Forgive my absence. I made a child. I can’t believe I’ve found time to write this. Ok, that’s a lie. I didn’t find time to do this. I’m refining the ancient art of balancing a baby on my lap while typing. Just really wanted to encourage you to apply for an incredible fellowship, and share some other great stuff.
Sharenting
Objectively, I am now in possession of the greatest child. Keeping said child offline as much as possible. I fully expect someone in my online social network to slip up and share the deets about this wonder kid — a photo, the name — somewhere. But I won’t for now (underlined, italicised, cause I may just change my mind). Deeply interested in how our generation shares info on our kids — Sharenting, if you will — and what that will mean when they grow up and have the capacity to write tell-all trauma memoirs and opinion pieces. At the same time, I sometimes like telling stories from my own life, but how to do that now honestly and exclude this little human from the storytelling? Impossible. Have no fixed ideas about what I’ll do in the future, but want to keep mulling over how to raise a wonder kid in a digital age. The impulse when you have a child you think is excellent is to tell people everything — and now, we can tell the world. What do you do? Keen to hear.
Mid-career storytellers — this is for you
It’s countdown to everyone’s favourite Aussie audio festival — Audiocraft — with the main event on June 1 at Sydney’s AFTRS. It’s also the launch of what I reckon is the most exciting audio storytelling fellowship in Australia: the Jesse Cox Audio Fellowship. Aimed at mid-career storytellers, it’s a chance to make work that’s important, exciting and out of the box. At Audiocraft Jess Bineth and I are going to be playing some of Jesse Cox’s favourite stories, his own and others, to get you brainstorming on ideas to apply for funding. There’s still time to contribute to the fund as well. Even if you can’t make it to our session (at 2pm!) — here’s the program — I urge you to thinking hard about what you could enter. Sign up for updates on the fellowship here.
My pen pal, Les Murray
The Australian poet Les Murray passed away this month. Declared by the Atlantic a few years back as being the greatest poet alive. About a decade ago, I met Les in a cafe for an interview when I was a junior reporter on a local weekly newspaper, and for a few years after that, we exchanged letters while I was overseas. I wrote a small piece in The Australian (paywall) honouring him.
I consume content
A lot of Mumsnet reading, to be honest. Yeah go on, laugh. And one more to convince you these notes are just a yummy mummy blog now: the New York Times has started a Parenting Newsletter with some thoughtful pieces. The Poetry Foundation also has a daily poem-a-day email service and the curation is a bit wacky. I like it. Digging the new Mayor of Madrid, a 75-year old lady who brings her lunch in a tupperware container and has cut the city’s debt in half. My dear friend Stephen Fitzpatrick’s beautiful piece in The Monthly about the Uluru Statement from the Heart (paywall). The behind the scenes story of how it happened. Have you heard George’s Podcast is poetry, investigative journalism, musical criticism, fireside chatting rolled into one. Listening to it makes me jealous not to have worked on it. A multifaceted storytelling wonder from George the Poet- one to watch (thanks for recommendation Jess Bineth!).
That’s it. Extra typos guaranteed on this rush job. Sign up for more typo-filled notes here. x