Academic Conferences – Regional Adventures

The last time I posted, it was my “second” 21st birthday.

Nope, I’m not 42. I’m a good decade older than that. It’s 21 years since I was diagnosed with–and subsequently recovered from–cancer.

The Offspring never seemed too bothered by having two bald parents for a time

Having choriocarcinoma in my early 30s probably did change some of my paths in life, but marginally. It’s cancer of the placenta. The risk of it returning if you have no more placentas is nil. We did attempt, briefly, to expand our family further but those pregnancies didn’t take and the cost benefit analysis very quickly just didn’t stack up. The risk may have been worth it for more kids, but if we weren’t actually getting those, then it was time to focus on the two that we had, who actually turned out to be kind of wonderful.

Those kids walked beside me at multiple Relays for Life, joining with our community to raise awareness and funds that would mean fewer families would face what we did while they were still so very, very young (Child the Elder was in Kindy and Child the Younger in preschool when I was undergoing treatment). Ultimately, Child the Elder would serve on the organising committee with me.

A young child and her Mum, both wearing red caps, white shirts and smiling. The Mum is wearing sunglasses. — Team members at our first Relay (2005)

A middle aged white woman with grey hair and her 20-something daughter. Both are wearing glasses and yellow committee shirts, and are smiling. — Committee members at our last Relay (2023)

For his part, Child the Younger accidentally scored us a sponsor when I once materialised at his work on Relay day, frazzled, and asked was there any way they could blow up some purple and yellow balloons, stat, because our planned supplier had dropped the ball. While they were working on this, his boss asked whether there was a personal reason our family was so involved, and my boy matter-of-factly responded, “Oh yeah. Mum.” The balloons were donated that year, and for quite some years afterwards.

A young boy in purple leading Dougal the bear, the mascot for the Cancer Council, onto an oval. Behind them, a young man in a purple shirt and wearing a black cap backwards is leading Sid the Seagull, the mascot for the Slip. Slop. Slap. campaign. — Child the Younger handling his Mum and Child the Elder being handled by our Josh.

Those “kids” are now grown and have been kicking some serious life goals lately.

In late June, Child the Elder and her Sweetie got engaged. Unlike me, she was the kind of child who dressed up as princesses, brides, and princess brides. As a teen, she created her first Pinterest wedding board.

Round cut engagement ring on left hand. Winter leaves in background.

I am happy to report that she must have got all of that out of her system, because she’s being very sensible now that wedding planning is an actual reality.

My main task is to grow the flowers for the bouquet and table arrangements. (No pressure!). Luckily, I have a Garden Design assessment coming up in my Diploma course, an enabling spouse, and a tradie on speed dial who’s used to my insane ideas and yet is still willing to assist when I inevitably bite off more than I can chew in the landscaping projects arena.

Just a couple of weeks later, Child the Younger graduated. As someone who was a long-term employee of his university, I have been to a great many graduation ceremonies, so I was surprised that I got a bit emotional at this one.

Blue banner with white writing that reads: UOW Graduation Ceremony. Congratulations! — Beaming parents with the Graduate!

The Deputy Chancellor in black and gold robes and bonnet congratulates a young man in black shirt, gold tie, tan pants with cobalt blue robes and trencher, holding a certificate. — Beaming parents with the Graduate!

In between, I had a professional milestone of my own. Two, I guess. First, I went to my first academic conference since COVID.

Secondly and more importantly, while I was there, I was awarded a HERDSA Fellowhip. Basically this means that I put together a reflective portfolio of work focused on how and why I teach the way I do. Anonymous assessors judged it and came to the conclusion that I actually care about teaching quite a lot and do a pretty good job of it, which was very nice validation to receive.

The conference and awards were in Perth, meaning I got to catch up with a couple of long time friends.

I took advantage of the only working 4 days a week thing to add in a quick trip to Rottnest Island. (Aside: Angel and Dick Strawbridge from Escape to the Chateau had the same idea. I nearly fell off my perch when I saw them). There, I made some new friends:

Kimberley, in a black jacket, grey jumper and jeans, kneeling in front of a quokka. — My first quokka!

Sign: Don't let the quokka inside no matter what he tells you — My first quokka!

I loved everything about Rottnest Island–except the ferry ride over. The less said about that, the better.

Sun breaking through a grey sky. The ferry is coming in from the right. A bird flies above it. — So picturesque. This was taken from our verandah.

Forgive me, Readers, for it is WordPress Wednesday, and it has been six weeks since my last post. SIX! Does that make me a lapsed WordPresser?

So, what’s my excuse? Well, the excuses are plentiful and varied. June was something of a blur, as Roslyn and I from Shapeshifters in Popular Culture have been working very hard on finishing off our latest book, which is all about how mental illness is represented (or misrepresented, or just ignored) on TV. And it’s very nearly done. Ros is putting the finishing touches to the chapter on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder but it has otherwise all been collated into one document and I’m sorting out referencing and so on (the joys!). As soon as we’re both happy with it, it’s off to the person we very much hope will agree to write the Foreword, and then it will be winging its way through cyberspace to our wonderful publishers at McFarland.

So I was working on that until June 30, and then from July 2, I was in Melbourne for the tenth annual PopCAANZ conference. I presented some of our work from the book at this year’s event; specifically, looking at the representation of clinical depression in You’re the Worst. This series is not very well known in Australia–literally no one in the audience had watched it!–but it is well worth the effort. I’ve talked my husband into watching it, and he’s really enjoying the quirky, non-traditional characters. As well as being quite unlikeable in the conventional sense, two of the four leads have diagnosed mental illness, and are living under the same roof.

inauspicious meeting — Gretchen (Aya Cash) meets Jimmy (Chris Geere) in the pilot of *You’re the Worst.*

Now, hold on to your hats for this “spoiler”- the show actually does a pretty realistic depiction of clinical depression, including periods where Gretchen is asymptomatic, and periods where she lies in bed. The latter is really significant; despite being the single most prevalent mental health disorder in the word, we haven’t really seen much depression in screen because people lying in bed doesn’t move narratives forward. In fact, I would argue that we didn’t really see it at all until as recently as 2015.

Ian and Gretchen — Ian Gallagher (Cameron Monaghan), *Shameless* (US); Gretchen Cutler (Aya Cash), *You’re the Worst.*

So, in the ten days since Melbourne, what have I been up to? Well, lots of meetings, and lots of driving between Wollongong, Nowra and the Southern Highlands. The pace has been pretty intense, because I’m about to head off on some much-anticipated leave, so there are a lot of loose ends that are frantically being tied (or at least, we are trying to tie them).

My daughter is currently in Buenos Aires, doing a subject for her University course. And she invited me to join her for a few days at the end of her course, so that we can go and visit my “bonus children” who live in South America.

You see, once upon a time many, many years ago, I was fortunate enough to go to Japan for a year on a high school exchange with the AFS International, on a scholarship generously provided by the Tokyo Municipal Government. It was an amazing experience, and I met some of my very best friends there (and in fact, recently caught up with one in Melbourne!). I expanded my horizons, my language abilities, my family and yes, my waistline (we used to joke that AFS stood for ‘another fat student.’) And while there are some ancient photos from that time, they are all analogue and not with me.

I remained involved in the organisation for a few years, and then when we moved to Nowra and I knew absolutely nobody bar my (working) husband and own (infant) child, I got in touch with the local branch and introduced myself. Here, I met another really special friend, Sue. Sue’s job in this volunteer organisation was to find host families for incoming students; mine was to prepare the outgoing ones. And every year she would see me start to waver and want to host a student and she would remind me that no, our little family couldn’t really afford the time or financial commitment for six months or a year. But I became her go-to as a support mum (another person outside the host-family; a kind of counsellor, who has typically also been on exchange), temporary mum (when students were moving between placements); or billet mum (if a student was coming to a regional event in the Shoalhaven). And so that’s why, if you know me, you know I have two biological children, even though Facebook shows me as having five. And that’s why three of those kids are in their thirties when I am only in my forties myself, and why I have four grandchildren (and a fifth coming next month), despite the just-turned-adult nature of my two bio-kids.

So, the upshot of all that is that on Saturday, these two “sisters” will see each other in person for the first time in 18 years.

grace and Jamie — Jamie & Grace, December 2001

Grace is now married with a daughter of her own, who is almost exactly the same age as Jamie in this photo.

After our whistle-stop tour of Chile, we’re off to Paraguay to see my son Dany and meet his lovely wife and two kids. His daughter is very thoughtfully having her sixth birthday while we are there, so we get to go to a party!

And when we get home, there’s about a week until my other international child has her second baby. I’ve been really fortunate to be able to catch up with Ellyn (and indeed, her entire family) a few times over the years, both in the US and here. And Jamie and I managed to get to the US to meet her little first little one, so I’m pretty determined to get over there and witness firsthand the new big sister/little brother dynamic.

ellyn bride — The AFS Effect in Action: Bride Ellyn flanked by her Australian “brother” and “mother,” and her actual parents, Marsha and Mike, whom we also love and consider family.

And as for my bio-daughter, my current golden child because she invited me to tag along on her South American adventures? Well, her love of travel might date back to being “impressed” like a chick by these well-travelled older siblings, who came into her life when she was two or three years old. She too became an exchange student via AFS when she was just 15. She had an amazing time in the beautiful Matera region in the South of Italy. You can see the ancient Sassi region, one of the oldest inhabited areas in the world, from the town centre.

This past (Australian) Summer, she and her brother headed to Europe for nigh on three months. Tony and I joined them for a month over Christmas and New Year, and were very privileged to spend Christmas with her Italian family.

family in Italy — L, Front to back: Imma (aunt), Luisa (sister), Mariangela (mum), Michele (dad), Cecilia (cousin), Carlo (brother), Pierluca (uncle).
R, Front to back: Anna (sister), Jamie, Robert, Ester (cousin), Kimberley, Tony.

All this to say– there won’t be a post next Wednesday, either. But I will have the very best of excuses!

Category: Academic Conferences

On Milestones

Mea Culpa, and #theafseffect