If I were a butterfly...

A butterfly I met at Singapore Zoo last year

I woke up this morning and lay in bed for a while, thinking about who I am and praying. A song that we use to love as kids at Mascot Christian Fellowship popped into my head - do any of you remember the Butterfly Song? (I googled it and would you believe it has its own website? Of course it does.)

It's a typically cheesy 70s kids song (I know the face Mark B would make if I sang it to him), but singing the chorus to myself I couldn't think of a better thing to pray on my birthday:

For you gave me a heart and you gave me a smile
You gave me Jesus and you made me your child
And I just thank you Father for making me me

Also born today: Queen Elizabeth and Charlotte Brontë. But I'm glad God made me me, and not either of them.

Birthday meals

I think the best parts of birthdays are the meals with wonderful friends. Well, and the presents. But the meals are always the standouts. It's probably a throwback from childhood when you have the birthday party with all your friends, and the food you like, and a cake. Sometimes we have parties as adults, but there are always lovely birthday meals, no matter what.

In the last few days it's been a birthday for two lovely friends, Karen and Mary.

Karen's birthday was on Friday, so Ben, Guan, Elsie and I took her to the Chinese Dumpling and Noodle House on Anzac Parade for...Chinese dumplings and noodles, oddly enough. Ooh, and honey chicken (if you have given up on honey chicken as something flabby and over-sweet from those all-you-can-eat takeout places, give this honey chicken a try - it's absolutely divine). I love eating there with these people! And I think K enjoyed her birthday lunch.




Today was M's birthday. She loves breakfast and brunch, and I wanted to take my friends to Pyrama, so it was the perfect opportunity. Although grey and cloudy and a little on the chilly side compared to last time we went, Linda fixed us up with a heater and we were right on the edge of the outside area, overlooking the light rail.

The food was yum, and needless to say, enjoyed by all (yes, even G, despite his 'grumpy' face).

Monday - Oxford birthday

I turned 32! The day was heralded by a call on my mobile that woke me at 5am...I thought it might have been someone calling to wish me a happy birthday but it was the NRMA. Hmm. (update on the car: it's been written off, sadly, but it means we have enough money from the payout to pay the Bs for it, and we also have the use of my dad's car while he's living overseas so it all works out okay) Wide awake, I blogged my 32 year autobiography and chatted to G on instant messanger.

After breakfast, Jen, JD and I headed out. It was another rainy, grey Oxford day, but we didn't mind. Jen was very excited that I wanted to see the Martyr's Memorial, and she talked me through it as we looked at it. She knows her history, and I've never known anyone who has gotten so excited about sharing church history with others; she really makes it come alive. If you ever want to learn more about church history, she's the gal to talk to.

She took a photo of me beside the memorial, but I wasn't sure what kind of expression you're supposed to adopt when standing beside something commemorating the fact that three men were burned at the stake for their faith. It doesn't seem right to smile in a touristy way. I've settled for faintly ridiculous.

Around the corner, in Broad Street, is the spot where the men were actually burned. It's so strange, looking around Oxford, to think that anything like that could happen here. I understand that this part of Oxford was actually outside the city walls at the time, a rubbish tip. But even so, to think that it happened at all, here...that the monarchy ordered people to die for believing the same things I believe, and that they faced their deaths so squarely...it's mind-boggling. And humbling.

The spot is marked by a cobbled cross in the street, and a stone plaque in a nearby wall. The thing that got me is that the day before I'd been wandering around here, and actually walked over this without even realising what it was. Somewhere like Oxford is so full of history that something as extraordinary as this is just there, on the street, to be walked over by tourists and ridden over by students on bicycles. I find it fascinating.

We went to the Covered Markets and bought some berries for my birthday cake. Then we tried to go and have a pub meal at the White Horse Inn, but were turned away before we even got in the door. JD's pram isn't the biggest pram in the world, but it's kind of unwieldy and most places just don't seem equipped for mothers with babies. Aisles and doorways are very narrow, and people don't seem to be able to cope that well with babies in public generally. We ended up having lunch at a cafe called The Buttery, which had fairly indifferent food, but I was quite startled by the attitudes of the other patrons. We were openly stared at by most of the people in the room, especially when it came to JD's feeding time. It was as though they had never seen a baby before. It's not like he was crying or being difficult or anything; he is a very, very quiet baby. But I noticed one guy staring at Jen and when I turned to look at him, his girlfriend stared at me. And the thing is, in Australia if you met someone's stare they'd either look away or say something to you. In England, they just stare back at you. So we ignored them.

JD wasn't fazed by it at all.

After lunch we went to Blackwell's bookshop, Oxford's biggest bookshop and an institution in its own right. It looks like it's just a little shopfront, but it has three storeys up, and a massive basement "of over 10,000 square feet housing 160,000 volumes on over three miles of shelving. The room is under Trinity College and was opened in 1966. It gained a place in the Guinness Book of Records for having the largest display of books for sale in one room anywhere in the world." (source) It's pretty impressive. And they have a great cafe, that actually has room to park a pram. And when I sat with JD in some comfy chairs and felt an old woman's eyes on me, I was expecting some stern lecture, but she just smiled and said "What a placid, lovely baby!" So definitely our kind of place, for sure.

After coffee we walked back down to the area I'd been wandering around the day before, to look inside the Bodleian. In the foreground of the photo below is one of the many massive carved heads ranged around the outside of the Sheldonian. This is the theatre where all the Oxford students go to matriculate, and is right beside the Bodleian, which you can see in the background. I love how all these magnificent buildings are just all lumped in together in a relatively small space. Doors open as you walk past colleges and you get a glimpse of green quadrangles and spring flowers; it's like there are worlds within worlds here, just waiting to be explored if you can find the way in.

As a visitor you can't go into the Bodleian itself, but you can wander around the courtyards and gasp at the gorgeousness of the architecture.



We went into a small exhibition on John Milton, called Citizen Milton, which was quite interesting. I didn't know much about him, but was taken by his passion and how he struggled against the monarchy, censorship and the oppression of his time -

Advocate of freedom of the press, transparency in government, public debate, education for liberty, the right to divorce, the disestablishment of the church and the abolition of monarchy, Milton espoused positions radical even by today's standards. The cornerstone of Milton's concept of liberty was the virtuous citizen, an individual endowed with reason to make choices and to act freely in the world. . . This exhibition gives an account of this remarkable writer, with especial focus on Milton's concept of citizenship and the ways that later artists grappled with the complex legacy of his powerful words.
(source)

It was only a very small exhibition, but had lots of interesting source documents, including 'pirated' versions of Milton's banned works that had painstakingly been copied out by hand, even Percy Bysshe Shelley's notebook with his notes on Milton (he had terrible penmanship).

After this we wandered down to Magdalen Bridge and watched some people punting despite the dreary weather. The English have this strange stoicism when it comes to the weather - "it's spring, I don't care if it's six degrees outside, it's spring and we are going to conduct ourselves accordingly." (This is especially apparent in the shops; even though it's cold enough to still warrant scarves and gloves outside, you cannot buy a long sleeved top in any of the shops. It's all frilly light cotton blouses and spaghetti strapped dresses...delusional.) So a few people were punting, though most of the boats were unused.
I then went to Neal's Yard and had a wonderful, wonderful birthday massage. I left feeling light as air.

The Bs had organised Chinese takeaway for dinner, and Jen's marvellous chocolate and berry cake. We kind of failed at taking a good birthday pic, but this kind of sums up how we are when we're together:

Totoro explored the bookcases but came to disaster when he encountered Barth and Brunner.
We were all greatly revived by Jen's marvellous cake, though.

We had a pleasant evening, though after dinner I rapidly went downhill, especially given I'd been awake since 5am. Massages can have a downside too, releasing all the nastiness in your muscles and leaving you with a dreadful headache. So we played a little WoW, I drank a lot of water and then I slipped away to bed.

The longest short autobiography in the world

32 years ago, I arrived. It’s true to say the world has not been the same since.

31 years ago, I lived in my little world in a little house in a humble suburb with my young parents. It was the seventies; my dad’s hair was long, my mum’s hair was short.

30 years ago, there was another. The bane of my existence, the apple of my eye. A symbiote, a stranger, a partner in crime, a brother, a friend. Someone to run from, someone to look after. Someone I was bigger than. Someone new I was bound to.

29 years ago, I dislocated his arm by trying to help him to fly. He has never let me forget it.

28 years ago, I was in pre school with Miss Yee who I thought was amazing because of her long, long black hair and her beautiful Chinese face. I remember a creepy Santa Claus visited us at Christmastime and we all got to pull a present out of the sack. I got a blue and white plastic tea set; I remember being not especially impressed.

27 years ago, I started at Mascot Public School. I don’t remember much about it except for the Book Parade when I wore pink velvet knickerbockers. They were very special.

26 years ago, I decided that since our house was across the road from my school, it would be logical for me to walk home on my own. I neglected to tell my mother this. She wasn’t that happy when she went to pick me up and I wasn’t there, but it made perfect sense to me.

25 years ago, we forged a new life in a new place. We moved to Papua New Guinea and a tropical climate and curfews and states of emergency and buai on the pavements and unseen danger around every corner and Pidgin English.

24 years ago, I wrote stories. I won a short story competition and didn’t even know I was in it. I am an accidental writer, mainly because it’s so ingrained in me I don’t even notice it.

23 years ago, I stood up to a bully.

22 years ago, we went to Disneyland and England and then we moved to Singapore.

21 years ago, I was happy in my red and white pinstriped school uniform, with my gang of rag-tag friends from all over the world and a crazy teacher who taught me about Monty Python, the joy of Fridays and never to use the word ‘nice’ if I wanted to be a decent writer. That was also the year I heard something at church that made my soul dance. I don’t remember the specifics, but I knew I had to make a choice. I chose Jesus and was baptised at the International Baptist Church by Pastor Ray.

20 years ago, we moved back to Sydney and I started high school. Again. I was the new girl, again. I stood in a corner at recess, biting back rancid tears of fear and loneliness, wondering if I would ever fit in, anywhere.

19 years ago, I still had penpals and a best friend in Singapore and we loved a certain boy band and our obsession knew no bounds. Our letters were full of fantasies and imaginings and the secret language of teenage girls. If, at the time, you had told me 19 years later I would be mildly embarrassed about this, I would have shot daggers at you with my eyes and told you flatly that it was impossible. My love was timeless. Sadly, the band was not.

18 years ago I had two best friends, both boys. We had a band and we played jazz standards and Billy Joel and songs from the Blues Brothers and we made lots of noise and silly movies. One of these boys became my first boyfriend. I can’t remember how; it probably began with a kiss, or hand-holding, or shy shufflings. We were inseparable, we were hilarious. Everything was fun and funny. His mother thought we were more devious than we really were, thought I was some kind of Lolita. I didn’t even know what a Lolita was.

17 years ago, I realised it wouldn’t last. We stayed friends, but it was never the same.

16 years ago, I wanted to be cooler than I was. I was still learning that coolness is intangible and worthless. I spent a lot of time at Kings Cross and Elizabeth Bay, discovered Rickie Lee Jones, and ate cherries while my stoned friends danced in the park.

15 years ago, I finished high school. I got into a relationship with a man twice my age, a jazz guitarist who should have known better but didn’t. I thought I was grown up, but I wasn’t.

14 years ago, I was in love with jazz. I played Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock and Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald and I went along to my boyfriend’s gigs and sat in the darkness lapping it up. I still thought I was grown up, and that I was accepted by all his thirtysomething friends, but now that I am their age I think their kind expressions must have been ones of bemusement.

13 years ago, my parents split up. I was unsurprised. I think that was also the year that the unimaginable happened, though as with those sorts of traumas, I don’t tend to remember times and dates. Looking back, it’s probably no surprise either. I wasn’t really in the mode of protecting myself from the world and its evils, I was just trying to obliterate and was in the danger of being obliterated myself.

12 years ago, my mother’s best friend and fiance died. The world is a smaller place without him. Every January when the nights are hot and the Australian Open blares from the television, I remember those times sitting in the hospice. I remember holding hands and the sunkenness of his face and the sad relief when he was finally free of his body.

11 years ago, I celebrated my 21st birthday with a masquerade ball in the Chinese Gardens. It was a magical night. I was worrying about who to invite and who not to invite and when I look at the photos now, I don’t even know half the people who were there anymore. But I wore an amazing dress and sat in the dark on a stone bridge while friends sang ‘Throw Your Arms Around Me’ in four-part harmony.

10 years ago, I finished my Bachelor of Arts with honours in Theatre and English. I had written and directed a play that was very well received; I loved theatre and was going to work in theatre forever, start my own company, do something amazing, though that star seemed to blaze brightly and burn out quickly. That year I moved out of home, although home by that stage had just become an idea. Each member of my family was living somewhere different. I was living in a studio flat in Glebe, overlooking the city. My boyfriend, an actor, came to stay one night and never really went home. That’s how we ended up living together. We cooked together, had sleepy Sunday breakfasts in the sun, listened to crazy music and learned lines together.

9 years ago, that relationship imploded and I lay on the bathroom floor in tears and distress, unable to work out what to do, where to go, who I was or why this had happened to me. I had wandered a long way away from God. That was the year he pulled me back in. It was like healing, like learning to walk again, like bones knitting. I was broken, shattered, wrecked beyond repair, and he put me back together; the same person, but better. Whole. That was also the year my grandfather died, my Papa, who had always been. I moved back in with my mother.

8 years ago, according to some, I “still had no music taste”. This is a disputed ‘fact’. I love music so much that sometimes I just don’t discriminate and quite like the fact that I enjoy so many different things. I think it’s called eclectic taste.

7 years ago, my mother and I went to Europe together. I discovered the joy of exploring England and the thrills of Italy. She smoothed over the bad memories of her past travels by seeing it all afresh with me. I wandered through Venice alone, and imagined great things.

6 years ago, I started working for AFES, in what felt like a proper, grown-up job. I continued to grow as a Christian, but felt the growing pains keenly.

5 years ago, I started sewing a quilt with Danielle that took me five years to finish. I exulted in the friendship of women who encouraged me in my faith.

4 years ago, I graduated with my MA in creative writing and half a book in my hands. I moved out again, to live on my own in Kensington.

3 years ago, I couldn’t write anymore. What had once been like breathing to me was now difficult and laboured. I got involved with someone who seemed right but was very wrong for me. As my life seemed to fall apart again, I wondered why I had such terrible taste in men and why I found it so hard to disconnect from them.

2 years ago, I started seeing a counsellor and taking anti-depressants. I realised that through the fog and the fug, God was still holding on to me, and that was very reassuring indeed.

1 year ago, I was very sick. It was then discovered my gall bladder was very diseased and I was rushed into hospital to have it removed. Mum also had a total knee replacement. It was a year of hospitals. I was heartbroken when my best friends moved to the other side of the world, and then almost surprised to discover new kindred spirits. I started to write again. I started to sing again. I started to laugh again.

32 years ago, I arrived. It’s true to say the world has not been the same since.

that's better

My cold is finally ebbing away. The weather has been cool and sunny - beautiful! I've been digging in my garden. We've been celebrating mum's birthday by going out and eating lots of wonderful food. Life is good.

We went to China Doll, where Nic works, for mum's birthday dinner on Friday. The meal was wonderful, and the company (Nic's girlfriend Linda) great. It was lovely being down at Woolloomooloo and seeing the city from a different angle, though it did get a bit cold (they give all the customers blankets if necessary!). Nic did what he does best: he 'took care' of us, and just ordered what he thought would make a great meal. And it did! We had rabbit dumplings (divine), the most delectable Peking duck I've ever had, blue eyed cod and Moreton Bay bugs. I loved it all and I'm not even a seafood fan. The dessert was delicious too - a plate with tastes of all sorts of different things on it: sorbets, sago, sticky black rice, and the most divine caramelised pear with Tiger Beer ice cream (which was incredible).

So, as you can tell, the meal was good.

Then on Saturday mum and I went to The Observatory (our favourite posh hotel) for high tea. I got an idea for another book while sitting there, looking at all the women eating these sweet delicacies - lots of civilised hen's gatherings I think (not a bunch of well-mannered chickens - I mean women celebrating an impending wedding...though given the chatter, you can understand where the 'hen' label comes from), and a particularly vociferous Chinese mother-daughter couple sitting next to us who gave me a very pointed up-and-down look (finishing at my chest) when we got up to leave.

"It's so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up." Never truer a word said, Ferris.

how Rebecca got her groove back

Birthdays are fun. Well, they should be fun. I know some people don't enjoy their birthdays, but as you all know, I do. So I like to do my bit to help people enjoy theirs!

Today is Meg's birthday. I made her a cake and also this little creative thingummy, featuring some pics of Bethany, me and Meg, artfully placed paper and a ton of Liquitex gloss medium and varnish. It's been really fun playing around with colour and using a paintbrush - there is something so therapeutic about painting, even if it's only layers of varnish.

I hope she likes it.

Mum was excited, mainly because she could see me doing something creative. "My creative daughter is back!" she said when she came over the other day. It's a big deal mainly because I haven't felt able to do anything much at all since I've been sick, and so to start up a new project and enjoy doing it seems momentous.

We agree that it bodes well for Varuna - I return there in two weeks! I can't wait. I haven't been able to do that much writing since I left in March, but hopefully I will be able to use this week in Katoomba to great effect, and I will soon have a novel that I'll be forcing you all to read.

a long birthday post (with pictures!)

It's been a great birthday weekend. After my little burst of melancholy on Friday night (and a little cry), I went to bed determined that I would wake and be positive and have a great day. And I did!

It began on Saturday with breakfast in Clovelly with mum. She gave me my present - another charm for my bracelet, of a little cat (left). After some delicious banana bread with cinnamon ricotta, we went to White's Cakes and bought some supplies for the party. We went to Bondi Junction for the rest of the things we needed, and I bought myself some candles and yummy smelling body cream (I always have to buy myself something...). DJs was having a special so I got two free things with my cream - so it felt like a birthday present from them too!

We set up my flat for the afternoon tea, and mum was brilliant, making sandwiches and salmon quiches and the obligatory pink iced cupcakes. Then people started arriving and we had rawther a lovely afternoon tea. They were almost all St Martin's people, with a couple of valuable extras - the Tonks, the MacBeaths, Bec R, Kieran, Meg, Jen, Em and Stu, Freda, and mum of course! People were very sweet and gave me lovely presents, like flowers, lovely stationery stuff, a voucher for a pedicure, the cuddliest Converse sweatshirt, a beautiful glass teacup and saucer, money to buy pampering things...and other stuff too. I'm so blessed with such wonderful friends. :)


All the delicious food - salmon tarts and quiche, neenish tarts, jam tarts (a lot of tarts), fairy bread, tomato sandwiches and egg and cress sandwiches, passionfruit sponge, maccaroons, merengues - the little pink cakes are not pictured because they disappeared as fast as mum could ice them.

me and my goddaughter, imi

me and my 'sister' bethany

imi and nathaniel

our elegant and refined surrounds in my flat

rebecca r showing us exactly how a lady takes tea

me and miss meg

Mum and Freda, the champions they are, did the cleaning up while I got dressed for the next portion of the celebrations. Dave came home, then we trundled off to Darlinghurst to Bill & Toni's for some cheap and cheerful Italian food, gelato and yummy wine with Heath and Simone, Jackie and Brett. I even played pinball and we had a couple of rounds of that gun game. Turns out I'm something of a crack shot (yeah right).

Heath and Simone face off

Me, Jackie and Mr Brett in my favourite 'Very Hungry Caterpillar' t shirt

Dave and me

And then, after all that, Dave and I went to meet up with Kiz, Renee, Glenn, Josh and Geoff for some drinks, dancing and pool in the city. For better or worse, I was introduced to Jaegerbombs and remembered that no matter how hard I try, I really suck at pool.

Kiz and me

It's really hard to take photos in the dark, while dancing

After a looong walk from one end of George st to the other, where Dave and Glenn seemed to stop for a conversation with every single person we passed, we finally got back to Central where Geoff's car was parked. Before we could leave, however, the boys had to go and help a taxi driver who had managed to get his taxi stuck on a traffic island (above). There were about 20 guys all pushing and bouncing the car, but it didn't go anywhere until Dave calmly headed over and suggested they push it sideways, off the thing it was stuck on. Oddly enough, it worked. Then we finally headed home and I was grateful for my lovely soft bed.

Today mum came round after church (I was still quite asleep), and we brought out the leftovers from afternoon tea and just blobbed around for a while. Then we went into town so I could spend my Dymocks gift voucher (from Heath and Sim) and I also bought a denim jacket, something I've been meaning to get for the last few years.

And now I have cooked a delicious smelling beef and red wine stew for dinner, and it's raining with thunder and lightning and everything, which seems just the perfect way to end a birthday weekend.