Blogjune Day 8 - on musicals

Anybody who vaguely knows me will know how much I love musicals. If there's even just an opportunity to sing showtunes, then I'm in... I'm always the guy at the karaoke bar who'll inevitably be belting everything from Heaven on their minds to Part of that world.

So, on the weekend, I saw that my local cinema was showing the National Theatre's production of Stephen Sondheim's Follies, as part of their NT Live series. I'm familiar with quite a number of Sondheim's shows, but Follies was not one of them - with the exception of the songs 'I'm still here' and 'Buddy's blues', which were both standout performances. But, damn it, why does every Sondheim musical have to be so depressing? Sure, Phillip Quast and Imelda Staunton were both incredible on stage, but I stepped out the theatre feeling like my life was already over and all my youth had been wasted - all I had left were memories and regrets. Yep, it's that kind of Sondheim musical.

On the other hand, this Friday I have tickets to see In the Heights on the big screen. Now this is something that I'm really looking forward to, being the big screen adaptation of Lin Manuel Miranda's *first* Tony-award-winning musical (you know, before he went and wrote Hamilton). Yes, Hamilton is a intricately layered work of lyrical and theatrical genius, but In the Heights is still my personal favourite - it just has so much passion and heart... it's raw and honest, full of joy and fear and hope, with its central theme of community. I already know that this will be one of my favourite nights out at the movies this year - there will be much laugher and tears.

As for Hamilton... I'm definitely looking forward to seeing it live on stage next month. I just wish that it'd happened sooner - like six years ago when I was so obsessed with it and I had it playing on repeat for months. Part of me has definitely moved on, but hey, I'll probably be absolutely wowed by the choreography, set changes and surprise reinterpretations by the Aussie cast.

Finally, I myself am going to be in a musical soon. My first musical theatre production in... *counts on fingers* over 15 years! Though it hasn't been for lack of trying. The local community theatre scene is definitely a tightknit community, and I've been occasionally auditioning for a few years now with no luck... until now. So, if you're in the Canberra region, keep an eye out for Oklahoma! in October...

Blogjune Day 7 - my TBR pile

Continuing on yesterday's theme of catching up, I've spent much of the past year catching up on my "to be read" - or TBR - pile of books.

It would have been during last year's lockdown that I faced the fact that a large proportion of my bookshelf contained books that I'd never read. Whilst this certainly isn't unusual for many in my social circle, the librarian in me decided that enough was enough, and it was time for some proper collection management.

That is, either I read those books that I always intended to read, or off they go to Lifeline to sell at the bookfair.

The rules are simple:

• Pick up a book from the shelf that I haven't read
• Proceed to read the book
• If the book hasn't grabbed me by page 50, then I'm allowed to let it go in the box to Lifeline
• If, at the end of the book, I'm unlikely to ever read it again or recommend it to anybody - again, Lifeline.
• Otherwise, it can go back onto the shelf.
• Repeat
• Don't buy any more books in the interim (with a couple of exceptions, ie the next in a series that I'm reading comes out, or I'm at a book launch)

This has been a remarkably effective way of (a) motivating myself to read those books that I never got around to, and (b) realising why I was subconsciously avoiding that book!

I have recently reached the point where I've most of the 'fun' books on my TBR pile... Cormac McCarthy's The Road is still waiting for my attention, but for now I've started moving on to some of my non-fiction collection. After wizzing through Clara Bensen's No Baggage (a particularly nostalgic read, as we count the months before the international borders are likely to re-open), I've decided to take on something with more heft - The Fog of Peace, Jean-Marie Guehenno's memoir of his time as the Under-Secretary General for UN peacekeeping operations.

It's not a light read - especially for somebody like me who doesn't come from an international relations background - though after a while, I begin to get a feel for the blow-by-blow accounts of diplomatic issues in the international sphere, and definitely gain an appreciation for the sheer level of complexity in managing the many relationships involved. But something in his introduction that struck a chord with me was describing how he had come from an academic understanding of peacekeeping, and had a reputation as an intellectual, but needed to assert himself as a capable operator.

Something that I've thought a lot about these past years are these strange dichotomies that we often try to connect. Whether it's between between practice and theory, operational and strategic, support and substantive. For the longest time, I've worked in day-to-day operational roles, whilst trying to make the transition to something more strategic and influential. At the same time, there are plenty of times where I've been critical of those who make the big decisions, because they are based more around practical and operational efficiency rather than upholding idealistic principles of altruism and progressing cultural development.

Everything's all well and good in theory, until I'm the one who actually needs to carry it out - and I realise that by saying that, I'm sounding like an apologist for everything awful that's happening in the world - which is not my intention! So, instead, I'll end with a Hamilton quote: 'Winning is easy, young man. Governing is harder.'

Blogjune Day 6 - on catching up

I said that I'd catch up by Sunday night... here I am, in the wee hours of Monday morning, but I feel like it still counts. I often feel like I'm falling behind, and catching up.

I was out to dinner with my partner's family and friends, and I was struck by some comments around the importance of making the right career decisions that will help ensure a comfortable retirement. This was from somebody who was only a handful of years older than myself.

I felt that familiar pang of, "So, Andrew. How are you going with that, then?" How long will it be until I catch up with where I need to be to be able to retire comfortably by my mid to late 60s? Yes, I have a mortgage, a moderately sized superannuation - and a sizeable HECS debt - certainly not yet on track for where I "need" to be...

Then again, I feel like the goalposts are always shifting. I hear from those a decade younger than me who feel like they'll never be able to own property. For every person who I hear talk about putting extra money into their super, I hear about others contemplating taking out of the super to pay their daily bills and rent.

Part of me still aspires to try to aim higher, earn more, purely for the sake of being able to hang up my hat in 25 years and not have to worry about these things. But at what cost? If I'm comfortable now, somewhere in the middle, then why should I risk making my life more difficult or miserable, for a few dollars an hour more?

Then I think back to the years that I spent volunteering overseas. There's not a day that I look back and wish that I'd spent that time working in a regular job in Australia, earning more money, getting a mortgage sooner, putting more into my super, etc...

I realise that this is a position of massive privilege as it is. So why do I constantly feel like I'm still at a disadvantage?

Blogjune Day 5 - June 2020

 I don't think I'd blame anybody for not participating in Blogjune in 2020. Looking back on that month:

• More than two months into lockdown, and six months after my Dad died, I was just not in a good headspace.
• Also four months into a new job in a new organisation, in what felt like something of a trial by fire approach to learning a new role, and overcoming imposter syndrome regarding my writing and editing skills.
• I pretty much withdrew from most social media interaction - deleted my Twitter account, and vary rarely posted on Facebook. 
• I took time to develop some skills in amateur photography
  

My attempt at being arty

• Being in a full-time live-in relationship tested my ability to adjust and adapt to new domestic arrangements...
• I did a lot of cooking - more than usual.
• Finally, I committed to hiring a plot at the Canberra City Farm - a decision that brought a lot of hard work through the following months, but a good excuse to get out of the house, and develop a bit of a green thumb.

It was a horrendous month, to be honest. I was pushed to the limit, which I guess was the only way for me to learn when to step back, and find beauty and value in some of the simpler pleasures in life - an important lesson that has made the past year much more bearable in hindsight.

Blogjune Day 4 - June 2019

 Flashforward a year to June 2019.  A lot had changed...

• The month began with a mushroom-foraging adventure in a local pine plantations, using newfound foraging skills learnt at a workshop the previous week... 

Spotting the easily identifiable, and edible, saffron milk-cap mushroom.

• I was working for the same organisation, but in a very different role, and presented a webinar all about the Australian Web Archive
• The Broadway Cast Recording of Beetlejuice the Musical came out, and became my new musical obsession
• I went to Sydney to see the Vivid festival for the first, and so far only time.
• I bought tickets to travel to Athens for IFLA 2019 conference, along with a backpacking adventure around Romania.
• I was five months into a new relationship, which had quickly turned into a long-ish distance relationship, but worked surprisingly well. I developed a newfound fondness for the village life in the Southern Highlands every other weekend.

After what had felt like a challenging year in 2018, I was finally settling into something that felt like a comfortable pattern. My professional and social life was great, and I was still discovering new and wonderful things.

Blogjune Day 3 - looking back on June 2018

So, what *did* happen in June 2018 to break my four-year streak of blogging every June?

Looking back on my old emails and social media posts, I can glean the following things that happened:

• The month began a week into home ownership. As the month progressed, I slowly started discovering some of the issues with the apartment that could only become apparent after living in it for a number of weeks.
• This resulted in me spiraling into a mess of anxiety, entertaining notions that I'd made a poor decision and that I would be forever stuck with a crumbling piece of worthless property (which wasn't the case, but my brain couldn't logic in that particular moment).
• I'd deal with this situation by spending every Thursday evening at the Phoenix bar, belting out pop bangers at the weekly karaoke competition night.
• I came equal first at the grand finale, winning half a keg of beer's worth of a bar tab. Unfortunately, the Phoenix closed down in the following months, and whilst I drank a fair portion of this tab, never managed to finish it.
• I also performed at the grand final of the very first Canbeurovision song contest, with my song "Down like Chowne". I did not come last, which felt like an accomplishment in itself.

Who knew that my old scout uniform would still fit,
let alone come in handy for this occasion?

• I bought a lot of second-hand furniture online, and slowly my apartment started to feel like a home.
• I also learnt a lot about how plumbers work, and got to know my neighbours a bit better. By the end of the month, I was settling into an uncomfortable but stable level of security about my life choices in property ownership.
• In my job, I was doing simple but awesome stuff with my social media project, NLA50ppl, and had my conference proposal accepted to speak at the ALIA Information Online conference in 2019.
• I was also working with an international team with NPSIG, preparing what would be an awesome program of events at the IFLA 2019 conference in Kuala Lumpur.
• All in all, it was the best of months, it was the worst of months, one of those roller-coaster months, where I was at both my best and my worst.

Blogjune Day 2 - ghosts of blogjunes past

One thing that I enjoy about blogging is the ability to go back and read my past reflections that encapsulate a moment in my life. Yes, sometimes this can be embarrassing and cringeworthy, but it's a moment in time captured through words (and sometimes images and videos).

By the same token, Blogjune is a whole month captured in words. So, I thought I'd take this opportunity to look back at my past forays into Blogjune...

Whilst the tradition of Blogjune began back in 2010, when I think back to that year, it was the year that I first started to really disengage with the sector...

I didn't start officially participating until 2014, though it's interesting to note that in June 2011, I felt like I was on the verge of leaving the profession for good, and in June 2012, I was already back in a library job in Melbourne, and in June 2013, I was halfway through my first overseas AVID assignment, in Alotau.

June 2014: After a year of hopping between working overseas assignments in PNG and Vietnam, performing at arts festivals in Melbourne, and working casual public library shifts in-between, 2014 was the year that I was making my triumphant return to the library sector, managing a swish school library in the inner suburbs of Melbourne (again). June was a pivotal month for me - clearly I was having a lot of thoughts about whether this was right for me, and by the end of the month, I'd decided to give it all up, and move back to Vietnam to take up a 18-month contract with an NGO in Hanoi.

June 2015: A year later, and I was no longer in Vietnam! The role wasn't a great fit for my skills and experience, which happens, but I think I made the best of a less-than-ideal situation, and still have many positive memories of my time there. On the plus side, I'd been successful in a securing a place in the UN Volunteer program at the UN Mission in Kosovo as an Associate Information Management Officer. Through this month, I was still processing a lot of initial impressions of a new country, dealing with feelings of failure from my previous assignment not working out the way that I'd liked, and trying to maintain a balanced perspective of working in a developing country... clearly I was already mindful of my own mental wellbeing, and the challenges in managing it in these situations.

June 2016: Another year on, and I was coming up to the final month in my UNV contract. The first week comprised of me using up the last of my leave to travel around the UK, volunteering at the Hay Festival, and visiting lots of places on my bucket list, such as Cardiff, Stratford-upon-Avon and Oxford. I was also getting to the point where I needed to figure out which direction my career would continue - whether that would be in libraries or maybe another foray in development.

June 2017: Turned out, it was libraries. By June 2017, I'd finally ticked off another career objective, and secured an ongoing position at the National Library of Australia. It was also a month where I really started reengaging in the sector - I joined ALIA again, after a six-year absence, went to the New Librarians Symposium, and signed up for the ALIA Mentoring Scheme - all things that set me on the path that has led me to where I am now.

2018-2021: Blogjune fell by the wayside, but a lot has happened. I'll reflect more of these in coming posts.

However, it's interesting to note that June has, in many ways, marked some real turning points for me in the past. I wonder if June 2021 will be remarkable in a similar sense?