Anxiety

  “Anxiety is love’s greatest killer. It creates the failures. It makes others feel as you might when a drowning man hangs onto you. You want to save him but you know he will strangle you with his panic.” Anais Nin, February 1947  Read More

How to listen between the lines

I learn a lot from silence. Feeling, for me, heightens in that space, there, too.   So it was with pleasure that I came across a book that explores silence.   Here are some morsels from an article about it: “Smith was looking for a way to get at precisely that unrehearsed language, so the linguist suggested three questions to crack the shell of verbal habit: “Have you ever come close to death?”; “Do you know the circumstances of your birth?”; and“Have... Read More

Thinking about last year

Bronte ocean pool gives moments of beauty, simplicity I’ve put on idleness like a pair of comfortable summer shorts.   Books everywhere on the floor around my bed and on my bedside tables like a still life mice plague, ungovernable.  Their numbers and mess say it’s January, when I reflect, read, plan. What was last year about, what did I do badly or well, what would I like to do this year? I pretend to find answers.   And there are movies, walks, morning swims in... Read More

There is no ‘try’, just “do . . . or do not”

Yoda was right when he said to Luke Skywalker, ‘do . . . or do not’. The same goes for me, anyone wishing to be ‘sustainable’, and all of us seeking to sustain our lovely Earth. I’ve written about this in my column, Bathurst Burr, for The Fifth Estate.  Read More

Six seasons in Australia, not four

Here’s a well-written book by Tim Entwisle with persuasive evidence Australia has six not four seasons.   I reviewed the book for Spectrum in the Sydney Morning Herald, here.   Enjoy   Michael    Read More

Microbat nests come to Chippendale

Microbat nest boxes Steve Fadel and his artisans from Paramount Properties – www.paramountpropertygroup.net….au – have built and given three microbat houses to me and our Chippendale environment.   Microbats can be as small as a knuckle on a human finger.  They eat mozzies – over a thousand a day!  They have been dying out as we cut down trees in our cities.  These new houses will provide a home and refuge for them in Chippendale.  This is what... Read More

I love birdsong in the morn n eve

Birds, birds, birds A friend has a couple of trees with flowers that attract parrots.  They feed there day and night, gossiping, laughing, chortling, scurrying, eating upside-down (my favourite), coming and going.  How I love Aussie parrots for their song and colour, their beauty.  And there are both honey and native bees there, too, feeding on the tree’s feast. This year I’ll plant a tree or two like this. M    Read More

Australia’s best gardening bookshop

Luckily for me my favourite gardening bookshop is in Sydney, about 15 minutes walk from where I live in Chippendale. It’s Floriligium at 65 Derwent St, Glebe. Inside the cool, quiet old sandstone building you’ll find a wonderful, complete coverage of all things that grow and if you ask for help your visit will be made richer by talking to the knowledgeable owner, Gil Teague. So I’m giving it a shameless and proud plug and suggesting that you either drop in or... Read More

Random science means the world to me, and you

A friend, Kylie, and former founder of Cosmos science magazine, sent me this transcript: “I sometimes hear people ask, ‘Why should we spend money on space exploration? We should focus on the problems here on Earth first.’ But if it hadn’t been for space exploration we wouldn’t have known about the greenhouse effect or the ozone hole. It was while trying to understand why Venus was so horribly hot that scientists discovered the greenhouse effect and... Read More

Axel Munthe’s house in Capri

“My house must be open to the sun, wind, and the voice of the sea just like a Greek temple and light, light, light everywhere”  - Axel Munthe A friend, Jeni, is leading a tour to Italy and will show folks the house of Axel Munthe, a Swedish doctor who made his life in Italy. So beautiful, as it appears in this photo, it seems words can’t do. From Chippo, where I am now, it prompts the question:  where do I find beauty in my life where I am now? I  don’t... Read More