LORELEI VASHTI
AUTHOR
My friend Vegan Jenny is one of the
most passionate people I’ve ever met.
Passionate for her children, her job
and her life, but it’s her passion for
veganism that I’m most in love with.
I’ve been vegetarian for 32 years, and I
often feel like the worst type of potential
convert. I’ve already become who I am,
but still, she gently persists. She sends
me links and recipes, and although I’ve
cut out a lot of dairy, I can’t call myself a
vegan yet. I got really sick from being vegan
at 18 and, probably out of defensiveness,
I sometimes push back on what I consider
the extremes of a vegan life. Her convictions
simultaneously excite me (about what the
world might be with more people like her
in it) and plunge me into despair (that I’m
not one of them). So her passion – the
thing I love most about her – is also the
thing I’m most challenged by. Isn’t love
funny like that?
NADIA HERNÁNDEZ
ARTIST
I have a strong love for my whole
family who, at this moment in time,
are all scattered around the world.
My grandparents are back home in
Venezuela,with the older members
of my family. Some of us are in Australia
and others are in Chile, Spain and the
US. They are sprinkled throughout the
world, part of what is now known as
the Venezuelan diaspora. When people
you have strong bonds with are not
present, what happens to love? Distance,
time and a dictatorship have all gotten in
the way of love between my immediate
family, but love is kind of like a glue,
I'm guessing – an invisible glue that
is super-elastic and very resilient; you
can't destroy it. This glue is made from
memories of traditions, celebrations
and moments together, and when those
multiply and are passed down and retold,
the glue only becomes stronger.BRUCE PASCOE
WRITER AND ANTHOLOGIST
My uncle, Alf Briggs, drove trucks, and
onthe weekend an Oldsmobile of the grey
undertakers like to have their suits. He drove
me deep into the eastern bush to pick up fi sh,
and we went to a little town called Mallacoota.
While he went for refreshments, I was left
on the point overlooking the Mallacoota
lakes. Typically, the point was named after
a murderer, but they were black, so the law
didn't think it counted. The water on the sand
flats was jade, and the islands slumbering in
the lake were brooded over by the blue dream
of Howe Range. I was mesmerised by a deep
and serene beauty and promised myself I'd
be back. It took me a little while, but soon
enough I returned to dawdle in kayaks and
beach myself in the gorgeous jade water of
a mellow yellow beach, drifting into a reverie
so deep it has never truly left me. Bar-tailed
godwits stepped over my becalmed paddle;
beach stone-curlews stared at me with giant,
mad golden eyes. Bury me with that paddle.six interesting humans share
stories from the heart.