My loves,

Last time I wrote to you long, diary-style… we’d just moved back to Canberra.

Today, I want to share with you all the joys & good things that we’ve been doing since we moved back.

It’s been 8 months since we moved back to Canberra, and I swear we’ve done more than we did in 6 years on the Sunshine Coast.

Living by the beach was so beautiful, and I’ll never regret our time living near Noosa. It’s just a different kind of goodness from what I get living here. Canberra with all its galleries, museums, shows and possibilities feels like it stimulates my brain and spirit. It’s felt like such an expansive and enriching time. I’m so grateful for it all… the leaving and the returning!

First thing I got to do being back in Canberra was probably the most Canberra-ish experience I could have.

I took my eldest daughter to a Chat 10 Looks 3 live show at Australian National University. If you haven’t heard of Chat 10 Looks 3 – it’s a podcast run by two Australian journalists/authors/TV presenters – Annabel Crabb and Leigh Sales. The show is basically them gasbagging about what they’ve read, watched and cooked lately. I’ve listened to them on and off for a decade… plus we as a family loved watching Crabb’s TV shows taking a family back in time: Back In Time For Dinner and Back In Time For The Corner Shop. So getting to see them live was SUCH a treat.

Plus, we had a side quest while we were there… we realised we had just enough time to speed-walk into the heart of the city plaza. It was sticky hot, and a wild wind was blowing, and Canberrans were out in the early evening ready to party. I loved careening around with my girl, both of us feeling like tourists in a busy city. We went on a fruitless mission to try and find the Sonny Angel collectibles she is currently obsessed with. Once we realised we were running late, we grabbed an Uber back to the concert hall. This sounds so mundane when I write it out like this, but after living in a regional area for 6 years, it was a complete novelty. We were like country mice in the big smoke, agape at it all!

As for the show… gosh, it was wonderful. As an extra treat, the show was introduced by Australian National University’s Vice-Chancellor Genevieve Bell, who pulled out ANU’s visitor book to regale us with fascinating tales of who had walked through those halls. And the show itself? Crabb and Sales are SUCH smart, eloquent, funny women who are just so ridiculously talented with enormous brains. It was a delight to inspire my big kid with that calibre of brilliance.

We also went to see Steve Backshall‘s live show on Oceans. If you don’t know who Steve is – he’s like the love child of Steve Irwin and Bear Grylls. He’s a British naturalist, author and TV presenter of shows like “Deadly 60.” My youngest kid is animal obsessed, and Steve has been a hero of hers for years. We managed to get ourselves front row tickets and it was incredibly cool. Steve’s just so gloriously enthusiastic about wildlife, and it was contagious to be around that level of excited.

Plus the man is just so freakishly talented – he’s a real Renaissance kind of dude. Author of over a dozen books. TV presenter. Fluent in 4 languages. Winner of a BAFTA, Emmy nominee. Explorer. Triathlete. Won “Extreme” category for the UK Tough Guy race. Black belt in Judo. Ran across the Sahara Desert. Married to an Olympian. Father of 3 kids, including twins. He & his wife have won charity fundraiser awards for the amount they’ve raised for the World Land Trust. Seriously – what a human.

On another note — I did manage to make Steve giggle. At one point, he said he wanted us to guess what sea animal he was going to talk about next. And with that, he produced a tiny piano. My brain made instant calculations. The only two songs he could play on a piano that would be immediately recognisable for a sea animal was either the JAWS theme song, or “Baby Shark.” Either way, the answer was one and the same. And without even thinking, I yelled out “SHARK!” before he could even lay his fingers on the keys.

Steve burst into giggles, and looked over at me and said “You know, I’ve done this show HUNDREDS of times all over the world now, and nobody has EVER guessed that before I even played anything. Well played!”

So there you go, guys. That dude may be able to scale mountains and get honorary doctorates, but I can still fuck up his jokes.

He really was wonderful though. It’s contagious to be in the same room as accomplished and passionate as him.

It also makes me wonder if I should think about doing live shows around Australia some time. Would that be fun?

What else what else?

We went to the National Museum of Australia’s Pompeii exhibition.

Holy smokes, that was POWERFUL.

I wasn’t expecting it to be as emotional as it was… There’s so many parts of it that I found profoundly touching. I mostly moved around the room, silently weeping.

You walk in, and are presented with a video depicting what life was like in Pompeii. As you walk further into the exhibition, there are walls constructed on both sides made to look like villas. On one side, there are shadows of the people of Pompeii walking through 2000 years ago. On the other side, tourists visiting the ruins in modern day times.

I just felt this deep anxiety and empathy for what the people of Pompeii went through in the eruption. How one ordinary day, their world ended.

And then the artefacts – the incredibly beautiful mosaics and artworks that have been recovered. It was spellbinding artistry. Then the most heart wrenching piece of all… the cast of bodies found. It took my breath away.

For the climax – four times an hour, there is a simulated eruption. The beautiful mountain which is projected on the far wall above the town begins to rumble and shake. The lights flicker, and then the mountain erupts. Suddenly, a cloud of ash barrels towards you, and covers the walls around you in a crush of sound. And then… silence. Only dim darkness, and the soft sound of my own weeping, clutching my children tight.

Such a potent experience. And from those sobering depths… can I also just say something incredibly shallow? The accompanying Pompeii gift store was 10/10. Got some ridiculously good Italian meringues there. It made me laugh, the duality of it all.

On my bucket list for decades, I’ve wanted to see Daryl Braithwaite in concert. If you’re not an Australian, let me explain who Daryl is…

His album The Rise and song The Horses were a massive hit in the early 1990s. I remember my older brother buying the album and being obsessed with it. I’ve stayed a Daryl fan, and was THRILLED when a few years ago, I heard a brand new song on the radio that I was enamoured by:

Imagine my delight to discover it was a brand new Daryl song – his first top-50 single in 27 years. So to see Daryl LIVE? This man who provided the soundtrack of so much of my childhood and beyond? Priceless!

Getting to the concert gave me another delightful side quest. My love and I turned up to the city to discover it was the first day of the National Multicultural Festival, and we had to walk through the festival on the city walks to get to the concert. The streets teamed with food stalls from around the world, belly dancers, buskers, and stages with performers.

We pause enraptured to listen to the most spellbinding singer whose voice and presence pierce straight into me. It is Grammy nominee Tenzin Choegyal. Those moments spent hearing him were like the thrum of a drum, it reverberates in me still. I could have just listened to him and gone home happy.

Side note: for anyone who has ever uttered the words “Canberra is boring,” may I lovingly ask you WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT. This city is the world of delightful surprises at every turn.

By the time we were in the concert hall waiting for Daryl to come out, I was positively vibrating with excitement.

And then we arrived and the music started and it was so very loud and I began to panic and feel like the music was genuinely going to make me shit my pants, I was so overwhelmed.

I lasted five minutes before writing a message in my notes app to show my husband: “I really hate this.” He sympathetically nodded and patted my knee and I thought “Righto, if I really wasn’t ok, he would take me home. I’ll just stay for a bit longer.”

And I did, and all of a sudden after another ten minutes, my body got used to the sound, and I actually started liking it, so I wrote him another note to let him know I was ok. And then eventually I progressed to even loving it! What a blessing!

Afterwards when we were out in the quiet, my love explained to me that it was a common experience in rock concerts – that it first feels like an onslaught until you acclimatise. And I just hadn’t experienced it given my concert taste extends to soft folk like Sarah McLachlan and James Taylor.

Anyways I’m very brave and look at all the progress I made. Also I’m going to see Opeth for my husband’s birthday later this year and I’m going to have to uplevel again to cope with a metal concert. 😆😆😆

Despite the initial moments of having total sensory overwhelm, I really did adore seeing Daryl in concert. It was a joy to see him on stage, 76 years of age, still so obviously loving what he was born to do.

And the best part? When he kept “Horses” to play as the last song of the night, and made it last for 15 minutes by getting the audience to do so many rounds of chorusses with him. He said, mid-song: “James Reyne once told me that playing 42 rounds of this chorus was incorrigible. It probably is.” And we all laughed, and kept singing. It was absolutely joyous and if there is any song that deserves to be relentlessly enjoyed incorrigibly, it’s Horses!

We’ve had some glorious walks through the National Gallery to see exhibitions. Just to be in that space fills my heart with joy. It’s been a holy temple of creativity for me and Chris for over 2 decades now.

Some of my favourite memories of my 20s was meandering through the hallways with him, looking at all the beauty. And now we do it with our teen and tween in tow, and that feels astonishing in its own way.

My favourite artwork I’ve seen so far this year came by way of serendipity. Outside the gallery is an enormous new sculpture by Buddhist sculptor and artist Lindy Lee called Ouroboros. And that’s stunning – apparently even more so at night when lights inside make it pierce like starlight. But that wasn’t my favourite piece.

Instead, it was when an enthusiastic gallery guide greeted us, and whispered to us in reverential tones that we simply MUST go see the small gold scale model of Ouroboros that’s housed inside the gallery. I’m so glad they pointed us the way, because we would have missed it. It was a fraction of the size of the statue, but made of solid gold. It glowed in its luminescence, and I was spellbound by it.

I’m excited to return to the National Gallery soon to see their new exhibit Cézanne to Giacometti. Be still my beating creative heart!

One of our daughters is animal-obsessed, and has been asking to go to the zoo as her birthday present every year since she was four years old. We love the National Zoo & Aquarium so much we have annual memberships… that way we can visit more regularly to talk to our otter and penguin and white lion and sun bear friends. It’s so very special.

Another one of our favourite places – the National Library. They have some fascinating exhibitions to marvel at. Mabo v Queensland chronicling the legal fight to recognise Indigenous land rights was so moving. The Treasures Gallery has some stunning pieces of Australian history – including that brilliant bust of poet Henry Lawson. He not only had an extraordinary mustache but his mother is extraordinary too – Louisa Lawson was one of the suffragists which helped Australia become one of the first countries in the world to give women the vote.

The cafe at the National Library is also one of my most beloved. I always feel radiantly blessed to get to sit beneath those stunning mosaics and eat delicious food and people watch all the fascinating humans coming through that hallowed space. Eating breakfast there with Chris is my favourite date. (Also, following it up with a wander through the companion bookstore!)

Questacon – the National Science & Technology Centre – is still a hit with our kids even now they are a teen and tween. Their LEGO exhibition was particularly brilliant.

Imagine this — if you will. You are a dancing in an enormous museum. The vaulted ceiling is illuminated in fluroscent lighting, and the crowd sweat-dances its way through an anthem of 80s music. An enormous dinosaur statue looms over you and your old cubicle boss as you sing loudly along to Cyndi Lauper.

And then you take your headphones off. And the only sound you hear is people mumble-singing badly, and the squeak of their shoes on tiles. And all you can do is laugh laugh laugh laugh laugh, because an 80s Silent Disco at the National Museum is the best and most ridiculous invention that’s ever been created, and you’re ecstatic just to be there and to be alive.

And then the season turns, and the longest Canberra summer you’ve ever known ebbs away. The leaves begin to turn, and it’s such an eagerly anticipated event after 6 years in the tropical evergreens that you take detours just to see them, just to crunch through them underfoot.

I swear the vibrant colours do something nice to my eyeballs, a euphoric kind of dopamine at each splash of red.

And what would Autumn be without a pre-dawn adventure to watch dozens of hot air balloons inflate and take flight together, in great clouds of joy?

Oh, Balloon Spectacular, I missed you so.

And then there’s the spontaneous days where we start off aimless, and find ourselves at the National Portrait Gallery… only to discover I’ve matched my outfit perfectly to the fluro kaleidoscope of a Joan Ross exhibit. This exhibit did something absolutely marvellous to my eyeballs as well. It was a multimedia extravaganza of collage and video and paint and drawing and mixed media… and it made me very happy as a fellow creative who refuses to choose just one medium to express herself in.

Also: there was a moment in this exhibition, where I sat watching this gorgeous visual delight, and my two daughters came up and sat beside me, leaning their heads against me, and my husband stood behind us, and I had this moment of sweet euphoria and contentment all at once. I want to remember that moment.

Another spontaneous adventure on another day, and we end up at Old Parliament House. Except now it’s apparently called the Museum of Australian Democracy, but I refuse to call it that just like I refuse to call Tuggeranong’s shopping centre anything but the Hyperdome. I’ve got a fondness for the name I first fell in love with them by, so I won’t updated my internal branding for them. Ha!

Having said all that… there was a fantastic exhibit about Australian democracy… and it felt deeply important in times like this. I teared up at that quote, I must say.

Two of the biggest reasons I love Canberra is:
1. All the cultural institutions
2. The nature. It’s utterly perfect for hiking in.

And so one gorgeous weekend, I took my 11 year old and her best friend on a 6km hike through the hills. We passed through big mobs of kangaroos, found the most enchanted creek, spotted so many birds, got lost and had to stepping-stone across a river to get back… it was perfect.

My youngest had a school sports carnival on one day which she decided she didn’t want to go to. So instead we wagged school and had the most perfect morning at the National Archives in their gorgeous historic buildings. An exhibit of National Geographic photographic award winners. Another exhibit on how the Australian Constitution was formed, and the process by which it is amended (that sounds incredibly nerdy, but it was surprisingly accessible and interesting!)

A glorious morning spent walking at Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve… one of the most magical places I’ve ever known. It feels like pure peace just to be with her. It’s been the sight of so many special moments for me – including the place where I had my inner marriage ceremony and where I had a goddess maternity photoshoot just hours before my waters broke with my first daughter.

I met a new friend who just moved to Canberra a few months ago. She said to me in reverential tones: “The land spirits are just so beautiful here… there’s something really special about it. And then we went to Tidbinbilla. And oh… my… goodness.” And I couldn’t help but smile and nod because I remember exactly that feeling when my love and I first found Tidbinbilla and first fell in love too. And how it still feels the same, over and over, walking beneath the gums, listening to the wind wash over the mountains and through the forests, peace in every breath.

Then this tender miracle. So – as you know, I’ve lived here before. Last time, in fact, we lived only about 100 metres away from our current house. And I’ve walked over and around the nearby hills so many times. But it’s only this time that I discovered her… The Grandmother Tree. Perched high closeby, I found her not long after we’d moved back.

Spotted her at a distance and was inextricably drawn to her. Pulled up the mountain to her. Sat at her feet in wonder, feeling like she was the oldest of friends. Rested my back against her trunk, looking out across the valley and towards my beloved Brindabella mountains. It was there I channelled through Creative Goddess Embodied, and taught some of the classes in it, magpie warbling above me. There that I would go to experience distance healings. There that I grieved the death of an old friend. There that I collected rosehips and resin and made a smudge bundle to smell when I needed to remember the earth. There that my youngest daughter asked me to paint with her, giddy at the magic of it all.

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And and and… I’m back in my original women’s circle run by my dearest heart-friend and mentor Deb Namara. The one I’ve been in since I was 21 years old. I look over sometimes at another circle sister who I first met when we were sweet and wildly energetic 20-something year olds… and now we are both mothers of two in our 40s. And we look onwards and learn from those in the circle who are in their 60s and 70s. All these stages and phases of womanhood and life. It is a remarkable and holy blessing.

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And… more beautiful city culture goodness already booked in the calendar. James May‘s live theatre production on the history of explorers. Trent Dalton’s Love Stories play – based on one of favourite books. And of course, Opeth at the Sydney Opera House for my husband’s birthday. (Pray I do not actively shit my pants for that one.)

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This, and so many more memories. With so many more to come.

Here I am, grateful for it all. Grateful for all the adventures we’ve had across this beautiful country. Grateful for the years we’ve spent away. Grateful for the ways that Canberra continues to expand my brain and ground my spirit and enliven my creativity.

I am so very very lucky.

Canberra is a love story. And I’m lucky to be living it once more.

All my love,