Shoes, Books & Cynicism
Kate Stone Matheson
The Wax That Melts Our Wings

I’d say it’s what separates us, not from the beasts, but the bestial. Creating the future, renewing a learned past - these are reasons to strive. Writing for and with love, taking and framing an image, stretching new melodic skins onto old skeletons of song… it’s how we manage to fly. It’s how we stay you and me, not us and them.

The Wax That Melts Our Wings
Shoes, Books & Cynicism
Kate Stone Matheson
The Lady Jellypants Guide to Grace and Poise

Unlike Osk, who seemed to establish his own tactical task force wherever we lived, scooping up neighbourhood feline troublemakers as sidekicks (including the memorable ginger behemoth Watson, with whom he used to scope the street from the safety of the shed roof), Jelly has the intelligence gathering skills of a sponge cake.

The Lady Jellypants Guide to Grace and Poise
Shoes, Books & Cynicism
Kate Stone Matheson
Love Me Tender

Anyway, somewhere in between my 'and then you should've done this' and 'why didn't you say x and y, rather than z', and 'for the love of monkeys and the general public's eyesight, you didn't honestly wear that heinous shirt did you', something he was saying about the dating extravaganza we were picking to pieces finally penetrated my cloud of self-congratulatory cumulo-waffle. 

"Most people don't talk about how dates are progressing as a tender process, do they?" he asked. 

"What?"

"She said I was 'part way through the tender process' and that she was judging me on my submission. I'd like to think there was irony involved, and I think at the time I may have given an admittedly weak "haha, yesssss, quite". Looking back, I'd have to conclude, computer says no on the presence of Fabulon or other aids to achieving crisply pressed linen."

Love Me Tender

Staunch To The End Against Odds Uncounted

Staunch To The End Against Odds Uncounted

It’s hard to imagine being at home in 1916, one hundred years ago, waiting for news of fathers, sons, husbands, fiancés, brothers, away at ‘the War’. If I were here, where I am now, in Perth, chances are my husband would have been serving in the 25th Light Horse Regiment somewhere in Palestine or the Sinai, a proud Sandgroper representing state, country and Crown. And me – well, in theory, I would have been at home, keeping the campfires burning, writing long letters to the Front, and dreaming of the day he came home to me, safe and sound.

Smart Love: How Head Can Rhyme With Heart

Smart Love: How Head Can Rhyme With Heart

...admitting intellect is part and parcel of finding someone attractive seems to be akin to saying you love someone because they secretly wish Stalin or Kruschev was still running the USSR, and had Red Dawn-ed the world into submission.

If you find someone attractive for their butt or their boobs, why is it so wrong to find them attractive for their grey matter?

A Brand-Spanking Life In The Day

A Brand-Spanking Life In The Day

Perhaps you, my dear readers, simply by my saying the words 'marketing guru', are wiser than I, and would have known to run for the hills, screaming. Yes. Well. I didn't, and I suffered the consequences. Venetia suffered also, listening to the hideousness of my hysterical laughter, interspersed with "oh dear GOD" and brief spurts of dry retching.

Turn And Face The Strange: Heraclitus, Bowie, and Me

Turn And Face The Strange: Heraclitus, Bowie, and Me

It was a little like my first meeting with that extremely difficult gentleman of Ephesus, the ‘dark’ philosopher himself, Heraclitus. Now, short of travelling back in time to c.500BCE, this was obviously a meeting of the minds, rather than a chat over a coffee and a scone or two. (I’m fairly certain sitting down for a quick macchiato wouldn’t have been high on Heraclitus’ to-do list at any stage in the proceedings anyway, unless he was attempting to be clever or prove a point, but that’s just my opinion.)

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Just Somebody That I Used To Know

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Just Somebody That I Used To Know

Depression likes solitude, and peace, and quiet. This is the second reason it beckons to you, like a siren song. Because it's easy. It's so easy. All you see, hear, feel is a lack of glaring light, noise, touch; a big, blank hole, with a pouring darkness in it, sucking you in. Far less trouble than making conversation, than ensuring others are feeling okay, than going out, than cooking, than showering, than turning lights on in a room.

The Shadowlands

The Shadowlands

How many times did you say as a child "I hate you!" and feel sick to the stomach afterwards because you'd used the word 'hate'? Maybe it was just me, but I doubt it. Now think about how often you use it. "I hate that idea." "God, I hate this, it's vile." "I hate him so much, I hope he rots in hell."

I use it all the time. I use it about Donald Trump on a daily basis. And I can feel the shadow creeping in on me, because I have forgotten how wrong it is to say it, and by saying it, to put thought into practice.

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Teach Them To Be Still

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Teach Them To Be Still

In another galaxy, far, far, away, one hundred years ago, as the fourth of July weekend was getting ready to rumble in the 1916 jungle, innumerable young British soldiers, members of the Fourth Army, were preparing to immobilise for the Battle of the Somme. ‘Z Day’, as it was called, was supposed to be June 29, but due to poor weather it was postponed.

On a moonless but clear night, between 0200 and 0515, these young boys – these schoolboy warriors, these captains courageous – made their way along prepared lines to the Front, ready for Zero Hour at 0730, July 1.

By November 18, the total British Commonwealth toll of casualties and dead (or MIA) stood at 419,654 and 95,675 respectively. The Allied toll, including the French: 623,907, and 146, 431. German dead and casualty lists were equally horrific, at 465,000 and 164,055.

Rule, Brextannia

Rule, Brextannia

I watched today, along with the rest of the world, in stunned horror, as Great Britain decided – against all predicted outcomes – to pack her very dignified trunks and take herself off for an extremely long weekend at the country estate. As her shiny Rolls Royce (one must buy British), weighed down with the collective clutter of a nation state’s realisation of what they had just done, and Boris Johnson’s ego, made its way along Pall Mall in a semi-triumphal tooting of one’s own horn, the number plates seemed to flash and change in the twinkling of an eye: GREAT BREXIT 1.

Stellar Equilibrium

Stellar Equilibrium

As we face the journey onwards, we barely evolved creatures of flesh and bone, there are those amongst us who shine brightly with an honesty, a joy, and a brilliant quiet strength. They are our heat and our gravity; the outward and inner forces that balance our messiest messes, and handle our stupidity, our tantrums, and our tears with equilibrium and humour. They are celestial bodies in disguise. We turn to them when we are unable to navigate the darkness ourselves, and they provide the second star to the right, the straight on til morning our souls and hearts crave. 

Black And White, And Cred All Over

Black And White, And Cred All Over

The definition of a bully is 'a person who uses strength or influence to harm or intimidate those who are weaker'. Today, you have influenced the actions of the AFL.  You have used your strength to maintain a position you do not deserve. You have intimidated those of weak moral courage, and you have harmed your club, and women who play, follow, and love the game of Aussie Rules as a consequence. You have harmed young girls and boys - particularly boys - just starting in the game, who will see this kind of talk as acceptable - because if the Presidents of Collingwood and North Melbourne say these things, then it must be OK. 

Sensory Prevention Factor 30 Plus

Sensory Prevention Factor 30 Plus

Usually, summer - or at the very least spring - is running my psyche. But, occasionally, perhaps a little like Persephone descending into The Underworld for her allotted time with Hades, I can't help but let winter into my thoughts, and Cerberus, in his guise as the black dog of depression, manages to slip his leash. Thankfully, I am learning to get him under control, and make my way back to sunnier climes and blue skies of a happy soul.

But some people - well, for them, winter is a way of living, rather than just days on a calendar. Cold is ingrained in their personalities; it's almost as though they don't want to step into the sunlight for fear they may be burnt by happiness. Instead, they slap on Sensory Protection Factor 30 Plus, and allow the ice to become a part of their makeup, right down to the bone.

Clean To The Bone

Clean To The Bone

In the Regency era, women put wax pads inside their cheeks to make their faces fashionably plump. In the Edwardian, they constrained their rib cages and spines to the point of deformity with corsets. The 20s, thin was in. The 50s? Marilyn Monroe and curves were back with a vengeance, baby. 

Now? It's The Age of Kardashian, where cosmetic surgery is considered an acceptable sixteenth birthday gift. 'Happy Birthday, sweetie... you don't have enough turmoil going on with your hormones, so here's new teeth/breasts/a nose/lips/skin colour to confuse you even more about what you should look like to be a happy, whole human being'.