A thousand million years ago I ran away from home (for the second time out of four) and took up a room in Geelong. Pretty sure it was a big old rooming house with 9 other women (also pretty sure this is one of the reasons why I could never be a lesbian, besides not being one, whatever).  So anyway, I was at Deakin Uni and one of my classes was called “Narrative Studies” or something (this was 1987!) and a woman called Ania Walwicz came to our class and got us to do some weird-ass writing that changed my life.

One hour for a life-changing experience.

Ania had us do some stream-of-consciousness writing, something I’d never heard of. Yet it was life changing.

A few years later, I came across Ania again in a writing class at the Footscray Community Arts Centre, and had coffee with her at the Black Cat on Brunswick Street in Fitzroy, and visited her home. Ania believed in my writing before I did.

Many many years later, I took a class at Melbourne University with Karen Burnes. Karen had me do a reading at a bar on Brunswick street. Karen believed in my writing before I did.

I still don’t believe in my writing, because that’s weird, and presumptuous.

Anyway, I’m publicly launching my book next week, the one I started as a short story during Karen Burnes’s class 15 years ago. I’ve connected with a few people from that time, who read my stuff, people like Rachel Matthews and Peggy Frew. They believed in my writing before I did.

I’ll believe in my writing some day. 

Here’s some of Ania Walwicz’s writing. She’s such a rad spoken word artist, and I believe in her.