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The Griffith Award for Academic Excellence

9 April, 2019 by Vicki Leave a Comment

Last week’s email from Griffith University hit my inbox exactly as did the hundreds before it, almost all irrelevant to me and usually advertising an on-campus event or initiative. As a remote student merely picking up a few electives towards my BA in Professional Writing and Publishing through Curtin University, I tend to be quick with my delete key. This occasion was no exception; the subject line was something about an award. Yawn. Nope, I’m not applying…

I don’t know what made me look twice, but whatever it was I’m grateful it did. The subject line in fact read:

‘Congratulations, you have earned a Griffith Award for Academic Excellence’

Er, what? Naturally, I had to read this more than once. I checked the recipient. Yep, it was definitely me. Sent to my Griffith email address. Hrm.

I read on:

I am delighted to inform you that you have been awarded The Griffith Award for Academic Excellence in recognition of your studies in Cross Institutional Study. This will be annotated on your Academic Transcript … This award, which recognises your consistent achievements this year, places you in the top 5% of students across the university.

And I have been presented with a shiny new badge as proof:

The Griffith Award for Academic Excellence badge

My first reaction was disbelief. My second was to laugh. I carried my laptop to hubby in his study. ‘Read this!’ I chuckled away madly.

Bemused, he read it. Then he beamed at me. ‘That’s brilliant!’ he said. ‘Well done, love!’

Brilliant? It was funny — wasn’t it? It’s not like I have been academically excellent, after all.

But hang on. Have I?

Impostor syndrome

I may not have been particularly happy with my grades to date — they are far from excellent as far as I’m concerned — but if I am in the top 5% of students across the uni and have won an award for academic excellence as a result, it would seem I haven’t exactly been doing badly.

It’s a little difficult to get my head around, to be honest. I’m that person who tragically failed her university studies as a school leaver. But hey, they gave me this award so I’ll take it. I may feel like an impostor, but apparently I am the real deal.

So I’ve put it out on Facebook and Twitter, and blogged it (see?!) but just between you and me, I’ve been cackling to myself the whole time.

Filed Under: Life, Vapour Tagged With: award, impostor syndrome, uni, writing

An excellent start to 2019

16 February, 2019 by Vicki Leave a Comment

For the most part I’ve been head down, you-know-what up for the last few months (and, indeed, years) and am relieved to be entering into the final year of my Professional Writing and Publishing studies. It feels like it has been a long, hard, slog, not least because there are no breaks between study periods when studying through Open Universities Australia. Not even a break for Christmas. It does get wearying, with never so much as a single day when I don’t feel I should be doing something for uni. Like now. I have two major assignments due in the next week, so here I am writing on my blog. (I’m telling myself I’m just getting warmed up. *cough*) Nevertheless, the end is in sight. Whew!

Cruising along

We had a wonderful break in routine at the beginning of January when my parents took us on a 5-night cruise on the Astor, down the south coast of Western Australia to Esperance and Albany. Such a wonderful experience! (And I refused to entertain thoughts of the uni work that was piling up while I was away.) By some bizarre quirk of fate, a writing and horsey friend I’d met on Facebook, Colleen, was on the same cruise. Coincidence? It was so good to spend time with her and get to know the person behind all the text messages of more than three years. She was on the cruise with a lovely friend and it made the holiday extra-special for us to have them there.

Looking across the bow of the ship out to the horizon.

Leaving Fremantle Harbour.

Esperance is so beautiful. We went on a lovely day tour, taking in Hellfire Bay, Lucky Bay, Twilight Beach and the amazing Cindy Poole Glass Art Gallery.

Esperance  looking out to sea from the Rotary Lookout

Looking out to sea from the Rotary Lookout.

A beach with white sand and bright turquoise sea under a grey, cloudy sky.

Lucky Bay

We’re quite familiar with Albany, so had a relaxing day there, splitting our time between pottering around the ship, having coffee with hubby’s brother who lives down there, and wandering around town. Albany was the first white settlement in Western Australia and many aspects of the township reflect that period in its history.

Statue of an Aboriginal warrior

Mokare, man of peace.

A woman in jeans with windblown hair, tinted glasses falling down her nose, and a miserable expression, poses in the stocks near the Albany waterfront

Me in the stocks.

Iconic of the town is the leafy sea dragon, and this mural painted on silos down at the wharf made me really want to go diving…

A group of silos with a leafy sea dragon painted across them at one end

Leafy sea dragon painted on silos at the wharf.

In the evening, we went to the Field of Light art installation at Albany’s Avenue of Honour. Once it was dark it was just beautiful.

Green lights at ground level between two rows of trees.

Field of Lights art installation at the Avenue of Honour.

I’d never been on a cruise before so it was an amazing gift from my parents. They are just the best!

Boorna Waanginy: The Trees Speak

Earlier this week we went to the Boorna Waanginy light show at Kings Park. A celebration of Aboriginal culture, it was part of this year’s Perth Festival and really worthwhile. I unfortunately didn’t hear most of the commentary, but appreciated the beauty and skill of the lighting, especially the 3D aspects. It was a fantastic production, despite it being so crowded it was literally impossible to move at times. Sadly, most of my photos didn’t turn out because of the low light, but here are a few.

An avenue of trees in the darkness with thick crowds on the road ahead. The trees are lit with Aboriginal artwork.

Near the beginning. You can’t really see here, but 3D goannas and other fauna were running up the tree trunks.

Silhouetted shadows of people interacting in the lit-up treetops

Stories in the treetops.

Light tree trunks and branches beamed on the dark treetops

Trees in the trees!

Avenue lit with blue, green and white light

Last leg.

Lanterns arranged in arcs around a lighting display of contributors and their totems

The end. 2,500 lanterns were made by WA school children, and each is a pledge to care for country.

SHRINE by Tim Winton

In another first, last night we went to the local theatre, Melville Theatre. The Melville Theatre Company is currently putting on a production of Tim Winton’s play SHRINE.

Photo of the program cover showing the silhouettes of a man and a woman in a moonlit ocean with the text: Melville Theatre Company Presents by arrangement with Jenny Darling & Associates Shrine by Tim Winton, directed by Kayti Murphy, February-March 2019

SHRINE programme.

It was excellent! The venue was unprepossessing from the outside but looks can be deceiving. There was an atmospheric bar area with dimmed lighting, complimentary port and sherry on offer, and candles on the bar tables.

Bar table with candles, tickets showing the name Taylor and seat numbers A-8 and A-9, and a glass of port

Before the show.

The theatre itself was larger than I’d imagined, and the staff had given us brilliant seats to accommodate my hearing difficulties. Altogether it was impressive for a community theatre.

2019 is off to an excellent start!

Filed Under: Life, Vapour Tagged With: Albany, Astor, Boorna Waanginy, cruise, Esperance, Melville Theatre, Melville Theatre Company, Perth Festival, Shrine, Tim Winton

Birthdays

9 September, 2015 by Vicki Leave a Comment

Today I celebrate my husband Dohn’s birthday.

I say “I”, because he is only participating in the celebrations under sufferance. (Or so he says. :-) ) Despite this being a “-ty” birthday, and therefore a “big one”, he has refused any fuss. I was allowed to make him his favourite Almond Puff Pancakes for breakfast, and his mother was allowed to take us out for coffee and cake this afternoon. He even permitted me to take him out for dinner at Nunzio’s, a fabulous new Italian restaurant in Fremantle.

It’s been quiet, but he’s had a good day, which is the main thing.

In the wake of our — er — “discussions” about how we would celebrate his birthday (he most emphatically did not want a party, or even to go out with family), I started to consider the nature of birthdays in general.

Those major milestones in particular, that end-of-decade punctuation we apply with deliberate, dreadful regularity throughout the span of a person’s life, can be somewhat confronting. I mean, forty sounds so much older than thirty-nine. Fifty sounds so much older than forty-nine. And sixty? Heaven forbid.

One wonders, should we even continue to keep count?

Yet, incomprehensible as attaining such an age may have seemed to us when we were kids and even as younger adults, we all aspire to reach these very milestones, every single one of them. After all, the alternative holds even less appeal.

On birthdays, we do what we can to make those whose birthday it is feel special. We’re so happy about their very existence! And in that sense it’s as much about us as it is about them. We want to express how glad we are. When we pare it down, birthdays are the anniversary of the day on which a person was born, a celebration of the fact they are alive. We make it a point to note the passing of each year because we are thankful for every one of them, and we think it a worthwhile exercise to stop and mark the day by openly acknowledging our gratitude for them.

I can’t help feeling that birthdays are probably more important to mothers than to anyone else. Other than the birthday child (whatever their current age), mothers have by far the most intimate experience of the actual birth. It’s the mother and her baby that endure the physical trauma and the emotional upheaval that accompany it. But the mother, unlike her child, actually remembers the occasion, usually with vivid clarity. On my kids’ birthdays, I celebrate their lives but I also recall their individual births, each unique to the them and to me. Each was a momentous and miraculous occasion and truly worth celebrating every year — in fact, every day!

I know, because she told me, that Dohn’s mother remembers his birth like it was yesterday. I know, because it was in her card to him, that she is grateful for every year of his lifetime. Birthdays are an extra-special special occasion for mothers.

The perspective of the child is quite different of course, but I also want to celebrate the births and lives of my parents, who gave me my own life. And I want to similarly honour every single person who is important to me. Their lives matter, and birthdays are the traditional, accepted occasion for me to articulate what I already know and hope they do too, which is how very glad I am that they are alive.

While we don’t theoretically need a special occasion for this, the reality is often that birthdays provide a useful prompt, especially when we have been drowning in the stresses of everyday life.

I feel so badly for those who don’t have anyone to celebrate their special day with them, even when they don’t themselves appear to mind. While my hubby, and my Dad too, for that matter, would prefer not to make a fuss on birthdays, I know they both do appreciate that others care. Those of us with family and friends to care about, who care for us too, are truly fortunate.

So birthdays, I feel, are very much about gratitude for life, and for family and friends, and give us an occasion on which to make a particular point of showing it.

I want to celebrate! What do you think?

Filed Under: Life, Vapour

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