this week

The ducks in the Botanical Gardens have so much personality and always make me smile!

There was snow on the mountain and ice on our windows this week, so I think winter has definitely arrived. I wore my favourite scarf in all my Zoom meetings and video chats with overseas pals. “Ah, it’s your turn to wear the woolies now,” laughed my dear friend Lisa in the UK, who’d noted my tank tops and dresses over the Australian summer with longing!

There’s been a lot of ‘not easy’ weeks in recent history. I’m learning to roll with it. In one of the podcasts I listened to this week, they quoted Eckhart Tolle who said: “Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.” Obviously that won’t apply to everything (it would be a bit insensitive to say it to someone who has just suffered a tragic loss, for example) but I appreciate this quote for the fact that it encourages you take back some power, particularly in situations where you feel very vulnerable and at the mercy of others. What is the lesson you can take from it? If you had intended this situation, what was it that you were trying to learn? Sometimes it can help to ask yourself that question, to make meaning out of hard times rather than wallow. As I am wont to do on occasion, admittedly!

I have drawn a lot of lessons from this recent period in my life but the overriding one is to trust myself and my instinct, always. It is very rarely wrong. This week, it was proved right once more and I will never, ever ignore it again.

Favourite experience/s of the week

Having my dear friend Isabel round for dinner! I hadn’t seen her for over three years and it was wonderful to be reunited. I cooked Pip Lincolne’s casserole again, perfect comfort food for a freezing night, and we talked for hours about writing, life, politics, and everything in between. You know how some people in your life are just balm for the soul? Iz is one of those people for me.

I also thoroughly enjoyed this month’s Hidden Nerve lecture, and discussing it with a lovely new friend who I’ve met through the course over Zoom the next day. We were both stunned that we were drinking the same tea, the same way (black, no milk or sugar), in two different parts of the country! I love life’s delightful surprises and synchronicities.

Reading

Sydney Review of Books: Critic Swallows Book by Catriona Menzies-Pike which argues that Trent Dalton, a phenomenally successful Australian author, is “the definitive novelist of Scott Morrison’s Australia” which I found very compelling and deeply thought-provoking. And let’s hope that Scott Morrison’s Australia will be a thing of the past after the election tomorrow.

I also loved Notness by Oliver Reeson who reviewed Yves Rees’ memoir of transition with great care and insight. I found Reeson’s ideas about representation, “reinforcing difference through representation, and how this relates to social power” and what this particular book said about these things really interesting, especially the way global popular culture validates certain ways of being. Reeson writes: “In fevered discussions about the importance of representation in popular culture we are forgetting how many cultures exist, quite successfully, completely outside of global popular culture [my emphasis]. In this idea that a way of being can only be taken up if it is first modeled and seen in popular culture, we are engaging in a bizarre denial of our humanity, ignoring that most of our impulses originate in our mind and bodies, rather than being taken in from an external source.”

Write or Die Tribe: Brad Listi: On Writing Autofiction, Working Through Failure, Quitting Twitter, and His New Novel, "Be Brief and Tell Them Everything" - I enjoyed this interview because it’s always validating to hear other authors talk about the process of trying and failing while you’re writing a book, experimenting with form, realising the form is wrong and starting again, or going in a completely new direction with a work.

Nathan Bransford: I’ve followed Nathan’s blog for years and this week’s post on Breaks, permission and writing was very timely and relatable!

The Wilderness Cure by Mo Wilde - this book is coming out in August, and I was lucky to get an advance Kindle copy to review. I really liked it! A compulsively readable, engaging and compelling book about a woman who decides to spend an entire year eating only wild food - what she can forage. And the challenge begins at the end of 2020 just as Scotland is heading into winter... I think a lot of us would like to think we eat seasonally and locally, but this book showed me that there's a lot more I could be doing to tread more lightly on the earth. One scene has had a profound impact on me - when Mo floats the idea of making a video to encourage people to eat organic food. She proposes making a gorgeous dinner full of organic produce, then placing it in front of people who aren't convinced of the benefits organic food, along with a shot glass of the legal amounts of pesticide and herbicide that you'd typically ingest with non-organic food, to pour over their food like you would a salad dressing. What a brilliant idea. I think such a video would almost certainly go viral and have an incredible impact. Overall, this book comes highly recommended to anyone interested in foraging, eating locally (that's an understatement!) and the natural world. Mo's passion and commitment is obvious and admirable in this very enjoyable and, I think, important book.

I also just read Caitlin Moran’s More Than A Woman and found it very enjoyable too, but more of a memoir this time and less a gritty, full-of-fight manifesto than its predecessor, her massively successful How To Be A Woman, was. Of course one can only write what one knows, but it’s then important to note that this isn’t a book all women will relate to, as the stories are told through a white, cis and educated lens. The parts about her daughter’s illness, however, were beautifully written and very moving.

Listening to

TIDAL inner autumn, yoga, running and writing beats playlists

I’ve also just discovered the Kronos Quartet - wow! Do you know of them? I’m quite blown away.

Best Friend Therapy: Endings - Are they a bad thing? What’s the difference between loss and change? How do we make meaning? I don’t know how they manage it, but the themes of this podcast always seem to be incredibly timely for me. Lots of useful stuff in this episode.

Eating

I had to think about this and try to recall from memory because, since being off social media, I don’t really take photos of my food all the time any more, nor that many selfies, which I find very interesting. I sometimes go through my phone looking for photos to accompany my This Week post and there’s very little, in comparison to how many photos I used to take.

We had the aforementioned Pip casserole for several lunches and dinners, either thinned out with stock as a soup, or with reheated with rice. I also made this wonderful West African Peanut Stew which I’ve made many times since discovering Rachel Ama and her wonderful books over the summer. If you love peanut butter it’s a must-try, and also a great way to clean out all the peanut butter jars sitting in my pantry with a teaspoon or two left stuck to the bottom! I also turned leftovers of this into a soup by thinning out with stock. Gorgeous!

We also discovered, thanks to a kind hostess gift from Iz, these morsels of heaven:

I don’t think I’ll ever eat any kind of chocolate again! They are seriously incredible.

Picking

I’ve been picking ruby chard, celery and kale - there’s still plenty to be had out there. I planted garlic last weekend and to my delight the soil was soft, crumbly and dark, like coffee grounds, and writhing with healthy worms. Bodes well for spring planting!

Watching

The football (by which I mean AFL) with my sister and her husband - I don’t know any of the players any more! I only recognise the commentators….who were players when I last followed the AFL with any seriousness, which was about 15 years ago. My lack of knowledge is a source of great hilarity to the family, as you can imagine.

Long Way Up (Apple TV) - the Long Way series, where Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman attempt epic motorbike journeys across the world, are our very favourites. No matter our mood, we can put an episode or two of any of the series on and it’s guaranteed to make us smile and ignite that spark of adventure in us. Long Way Up is the latest in the series, filmed 2019 and released in 2020, where Ewan, Charley and their loveable crew ride electric motorcycles and electric vehicles from the bottom of Argentina to Los Angeles, California - 13,000 miles in 100 days. It’s quite the adventure! I love that Ewan and Charley did the whole thing with such mindfulness of the environmental impact and wanting to show that these kind of epic, off-road trips are possible to do with electric vehicles.

Rick Stein’s Secret France (DVD) - I don’t know what it is about cooking shows, but they are the TV equivalent of a foot massage. I find watching them deeply relaxing, nothing makes me switch off as instantly as seeing Rick, Nigella, Jamie or even John and Gregg on the screen. I particularly enjoy Rick’s shows because they combine travel and cooking. Long Weekends is probably my favourite but this one, which takes him all over the less-visited parts of France where there is plenty of good food and wine to be found, is also fabulous. I do wish he’d get another dog sometimes. That Chalky was quite a character!

Quote of the week

“I must choose between despair and energy - I choose the latter.” - John Keats

I’m going to take a few weeks off from my weekly posting, as I need to focus on some other projects, but I will be back with a vengeance in June. Until then, my friends, stay safe and well and know I am cheering you on, whatever it is you’re striving for or working through.

And as always, if you’d like to share your thoughts on this post, or anything, with me, then please do! Thank you for reading xx

this week

A rare coffee enjoyed inside a cafe. I might no longer partake in the Zuckerverse but I still can’t resist a colour-coordinated flatlay.

Is it that time again?! Welcome reader to my weekly round-up of what I’ve been digesting - literally and metaphorically - over the past seven days. It’s good to have you here.

Favourite experience/s of the week

My adorable two-year-old niece coming round for afternoon tea today. I gave her a piece of banana bread and after tasting it she burst into a big grin. “Delicious!” she announced. My heart just melted.

Receiving a lovely, handwritten letter from a reader in Queensland. It’s kind gestures like that that really keep me going, especially when I look at the chaos that is my novel’s current draft and quietly despair! Knowing that at least one person is waiting to read it helps me find fresh courage to press on.

A brisk morning walk with a dear friend on Hobart’s eastern shore. It’s a gorgeous place to walk. I mean, LOOK AT THAT VIEW! That clear blue sky! I can practically smell the fresh air just looking at the photo.

I spent the first 24 years of my life with that beautiful mountain in the background and I barely noticed it. Now, I want to drop to my knees in awe and wonder every time I see it, especially on a clear day. It’s called kunanyi and it is truly magnificent. My friend and I both agreed that if a cable car is ever approved that we would chain ourselves to the Organ Pipes to prevent it happening. But they’ve been throwing the idea of a cable car around since we were at school - I remember our class having a debate about it, nearly thirty years ago. I think it’s one of those annoying things that just resurfaces every now and then. Hopefully.

Reading

Forty South: The Tasmanian Writers’ Prize 2022 winning short story was published last week and I loved it! It’s called “How I Got This Tattoo” by Christine Betts, who is not only a very talented writer but has a very inspiring blog too! I’m a new fan.

Gwenn Seemel: Gwenn has been a big inspiration on my creative journey this year and I enjoy all her posts, but especially this recent one.

Kill Your Darlings: Hannah Kent’s Unexpected Path to Publication, which I referenced in my interview with her way back in 2013 but found myself reading again today for some reason. It was so deeply reassuring.

The Marginalian: I heard a wonderful quote earlier this week - “The writer is one who, embarking upon a task, does not know what to do.” Oh, how that rang true! Digging around (for I never take the source of quotes on the internet at face value) I found this fascinating article on the man who spoke those words.

Lit Hub: there were some real gems on there this week, including The Untold and Very True Story of The Devil Wears Prada; Victoria Chang on her writing process; and using tarot as part of your writing/creative process.

Bitch Media: 10 Essential Books About Writing which, I must confess, I have only read two of! But I’ll be remedying that, pronto. They all sound fascinating!

I also finished Meg Rosoff’s new novel Friends Like These, which is a coming-of-age novel set in New York City in 1982 (a wonderful setting and fascinating time period) where 18-year-old Beth moves to Manhattan for a journalism internship over the summer. Her fellow intern, Edie, is charismatic and fun, and the two fall into an intense, heady friendship that becomes very intimate very quickly. It might have been my own experiences of these kind of friendships, but I certainly had the sense that a wounding betrayal was lurking…and that hunch proved correct!

I hadn’t picked up a Meg Rosoff book for years but hungrily tore through this one, so her storytelling powers have clearly only grown with time! It’s interesting that I’m finding myself drawn to books that centre around a protagonist’s loss of innocence. Those can be such cataclysmic events in your life, a clearly defined before and after. But hopefully, as Beth seems to discover, they make you stronger and wiser, and you learn a great deal about yourself in the process. I found this book immensely readable and enjoyable, and also, as you’d know if you’ve read The Latte Years, deeply relatable!

Listening to

The Guilty Feminist: Ten Steps to Nanette with Hannah Gadsby - I can’t wait to read this book. Powerful words from a powerful woman.

The Creative Penn: Improve Your Creativity with Dan Holloway - really enjoyed this one, as it primarily focused on the ways physical health and fitness can underpin and influence creativity. Fascinating!

The Tim Ferriss Show: Margaret Atwood - A Living Legend on Creative Process, The Handmaid’s Tale, Being a Mercenary Child, Resisting Labels and More - some real gems in here from, as the title says, a living legend.

Best Friend Therapy: Competition - What does winning mean? Why does it matter? - some real truth bombs and a-ha moments in this one.

Between the Covers: Sheila Heti on Pure Colour - this was a long interview but honestly, I couldn’t get enough. I particularly loved what Heti said about Rachel Cusk and her “iconic utterances”!

Eating

I’m a bit sad that the Shepard avocado season is over and we’re back to wrinkly, hand-grenade Hass again - but today’s specimen was perfect and blemish free, so I’m choosing to see that as a good omen.

My favourite dish I made this week was the all-in-one sticky rice with broccoli, squash, chilli and ginger recipe from Rukmini Iyer’s The Green Roasting Tin. However, I made a few adjustments.

First of all, no offence to any recipe writers, but I find it hard to trust recipes that say “serve 2” in that it will actually serve me and Tom to our satisfaction. We’re hungry people. In my experience, “serves 2” usually means “serves Phil, with a little leftover, OR Tom, not both”. So I nearly always double any recipe for two, which I did in this case, and it proved a prudent decision, as it was so delicious we went back for seconds. I used sweet potato and carrot instead of squash, added silverbeet as well as broccoli, and I also didn’t have any sesame oil so I subbed half tahini and half sunflower oil. I also added a kaffir lime leaf to the dressing. It worked beautifully! It was so delicious and easy, one I’ll definitely be making again. Doubling the recipe, of course.

Picking

A few potatoes, a bit of chard and celery, but it is slim pickings out there now! This might not be a category in This Week for much longer, until the spring now. Thankfully Dad let me have some cavolo nero and silverbeet from his garden. I will plant garlic this weekend, though I suspect I’ve left it way too late, as usual! An organised gardener I am not.

Watching

Belfast (iTunes) - if you haven’t seen this beautiful film, I would urge you to. Based on Kenneth Branagh’s own childhood experience, nine-year-old Buddy finds his once-peaceful working-class neighbourhood torn apart by The Troubles. People start fleeing their homes and face violence on a daily basis. Buddy’s family are torn - do they stay or go? It’s stunningly shot and acted - in fact, almost faultless.

Colossal (iTunes) - I really enjoyed this film and thought it particularly showcased the acting talents of Jason Sudeikis, who I’d only ever seen in good-guy roles! Gloria (Anne Hathaway) is an unemployed writer struggling with alcoholism who moves back to her hometown after (finally) being thrown out of her long-suffering boyfriend’s apartment. She reunites with her childhood friend Oscar (Sudeikis) who is now running his father’s old bar and offers her a job. Red flag! But Gloria of course does it anyway. Meanwhile, a terrifying monster is appearing at the same time each day in Seoul, terrorising the city and wreaking havoc, at exactly the same time of day a still-intoxicated Gloria is stumbling home from the bar, through her childhood playground. Coincidence? Absolutely not. It’s funny and very dark. There’s a lot going on in this film - you could have a field day with the symbolism!

Jurassic World (4 and 5) (Blu Ray) - I think the original first film was the best (Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum - it’s gotta be good!) but these two were also really good. After Jurassic Park 3 my hopes for these two were not high, but I really enjoyed them. Great popcorn fodder!

Bridget Jones’ Diary (Blu Ray) - it’s Philmas (the month of May, my birthday month) which means I get to watch all my old nostalgic favourites any time I want, no questions asked! But I have to say, despite still fancying the arse off Hugh Grant as Daniel Cleaver (a fact Tom is well aware of!), this watch left me a little cold (while I still laughed in places). I think this might be a very interesting separate blog post - one I daresay I’m well behind the curve on, because people have been debating whether Bridget Jones is a feminist icon for decades - but I found this great paper by Stephen Maddison and Merl Storr which summed up a lot of my thoughts and feelings on rewatching it. And also, every time Bridget goes on about her weight or someone jabs her about it, I feel rage hot in my throat. SHE’S NOT FAT!! But the vile insidiousness of diet culture as a tool of the patriarchy to keep women insecure and under control is, I realise, is one of the points it’s making.

Quote of the week

“Not till we are lost do we begin to find ourselves.” - Thoreau

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! Otherwise, stay tuned for another exciting instalment next week xx

quitting social media: a video diary

Image source

Not sure what I’m on about? Read this post.

So, as you know, at the start of January 2022, I decided to have a hiatus from social media. It has now been four months.

And you know what? I think I’m going to stay away, certainly for the foreseeable future.

I miss it sometimes, but I don’t miss it enough. I prefer life this way. Quieter, more reflective, less performative. More time to write and blog, more time to think. I’m learning French. I’m sewing. I’m exercising more and reading more. Despite a few destabilising events of late, I still feel mentally strong and calmer than I can ever remember being in my adult life. If anything, being away from social media has helped me cope better with some recent events.

I miss connecting with people but, on reflection, I don’t know how much of it was true connection. Several people who I thought would notice my lack of activity have not. But I’ve been very humbled by the people who have reached out and let me know they’re enjoying the fact I’ve been blogging regularly again.

Admittedly, I occasionally have moments where my busy-body gene goes into overdrive and I feel a huge compulsion to just KNOW WHAT EVERYONE IS UP TO but somehow (perhaps thanks to a daily meditation practice) I’ve managed to observe myself in these moments and become very curious about why.

Why do I need to see what people are up to? Is it healthy/helpful/necessary to know so much about other peoples’ lives, often people we have never even met? We know everything online is curated and edited to varying degrees, and that we're only seeing what people want us to see. With that in mind, is any of it real? And if the answer to that question is no, then why do we allow these platforms to drain our time, creative energy and self-esteem?

Frankly, I feel like a total rebel to have broken away! 

The video below is just a mish-mash of some video diaries I made in January and February, only a few days, weeks and then a month or so into my hiatus. I think you can even see the difference in me physically, and not just because I’d had a haircut by the last video! And don’t worry, I’ll be doing my video diaries in landscape mode from now on (cringe)!

• VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

  Day 8, 18 January 2022

  How does one do these things – vlogs? I'm much better at writing than I am saying what's on my mind and being articulate in the moment I think. However, this is day 8 of no social media for me. I feel so much calmer than I have for a very very long time. I feel like it's really nice that I don't know what other people are doing and they don't know what I'm doing! I feel free in a bizarre kind of way. I'm free in a way that I actually always have been, I just chose not to pay attention to that fact.

  Day 20, 30 January 2022

  Hello everyone. It's Sunday, it's about 8:30 in the evening. I've watered the garden, Tom is watering the back garden, we've eaten, and I have been off social media for 20 days and… I feel like a new person! I don't actually know if I want to go back on! So…stay tuned!

  Day 42, 21 February 2022

  Hello everyone. It's the 21st of February which means I have been off social media for 42 days.

  The benefits have been amazing. So amazing that I'm really considering never going back! But maybe going back to tell people that I'm not on there anymore because I didn't actually announce that I was taking a hiatus. I just put everything in a different area of my phone where I couldn't access it easily and then have quite impressed myself with my willpower and just not opened the apps for 42 days. Since the 10th of January.

  Interacting with people and connecting with people is still very, very important to me. It's the main reason I started blogging in the first place, because I wanted to be part of something and I wanted to join the conversations that were happening and I wanted to connect with people and help people feel less alone on the journey that they were on.

  And I still feel like that – but I feel like I can do it the way I used to do it. I started blogging with no idea what I was doing and no intention of growing a global audience or a brand or a following but that's exactly what ended up happening just purely organically and by accident. And I did all of it without social media! I really feel like blogging is going to have a renaissance and I want to get on that train before it leaves the station.

  So yeah, I'm not really sure what's going to happen next. All I know is that I'm enjoying this experiment greatly and I really hope whatever happens that you'll come along for the ride because I'm not going anywhere! I think that the world is changing and the world is waking up.

  Wherever you are and whatever you're doing, I send lots of love and I hope you're all well. Stay tuned! Thanks for listening.

Would you like to share your thoughts on this post with me? Please do - I’d love to hear from you!

this week

This week has passed in a bit of blur, as they all tend to at the moment. Thank you to those of you who have messaged me recently saying that you’re enjoying reading these weekly posts. Knowing that people are reading certainly gives me an added impetus to check the calendar, realise it’s Friday and crack on with sitting down and writing to you all!

Favourite experience/s of the week

There have been many. A trail run one rainy morning, where the tracks were deserted and the lung-clearing, earthy sweet smell of wet gum leaves and crushed gumnuts was simply divine. It made me a bit sad for all the times over the past couple of years that I decided not to go out running because it was raining slightly. I had forgotten that they are usually the best runs! As I was the only human around, the wildlife were out in force. I ran towards what looked like a field of white cockatoos, all of whom took flight as I approached - it was spectacular, and made me feel a bit like I was in a nature documentary.

Going to sleep to the sound of heavy rain clattering down on our metal roof - perfect white noise - and then woken early by an incredible storm raging outside. I love thunderstorms. Especially when I’m all tucked up and cosy in bed.

Our Robo-Vac (who we’ve named Avis DeRobo after Julia Child’s friend) arrived and it has already completely changed our lives. I don’t think our house has ever been this clean, and we are not unclean people! I was gobsmacked by the amount of dust and debris it picked up after just doing under our bed!! We hope to get a dog at some point in the near future so I can imagine having Avis will be a lifesaver in that regard.

These are from Kerry Ward’s Good Karma Tarot, which is a beautiful deck and I highly recommend it!

And finally, a lovely, much-needed catch-up with a dear friend I haven’t seen all year. A full, golden afternoon of laughs, bolstering conversation and even a tarot reading at the end, which was equally comforting. I told her about everything that’s happened lately and she reacted just as I hoped she would. I was worried I was boring her, as I’ve bored myself going over and over the horrid details of it all. “God no,” she laughed. “You sure know how to tell a story.”

Well, one day, dear reader, I will tell you the story of what’s been going on this past little while, but not yet. Not yet.

Reading

I’ve been reading a lot for my PhD but I realise that’s a bit like a coal miner saying they’ve been handling a lot of coal this week. It’s what one expects!

Boston Review: Hating Motherhood by Judith Levine. I don’t know how I stumbled on this (a link, then another link, then another which led to this - nice to know the internet can still be a delightful rabbit hole) but it was a fascinating read.

Sydney Review of Books: The Aesthetic Conduct of Sally Rooney’s Readers by Beth Driscoll. Such an interesting discussion of Rooney’s work alongside reading culture - “Readers link art and life when they find books that make them feel seen and known, when they learn something new, when they discover an author and decide to read everything they’ve ever written. These interior moments are accompanied by bookish behavior, which is abundantly on display in the twenty-first century.” Indeed!

I started Checkout 19 by Claire-Louise Bennett this week which reminded me a lot of reading my own Morning Pages back, when I occasionally dare to do that. You might think that sounds like I’ve got major tickets, as this book has been very well-reviewed by the Guardian, among others, but no, of course not - more that the voice and the way it jumps around from memory to memory, reminded me of the random, stream of consciousness stuff that I come out with as I sit at the kitchen table, freshly meditated but still sleepy, scribbling between my first sips of coffee. And then I thought, my stuff would be pretty unreadable to anyone else but myself. It’s one thing to just write whatever comes to mind, without thinking. If you’re going to deliberately write an entire novel that way, you have to write with incredible control and clear intention, which is what Bennett does. I’ll be interested to keep reading!

Listening to

My inner spring playlist - quite a contrast to actual season and the wild, windy autumnal weather outside.

Also my running playlist - with the recent addition of Ricky Martin’s “Cup of Life” which until this week I hadn’t actually heard since 1998. Perhaps no one else has either - haha! It’s a surprisingly motivating song to run to.

In fact, I’ve been listening to a lot of 90s music this week, for some weird reason. Perhaps it was my friend’s influence at the weekend! Instead of jazz playing while I cook dinner, it’s been “Glycerine” or “Lithium” blasting out of the speakers. Accordingly, I’ve created a 90s Nostalgia playlist on TIDAL too!

No podcasts this week! I know. I’ve been chained to the desk, apart from my runs, what can I say?

Eating

It has been freezing at night lately, so I’ve been embracing that in my cooking and dialling up the comfort factor.

A few weeks ago, I made our favourite summer meal - Charity Morgan’s Nacho Average Nachos, which are utterly, utterly delicious. There’s a bit of prep involved, as I might have mentioned in a previous This Week, but you end up with plenty of the fixins leftover. As it’s got much colder, I thought I’d try Charity’s suggestion of using the leftover queso and walnut chorizo to make a taco mac and cheese. I cooked the pasta in some stock with some frozen peas (I like to have something green with every meal if I can), then combined with the fixins, topped with breadcrumbs and vegan mozzarella (I get the Made with Plants one from Woolworths). It was sublime…but so filling. We did not finish our usual greedy portions and there was quite a bit leftover! The queso is made from cashews and the chorizo is made from walnuts - a double hit of protein, so combine that with pasta…yeah, not a mystery why we were so full! But 10/10, would make again!

I made the speedy sausage and smoky bean ragu which I found in the Coles free magazine and to my surprise it was gorgeous! I used Eaty No Meaty sausages, which I kept whole, and served alongside my homegrown potatoes, which I also kept whole rather than mashed, as they were on the smaller side. I think this dish will become a real winter favourite. The addition of the canned smoky beans makes the whole thing really quick and easy, but it tastes like it’s been simmering on the stove for hours. Yum!

I have been meaning to make my favourite vegan banana bread all week but kept putting it off - and now the bananas are so black they may have turned! Ooops.

We also treated ourselves to croissants from Banjo’s yesterday morning as a treat after getting our flu vaccinations - I feel ready to face the winter now. Tom likes his plain, I had mine with some apricot jam I made in 2020 that’s still happily in its jar in the fridge, infused with bay and vanilla. It’s probably the best jam I’ve ever made. Time has only deepened its flavours.

Picking

Before the rain yesterday, I dug up some more potatoes, which we’ll be eating this evening. I will try and dig up the rest this weekend before the frosts come! I am hoping there will be another giant one I will be able to bake and enjoy in all its simple glory like last week. I’ve also picked a lot of celery and red chard leaves to use in aforementioned sausage ragu and in a thick minestrone soup which makes a wonderful WFH lunch in the late autumn, as its so chunky and filling.

Watching

Jurassic Park III (Blu Ray) - Tom’s choice (as he wants to watch them all again before the new one comes out) and, in his words, a stinking pile of garbage. I am inclined to agree. It’s one redeeming feature is Sam Neill, whose delivery of the line “it’s a birdcage” was probably the most terrifying moment of the film. The raptors and pterodactyls were also pretty scary. But I was secretly hoping Tea Leoni and William H. Macy’s characters would get picked off by one of them! Does that make me heartless, that I failed to identify with the terrified parents desperate to find their son whom they sent on a parachuting adventure with some random? Probably. Nothing to do with the terrible script and overacting, haha!

Marley and Me (Netflix) - A very sweet little film that I’d never managed to see until now and it was genuinely emotional at the end. Perfect date night flick. But oh dear lord John and Jenny, just get your puppy trained instead of just giving in and letting him destroy your house!

Devoured (SBS) - We watched the first episode of this, about links between the food world and organised crime. I found it a bit repetitive - it’s frustrating when they only have enough material for 30 minutes but somehow stretch it to 45! But super interesting nonetheless.

I don’t know if this counts as reading, listening or watching, but I’ll put it in this section as it’s mostly videos! I’ve been neck-high in Kerstin Martin’s brilliant Squarespace Express course this week as I have finally made some serious headway on my business website. Can’t wait to launch it - it’s looking fabulous, which is more down to Kerstin’s excellent instruction than anything. If you use Squarespace and want to get your head around it a bit more, or are a complete beginner and want to build something that looks incredibly professional, Kerstin is the best teacher I’ve come across for the platform.

Thinking about

How this week I marked a milestone - I have meditated, in some form or another, every single day for five years straight. That’s 1,827 days. I don’t know if that’s an achievement or not. I’ve often wondered why I still do it, and whether I should stop. What would happen if I missed a day? Is it actually helping me?

The thing is, meditation is now so ingrained in my routine that it would be a bit like stopping my Morning Pages, or drinking coffee. I don’t know if I can attribute a daily meditation practice to being more focused in my life but things certainly started coming together a few years ago, when the world was different and I had a bit more control over things. Many things have been out of my control for about, oh, 827 days now (!) so I think meditation has probably helped me more than I realise. Have I been more grounded than I otherwise would have been, during the pandemic and everything that’s come about because of it? I’d like to think so.

Quote of the week

“Let everything happen.” - Tara Brach

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! Otherwise, stay tuned for another exciting instalment next week xx

this week

How is it Friday already? And how is it May on Sunday?

“I feel like it’s still March,” I remarked to Tom this morning.

“I feel like it’s still some time in 2020,” he replied.

Favourite experience/s of the week

There have been a few.

Digging up my first potatoes on a warm, blue-skied day, which was so joyful and fun, like digging for treasure…and finding it! Many of them were knobbly and oddly-shaped but there was one giant one, which I baked for a late lunch. Split in half; butter, pepper and salt gently mashed into its fluffy insides. Tom and I shared it at the kitchen table, the warm breeze wafting in, and we were quite speechless by its utter deliciousness. Funny how the simplest things can feel like the most luxurious.

There was also a memorable misty morning walk, when the air was thick with the smell of woodsmoke, the pavements were carpeted in yellow leaves, and boughs heavy with red apples and buttery quinces hung lazily over fences, the occasional musk lorikeet pecking away at some of the fruit. It felt like autumn had truly arrived.

The wedding of a dear friend on Saturday afternoon - the weather was glorious, my friend was a beautiful beaming bride, the wine at the reception was fantastic (rare) and our fellow guests were a fascinating creative and intellectual bunch. How I have missed mingling and meeting new people!

Finally, afternoon tea with another dear friend I haven’t seen all year, and her two children who are sweet, intelligent and lively little creatures who made me smile a lot.

Reading

I’ve just started Breadsong by Kitty and Al Tait, a father and daughter, which was released in the UK this week and is just astonishing. A young girl whose life was derailed by depression and anxiety finds hope, and her passion, in bread making and baking. Her parents were willing to do anything to support her, including turning their kitchen into a bakery! Kitty and her dad Al are now professional bakers and run the Orange Bakery in a small town in England. They have become widely known not just for their very heartwarming story (which I’m sure will give so much hope to all young people struggling with their mental health) but for their excellent bread too! There’s a great Guardian article about them here.

Wonderground: “Other-Motherhood” by Georgina Reid. This article almost had me in tears of recognition at the first line - “There are few things lonelier than being a childfree woman in a house full of mothers.”

Continuing The Writer Laid Bare by Lee Kofman - I’m finding it very relatable and insightful.

Stray by Stephanie Danler - when I used to be on Instagram, Stephanie Danler was one of my favourite people to follow. She gave great insights into the writing life and craft, and recommended some fabulous books. I like her as a person, and enjoy her online persona, but I’ve not been as taken with her actual work, but perhaps that’s because both her books have featured a lot of drug and alcohol abuse, which is something thankfully I don’t know a great deal about. And I’m always reluctant to say anything less than glowing about a memoir, because I’ve written and published one myself. I know how much courage it takes to put it out there, and how it stings when people who weren’t your intended audience are careless or indifferent in their assessment of it. And Stray is a courageous memoir indeed, unflinching in its portrayal of all its characters, including the author/narrator herself. There’s a lot I enjoyed about the writing and imagery, and Stray is certainly an interesting journey but I don’t think it was a journey I personally needed to take. But that’s OK. I’m glad I couldn’t relate to a lot of it, because some of the things Danler writes about are truly horrific. There is no doubt that being raised by addicts has lasting, damaging effects on children well into their adulthood. But Danler certainly intrigues me, as a person and a writer, so I’ll happily read whatever she writes next.

How to End a Story - The third and final instalment of Helen Garner’s diaries. I read it in a day. As usual, I find it astonishing that people annotate library books (albeit in pencil) but what they choose to asterisk is always very revealing. I’ve read all the volumes of Garner’s diaries that Text has put out over the past few years, and this was by far the most compelling one. Completely immersive, in fact.

Listening to

My inner winter playlist on TIDAL

In the evenings, gentle jazz

The First Time : Masters Series with Bernadette Brennan - I really enjoyed this one, particularly Brennan’s discussion about archives. I felt very reassured that my own note-taking system is perhaps not as haphazard as I thought.

The Creative Penn: From Big Idea to Book with Jessie Kwak

How to Own The Room: Julia Samuel

The Shift: Christina Patterson on how to deal with the blows life throws at you

Eating

We’ve had potatoes a lot this week, unsurprisingly! I made Pip Lincolne’s Casserole again (as mentioned Last Week) with extra potatoes and carrots instead of pumpkin. The leftovers made a lovely soup thinned out with stock.

I also made a divine potato and cauliflower curry, generously spiced with mustard seeds and curry leaves. It was even better the second night, as curries tend to be.

I made apple butter a few weeks ago with the giant bag Dad brought round, and we’ve been enjoying that on porridge in the mornings.

My sourdough bread dough didn’t rise very well, so I made pizzas with the dough rather than put it in the compost. They turned out brilliantly, and I was very happy there was no waste. Our favourite topping at the moment is basil pesto, mushrooms and green olives. Divine!

Shepard avocados - I have no idea why nearly everyone in Australia moans about them! I think they’re wonderful. Once ripe they last significantly longer in the fruit bowl than Hass tend to. You cut one open and it’s nearly always perfect and blemish free, none of the yucky brown bits. The flesh is buttery and wonderful for toast and guacamole. Honestly, I think they’re brilliant. No complaints here. Shepard forever!

Maggie Beer Seville Orange Marmalade - Vegemite will always be my go-to toast spread for comfort, but a well-made orange marmalade is a close second. A perfect start to the day for me is a steaming hot coffee and thick toast made from Pigeon Whole’s malt and linseed sourdough bread, spread liberally with butter and marmalade. I got a taste for it living in the UK and it still makes me think of weekend winter mornings there. Once, I remember the toast was so hot I could hear the butter sizzling on it while it waited on the plate.

Picking

I dug up the first potatoes, as mentioned, and my joy in doing so was unconfined. Totally worth being sore the next day, as I planted them in the ground this time rather than growing them in gro-bags as I have done for the past five years. That is a low-fuss way to grow them, but I can’t deny the specimens I unearthed at the weekend are bigger and taste better.

Our lovely neighbour came over with a bowl of green tomatoes. “Would you like these? I only eat the red ones!” she smiled. It inspired me to pick all the remaining tomatoes in my garden and make my great grandmother’s recipe for green tomato pickle. It was fun to see her wonderful familiar (though sometimes unreadable) handwriting and work out the metric measurements for all the quarts, pints, pounds and ounces. How I might have managed that task prior to digital scales and Google I have no idea.

We were also given a giant bag of cucumbers as our neighbour grew so many of them this year and didn’t want them to go to waste. Two we ate raw, dipped into hummus, but most of them were washed, cut into batons and put straight into waiting brine in the fridge. Pickled this way the cucumbers are ready to eat within a few days and keep for absolute yonks. We particularly enjoy them with a veggie burger, both in the bun or alongside.

Watching

The Walking Dead (Binge) - we’ve started on Season 11 at last, the final season. Tom was a fan of this show for years and years, and towards the end of 2019 he finally convinced me to give it a go, appreciating it wasn’t my kind of thing (zombies, violence, etc) but, in light of my PhD work, I’d probably get something out of it because he thought colonial and post-apocalyptic societies have many similarities. He was right.

I also think watching The Walking Dead prepared me a little for the events of 2020, as strange as that sounds. While I was still frightened and outraged by the selfish, dangerous and downright bizarre behaviour we saw playing out all over the world as lockdowns were imposed, businesses were closed, and everyday goods became scarce, it didn’t take me by surprise. The Walking Dead is a deeply accurate meditation on how human beings behave in a crisis, when the scaffolding holding society up falls apart and then, further down the line, is re-established. The show forces you to think about your own morality, about what you might become, or be reduced to, in a similar set of circumstances. On the surface, it’s a zombie show taking place in an imagined future. Buried underneath the gore is a fascinating portrait of our world as it already is.

Yesterday (on BluRay) - we discovered this film during the 2020 lockdown and it’s become one of our favourites. I won’t spoil some of the best, tear-jerking moments of it in case you haven’t seen it, but if you are a Beatles fan and have not watched it yet, do so NOW.

Call My Agent! (Dix pour cent)(Netflix) - the final episodes, and they were manifique. Oh how I’ll miss it! “We have to start it again, from the beginning!” I cried as the last credits rolled. Tom looked aghast. “When we’ve got so much Walking Dead to watch?!” Ahem.

Thinking about

Some big things, and negotiating the trepidation I feel in daring to make some big plans, knowing how easily they might fall away. How risky it all still feels.

But also some small, insigificant things but that give my brain a welcome respite from the big things. Such as how I will make sourdough now my house is too cold to prove dough in overnight? How is it possible that Tom and I got the same score in Wordle and guessed exactly the same letters and words, independently of each other?! Spooky!

Looking forward to

Our robo-vac arriving! I’ve been promised it will change our lives. We’ve already decided to name it after a character in Julia. I’ll let you guess which one.

Quote of the week

“The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.” - Bob Marley

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! Otherwise, stay tuned for another exciting instalment next week xx