Sydney with Taylor

Sunday Blog 124 – 25th Feb 2024 The last time I was in Sydney was before Covid. Finally Iā€™m back, travelling for work, accidentally coinciding my visit with Taylor Swift. As I wait at the Artisan Hotel off Pitt Street for my dinner companion I think about it all. The Sydney streets had become smudged …

Giving Up The Ghost

Sunday Blog 104 – 1st October 2023 While I was away on holiday, I took two actual physical books. One of them was a copy of Hilary Mantel’s Giving Up the Ghost: A Memoir, which details her struggle with endometriosis. I was too mean to lend it to my husband after he finished his one …

Reflections from the city of ghosts

Sunday Blog 103 – Sunday 24th September It always takes me some time to “arrive” once I return from a trip. One of the biggest mysteries of travel to me not just exploring new places, but also being once again in places that you were before. It’s like re-reading a book over time, when you …

An Independent Greek Holiday

Sunday Blog 102 – 17th September 2023 It’s there in my Vision Book – “I allow myself to have regular independent Greek holidays with Zoe.” My beautiful half-Greek daughter. This year, finally I have achieved this. And it was absolutely in every way worth the wait. It’s a complicated life path to here – Greek …

KSP Mini-Retreat

Sunday Blog 90 – 25th June 2023 Thursday feels gratifyingly far away and long ago now. I’ve even lost track of the days on this three-day, mini self-guided writing retreat at KSP. For the uninitiated, KSP stands for Katharine Susannah Prichard, one of Australia’s best-known authors. Born in 1883 in Fiji and raised in Victoria, …

Minds Went Walking

Sunday Blog 84 – 14th May 2023 This is the chapter I would have written for the Minds Went Walking- Paul Kelly’s Songs Re-imagined book if only I had been asked to contribute. Australian singer songwriter Paul Kelly is our Bob Dylan. Our Billy Bragg. Perhaps they sent me an invitation via email and I …