fly, my darlings

I say this every year. without. fail.

Where [insert expletive] has the year gone? Seriously. It's been another BIG one.

Photo: Ginger Yeh

Last week I read at An evening of awesome with Canberra's award-winning authors. Thank you ACT Writers Centre and Ainslie + Gorman Arts Centres for the opportunity. It made my night to meet other local writers I hadn't yet come across who made me shiver and laugh. What talent!

I read 'Not what I wished for', which was recently published in Seizure. It was my first fiction since school and given my memoir inclinations, heavily autobiographical. I worried whether the audience would be able to follow my 'experimental meta fairytale that travels across English and Mandarin' but they laughed at all the right points. (I hadn't thought it was such a funny piece..).

After a few shaky pauses, I found myself thoroughly enjoying myself and focused on an audience member at the back of the room who smiled from beginning to end. IT WAS FUN.

I highly recommend checking out the Translation Edition in full. Elizabeth Bryer (editor) and Alice Grundy (editor-in-chief) are just brilliant. Thanks also to Ginger for her translation.

(I will post the original fairytales I wrote aged seven separately. Soon.)

.....

The next day, I had my first radio interview with Zoya Patel and Rosanna Stevens, both of whom I really, really look up to and have helped me so much as a young, emerging Canberra writer.

Rosie is founder of Scissors Paper Pen, which gave me my first  break, through Papercuts. Zoya is founder of Feminartsy and published 'Biting my tongue', the piece I am most proud of to date.

I can't imagine Canberra without either of them or the excellent organisations they have founded. I certainly would not be the writer I am today without them. Thank you and I owe you big time x

Thanks also to the super-lovely Alex Sloan. So warm and generous.

Without this blog, I'd probably still be writing in my diary. Keeping all 'em words to myself.

As it turns out, my darling word babies are out in the big, wide world... 

fly, my darlings, fly.

.....

Both of these opportunities came about because a friend put my name forward. Nurture your community, whether it be writing or humanity in general. Kindness makes the world go round.

Putting your energy out into the world in support of others is not, as some wrongly imagine, enervating. You don't use up your creative potential when you help someone else grow. You are simply ploughing the fertiliser you will one day be using. Supporting writers inspires you and gives you hope for your own future and possibilities. And, ultimately, it builds your social cache and makes you a person of interest. Taking some time out of your writing schedule to devote to the talents and dreams of others is one of the very best forms of creative self-care.

- Walter Mason -