Women of Letters

As you may have guessed from my post yesterday, I was feeling rather blog-motivated last night. The idea to write a letter was also an inspired one, a little seedling planted in my brain by a bunch of inspirational and intelligent women yesterday at Women of Letters.

This event is curated by Marieke Hardy and Michaela McGuire and has been running for a little over a year, mostly in Melbourne but with additional shows in Sydney and Brisbane. The basic premise is Marieke and Michaela invite five influential women to write a letter, and each time the theme is different. Yesterday I attended the second WOL Brisbane show, held at The Zoo. The theme was love letters and we heard five very different interpretations from five amazing women.

Patience Hodgson from the Grates wrote to New York City and the amazing co-op she was lucky enough to purchase her groceries from, which heightened by burning desire to move to NYC to an almost unbearable intensity.

Queensland’s first Indigenous Magistrate and mother of six, Jacqui Payne, wrote a moving a beautiful letter to her babies that brought tears to my eyes. Her unconditional love for her children and the wonder with which Jacqui spoke of them even made my friend who is most adverse to reproducing clucky for a moment.

Morag Kobez-Halvorson, a food writer and editor penned a witty and funny account of her experiences with a string of medical ‘professionals’ including a doctor that came to the hospital donned in boardshorts and thongs.

Author Kris Olsson went a little more abstract in her love letter with the alphabet as her muse. She wove an intricate story of the wonder of words, reading and the power those 26 little letters hold. I could totally relate to her muse, as I also have a deep emotional bond with the alphabet.

And wrapping up the show was Kate Miller-Heidke, with a love letter to her twelve-year-old self, full of witty little warnings and life lessons told with her trademark wry sense of humour and quirky quips. (I think there must be something in a name, because I tend to be a tad self deprecating in my humour as well, although I've never recorded a double platinum album, so maybe it's not as funny when I do it...)

As if we weren’t inspired enough, after each of the women read their love letters aloud, the audience had a change to pen a letter of their own, on the stamped post cards left like little presents on our seats. We really should all write lovely letters more often, and I hope those who I sent letters to yesterday enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed writing them.

Needless to say, by the end I was absolutely in awe of these women and their stories. I hope when I grow up I can make the same kind of clever observations and pen loving letters and stories that make others laugh and cry and feel, like I did yesterday.

If you ever have the chance, do yourself a favour and check out Women of Letters.

xo