fourth floor feminism | sociable speculation

I was recently the writer in a devising project for a stage play. Devised writing is something completely alien to my usual writing style, and I very much enjoyed the process and experience. I was often given homework by the director, prompted by lines and concepts from the actors on the floor. This is one such piece, and I think it is quite evident why it was not suitable for the stage. It was, however, an interesting exercise for me to write a piece in my usual style, but prompted by something than my own observations. For thousands of years swans have been associated with beautiful women in myths, legends and stories that survive to this day. From Leda conceiving Helen of Troy with Zeus in the form of a swan, to The Ugly Duckling and Swan Lake, the powerful association of women and swans is well worth an examination. The pace of modern life is often likened to a bird gliding across the water, calm and beauty visible to all, frantic paddling hidden below the waterline. Watching a ...

Dolls, like puppies, cry for the first few days they are with new Hosts. But, like puppies, Dolls are held and loved and taken to tea parties and given treats, so after a few days, they start to feel loved and stop crying. The Fey called from the Circles to Dolls are always on their first calling, so they are young and affectionate. When I picked Abigail up on Saturday, her Host had been adamant that she moved, but had not mention talking. I assumed the Host was investing her doll with the characteristics of a Doll she remembered from childhood. Only about 5% of dolls owned by Hosts over 6-years-old call the Fey and become Dolls, so when I got home and Abigail wasn’t talking, I figured she was merely an adult’s doll and I placed her amongst my other housemates . Last night I was woken up at about 2am and Abigail was at the end of my bed. I was so pleased. Dolls that find themselves in households without children sometimes forget how to talk. I assumed she had talked to my sister, t...

Housemate One: Sister. Soon to be in London. Huzzah! Housemate Two: Humpty Dumpty. Born the same time I was born. Better than Humpty on Play School, for sure. Housemate Three: Green Dragon. Again, a friend from when I was very young. He could be a dinosaur. It's hard to tell. Housemate Four: Queen Mab. A friendship cemented in Year Twelve Religion, named for a Shakespearean Fairy, she has a crucifix (body of Christ removed) at her waist. Housemate Five: The Librarian . My orangutan friend, entrusted to me by the Ladies of The Broken Drummers on the occasion of my Leaving of London. Housemate Six: Penguin. Because I've always been friends with penguins . Housemate Seven: She comes with a bad reputation , but I think I can handle her. Hey guys, this is Abigail !

I like to buck the trend, I don’t like Fridays. I don’t like Fridays because I love my workmates. Monday *burp* “Guess which end? That was a lost fart. I can sing through my bum. If you ever want a demonstration, tell me.” Tuesday *Workmate with Manflu drinking a can of Coke* Manflu to Workmate 1: “Did you want a drink?” Workmate 1: “No thanks, especially if you licked around the rim.” Workmate 2: “If that’s what you’re into …” Workmate 1: “Don’t you use a straw for that?” “Have you ever drunk hot Milo with a straw? It makes it hotter. You have to have warm Milo to make it work.” *Workmate with lost look on their face* Workmate: “I had a can of Coke, and now I don’t.” Me: “Do you drink it with a straw?” Workmate: “No, it makes it too fast and my brain gets bubbly.” Wednesday Investigation officers, awful-cers or orifices? Thursday *thoughtful eating of blueberry muffins throughout the department* Me: “There is nothing that can't be solved with food arou...

I saw this marvelous advert and decided to send the seller an email offering to be Abigail's new Host. I am sure I can keep Abigail in line, as I did my very naughty Barbie when I was five! Dear Abigail’s Current Host I run the Fey Circles Relocation Service for Dolls. We offer a Protective Intermediary Service to human Hosts who are having their Doll extracted. When a Doll is being removed from Middle World, it is unwise to wait until The Circles call on you, especially if you do not have salt, milk and witch hazel on your person in the correct proportions. We seek to prevent injuries and loss of life. Abigail is due back to her Mother in less than a fortnight and we are so pleased we were able to locate you before the end of her allowed time in Middle World. I was the Host for Abigail’s sister, Barbie, around thirty years ago. She was similarly wilful and I kept her in line by keeping her naked under a cupboard and chewing her feet off slowly. She was a very acq...

It's almost The Midnight, and I am waiting for the third piece of news. The first half of today was flat and boring and grumpy. By lunchtime I knew the extreme grumpiness was simply The World warning me that she was sending me something very, very soon. I told my lovely lunch companion that something was coming. Over the last year I have developed some really excellent gut instincts that have only grown stronger and more correct over time. Sure enough, The World sent me two marvellous pieces of news, exciting news, news that has changed the shape and direction of my next five years or so. The World even added two supplementary marvellous pieces of insightful and encouraging feedback, designed to help me move forward very quickly. But somewhere out there, in the world, to one of my friends, a third, marvellous thing is happening. I look forward to hearing about it very soon indeed.

This blog has given me many things over the last eight years; feedback and friends being the most fulfilling. Any kind of feedback has always astonished and humbled me, because I write and post mostly for myself, I don’t often remember my blog has an audience (small as it is) at all. FEEDBACK Revisiting some of my writing has reminded me that I have fond wishes for my writing to travel and change with each reader. I would like just one line written by me to survive the apocalypse - although I hope it will be used by the right people! I would like at least one of my articles to be so subversive that it is banned by someone who likes banning stuff - although I have had a very unsatisfactory partial experience of that also. I would like to have someone disagree with me so violently that they need to write about it. Bear with A Head Cold (Reprise) is my most read blog post, and it has collected pretty much the only comment on the entire blog. I am incredibly proud that it ha...

AFTERNOON There are little girls all over the café, mostly about five years old, dressed in bright cotton dresses not that different to those of their mothers. The little girls are sending glittering streams of bubbles off into the breeze to catch the white-hot light of the descending sun. The bubbles drift over the volleyball court and through the players. Two dark and slender Islanders, both with the perfect proportions of models, and a classic sporty Perth girl with dirty blonde hair and a heart of gold. The rest are fifty-something Western Suburbs Dads in fabulous shape with yachting crew cuts. They still adopt that ‘older man’ walk though, shoulders back and leading with the stomach, except they have six packs. EVENING There are two little girls on the beach; one four years old, one four times four years old (well, four times four years old on the inside, twice that on the outside). They are fighting their daily beach fight, the fight for their feet. They both have very wi...

I admire, from a comfortable distance and usually in the shade, people who DO things. I don’t really DO things. I go places. I participate. Things are DONE by other people and I am there to cheer them on. I only actively DO something because it is a necessity, and usually I do it under great duress. No one has ever accused me of being an Action Woman. Except reading, I actually DO reading. I wish I DID more action things though. It would make me way cooler. Action is so attractive, so inspirational. It generates energy and moves the heart and the head of the onlooker and it is the reason tangible things are achieved in this world. I always feel I should be DOING more, so I admire people who DO things. On the other hand, I adore people who MAKE things. Mostly people who MAKE words DO things, because that is pretty much what I want to DO . Things I MAKE : JEWELLERY Usually plastic, always colourful, recently described by a friend as ‘rawr-I’m-going-to-eat-your...

I know a teacher who studies a new subject or skill every few years so she remembers what it is like to be a student and keeps her teaching fresh and responsive. I admire her for her dedication in following this inspirational theory, but I show considerably less commitment each time I try the same technique. I have a German dictionary, a beautiful jewellers tool set and two bicycles (among other abandoned, yet aspiration items) that bear witness to my love of new activities and my short attention span regarding anything that isn’t directly mentioned in Shakespeare. As a control freak with an eye for detail that … wavers … I used to hold an unhelpful belief that I knew stuff, a lot of stuff, and I coasted, unwisely, on that belief. Last year I started the year feeling in control of the usual stuff, the stuff I always felt in control of, and within about two months everything went seriously awesome. I was invited, repeatedly, through a new job, new friends and new information, to b...

MORNING The streets are deserted, as is fitting for the morning after a Perthwide party, and I join a peloton of MAMILs on West Coast Highway. They were the largest I had encountered yet, at least thirty strong, and I overtook them jauntily on an empty highway. Ten minutes later I was driving out of the carpark of a very expensive and very closed beach café and the MAMILs and I cornered together from different directions. I precipitated a wordless, deep throated call to travel down the line, warning that there was a tiny car occupying the tight corner! NOTE: MAMILs – Middle Aged Men In Lycra, or, Men Who Brunch (in Lycra) MIDDAY I was just turning to walk back down the beach when I saw him, a golden lion of a man with a classically good-looking face, bright blue eyes and gold streaked brown hair. He had a long, ideally muscled tan body with glistening gold hair over every inch. He wore perfectly fitting red shorts, thin enough to cling to all the right curves. I turned around...

I have spent the last few weeks asking people who their Heroes are and, most importantly, their Heroes who are not the same gender as them. It has been a small sample surveyed so far, but the blank looks that come from women asked about their male Heroes and men about their female Heroes genuinely surprised me, because my Heroes are not only of my gender. Anne Boleyn Jane Austen and William Shakespeare Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley Henry Tudor and his daughter Elizabeth Edith Wharton and Henry James David Attenborough and Stephen Fry There was one woman who topped almost everyone’s list of Heroes however, and for Christmas one of my inspirational friends gave me a book of her writing. Glancing through Come Be My Light , I immediately saw that Mother Teresa wrote her letters in a style very similar to one of my favourite poets, Emily Dickinson. The goosebump inducing revelation from Mother Teresa’s writing is that although she brought light and hope t...

So, there is going to be this play ...

There is a fearlessness to good writing that I am yet to fully embrace. I only write what I know, so if I write anything that is not about me, it is inevitably about someone real. And I am not fond of the idea of writing about someone I know purely from my point of view, because it somehow seems untrue to their history. There is a variously attributed (and edited) quote that suggests ‘mediocre writers borrow, great writers steal’. That idea sets my teeth on edge, but I must add more characters than just myself to my writing, so I frame each story of a friend within my own story, so it can clearly sit as my own experience of that friend, not some truth of their own, discreet life. A lot of my memories are about the quality of the light I travel into. When I drive back home from the farm, I usually come down Greenmount Hill into the sunset or into the dusk. I descend into orange or grey light, and my thoughts turn to orange or grey thoughts. Things to do, things to face, the work ahead...

Having really enjoyed Live Blogging with Guests for The Voice , I sat on Facebook for four hours and let anyone say anything about the Diamond Jubilee Concert. It was fun. Below are the best bits in my humble opinion. C + M: the queen is known to recycle outfits rarely (due to global financial crisis), but always has the same hand bag - i think she may have a gun inside? - She's So Mall ... it's Pandemonium in Pall Mall as Her Majesty drops two of the attackers before the Horse Guards even get their spurs into the flanks of their Chargers ... C: ROBBIE! The crowd will always go crazy for Robbie. He is kinda going Eminem right now. I can only think of a night in Kingston at McCluskys and the boys going crazy when a Robbie song came on, leaving the girls and and dancing with their arms around each other. Robbie! Prince Edward loved Robbie. Rob Brydon you legend, the man that I quote almost as much as Shakespeare. Rob doing Tom Jones! Shout out to the mighty Welsh! Haaaaaaaa...

My Live Blogging of The Voice has changed in the last four weeks and become a different animal altogether. From the second week I had lurkers interjecting occasionally, in the third week the comments were shaping some of my answers and this week the Live Blogging went the way of Joel's hair and became a herd of cats from Perth and Glasgow. But I would like to preserve the fun times, so here is the transcript, only lightly edited. Ah, and language warnings for my own writing. Claire wishes she could have tonight's Live Blog for Kevin, Alicia, Marlee and Iain read out by a Voice Over Artist to get the excitement really up there! I presume Keith and Joel will be performing - I am so looking forward to this! Iain Im in a pub in Glasgow waiting with bated breath! via mobile Claire You are the best! Marlee keith's turn to be orange! via mobile Claire Seal and Keith are in black, JOEL IS IN THREE ANIMAL PRINTS: in tiger striped hair, cheetah print t-shirt and leop...

So, the roundup from last week; all the songs reached the Top 20 in iTunes and the results of the votes for Team Keith and Team Joel are coming in. And Seal and Delta are going to sing their trademark songs with their Teams! Wheeeee. Oh no, Host is Not in Suit of Sex. It is a Sweet Suit though ... Seal is in Black, Joel is dressed as an Amish Man, Delta is in White and Keith is Skyping It In from the US! Team Keith's winners by Australian Public Vote are The Man with the Velvet Voice, Darren and The Interchangeable Blonde (her dress really is good), Brittnay. Keith hates that he is not there for his Team, but he loves them all and feels very close to them. Keith picks The Greek Goddess Diana, and The Shy Boy Adam. That strange man, Jimmy, is leaving ... Team Joel is up next and Big Red (that hair!) gets in with Australia's Vote - PHARQUE - the power of the Screaming Girls of Australia gets Edward Cullen/Robert Pattinson in. Sigh. Joel then selects Ben (he has no nickname fo...

One of Team Joel had to leave because she had done a Video Clip with Famous Sebastian. Naughty Girls start off the night. Seal's shirt is open to his navel (and he has fingerless white gloves on! They somehow look as if they attach to his shirt), Joel is going sleeveless again, Delta is finally in something skintight and black with boobs and a ponytail and Keith is being all darling in gray. Cute host in full-on three piece suit. Results from last week are coming in - Team Seal first. The winners from the Australian Public Votes are the Girl That Makes Seal Dance and The Girl That Needs to be Styled Way Better. Seal nominates (after a lecture) The Diamond/Feather Girl and The Other Sebastian. Team Delta wins The Russian and The Angel through with Australian Public Votes, and Delta (her foundation is too light for her neck, makeup FAIL) decides on The Backup Singer (because he moved Keith to tears) and then, after a really long speech, with The Singing Teacher. Christ, Team Ke...

Flâneuse watched the boy from the painting. The boy was solemnly assessing his coiffure, a mane unparalleled in Flâneuse’ interested observation. The boy from the painting darted his hands in, around, and out of the flames atop his crown in a sudden movement that spoke of the restraint necessary in taking his hair from unruly to half-tamed. Such hair must be treated as the finest pastry, the moment between perfection and destruction could rest in a fleeting pat. The boy from the painting rested his hands, and glanced at Flâneuse in the glass. Flâneuse rose slowly from the frame and brushed her ignescent tail around the boy’s ankle as they finished his toilet for the day. Photo Credit: The Sartoralist; On the Street ... Redhead, Paris With Thanks to Jennifer for the inspiration 22 September 2008

My fabulous American Pastry Chef Housemate, the awesome Kevin, has left the building and I miss our three-hour conversations, his cooking and the fact that you find out something new about him each time you talk to him. Kevin and I watched The Voice together and I promised to Live Blog on Facebook the episodes that he was missing by not being in the country. Seal tells me that ‘you're never going to survive (without Kevin) unless you get a little crazy’, so let's get this crazy Live Blogging party started ... The judges are singing - Joel in white sleeveless vest, Seal in a grey suit, Keith in grey marle t-shirt with drum kit print and Delta with braids and bronze sequinned long flowy gown. They are singing 'Sing' from My Chemical Romance. Why. Talking to the Judges as they settle in their red thrones, Seal is stroking everyone's ego and being messianic, Joel wants an Australian passport, Delta is being vague and Keith well, he was just cute. Seal's sweet...