“Things have a life of their own,” the gypsy proclaimed with a harsh accent. “It’s simply a matter of waking up their souls.” – from One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Over a decade ago now I spent some months in Colombia. I travelled from Ecuador up through the green coffee-clad mountains to the […]
I spent about an hour this afternoon gardening. I’ve still got dirt underneath my fingernails, and smudged on the knees of my jeans. We don’t actually have a garden per se, it’s more of a terrace. But it’s big and sunny, and we’ve been slowly filling it with greenery. When we first moved in we inherited […]
“Oh madam, when you put bread and cheese, instead of burnt porridge, into these children’s mouths, you may indeed feed their vile bodies, but you little think how you starve their immortal souls!” – from ‘Jane Eyre’ by Charlotte Bronte My friend Nev is of the belief that savoury porridge will be the next big […]
The half-circle of blinding, turquoise ocean is this love’s primal scene. That this blue exists makes my life a remarkable one, just to have seen it. To have seen such beautiful things. from ‘Bluets’, Maggie Nelson I’m reading Maggie Nelson’s cult novella Bluets at the moment. 240 short stanzas ruminating on love and life and […]
We went out to the bush last Sunday. It turned out to be the kind of winter’s day you wish all winter’s days were like; cold and crisp, bright and just warm enough in the sunshine. W waded into the shallows – shoes and all – so that she could set leaves afloat into the […]
A few weekends ago I invited a friend around for Sunday brunch. She came with a backpack full of eggs and fresh herbs and sambal oelek, and proceeded to cook us all bowls of egg-y, rice-y, herb-y goodness while I sat on the kitchen bench. My friends rock, I know it. Indeed, I enjoyed the […]
“I believe that one can never leave home. I believe that one carries the shadows, the dreams, the fears and the dragons of home under one’s skin, at the extreme corners of one’s eyes and possibly in the gristle of the earlobe.” – Maya Angelou Moving back to Melbourne feels like… home. The skyline, the […]
Love, we’re going home now, Where the vines clamber over the trellis… – from ‘Love, We’re Going Home Now’, Pablo Neruda The week that we moved down to Melbourne was chaos. The afternoon we picked up the keys to our new house it was pouring with rain. The kids were going stir-crazy and the removalists […]
Not that long ago, a special occasion called for booze and parties, wild costumes and late nights/early mornings. In these present days of small children and being all grown up, special occasions are mostly food-based. Afternoon barbecues, civilised early dinners, pancake breakfasts, brunch. Which is alright by me, truth be told. I like going to […]
Last month I loaded the kids onto the train and headed a couple of hours south for a long weekend in Byron Bay with various members of my family. It was still blistering hot, so we spent three days lazing on the sand, taking walks, cooling off in the ocean, drinking coffee, swimming in the […]
