ABOUT ME and this BLOG

I started this blog in 2007, to tell my story.

Born in 1959, I live in the town I was born in. For ten years I actually worked a mere several metres from where I was literally born. My standing joke is that I’ve travelled far.

And travel – I have done a little, in body and mind. What I would like to call meanderings.

You are cordially invited to visit the places I have been and join me on the places I am now visiting.

My blog is under Meanderings.

And other archives of the various dimensions of my life are under the other top menu links.

At the end of 2007 my family and I made a pilgrimage to Baha’i Holy places. We travelled to Singapore, Malaysia, Frankfurt, Turkey, and Israel. I have written of these travels in Meanderings.

In January 2008 I began a new venture in educational theatre with a business called Phoenix Functions. It was a very modest start but I am hoping the little spring of fresh inspiration and endeavour will grow into a meandering river. I felt that metaphor became more apt when I found myself working with The Wilderness Society of Australia on an educational theatre project about Cape York Wilderness, Animals and  Wild Rivers, for State Schools in North Queensland. The trial production of “Cape York Critters and Wild Country “went into a school in December 2008. Video clip from the latest production of ‘Cape York Critters and Wild Country” at Trinity Anglican School in April 2009 (read more below).

2008 ended with the marriage of my son, Nathan, to Danielle Akhtakhavari from Los Angeles. They met while doing volunteer work for the Baha’i House of Worship in New Delhi, India in 2006. Their marriage has created a few more tributaries in the river of our family with connections now to the Arneson family of Hay, Kansas, USA; and the Akhtakhavaris of Yazd, Iran and everywhere else in the world they have migrated. The wedding videos: Entering the ceremony; ‘Eagle’ sings love song in ceremony, then later keeps the dancers on the floor; The happy couple make their vows; Reception speeches.

Australian Health Minister, Nicola Roxon (centre) jokes with President NRHA, Jenny May (R), Student rep (L)

I was proud to have been the convenor of the National Rural Health Conference (May 17 – 20, 2009). It was a fabulous event with 920 delegates in the Cairns Convention Centre. We submitted 19 Recommendations to the Australian Minister of Health, Nicola Roxon.

I was glad to have made the effort to attend the 2009 Laura Aboriginal Dance Festival. It was a great weekend and, apart from the intrigue of the many dance groups from across Cape York, got to speak to visitors from OS, and visited with the Chair of the organising committee, Tom George, from the Laura Aboriginal community. I also took a walk to Split Rock art caves.

As of mid 2009,  on the eve of my 50th birthday , I resigned from the boards of SARRAH and the NRHA, to take up another look at that mountain of the reconstruction of the mind and spirit. I figured, as my 50th year turned over, I might have another 30 productive years in me. I certainly felt that I have a number of undeveloped potentialities that need a mind more free of the cornered animal.

My biography in pictures:

Artificial eye lense

As August 2009 came around, I found myself having to play a major role helping an elderly Aunt (Aunt Rae) move into an aged care residence. She has moved into an aged care residence in Gordonvale, a small town south of Cairns. My work to sort out the house she left and her finances took a hold as, in September 2009, I lined up for the first of 2 eye lense replacements. By December 2009 I could see perfectly long distances for the first time in over 40 years.

By Jan 2010 I had cleared her house out ready for sale, then cleaners and painters took a few months. Finally on the market, and, in a very depressed market, made a reasonable sale by August 2010, one year later.

In January 2010 I began two new projects.

One, a motor skill training activities class, a mesh of my professional expertise in neuroplasticity and performing arts training exercises, and aimed at people who can’t participate in usual fitness formats. The motto: If you can’t exercise, ‘Fake It’. ‘Fake it’ community class ran between Feb – April 2010 with 8 participants of various disabilities. ‘Fake it’ also ran for two months at the Carinya Aged Care Hostel, and rough evaluations suggest it was beneficial in lifting the balance abilities in mobile residents.

The second was organising two events on the staged area of our small local CBD – one themed, ‘The Child”, the other themed, “Critters”. The aim was to trial method for using the arts to engage the community on important current issues that will require change. Called ‘Philosophical Friday’ the events encouraged expression by local performing artists, multimedia presentations, booths. Philosophical Fridays were modestly successful, and taught a lot about the nature of my community in the CBD on Friday afternoons (especially that it is much quieter than I expected).

And that became two more projects.

Through the networking I did for Philosophical Fridays, around May 2010, I was asked to organise the Children’s Festival of the Tableland Folk Festival for 2010. This has been an immensely rewarding exercise. The Children Festival is a free venue the Folk Festival establish, It enthuses children with all sorts of activities and is a venue for development and training of youth performers and technicians, and showcases some major performers to the festival. And I have met a whole new bunch of wonderful people involved voluntarily in the organisation. It was a tremendous success. I accepted to be the organiser in 2011 and am happy to be supported by a core team of 4 woman and a growing group of interested contributors.

Around the same time, I put ‘feelers’ out for a couple of writer/actors to collaborate on a project to write theatre for social discourse. Wonderfully, a young actor, Liz Hurley (Falling Petals Sept 2010), and an experienced writer, June Perkins, came on board. We successfully applied for a RADF grant from the Qld Govt and the Tableland Regional Council. The grant committee asked if we could design the project as a community workshop, and encouraged us to submit it to … yep …  the Tableland Folk Festival. That project culminated in the design of a script writing workshop for social discourse facilitation, and our own small performance called ‘Rotations of Risk, that had its test run at the Tableland Folk Festival. In January 2011 I had reviewed the workshop and worked it with a group in Atherton.

Now called ‘Out of the Box’ Theatre Workshop it is now available for groups, organisations or communities for facilitation of specific discourses relevant to those groups.

Showing off the rock

Exchanging Wedding Vows

My son, Kelsey engaged to marry Sepideh Tara in November 2010.

They married on Friday 8th April  2011, Kangaroo Point, Brisbane River. Reception was held in Sebel Hotel, Brisbane City. I wrote and read a poem for the ceremony; and gave a speech at the reception.

During the networking in performing arts in 2010 I met a new collaborator in theatre for community service, Grace Chapman.  Grace became a  sounding board for “Out of the Box Theatre Workshops”, and introduced me to Landmark Education and in February and March 2011, I completed the Forum and Advanced Course. These courses are of a rigour I would not have believed possible in a weekend course and live up to everything their website declares. If religions such as the Baha’i Faith provide the blueprint for life, courses such as Landmark provide the technology for thought and behaviour to act on that blueprint.

My youngest son, Reuben, finished highschool in 2010 and began studies in Urban Development in 2011. Nathan and Danielle went to live in California, USA in 2011. Nathan is working in an agency preparing young adults with mental health problems to return to careers and independent living. Danielle continues her college education.

During 2011 my father had employed a man to break down many old machineries accumulated over 50 years of farming, to sell to a steel merchant.

My mother bought them a house in Atherton in April, and began clearing the house. My sister, her partner, and son came to help them move in June 2011. My father has rapidly advancing dementia. The house they bought sits in a suburb developed on land he farmed in the late 1950′s. He remembers it well and talks about it often.

After 2 generations of pioneering in agriculture on the Atherton Tableland, our family now has no active farmers. I hold on to my Peanut Company shares for nostalgia sake.

In November 2011 we visited Nathan and Danielle in Riverside, California. We were there for Thanksgiving. Then took a few days in Las Vegas.

I would be most pleased if I could visit with you as well, so please leave a comment for me.