Seeking Sydney, Episode 1: The desire to listen

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Seeking Sydney is a podcast that travels to the landscapes and landmarks of Sydney, adding the people and their stories. I will publish one episode every month for ten months.

In episode 1 I wander from Bondi to La Perouse, via Bronte, Centennial Park and Anzac Parade.

As Paul Irish says in this episode, ‘there’s actually layers to history in places like Sydney, just like anywhere in the world. And when you start to tune your eyes into them, suddenly they become really obvious. And you’re like, oh, okay, I now have a way of looking at that city that I didn’t have before.’

He’s talking about recognising the continuous presence of Aboriginal people in Sydney, but he could be describing Seeking Sydney.

I hope that in the future, if you go into Centennial Park you will seek out the Guriwal Trail and remember that emus were once hunted on this land. That you’ll nod to Patrick White and Manoly Lascaris in their home.

Then, as you go down Anzac Parade, past NIDA (National Institute of Dramatic Art), you’ll think about Matthew Doyle and his didgeridoo playing, and his straight way of talking. I hope you’ll remember how he says that his mother’s and grandmother’s generation weren’t allowed to speak their own language, but ‘Doesn’t mean they forgot it. They just put it to bed for a while. And knowing that hopefully in the future, times change, then they’re going to bring it back out and start teaching it to their children and families and the community. And that’s what’s happening now.’

And, although I couldn’t fit it into the podcast, here’s a strange connection to think about: in his will Patrick White left a quarter of his capital to NAISDA (then known as National Aboriginal and Islander Skills Development Association), where Matthew Doyle trained. The other three quarters were left to the Smith Family, the Art Gallery of NSW, and the Aboriginal Education Council of NSW.

I hope this podcast leaves you with an impression – of a city that extends in all directions, connected to other cities and countries, into the past and the future. These connections are through the heritage and legacies of the people who have lived here, through the lives of the people who are here now, through what has been said about Sydney and the books that have been written about it, through the long histories of its places. I hope this podcast gives you a sense of some of those histories and inspires you to seek out more.

After doing the first interview for this podcast one of the sound engineers, Zoe Hercus, said kindly, ‘You should try not to say mmm or yes so often when the other person is speaking.’ You’re right Zoe, but I just can’t stop myself. It feels so rude, when someone is telling you something interesting, to not respond. So you’ll hear a lot of ‘mmm’s and ‘yeh’s and ‘really!’s throughout the interviews. That’s me, being a bad interviewer. Sorry Zoe!

Interviewees for episode 1: my thanks to you all

Ben Ewald, former resident of Balmain and Hunters Hill

Matthew Doyle, Aboriginal Performing Artist. Find Matthew on Linked In and @wuruniri

Deborah Lennis, Cultural Advisor Inner West Council

Joss Bell, resident of Daceyville

Paul Irish, historian and archaeologist, author of Hidden in Plain View

Acknowledgements

Bronwyn Mehan, Spineless Wonders

Martin Gallagher, Echidna Audio: sound design

Zoe Hercus: publicity

Bettina Kaiser: artwork

Bondi: Historic Houses Trust, Bondi: a biography. Exhibition catalogue 2005.

Bondi name: https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/bondi_rock_carvings

Bondi points: Val Attenbrow, Sydney’s Aboriginal Past. UNSW Press, 2010 p154 and p102. 

Bronte family: Lynne Reid Banks, Dark Quartet. Penguin, 1986.

Bertha Lawson affidavit: https://lsj.com.au/articles/divorce-have-attitudes-really-changed/

Henry Reynolds, The Other Side of the Frontier. Penguin, 1982, p21-2.

Pre-colonial Aboriginal land and resource use in Centennial, Moore and Queens Parks, Val Attenbrow 2002: https://www.centennialparklands.com.au/getmedia/e32ae90a-e730-4c28-82c4-4b17e9e3c5e1/Appendix_S_-_Pre-colonial_Archaeology_report_Val_Attenbrow.pdf.aspx

Dugongs: https://australianmuseum.net.au/learn/animals/mammals/dugong/

Alexandra Canal is described as ‘the most severely contaminated canal in the southern hemisphere’: https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/from_sheas_creek_to_alexandra_canal

The Cooks River has the unenviable title of ‘Australia’s most polluted river’: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/cooks-river-20190110-h19wqs.html

Guriwal Trail: https://www.centennialparklands.com.au/learn/community/tours/bush-tucker-trail

David Marr, Patrick White: A Life. Vintage 1991.

Patrick White, The Vivisector. Vintage, 1994.

Trams make way for buses: Greg Travers, From City to Suburb … a fifty year journey. The Sydney Tramway Museum, 1982.

NAISDA: https://naisda.com.au/

Jakelin Troy, The Sydney Language. Produced with the assistance of the Australian Dictionaries project and AIATSIS, Canberra 1993.

Daceyville: http://www.daceyville.com/heritage_documents/DACEY%20GARDEN%20SUBURB.pdf

Governor Phillip described the area towards Botany Bay as ‘a kind of heath, poor, sandy, and full of swamps.’: The Voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay, London 1789 (facsimile edition Hutchinson 1982) p59.

Paul Irish, Hidden in Plain View. Newsouth Publishing, 2017.

The Seeking Sydney podcast – coming soon!

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Many years ago I started writing a book about Sydney. Now that unpublished book has become the Seeking Sydney podcast. It looks at parts of Sydney, then looks at them again, adding the layers of people and stories. It is not a history, although it draws on histories. It is not an attempt to lay down facts as solid objects, but it does rely on truths – the truths of observation. This is a recording of Sydney as I, and others, see, hear and remember it. Together we show where it has come from, and the past that it relies on for its existence. History’s web of connections stretches tight, and that’s what interests me.

Seeking Sydney comes from reading something like this.

The University grounds are on part of a broad ridge system which forms the watershed between Port Jackson and Botany Bay. An arm of the ridge system extends north from the watershed down between Blackwattle Bay and Rozelle Bay and their respective tributaries.[i] 

That makes me rethink everything. To me, the university grounds (University of Sydney) are not ever ‘part of a broad ridge system’. Nor is that high bit of Sydney, for me, ‘the watershed between Port Jackson Bay and Botany Bay’. The University of Sydney is a cluttered collection of buildings and people, with narrow winding roads that I can only negotiate to reach Fisher Library. The university grounds are the bits of lawn and road that I walk through to get to the books.

Seeking Sydney also comes from reading something like this.

Albions? For kids who lived on the southside, Albions were regarded as queer old buses from the north. They didn’t even sound like buses. After all, we came from Leyland territory and Leylands sounded like a bus should. Any contact with an Albion was almost always an unfortunate experience, usually associated with homeward journeys on hot summer Sundays …[ii]

This shows me how big Sydney is, with groupings and tribes running across any number of lines – in this case, the type of bus you catch.

And then Sydney is small – small enough for me to be reading a book about one 19th century businessman – Thomas Holt – at night, while researching the University of Sydney during the day, and discovering that Holt and William Windeyer and John Le Gay Brereton (the father) all shared a passion for Turkish baths.

And Seeking Sydney comes from standing in a field in Brittany, France, and looking at megaliths that are, at most, 7000 years old – megaliths that are viewed by countless numbers of people every year, revered for their age and mystery – and knowing that back home in Australia we have much more ancient carvings and paintings. We can see them on rock ledges, in caves and overhangs, and they have a direct link to a living culture.

It’s thrilling to finally see this project come to life, and in a different form to what I originally intended. Thanks to Bronwyn Mehan of Spineless Wonders for suggesting a podcast in the first place; thanks to Martin Gallagher of Echidna Audio for sound design and to Zoe Hercus for recording the studio interviews, and for publicity. Thanks to Bettina Kaiser for the wonderful artwork. Thanks to all the people I interviewed. I’m sorry I had to cut out any of your words. They were all so inspiring.

[i] http://www.facilities.usyd.edu.au/documents/docs/gcp_chapter2.pdf. Summary History Of The Development Of The University Of Sydney

[ii] Neil Munro quoted in Greg Travers, From City to Suburb … a fifty year journey, The Sydney Tramway Museum, 1982, p164.

Some writers look inwards

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At the end of October I was listening to a Jhumpa Lahiri story, The Third and Final Continent, on the New Yorker fiction podcast. In the story a man goes to a house to enquire about renting a room, and I was reminded that I want to write about my own experience of going to a house to enquire about renting a room. It was in London, late 1979 or early 1980, and the house I went to was like a vision of Utopia. When the owner turned me away at the door, I felt utter despair.

In the Jhumpa Lahiri story the man is successful in renting the room. It seemed unbelievable, given my own experience, and I decided to write a better, truer, version of room renting. The November 30 words for 30 days was about to start (thank you @WritingDani) so I could kill two birds with the one writing stone.

In the middle of November I was listening to another podcast – Rachel Kushner on Read This. Of the many fascinating things she said, in dialogue with Michael Williams, this hit hard: ‘Some writers look inwards. Some look outwards.’ She looks outwards. I thought about my own writing. I thought about what I’d been writing in my 30 words series. And at day 15, I changed course. I couldn’t bear to be a writer who looked inwards.

For a few days I looked outwards for inspiration – at the research that I was doing for my own podcast; at a woman walking down the street; at a baby being passed, with infinite gentleness, around the table at a café; at two little boys in a school playground, glimpsed as I waited at traffic lights. I responded, on a couple of days, to the sad world of news reports. But it couldn’t last. I reverted to writing from the inner prompt, finding unashamed joy in the placement of words. I couldn’t, in the end, fight my own newly-named nature.


30 words for 30 days: November 2024

1

Plant

Sally is wearing lipstick to make a good impression. She plants her feet on the doormat, arranges her fringe to cover her forehead. Desirable tenants don’t droop, or have acne.

2

Scatter

Sally’s rehearsed words are windblown husks, scattering on the black slate doorstep. I’m d-d-d. Determined? Dull? Debauched? What if that slips out? Dependable! That was it. ‘I’m dependable,’ she mutters.

3

Herb

Living here, perfection would be natural. Clothes would grace her lean body. Epics flow from her pen. Meals would be fragrant, meat browned, herbs plucked, sprigs of parsley in attendance.

4

Factory

She wouldn’t work in the factory kitchen where roasted ox hearts smelt of death and the underground walls made a dungeon. She would float, cossetted through life by invisible hands.

5

Decoy

She could leave her Self behind, a decoy for the Fates, its empty factory-fodder body going to and from the nosy people’s room. She could make a bright new Sally.

6

Drop
The door opens abruptly, pulled back by a woman who keeps her hand on the jamb. Her eyes drop to the young person on her slate doorstep, huddled and shrinking.

7

Seed

Some young people are lanky like seedlings pulled upwards by the surge of new energy. This young person’s lankiness was a frailty, ready to topple her. The woman saw trouble.

8

Mole

No, not a seedling. A little mole, head tucked down, eyes hidden. This young person was someone who would burrow into you, suckers delving to bleed you dry. Stay away.

9

Agent

‘I told the agent,’ the woman said into the cooling evening air. ‘The room is taken. Sorry for your trouble,’ her unapologetic voice concluded as she shut the door. Hard.

10

Perennial

Next to the door a modest garden of herbs said ‘cuisine’. Tarragon, sage, perennial basil. Sally watched those plants, concentrated on detecting each one’s scent. Better than turning for home.

11

Bush

The ink-blue sky darkened. Warm light filled a window, touching the herbs. Sally walked away stiff-legged, forced to the path’s edge by looming bushes. A night of shadows lay ahead.

12

Laboratory

Maybe she was a rat in a celestial laboratory, observed from on high by tutting analysts. Maybe, one day, she would penetrate the maze, be rewarded with pats and treats.

13

Vegetable

She could be a vegetable, no will left. Follow the streets to the station entrance glaring. Down to the trains pushing filthy air before them. Into the carriage, head down.

14

Plot

She was beyond plot. No neat bows would be tied. No rainbows appear. Her life was the dungeon-kitchen, her room in the house with those people, always there, always watching.

15

Fruit

Realising that November’s series of 30-word posts wasn’t bearing fruit, the writer abruptly changed direction. From now on she would be cheerful and outward-looking. She would smile as she wrote.

16

Mill

First, that ridge was Gadigal land. Then windmills tossed their sails. Then the wealthy built whitewashed villas. Bush gave way to manicured gardens. But still, that ridge is Gadigal land.

17

Snoop

When I’m frail and bent like her, head bowed to the ground, will I snoop on my own memory, snuffle in the mulch like some bandicoot looking for fragrant morsels?

18

Sow

The seed was sown, the egg fertilised and welcomed and now this little fragment of life is passed from person to person, sowing content, held up to view the world. 

19

Sting

The little boys take turns with the found stick, sort of. For both of them, handing it over to the other involves a darting, jabbing, poking sting in the tail.

20

Raise

She’d never raised the dead before. It had never been necessary. Plus, consider the mess. Soil, decayed coffins, bones. Ashes recomposing. Maybe there was another way to stop the bastard.

21

Spark

Fire at dusk, golden sparks ascend, splash on through the night, grow wings and spread. By morning the bush is alight, darkened trunks left behind. Homeless birds sing sinking songs. 

22

Leaves

When she leaves, only a slight hurry in her step betrays her impatience to be gone, to be away from this place where the air grows stale with unfulfilled need. 

23

Conceal

Her heart conceals, even from herself, a desire for a moment that never came. Glimpsed in the curve of a smiling mouth that can rattle the key in the lock. 

24

Place

Each grandchild made a nest in my heart, a place of feathers, soft and downy. As they grew, it grew rougher, like them, but stronger, with a more determined love.

25

Grass

The grass is bleaching, leaching out colour as it learns the danger of the sun. Once, it sought that glorious presence, turning its blades in adoration to catch every ray.

26

Embed

The message, embedded in the burning days the shifting ice the torrents of rain the tempests of storm the cracking creekbeds the whispering bones the vanishing of species, cries out. 

27

Tree

The girl stands tall and innocent, like a young tree, a sapling. She waits her turn and runs like the wind. A soft and graceful wind that bounds and smiles. 

28

Harvest

Should I be grateful that it’s only our words that they’re harvesting for their profits? In the past, and even now, people’s bodies have been harvested and set to work.

29

Blossom

Love didn’t blossom it burst open. Opened wide, petals overlapping, flapping onto each other, flesh of petals bruising in their haste. Rushing to open. Colours streaking edges, running through veins. 

30

Nature

It’s not in my nature to be effusive but this calls for trumpets and fanfare. Thanks

@WritingDani for another month of fabulous prompts, reminding me daily that I’m a writer. 

Yet more 30 words

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Another month with 30 days, another set of prompts from @WritingDani (explained here). She’s spoiling us! As ever, some are observations, some fiction. Strangely, I again got the highest number of ‘likes’ for #3. Am I writing my best on the third day, or does interest in the series wane after that?

1

Grow

Her love had grown horns as she’d waited that day, thrumming her fingers on the beer-stained tear-stained table, slippery wind in the curtains, heavy sun outside. What if? What if?

2

Flourish

When I was nineteen my grandmother gave me some advice. Maidenhair ferns like tealeaves. Hers did flourish, spilling their delicacy over the steps. Subtle advice, of limited appeal, and usefulness.

3

Dwindle

My life was fine. Completely fine. I followed my prescribed paths, within my porcelain shell. But all my appetites had dwindled. I see that now, as I stroke your arm.

4

Broaden

At the point where the river smoothed and broadened, a castle rose. In the castle a flock of flamingos flaunted their improbability, more exotic than me in that French town.

5

Potential

She is learning to read now, and to do backstroke. Every railing is for swinging on, every step for jumping. She sings sweet songs. So much potential. Not in Afghanistan.

6

Swell

As the days go by those moments gather, each dazzling play of sunlight, every brush of hand on hand collecting, swelling to a glory of clouded senses, clear thinking vanquished.

7

Evolve

I didn’t evolve for three billion years for this, this wanton destruction of our own and so many other species. For what? Money. Money! That hoax, that emperor we worship.

8

Wilt

Her strength was unbreakable but the child was wilting, falling behind, easy to lose. ‘Hop on my back,’ she said, shifting the baby to her shoulder, rejoining the straggling convoy.

9

Sprout

Her head is down as she shares out the salad, soft brown hair lifted gently by the breeze, and he gazes steadily at her. Love sprouts among the pea sprouts.

10

Fizzle

They had talked until all talk had fizzled out, leaving words like ‘never’ and ‘wouldn’t’ and ‘forgotten’ to hang in the air, forming bubbles that leaked out of her eyes.

11

Quicken

She knew what it meant. Never again would a baby quicken inside her, tickling with the faint frill of its fingers, lunging its head, promising the optimism of new life.

12

Harvest

Surely, he no longer loved her. His thoughts were elsewhere.

She looked up, stilled her hands and her mind.

If she nourished these seeds she would reap a bitter harvest.

13

Galvanise

Cone-shaped robots bristling with artillery jerked along the corridor. ‘Gal-van-ise! Gal-van-ise!’ their voices grated. Liquid zinc shot from their flailing guns, coating the row of cowering steel cans. Mission. Accomplished.

14

Crumple

When I accept the way you look at me, my heart crumples, all resistance gone. I look back with the same searching eyes, find my love was there all along. #30words30days

15

Balloon

While her heart ballooned with need, mine grew hands and drew him to me. Now she mutters to our friends, pinning me with icy glares, turning away as I approach.

16

Thrive

Once I taught them to sheathe their claws whenever they petted me, I thrived with the wolves. Their fierce commitment to bonding, to me, was a first. I was home.

17

Gather

I’d sent the children into the garden. I was watching them gather grass and flowers for their magic potions when the news came in. A quiet ting on my phone.

18

Become

Tonight the road, normally cluttered with drab, end-of-day drivers, has become a circus. Festive blue and red lights flash over two cars, astray, silent. On the tarmac, two blanketed shapes.

19

Wane

Summer had come and gone, long days grown thick with heat had finally waned, the promise of autumn sweet. And yet the nights were silent, no knock upon the door.

20

Ripen

The moon ripens, a butter-yellow round beside us, and the motorway is beautiful. The restless traffic becomes a glitter of ruby-red lights, driving towards an eternity of deep purple sky.

21

Wither

Her hand slips gracefully from his at the doorway. She drapes herself on a chair, not seeing, not looking. He walks towards me, smile lopsided. Words wither on my lips.

22

Progress

Progress is slow. One hand for Harry, stopping to look and point; one for Goose, sniffing, straining. I bite the inside of my mouth, the only place left to me.

23

Flop

She circuits the tiny room, door to window to cot – don’t hope too much at the cot. Finally, squawking is whimpering, then snuffling. Finally the stiff body softens, head flops.

24

Overflow

She’s directed out of the queue to the overflow area. Given a number, told to wait, not critical enough for urgent admission. She fingers her wrist, considers making herself urgent.

25

Bud

He gripped my hand at the school gate and I wanted to gather him up. ‘You’ll have a buddy,’ I said, twitching a smile. He sagged in his too-big clothes.

26

Develop

She had developed a stutter during the year. I noticed it after the holidays. When I saw her nails were bitten to the quick I knew I had to act.

27

Expand

She needs to stand at a periphery. Preferably the edge of a cliff, grasses swirling, swelling ocean before her. She needs to see the world expand, let life’s narrowness recede. 

28

Abound

Goals abound, but not in the right direction. His team doesn’t march onwards to victory. The wrong team celebrates, thrusting arms skyward, grinning like looking-glass felines. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ he mutters. 

29

Unfold

Not so much unravelling as unfolding, new layers of our friendship are exposed as time goes by. I’m no geologist, but I’m hoping he’s not so much sedimentary as metamorphic. 

30

Plant

Inside their shifting castle they plant their feet and twist, giggling as the fortifications slip. They dare the tide to attack the walls, filling cracks with grabs of wet sand. 

A derelict hotel, a horse, and mould

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I’m a sucker for writing competitions that provide prompts, particularly in microfiction (don’t ask me to define it because it varies too much, but maybe no more than 1000 words). I recently entered the Trash Cat Lit pop-up competition, where each writer was given their prompts according to a complex set of choices giving 6 x 5 x 5 x 5 = 750 possible sets of prompts. Probably, no two writers were using the same set.

My prompts were:

setting: a derelict hotel

character: horse

includes: mould.

My story was successful in being chosen for publication. You can read it here. You can read all 14 stories chosen for this issue here. There are some real beauties. Note the different prompts, and remember that they were written with time constraints.

More 30 words

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This year @WritingDani gave us a treat with a second month of ‘30 words for 30 days’. Unlike the April posts, where I wrote a series, this time I let each prompt take me in its own direction. Interestingly, I got the highest number of ‘likes’ for #3 and #6. Not sure which of the 30 is my favourite.

1

Green

Green as innocence. Fresh dew on sharp new shoots. 

Green as jealousy. Jaundiced light fading into dark shadows. 

Green as life itself, sappy and striving. Dancing, catching at the breeze.

2

Raw

I hadn’t seen them for years. Then there on the bus. We were going to the train station. They got off at the stop for the cemetery. Their faces raw.

3

Verdant

Looking back, I would describe those months with him as ‘verdant’. Lush, alive with possibility. We had nourished that time, made it plump. We must have missed some browning tendrils. 

4

Leaf

Every leaf has fallen in its own way. Gliding, or fluttering down. Every leaf, lying inert, has its own complexion. Yellows, reds, oranges. All this has happened since you left. 

5

Bitter

Only the wind is bitter on this sweet morning. I shelter on the bridge with my pirate captain as she steers us through the sharks massing below the slippery dip.

6

Square

Probably shouldn’t have put your photo in a square frame, cropping your head and the bottom of your chin. Probably shouldn’t have stood there laughing when you were behind me. 

7

Emerald

Emerald Isle? Nuh-uh. Fried eggs in grease Isle. Dusty rooms with nylon sheets Isle. What am I doing here Isle. Wanting this baby but oh should I do it Isle.

8

Lush

When the sun came out the land turned green, the grasses lush, full from days of rain. They stood tall. A flock of firetails darted in, and the wattle shivered.

9

Covet

Covetousness rises in her like bile, burning, etching a path. She turns away, feigns interest in something undesirable. But it has taken hold, uncontrollable, irrefutable. The shoes are soon hers.

10

Olive

By the end of that evening – longed for, wished for – empty glasses stood aghast. Olive pits punctured my faltering feet. Hugh had passed out long ago. So much for love.

11

Hope

Of all the mealy-mouthed yellow-bellied piss-weak utterances. Saying you ‘hope’ things will improve is right up there, mate. Improvement is yours to make, yours to take, with your lily-white hands.

12

Vegetable

‘Mum always served up burnt chops and,’ splutter, ‘vegetables boiled to mush. Then she discovered nouvelle cuisine.’ We were falling about laughing when mum’s weary face appeared in the doorway. 

13

Innocent

There’s always a time when you are innocent, and the moment (day, year) is delight. The apple beckons, the kiss is sweet. There’s always a snake, waiting to enlighten you.

14

Lime

Three years ago they were sprigs with lime-green leaves. Some have reached dark-green maturity; most have yellowed, browned or shrivelled. Still he tends them, on his knees, worshipping the box-hedge.

15

Pine

He opines. She listens. He describes. She droops. He explains. She wilts. He interprets. She dwindles. He lectures. She shrinks. He expounds. She shrivels. He remonstrates. She fades. And disappears.

16

Tender

Where had it come from, that tenderness? She’d never shown it before. It must have been hidden by her judging eyes and armoured heart. How soft it was, and pale.

17

Envy

Nothing to envy there. Sticky mouths tugging hands. Air thick with demands. But before that. The flutter within. The soft glide of life, turning and butting. My raw, buoyant wonder.

18

Moss

At this rate I’ll be putting down roots, deep into the soil. There will be moss growing between my toes. I’ll be embraced by vines before I’m in your arms.

19

Meadow

Out the back gate. Mind the nettles. Along the path by the water meadows, little chirrup of water flowing. Some of us are missing now. Some of us are gone.

20

Natural

In front of us, that girl. Woman. Frank round face, fresh strong hair. Easy smile and open eyes. The natural beauty of the young. I imagine you were like that.

21

Young

Each of the squad girls turns her cartwheel like the spokes of a wheel, smooth and inexorable, flying over the cushions on the strength of one lightly placed young hand.

22

Fir

Fir trees dot the beech forest, dark green caves of shadow. There’s a skitter of squirrels. You lead me out to the clearing where wasps grow heady on fallen apples.

23

Organic

It was organic, the way it budded and grew. Grew leaves of visibility, flowers of beauty. Beauty as its colours changed. Changed form until it dropped. Dropped back to earth.

24

Tart

Joy is startling, after those years of cardboard days. Happiness leaps out of unexpected corners, ambushes her with playful bounding. She watches it flex, running rings around her wooden legs.

25

Jade

‘Oh Paris! Done that.’ I’d never seen her so jaded. That city had been ours to get lost in, to embrace and be embraced by. She turned away, suddenly frail.

26

Pliable

Maybe a time machine could save us both from your rebellion. Memory tells me you were pliable once, in your Peter Rabbit t-shirt, your hand in mine, your feet skipping.

27

Pea

The mall appears to be deserted, lit only by flickering light. On. Off. Through the strobing a mound on the floor shifts, shuffles, changes shape. I’m not ready for this.

28

Sage

Sage tea, steeped well, is good for sore throats. Sage goes well with pork, and veal. Add it towards the end of cooking. That’s the sum total of my sagacity.

29

Mint

Only the mint has survived the rain. It sprawls where a garden was meant to flourish. Just so, your tendrils occupied my heart. My eyes were distracted by the deluge.

30

Growth

Time had passed, according to the trees and trembling vines. Their growth made the bird-pocked fruit remote. Only I had stayed the same, bitter as olive brine, sour as vinegar.

30 words for 30 days

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For some years – maybe five or six – I’ve been doing ‘30 words for 30 days’ in April. This is a competition with no prizes where a one-word prompt is posted each day and writers respond with a 30-word microfiction, hopefully for the entire 30 days of the month. Initially it was run by Writers Victoria but for the past two years it’s been run on Twitter (yes) by some keen writers. In 2023 by Sumitra Singam (@pleomorphic2) and Danielle Baldock (@WritingDani) and this year by Dani, doing a heroic task on her own.

It’s a great way to get into a writing practice with this short piece of work every day. Once it’s over and we enter May, I always have a sense of loss, of something missing from my life.

This year I decided to write my 30 pieces as a series. I let the prompts inspire me for each new segment, but about halfway through I knew how I wanted it to end. Luckily, Dani obliged with the perfect prompt of ‘green’ on day 30.

If you’re on Twitter follow the #30words30days tag to see some magnificent stories in miniature. My favourites are regularly from @pleomorphic2 and @WritingDani, obviously, but also reliably beautiful words from @sugarpigblog, @TomNotes1 and @KatiBumbera, while @rat_ink nearly always raises a chuckle with wry observations and clever wordplay.

1

Nature

It’s not in Leah’s nature to confront Ari in public. She lets the comment slide into the usual place. He scrolls through his phone. She hunches further over her coffee.

2

Wild

He continues to scroll, shoulders loose, face relaxed. Driving her wild. His comment. Her own passivity. She clutches her coffee cup. Maybe it will crack. She could scream then. Scalded.

3

Blossom

Once, Leah thought of their love as a tree; strengthening, branching, blossoming. Today she watches the last translucent petals fall, limp, brown-rimmed. Today she doubts that tree will bear fruit.

4

Sanctuary

The café is my sanctuary. A place where I can’t cry. But today the love songs hammer down. Don’t sink. There’s a woman to look at. I wish her well.

5

Flow

Leah’s gripping hand loosens. It’s as if something has – flowed – into her. Ari’s comment still whines and buzzes, but she no longer needs to crumple. She breathes, gathering her strengths.

6

Rock

Earlier, Leah had crooned. She’d rocked and jived in her seat. Boomers love songs all the way. At the ‘Woah …’ of ‘Unchained melody’ Ari smiled. ‘Please. Don’t sing again.’

7

Discover

The last falsetto notes of ‘Unchained melody’ were long gone when Leah discovered her cramping fingers, stiff around her coffee cup. Sunlight beamed tenderly into the café. Not for her.

8

Dynamic

Did you think I would forget you? Human dynamics were never your strong point. But I can’t stand and watch as your frailty devours you. The café is my sanctuary.

[alternative possibility for this one:] I have argued frantically with the second law of thermodynamics, but it always wins. I can’t watch as your fine mind increases in disorder, randomness. The café is my sanctuary.

9

Light

The slammed door leaves your gaping behind. Cuts off the disorder of your once-fine mind. In sodden rage I reach the café. Sunbeams drop through open skylights. Not for me.

10

Remote

The cup-clutching woman edges sideways. Sleeves no longer touch. Those centimetres grant her remoteness from the man. I see that her problem is worse than mine. She must have hopes.

11

Spirit

I once had hopes, fed beside that gleaming beach. Memories rattle my sunken spirits. The gentle give of the sand. The murmuring sea, opening its waves to let me in. 

12

Fire

The fire inside Leah is failing, a smouldering branch, sparks gone. Its flames hover and roll, wispy, sputtering with her breath. She is the only one scorched by its heat.

13

Mould

To say something to Ari now, here, would be to break the mould that’s been curing for 44 years. Leah was trained for silence. One fire won’t touch the edges.

14

Space

The space between Leah and Ari grows solid. Six years of slights swell. They crowd and poke. They bloat, filling the gaps where thighs and shoulders should be gently touching. 

15

Desert

That space is so taut it fractures, splitting apart their life together. Through the breach Leah sees the pain of Ari leaving. Beyond that, the raw thrill of deserting him.

16

Pattern

The tree above the skylight throws shadows across the floor. They shimmer with each breeze, the movement of leaves, little birds. Those dancing patterns will scatter consolation through my day.

17

Air

I’ve overstayed. Time to walk home. The air around me will thin as I near the house. It will disappear at the front step, and I will be suffocating again.

18

Being

I’m not just being discreet as I leave the café, taking one last glance at the fractured couple. My head is lowered to resume the reins, and the biting bit.

[alternative possibility for this one:] I’m being circumspect with my metaphors and hyperbole. What is the point of a journal if you can’t be honest? Who do you think will see it?

19

Grow

Leah grows ever quieter. She could be a piece of moss by a creek. She’ll be green, moist moss enjoying the water’s splash. Not shrivelled moss, waiting for somebody’s rain.

20

Element

The air between them is brittle, cracking into its elements. Leah sorts through the nitrogen and oxygen, wonders how to combine them. Laughing gas could be useful at this point.

21

Void

Leah pulls herself upright. Keep this up and she’ll disappear into the void. Look. The sun is shining. There’s shadow puppetry on the floor, with dancing leaves on swaying branches. 

22

Water

She could let Ari’s comment wash away, let a tide of rushing water dislodge it from her shrinking heart. Let it be tumbled until its sharp edges are smooth. Again.

23

Bones

Leah cannot let his words float away this time, to bob on that river of forgiveness. She gnaws at the bone of resentment, tastes the poison of her own deference.

[alternative possibility for this one:] If the water rages for long enough, strong enough, it will uncover bones. Leah’s own bones, hidden beneath this creaking armour, built of resentment, held together with strings of deference.

24

Character

At the front gate I stop. Get into character. Clamp on the smile. Fill my veins with patience. Lock down irritation. Forge chains that keep me nearby. At your command.

25

Wind

Rewind. Let memory feed compassion. Once there was. A train that clacked through terraced mountains, your hand in mine. Long nights and gleaming stars. Our bodies. No boundary between us.

26

Lost

My heart opens, pulsing me across the threshold. It falters at the first vacant stare, locks fast at the first sullen sigh. Today is another lost day in my life.

27

Shape

Once again I am contorted and contorting. Liquefying, pouring myself into the necessary mould. Diligently shaving off the protesting elements. I have never known the shape of my own heart.

28

Earth

I escape to the garden, close my eyes, sink down. In the moist soil, among the worms, I am one with the earth, flesh dissolving, bones crumbling. Nothing left now. 

29

Essence

Leah sighs, sensing the undeniable. She has moulded and broken and stapled that fragile truth in place for too long. The essence of their relationship, once fragrant, is now rancid.

30

Green

Standing up, Leah takes a long look at Ari. Feels nothing. No anger or hope, disappointment or desire. She takes that first solid step away. Heads out to pastures green.

This piece is called, When people die it takes all the fun out of Christmas cards.

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I put off writing Christmas cards then I thought of a couple of people I’d like to send one to, then that turned into a list and I started writing the cards and crossing off names but when I looked for their addresses I saw other names I should write to and when I looked up one name in my mother’s old address book I saw her desperate, increasingly large and shaky letters writing out the same name again and again and when I put my address on the back of each envelope I remembered that Martin and I had made a stamp that we used to press gleefully during our annual Christmas card writing evenings.

Two weeks in Greenmount

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In October 2020 I received an email telling me that I had been awarded a fellowship for 2021 at the Katharine Susannah Prichard Writers’ Centre in Perth. This was the biggest and most exciting award for my writing that I had ever received. Dates were set and changed and held in limbo while the WA lockdown dragged on. I put my excitement, like the dates, on hold. But eventually, unbelievably, I was packing my bag, getting in a taxi, and going to the airport.

This is the report I wrote about my time as a fellow at KSP, June 6 to 19, 2022.

I’d forgotten the tedium of airports and boarding planes, the extreme act of faith involved in packing yourself into a tin can to fly across the country. I’d forgotten the exhilaration of take-off, of watching the earth glide by below, reduced to patterns and hints of life.

My tin can took me to Perth, and a taxi took me to Greenmount. I found my keys and my cabin, opened the door onto a cosy room with a giant desk. I breathed it in, dropped my bags, and went out for provisions. I did battle with tardy taxis and dreary supermarkets but finally I was back with bags of food, coffee and lactose-free yogurt. There was a knock on the door. It was Chris, from the top cabin. She and Ashley, from the bottom cabin, had been worried about me and were glad I was there. I was glad I was there too.

That night, making our first dinner together in the kitchen, we each made a simple meal and talked about the joy of being at the beginning of two weeks of writing. Ashley and Chris had plans for each day. I had a manuscript of 65,000 words and a bag of notes.

The next morning I sat at the enormous desk, stared out the window at the bees buzzing around the tree trunk, and spread out the notes that I had been accumulating for the last six months. Little bits of paper on which I’d scribbled snippets of conversations, explanations for actions, my characters’ characteristics. To incorporate them into my manuscript took minutes for some, hours for others. I crossed out each one as I used it and threw it away. At some stage I ate lunch. At some stage I went for a walk, tramping up Old York Road to admire enormous gumtrees with massive gumnuts, twenty-eights singing on their branches, galahs flying overhead. Coming back I saw little furry figures, low to the ground, dashing through the grass and behind my cabin, and I realised I’d been lucky enough to see the quendas.

And that became my life. Wildlife, desk, manuscript. Walking, shopping, dinner. I compiled the remaining notes into two documents: One-offs (something that just had to happen in one place) and More than one-off (something that was a feeling or a general idea). I worked through them, striking through each one, and then they were done too. I listed issues I wanted to consider for continuity of actions and characters and checked through them. I drew up a sort of map with a range of pretty colours showing how my two main characters felt in each chapter, then used that to make changes that gave their actions and interactions psychological continuity.

On day 9 I wrote in my diary, ‘Want to stay here forever.’

On day 11 I knew I needed to make sure my manuscript wasn’t just a patchwork of notes and ideas. I printed it out in Katharine’s room and walked back to my cabin, holding the pages like a newborn baby. I read through it and made more revisions.

On day 13 I put my novel aside. A UK organisation had decreed it was National Flash Fiction Day [see my previous post] and was putting up one prompt per hour, all with a theme of ‘eleven’ for their eleventh anniversary. The first prompt was to write a flash of eleven words. Apart from the one I sent them, I wrote four more.

Lizard eats snail. Magpie sings fluidly. Parrot gnaws branch. I’m leaving.

Rain pours down. Bees are sheltering. Quendas stay hidden. I’m leaving.

Writing went well. Book took shape. Words still missing. I’m leaving.

New friends made. Good advice given. Keep in touch. We’re leaving.

Extra note: I started this novel some years back and very quickly gave it the title ‘The Dogs’. When John Hughes’s novel of the same name was published in 2021 I cursed, and started thinking of a new title. When ‘The Dogs’ became embroiled in plagiarism charges I cursed even more. What a waste of a good title.

National flash fiction day

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June 18 was national flash fiction day, as decreed on the UK NFFD website, and they posted a prompt every hour at The Write-in. All of the prompts had a reference to ‘eleven’ as this was NFFD’s eleventh anniversary. Well that was a fun way to spend a few hours. Looking forward to NFFD 2023 now.

Here are my published responses to four of the prompts.

Prompt 0: a flash using eleven words

https://thewrite-in.blogspot.com/2022/06/eleven-word-story-by-kathy-prokhovnik.html

Prompt 1: Reactions (because sodium is highly reactive and is atomic number 11)

https://thewrite-in.blogspot.com/2022/06/it-was-mean-night-by-kathy-prokhovnik.html

Prompt 2: a modern fairy tale

https://thewrite-in.blogspot.com/2022/06/luna-by-kathy-prokhovnik.html

Prompt 5: Hit the highway (a real means of transport that includes the number 11)

https://thewrite-in.blogspot.com/2022/06/the-lift-to-level-11-royal-prince.html