poetic.
This is a Recipe For a Good Mood, rather than a recipe for food, but all recipes have measurements – some are exact like half a tablespoon of sugar…
In your recipe, measurements don’t have to be standard. You can use traditional measures but be creative and add more inventive indications of quantity.
A small amount could be –
a pinch,
an echo,
a thought,
a moment.
A large amount could be –
a pound,
a mountain,
a shout,
a deluge.
Think of other ways we measure things, such as time, space, height and distance.
Here is a list of words for measurement (some traditional, others not) – you can add more in the comments:
pint
quarter
pound
ounce
teaspoon
glass
cup
drizzle
pinch of
slice
jar
lick
echo
mountain
tickle
cacophony
scattering
smattering
eyeful
thought
twinkle
suggestion of
wrinkle
beat
scrap
squeak
trace
ladle
shower of
blink
breath
fan
gaggle
whisker
chorus
trunk
particle
rattle
cube
scribble
scratch
dollop
This recipe is about feelings, therefore, make it as richly descriptive as possible.
Similes add depth to a description. eg. A summer’s evening as soft as velvet Spring blossom falling like snow
If your ingredient is A tranquil summer or A Quiet Summer Day/Evening
Think about comparisons: What things are quiet? for example tranquil as…. a soft wind in the trees, a sleeping mouse (or any pet), an owl in flight, a swan gliding…
Rather than repeat the description of ‘quiet’ twice, choose different words to mean the same thing eg.. A sprinkle of quiet summer, tranquil as an owl in flight.
Tip:
Do this for one or two ingredients, not every line because you can defeat the impact of the mood you want to create.
•There’s no right or wrong way to approach your method of preparation.
Write out the list of your ingredients onto a piece of paper.
What will you mix your ingredients in?
In what order will you add them?
Is there a special way they need adding?
This is where you can grab one of those recipe books off the shelf that you have stopped using because it is easier to Google but you haven’t thrown them out because of an emotional attachment, they were a gift, or sometimes it is quicker to check a page than wait for Malcolm Turnbull’s oh, so slow, NBN to download.
Check out the instructions on a favourite recipe and substitute your ingredients:
vigorously beat,
fold in gently,
stir slowly,
sprinkle liberally
beat with a fork
You might put a fractious toddler in a large garden and lightly whisk a sprinkle of quiet summer….
Look at the methods of preparation from the list below or choose your own:
whizz
mix
beat
stir
whisk
simmer
heat
cook
boil
sprinkle
Add
coat
cut
tip
pour
cut
divide
split
heat
warm
scatter
skim
knead
Garnishing & Serving Suggestions:
Add a ‘garnish’ to your recipe, these are the finishing touches that present a dish to perfection. You may like to think of it as the cherry on top of your Recipe For a Good Mood
For example:
Serve with a sprig of stories and a warm feeling.
Garnish with a cuddle from a sister and enjoy with a relish of friends
Best enjoyed with a glass of Cider
Serve with optimism and chocolate cake.
You can say how many people it serves – perhaps the ‘recipe poem’ is for a special celebration – birthday, anniversary, wedding, christening…
Add a title. What word or feeling would sum up your recipe? Try and keep it short.
Fun, Warmth, A Giggle, Feeling Blessed, Chilling Out…
Write Your Recipe For a Good Mood –
prose or poetry!
Preserving History
And here is a bit of history in a recipe book – a selection of pages of a book put together on my kitchen table for Mordialloc Primary School as a fundraiser in the 90s.
Most parents contributed a recipe, and some helped with surveys and collection and encouraged their children to illustrate. Some of the data is worthy of a time capsule!
There were no computers, no money for offset printing and the book was divided into sections, with bits of general knowledge and current research regarding food sprinkled throughout.
The aim was to encourage harmony, tolerance and an appreciation of each other’s culture and it worked – families had fun contributing and we learnt a lot about different countries and foods.
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We even got a review in the Herald Sun – not bad for a wee school and complete novices. You never know where your ‘kitchen’ creativity will lead!
I’ve always found refuge and comfort in words whether writing, reading, talking or listening…
However, perhaps it is ageing and adjusting to retirement or the weariness of coping with this latest cancer diagnosis, but the urge and even the passion for creative writing is difficult to muster.
Snatches of poems and stories still swirl in head and heart, but that’s where they usually stay – no ‘writer’s block’ just disinterest or lack of energy to go the next step.
Maybe I need to remove self-imposed pressure and unrealistic goals.
I haven’t fallen out of love with the art of writing, just facing the use-by date of some goals and dreams I thought important or achievable.
Conversations with self and the in-depth reflections that often accompany a cancer diagnosis, especially when it strikes again, have led me to a new passion and much-needed relaxation.
Or rather, it has encouraged an expansion of an existing fascination and another project.
I’m talking about protecting birdlife – especially the ‘backyard birds’ I see every day – and creating a garden for man, beast, bird, bee and butterfly to enjoy.
It is addictive watching the interaction when birds visit the front garden, listening to their chitter-chatter – delightful twittering.
And like the paparazzi, I try to capture the perfect photo!
They inspire me to write – not for anyone else but myself and for fun – two elements missing in the years of planning lessons, teaching technique, and inspiring others to write and publish.
I don’t have to feel guilty about writing for pleasure, or that the pleasure is mine!
Words Have Power
Words are a powerful form of communication. I love the nuances and capabilities of the English language, although the multiple meanings and grammatical rules are complicated and confusing when you are trying to master it.
Choose wisely, check the dictionary, listen to the tone, think of interpretation…
The influence of poems, stories, and novels can stay with you for life, also excerpts of dialogue from a dramatic script or film. Favourite song lyrics may move you to tears and can take you back to an important moment in time when you hear the song.
‘Putting it in writing’ and sending letters or emails, recording a journal or updating a diary, even keeping a blog are all valuable forms of expression to share ideas, feelings, and creativity and wonderful when it is not a chore, venting about injustice, or keeping a friendship alive.
I hope to return to feeling elation when my words work.
Word Choice Matters
The pen can be mightier than the sword but that depends on the opponent and circumstance – wars are fought and won with military hardware and signed contracts of peace don’t seem to wield the same power.
The belief ‘sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me’ is patently untrue.
The toxicity of social media attacks and resultant damage, plus the terrible toll of suicides after bullying (virtual and physical), proof that name-calling, insults, false accusations and misinformation hurt and destroy. (The pen is as mighty as the sword?)
We have, as an example, President Trump, one of the most powerful leaders in the world, and his use of Twitter. He is certainly someone who has brought the medium into disrepute more than others, but there are many other examples of what reporters call ‘Twitter fights” – and suddenly someone has their account cancelled or removes themselves voluntarily.
There are many recorded instances of two-quick Twitter reactions/responses, and the toxic comments of trolls and others who comment with online anonymity creating more articles so that often the important news or original topic is ignored.
Poison-pen letters and nasty critiques existed long before the popularity of social media, but the digital age and the speed and distance words travel makes me content to have a twitter account of the feathered variety!
And once sent out a word takes wing beyond recall.
Horace 65-8 BC: Epistles
Not that you can ignore ‘progress’ or technological change. I did introduce my students to Twitter and we had fun writing poetry and flash fiction – a totally different use than what it was designed for – although President Trump’s tweets could fall under the category of fiction but not poetry!
For the past year, walking by Mordialloc Creek and the foreshore, exercising Josie around suburban streets, exploring local parks and those further afield, provides comfort and delight but contentment is revelling in the joys of my garden’s flora and fauna.
The pleasure deepens sharing these activities with my daughters and friends.
Man does not live by words alone, despite the fact that he sometimes has to eat them.
The Wit and Wisdom of Adlai Stevenson (1965)
The real world often disturbs these idyllic routines of the natural world. Politics, protests, the climate emergency and mundane household maintenance intrude, along with a persistent inner voice that I should be ‘doing’ or ‘achieving’ – getting the hang of this retirement gig is difficult!
Every time I think that I’m getting old, and gradually going to the grave, something else happens.
Lillian Carter
A Comforting Stillness
Mairi Neil
In the stillness of the evening
a hush
birds nestle in the trees
until daybreak
In the stillness of the evening
a rustling
nocturnal animals forage
until daybreak
In the stillness of the evening
a hush
Above the stars twinkle
clouds veil the moon
the Milky Way cascades in flashing lights
a reminder each day a star is born
in the endless universe
yet, no sound reaches Earth
In the stillness of the evening
a hush
a rustling
a silence
my heart beats a sweet rhythm
thinking of you.
An Urgent Plea Received
Dear Mairi,
The bushfires have been worse than any of us could have imagined. If you (or anyone you know) has been affected, our hearts go out to you.
BirdLife Australia is coordinating the response for threatened birds nationally and our fire mapping has identified the species most impacted by the inferno. Now is the time for us all to take urgent action.
We believe millions of birds were incinerated in the blaze. Millions more have lost habitat and face starvation right now. I fear many birds, like the Rufous Scrub-bird, will soon join the list of threatened species. Their future is in our hands…
We have the plans and the people in place, but we know it will take at least $2 million to begin priority actions to save the most threatened of the birds impacted by the fires.
With your urgent help today, we can:
Get survey teams into fire zones as soon as possible to find threatened birds
Help birds recover by protecting them from predators and supporting habitat recovery
Rebuild populations over the long term, through actions like captive breeding programs
Birds live in a range of habitats, making them useful indicators of what is happening in the world. Across the globe and throughout Australia, birds take exciting journeys to search for food, to follow the rain and look for breeding sites. Learning about birds helps you connect with the natural world and helps us understand more about the environment we live in.
While we enjoy a position at the forefront of bird conservation, our work is far from done. With 238 Australian birds already extinct, threatened with extinction or near threatened, we need to ensure that we don’t lose more of them.
We are running out of time to address the climate emergency, but we can all contribute to protecting and improving the aspects of our local environment necessary for native wildlife, especially the birds.
We can make buildings safer for birds. Architectural elements like awnings, screens, grilles, shutters and verandas deter birds from hitting buildings. Opaque glass also provides a warning…
New York City recently passed a bird-friendly law requiring all new buildings and building alterations (at least under 23 metres tall, where most fly) be designed so birds can recognise glass. Windows must be “fritted” using applied labels, dots, stripes and so on.
The search is on for various other ways of warning birds of the dangers of glass walls and windows…
A zen curtain developed in Brisbane has worked at the University of Queensland. This approach uses an open curtain of ropes strung on the side of buildings. These flutter in the breeze, making patterns and shadows on glass, which birds don’t like.
Create a bird-friendly garden
Birds need a home to breed and bring up their families. Their natural habitat normally provides food, shelter, water and nesting sites, but in urban areas they need help.
BirdLife.org advise how to create a suitable habitat in backyards, parks, bush reserves and even wider communities. Here are four of their fact sheets:
On Main Street, Mordialloc
the lull of evening signalled
by oh, so familiar sounds…
birds jostle and joust
for palm tree frond, gum-leafed house.
Dusk descends into twilight glow
the tweets and squeals
a deafening crescendo –
a cacophony of conversation:
‘Time for bed.’
‘Nestle down!’
‘That’s my branch…’
‘Move over magpies!’
All must know their station
in life. There’s a sense of place,
chatter, bargain, even squabble
but eventually sharing space.
‘Stop skylarking about!’
‘You lorikeet lout!’
‘Squeeze over sparrows.’
‘How precious are parrots?’
‘Pigeons! The rooftops are home for you go mutter your usual “coo-coo”…’
And in the gloaming, shadows
of building construction loom,
mounds of dirt in lonely gloom.
A treeless landscape, evictions rife
Mordi’s birds may face a new life.
I remember a bloody chainsaw day
shake my head and turn away…
Continue to walk by Mordi Creek
watch the ducks silently glide,
a cormorant rest in contemplation
this beautiful tranquillity
a sanctuary from conurbation.
How lovely the shimmering ripples
of boats tethered for the night,
feathered friends dive and feed
in the fast-fading light.
A familiar outline against the sky
silhouettes of ancient trees
reminding us of when this creek
hosted Bunurong corroborees.
The path peopled by dog walkers,
and school children hurrying home
joggers and health fanatics
grateful for the space to roam.
In the eucalyptus evening hush
this precious part of the day,
Mordialloc Meditative Therapy
chases my doldrums away.
Hitchcock’s Crime Against Birds
I’ve always had a fascination for our feathered friends, but nursed a fear of close contact after seeing Hitchcock’s The Birds!
Nothing equals The Birds for sheer terror when Alfred Hitchcock unleashes his foul friends in one of his most shocking and memorable masterpieces… beautiful blonde Melanie Daniels rolls into Bodega Bay in pursuit of eligible bachelor Mitch Brenner. She is inexplicably attacked by a seagull. Suddenly thousands of birds are flocking into town, preying on school-children and residents in a terrifying series of attacks. Soon Mitch and Melanie are fighting for their lives against a deadly force that can’t be explained and can’t be stopped in one of Hollywood’s most horrific films of nature gone berserk.
Released in 1963, I must have seen The Birds on television in 1968 or soon after – I would have been 15 – but it could have been yesterday because it is one of those movies you never forget.
Hitchcock was a master at creating fear and who would have thought a movie with such an innocuous title could be terrifying?
It took me years to look at birds with admiration, not suspicion. And it is amazing how many people I have met over the years who were affected by that film!
For years, I preferred to keep a distance from birds, disliked seeing them caged and envied their ability to fly, but still held an irrational fear they’d try and peck at my eyes.
If you read the trivia notes on IMDb, they reveal the treatment meted out to the birds on the set of the film – behaviour not tolerated today – we should feel sorry for them not the humans.
Ten Birds Regularly Visit My Garden
Google Backyard Birds, to discover a host of information on birds found in Australian backyards; each state gets a mention.
Depending on what suburb you live in, the following birds will probably be common visitors.
Noisy Miner
Noisy Miner
Common Myna
Common Myna
Australian Raven
Australian Raven
Grey Butcherbird
Butcherbirds
Magpie
Magpie
Magpie-lark
Magpie-lark
Lorikeet
lorikeet
Red Wattlebird
young wattlebird
Spotted Dove
spotted dove
Sparrow
tiny sparrow
I admire and respect the tenacity and survival instincts of the bird population; their cleverness and beauty, their strength despite such fragile frames. For years, a blackbird family built their nests in the Photinia trees that line our back fence and watching the birds fly back and forth with twigs, discarded pieces of plastic and other debris hanging from tiny beaks proved how adaptable and innovative they can be.
Last year, I filmed a magpie ripping threads from a coir mat and flying off to build a nest.
Drought and urban development shifts bird populations. Mordialloc now echoes to the screeching and chittering of flocks of rainbow lorikeets, especially in the evening when they roost in the iconic date palms lining Main Street, the prolific sparrows and thrushes of earlier years forced elsewhere.
Marauding Mimics
Mairi Neil
They appear on the lawn
like four pirates of old
strutting and aggressive
noisy and bold.
Fixing beady eyes
on a treasure trove
they bully incessantly —
taking what they love
They’ve come to this land
from across the sea
in an ideal climate
they thrive with glee
The cockatoos and galahs are still around but prefer the open area down by Mordialloc Creek.
galahs feeding
Melodic butcherbirds and bullying wattlebirds have made their home in grevillea and banksias, ensuring the smaller birds rarely visit. The sky often patterned by flocks of migrating birds from the nearby Edithvale Wetlands.
Sometimes one or two rare birds choose my garden for a rest or snack instead of ‘eating on the wing’, the experience a delight, but Murphy’s Law dictates my camera is never ready to capture the moment!
Wandering in the garden with my morning cuppa, I’ve recorded quite a few of the bird calls because they are so beautiful. Identifying the singer often leaves me intrigued. Most birds are gifted with plumage to match their preferred habitat, they blend into tree foliage, the bushes, reeds or grasslands with ideal camouflage.
two lorikeets have the perfect cover
Shadows
Mairi Neil
The plaintive song echoes
in the university grounds
as students hurry home
past skeletal branches
of winter trees
hosting the bird’s lament
a mournful echo
of dinosaur dynasties
amid the whirr of bicycle wheels
tapping footsteps
ringtones
mobile conversations
iPod seclusion
a wistful whistle announces dusk
until full-throated celebration
a melodious call to rest
lights douse
classroom doors close
shadows deepen
the campus empties
crowded trams trundle by
bathed in artificial sunlight
tall grey buildings reach
for a star embroidered sky
this call of birded tongue
conjures ghosts
of long-forgotten species.
The Kookaburra Laughs In The Old Gum Tree…
When my family first arrived in Australia, in 1962, magpies proliferated in bushy Croydon, so did kookaburras, rosellas, cockatoos and galahs. Most of those birds absent from Mordialloc when John and I started our family here in the 1980s.
The last kookaburras sighted in nearby Bradshaw Park long before I joined the Friends group and worked to save the remnants of indigenous flora and fauna from encroaching suburbia. Bradshaw Park is the only native bushland reserve in Mordialloc and is home to 136 native species – some of which occur nowhere else in Mordialloc.
Rangers have sighted 33 native bird species, but introduced birds thrive too.
Tuneful blackbirds, thrushes and common mynas gobbled the crumbs I scattered each morning (a politically incorrect habit learned from Mum and Dad that I’ve now ceased!).
As I learned from others in the Friends group and planted indigenous trees and flowers, after many years, some native birds now call the trees and shrubbery I’ve nurtured, home.
Recently, a dear friend of 50 years visited from London. Nobuko stayed with other friends in Olinda before me and brought me a teatowel made locally as a gift. It reminded me of childhood trips to visit Sherbrooke Forest.
These rosellas are often seen up in the Dandenongs but there is another bird I have only been lucky to spot a couple of times in my life – very special memories.
Lyre Bird’s Lair
Mairi Neil
A forgotten memory surfaces strong
feeds a yearning now the days are long
an image of childish eyes entranced
the memorable day the lyrebird danced.
Performing his unusual repertoire of sound
the lyrebird proudly claimed his ground
tail feathers splayed shimmering white
hiding his head from onlookers’ sight
without colourful peacock arrogance
he began his shy seductive dance.
Throughout the day lovers came and went
until the lyrebird’s energy spent
and he disappeared amongst the trees
ephemeral as the morning breeze.
Walking the paths of Sherbrooke Forest,
enthused by dreams of aeons past
I hope to glimpse again the lyrebird’s dance
Tho’ its talent for mimicry limits my chance.
This bird can repeat the magpie’s trill
replicates man-made sounds at will –
chainsaw, hammer, or car alarm
he’s perfected them all as part of his charm.
The picnic area leads to the nature track
warmth of dappled sunlight upon my back.
Cloaked by primeval ferns dripping dew
I abandon pungent asphalt; exhaust fumes too
farewell gravel crunch, and human chatter
leaving creek where mosquitoes scatter.
Winding upwards to the whistling wagtail
I try to spot him but to no avail
a flurry of wings, camera shy rosella revealed
the foliage of Sherbrooke a perfect shield
As ancient eucalypts climb towards the sky
an eastern whipbird’s distinctive ‘crack’ nearby
spongy deep green moss cushions city feet
ornamental fungi from undergrowth peeps.
Vegetation hugs the path and sprouts native grass
exposed skin tickled as I stride past.
Eucalyptus tang replaces rich loam smell
the towering Mountain Ash cast their spell
fragile maidenhair ferns decorate the trail
flighty butterflies appreciating their veil.
Panting with the exertion of the climb
each pause filled with birdsong sublime
my misty breaths join whispering trees
a nearby rustling makes me freeze.
Low in the fork of a wattle tree
a sight I never expected to see
constructed with meticulous precision
a female lyrebird’s nesting vision.
A beautiful ball-shaped structure appears
the perfect home developed through years.
Of evolution, and remarkable adaptation
what an amazing bird unique to this nation
but alas like the palette of fleeting dawn
the enigmatic lyrebird and chick long gone.
Last year, the frustration of failed words, struggling motivation and dashed hopes seemed to be my lot, although I enjoyed limited success with a poem published in the Australian Senior, July 2019 and a play shortlisted in ARKfest 2020.
Maybe I can still claim the title writer…
Satisfaction came by helping students achieve their writing dreams, which in Mary Robinson’s case (the Irish eyes of this post’s title) was a book she had been working on for several years before coming to the Life Stories & Legacies class at Godfrey Street, Bentleigh, ‘to finally, transform nostalgic reflections into a book to hold.‘
The class finished in 2018 but I promised Mary to help publish One Last Goodbye, a labour of love and a wonderful legacy for her daughter Catherine, and granddaughter Ilsa.
In the Introduction, Mary expresses why so many ‘pick up a pen’ or attend a writing class…
There are deeply personal reasons to finish writing my memoir. I am, I suppose, like most people who have reached the 80-year mark, conscious of time passing and wishing to reveal information to family members I may not have previously spoken of. I am also keenly aware of my daughter, Catherine, raising her child at a time of tumultuous change in Australia and the world. I possess that innate human need to link the past with the future so that all our loved ones who came before us are honoured and their stories not lost. I want the generations who will follow to remember how hard their ancestors worked to give us all a better and slightly easier life, and the real sacrifices the Morans made to reach these goals. I want my darling little granddaughter, Ilsa to get a sense of where her kith and kin have come from so that no matter how far is travelled, both in terms of time and geography, she will feel the tug of her Irish roots and be inspired by their great efforts to meet the challenges in her own life as she grows up.
A fellow student, Edna Gaffney, published her memoir in July, to celebrate her 90th birthday, giving Mary a fresh burst of energy to persist. Determination needed to see the project through because a series of health crises, including a bad fall led to an extended hospital stay to heal several broken bones in her hand and other damage.
(Murphy’s Law meant it was the writing hand!)
We set the deadline for November so copies of the book could be Christmas gifts to family overseas and just made it when the happy author held a copy on November 25th!
The painting Crossroads, Bleaskill, Achill Sound, by Thomas Moran, Mary’s brother, adapted to good effect by my daughter, Mary Jane who has helped me with the ten books I’ve published in recent years.
The title of the book, a phrase Mary’s mother said each time her daughter left after a visit. Echoed in the last line, it is a fitting end to the book, when on a visit ‘home’ in 2002, was indeed the last goodbye.
We had many discussions about the format (A4), titles and placements of chapters, what photographs to include, the cover design and blurb – a process of close collaboration to ensure the book encapsulates Mary’s love of her birthplace, Achill isle and her family. It was important to tell the story in a natural voice, including Gaelic words and local vernacular.
There is Irish history, information about traditional customs, and immense pride in the Irish diaspora’s contribution – Mary’s family, the Morans – a clan scattered across several continents, like many others from Erin’s isle.
Before coming to Australia and continuing a long nursing career, Mary was a nun in the USA for 15 years. This time in her life merits a stand-alone book if she felt inclined, however, it does not define her life of caring for others. Mary’s nursing career took her from London to Chicago, Perth, Port Hedland, Darwin, New Guinea and Melbourne, including an active part in the memorable 1986 Victorian Nurses Strike!
Modest and unassuming, Mary Robinson is typical of many ‘ordinary’ people who have lived extraordinary lives.
I always feel privileged to hear the journeys and help the women record their stories. Society must not lose valuable contributions to the tapestry of herstory and history.
Celebrating Each Other’s Success
Another student from the Bentleigh class offered to host a celebration and mini-launch of Mary’s book but organising a date to suit everyone over the Christmas period is not an easy task.
On Friday, December 27, most past students met for a delicious lunch and just ‘like old times’ we all read a piece of writing, listened to each other’s stories and congratulated Mary on her achievement.
Edna read a small piece from her book, Chibby From Brandy Creekreminding us of life in rural Australia during the 1930s Depression. She shared the wonderful news that her daughter was arranging for the printing of more books.
A thoroughly modern Jan read a poem she confessed to ‘dashing off’ on her mobile phone while on the train. We sat enthralled at the funny rhyming verse about Christmas and the discovery of decorations like the ‘hairy fairy’.
An impressive, polished poem produced in ‘ten minutes’ – wow – and a demonstration that age is not a barrier to mastering technology!
Nora shared a delightful ‘Ode To The Pantry’ and reflected on her life as an Armenian immigrant integrating culinary and cultural practices, especially at a time like Christmas with traditional rituals.
She cleaned out the pantry to prepare for cooking expected treats and pondered the outcome if spices, seeds, sauces and legumes commonly found in Armenian recipes were forgotten or the wrong quantities used.
Special occasions need the added spice…
And we all agreed, we like added spice!
Janet read her poem The Mirror of ANZAC, written when she attended a ceremony at Gallipoli in 2000.
When she stood at the grave of a man from Mentone buried at Lone Pine, she reflected on the universal story of soldiers everywhere who fight and die far from home.
Annie read a thoughtful essay with observations about various plants in her garden and having conversations with her flowers and trees when she is weeding, fertilising, pruning and planting.
An ex-teacher, her essays always delve below the surface and like Nora’s stories; they are philosophical reflections on the human condition and human behaviour.
The gardening piece morphed into memories of her first teaching position, a tough gig. Assigned a class of Grade Threes comprising 36 pupils deemed ‘troublemakers’ and unwanted by the other teachers, it made her question her career choice.
Annie said to be a good gardener and teacher you have to stay alert and adapt, and like the needs of plants, we must nurture some children more than others.
Mary read a lovely poem about a rose presented to her by the Henry Lawson Society for her 80th birthday.
The care and development of the rose and the joy experienced when it blossomed an apt metaphor for the time and effort Mary put into writing her book and how she felt when she held a copy in her hands.
It was a lovely memory day, allowing me to bask and learn from the writing prowess of others.
I’ll finish the post with a memory Mary shares in her book that has remained from the moment she shared it in class:
We had many farm animals and so had to cut and dry a large supply of hay to feed them through the colder months when snow covered the fields and hills. The children helped with this process, gathering in the fields and helping to rake the hay into rows. Haymaking and wet weather made for bad work companions similar to the peat preparations. We always prayed for the rain to stay away. A day in the fields cutting and collecting hay both hard work and happiness. We all looked forward to 3:00pm when Mother came around. We watched eagerly as she passed around cups of tea and slices of home-baked soda bread. This picnic atmosphere made the hard work more bearable.
The next labour-intensive work was hoeing the potatoes out of the ground and piling them in hessian sacks. Father also cut, bundled and stacked the hay for the animals in the barn to last through winter. Farm life harsh with work never-ending. While growing up, I didn’t fully realise how extremely hard my father worked because he suffered in silence, never complaining or being negative. Life was what people did and they just got on with it.
Recently, by sheer accident, my brother, Michael spotted a photograph of Father in one of the many books that are published about our region. The book titled: I Remember It Well: Memories of Yesteryear, 120th Anniversary of Western People, published in 2003 by The Western People newspaper. They had not identified him by name but it was Father all right, just as I remember him, face concentrating on his work, yet managing to convey an air of cheerfulness. Whenever I read the caption: ‘Back-breaking work – an old man carries a creel of turf in Achill, 1967’ tears well and my heart constricts. Father was only in his sixties but looked eighty. All the decades of hard work aged him before his time and sadly, he died of a massive heart attack a few months after this picture was taken.
p9, One Last Goodbye, Mary Robinson
For many years, the regular exodus of Irish families to mainland Britain working skilled or semi-skilled jobs was vital to the British economy, especially the rebuilding necessary after the war. These workers returned home to work farms to provide for their families during the winter months and sent money home at other times. Some never returned home and hence statistics like 60% of the population of cities like Glasgow and Liverpool have Irish ancestry!
Many countries and many economies owe a debt of gratitude to the hard work of Irish immigrants and books like Mary Robinson’s, add faces, names and background details to enrich the stark statistics.
Writing Post for Day Five – Count Your Blessings To be Alive
Up the Creek with a pen ... 