Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

Once upon a time there was a little village, situated in a small spot between a tidal river and the ocean. In a noisy world, it was a tiny triangle of peace.

The little town had a little shop and a little pebbly beach. Beyond the pebbly beach, if you walked to head of the river and turned left, there was a large expanse of white, sandy beach. The beach was almost always empty.

In a ramshackle old house just back from the sand dunes, there lived a little old lady.

Throughout her long life, she had lived in big cities and worked hard at a career. She had travelled the world and had loved dearly and passionately.

She had been called back to this little village, the village by both the river and the sea.

It had stayed with her throughout the years; she had never really left it behind. Her dilapidated house was her sanctuary, filled with memories of a long life, well lived.

Every day, the little old lady walked carefully down her steep gravel driveway to the river beach with all its little pebbles and turned left toward the head, where the river met the ocean.

When she reached the river head, she turned left and continued down the white, empty beach.

The roar of the ocean calmed her and the impossibly straight, unhindered line of the horizon comforted her. Here, there was only ocean and sky.

One day on her long walk, she encountered a large German Shepherd.

She was not afraid of the dog. She greeted him by ruffling his ears like an old friend.

They walked together happily to the end of the beach, up through the sand dune track towards home; the house on the hill. As always, it was lit with welcome and warmth.

The old lady walked slowly up her steep gravel driveway. She looked at the dog and he tilted his head sideways. His left ear flopped over at the top and his deep brown eyes were inquisitive.

The old lady ushered the dog inside and he settled himself immediately on the old, fluffy brown mat in front of the warm wood fire. It was almost like he had come home.

The house itself was filled with furniture and ornaments from days long past.

The old lady looked around and saw the skeletons of her past on each antique couch. Whispering ghosts lived in each room. She wasn’t frightened. They were old friends.

She imagined her younger self, naked and curled in the corner of the couch, as if enticing a lover. As she had when her skin had been soft and her eyes had been clear.

This time though, she was beckoning only to the dusty skeletons around her.

She decided to keep the dog.

The old lady and the dog spent many more years together, walking their daily walk and happy in each other’s company.

Finally one day, the old lady found she could no longer walk down the steep gravel driveway. She was too afraid her old bones would not allow her to trudge back up.

The dog looked at her and tilted his head.

The old lady decided to call her neighbour, Jill.

“I need a volunteer,” she said. “Can you please take my dog for a walk? I can’t take him myself and he so loves the beach.”

Jill was delighted the snobby lady from the house on the hill had asked her to take the handsome dog for a walk.

Jill was young and lonely in the cold, isolated little village with its pebbly beach and its threadbare shacks.

The house on the hill stood waiting, warm; its lights burning in welcome.

Her young legs walked easily up the old lady’s steep gravel driveway. She knocked on the glass-paneled door.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

I watch Jane demonstrate. “That looks scary,” I say. “I don’t want to do it.”

She smiles, looks at me quizzically and, is that a touch of frustration? “Sure, it’s pretty sensible to be scared, it’s a pretty stupid thing to do”.

I let the others go first. I watch them intently, their nervous comments and banter buffeting me like hip high surf.

It’s my turn. I wipe my hands on my leggings, take a deep breath and try to remember what Jane said. My hands clutch the bar. I spring up and my feet cross under then flick over the bar. I take my right leg off and behind the bar then stretch it up, straight. Flexing my foot hard, I bring it down slowly so my shins scrape along the bar until my foot lands. I put my left foot behind the bar and stretch it to the ceiling. My hamstring screams as I pull the foot down toward the bar. My butt starts yelling too. I remember to drop my hips and my foot gets closer to the bar. I watch the foot. There is nothing but my left foot. Get the foot on the bar. I repeat this and gradually something gives, until my left foot sits next to my right, the bar resting at the bottom of my shins. Breathe. I take my hands off the bar and, holding on to the straps, slowly, slowly, lean back and down, let go of the straps, and stretch my arms wide until I’m looking up at myself, hanging from a bar by my feet.

I’m hanging, from a steel bar, by my feet.

Oh Jesus I’m hanging from a bar by my feet. Oh shit, that hurts. What’ll happen if I stop flexing my feet, don’t stop flexing your feet, oh God that hurts, don’t stop flexing. Oh shit…

I fall.

Thankfully its only three and half centimetres onto my back on the mat. My classmates cheer. I feel that for a moment and glow.

Jane is enthusiastic. “That’s fantastic, that’s nearly a trick, you’ve got it, you’ve just got to…”

And the glow fades. I focus back on to what she’s saying. Next time I’ll try it without the guiding straps, aim for a five second hang, and walk my hands up the back of my legs to return them to the bar.

I take a deep breath, wipe my hands on my leggings, then walk up to the bar.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

Once upon a time there were three men of different sizes who worked at Wendl’s Department store during the depression. Harry, the tallest of the three, was the store manager. He was a mean, burly faced man who always carried a cane. He was known to wave it around should swaggies dare to venture into the illustrious department store. The second man was Samuel. He was a man of medium build who ran the men’s department. The smallest of the three was Frederick the dwarf. Fred’s role was to wander around the store telling jokes about his size in order to entertain the customers. One day, a tramp entered the store hoping to steel a tin of milo from the food department. Milo was the latest drink to hit the food scene and he was dying to give it a go. Unfortunately, Harry saw the swaggie, so he asked Fred to tell him to leave. Because of that, the swaggie jumped on Fred to make him disappear. He did this with such force, however, that Fred disappeared up his arse. The tramp knew he was in trouble so yelled out: “Help, I need a volunteer to pull this short arse out of my arse’’. Because of that, Sam appeared on the scene; he tried pulling Fred out but he would not shift. Harry then appeared and tried working him out with his cane but still Fred would not budge. It was then, that Sam grabbed the latest constipation remedy and forced some dates and senna leaves down the swaggies throat. Before long, Fred, covered in shit, burst out of the swaggies arse. When asked some days later about the ordeal, Fred said “that although it had been a mostly shitty experience, it had also been a very moving one”.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

Once upon a time there was a heavenly garden on the edge of a cliff that overlooked the churning sea. The garden was fertile, green and luscious, with all the promise of new blooms every spring. It was this way until it was bombed to smithereens in the war. The war came quickly but, like most, followed some rise in political and social upset, and naturally and dramatically changed the lives of everyone that lived thereabouts.

Now there is no green dewy grass that the sun shone off in the morning; there is rubble. There had been a small rose garden at one end of the larger shrubbery, which had been one of seventeen year old Thomas’ favourite places to relax in when the world became heavy on his shoulders (just as though he were Atlas). Thomas would lie back between the rows of roses – his colour preference to lie amongst leaned to the purity of the whitest variety – and look at the sky for at least fifteen minutes every day, creating in his mind superheroes and Gods from the cotton-ball clouds above, whilst breathing in the salty sea air that rose up and over the cliff. He lay appreciating the fact that his house even had a garden, and appreciating the roses particularly (as his Mother had informed him that “They are hard to grow in the silty, sandy earth near the beach and exposed to the cruel winds atop the cliff.”)

One day, many years ago, Thomas had just spotted a cloud he could only describe as ‘dog-tastic,’ when he heard a terrifying, long, earsplitting screech from somewhere above. Because of that, he immediately jerked his upper half upright to a sitting position, bending his legs into a mountain for balance. He realised that his left leg had fallen quite asleep (it protested the sudden change of circumstance via a strong bought of pins and needles). Ignoring this, Thomas craned his neck and turned his head to the right to lay his eyes upon the silver fuselage of a fighter jet that rushed fiercely toward him. The menacing sky-fish (as his younger sister called them) dropped the bomb, Thomas’ eyes in a state of disbelief as they actually followed the bomb coming toward him. His brain did not catch up. The plane had dropped its precious cargo, but dropped it in precisely the wrong location, and quite swiftly, killed both Thomas and all the beauty of the garden.

Because of this, the whole house and indeed many of the surrounding houses and gardens and the families that belonged in them ceased to exist in any way that they had previously been known. Years passed and the war raged over the clotted dirt and the broken bricks, the dust taking a human’s perception of eternity to settle, until finally, from the dust and clotted dirt and ruined lives, one small rose bud poked unassumingly up from the brown earth, and that is what is there today. This proves that life certainly goes on in some form, even if there is no audience left to acknowledge it.

That was the story of the larrikin Thomas’ demise, which to you may seem quite simple, plain and uncomplicated. But you don’t yet know Thomas and therefore surely cannot be expected to truly care for him or his family. So I guess I had better tell you just a little more about his life altogether…

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

My life got a little hectic, a little apoplectic.
I met a man, we formed a band and then I was subjected…..
To HIS story, his-story, repeats.
Abuse, neglect, respect.
I just had to find myself.
Through him, through me, we became three, and I’m glad to say….
We created, something sacred.
The happiness that originally occurred to me abated, but then returned.
When my self love and respect was reborn.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

As a child of Russian migrant parents the phrase ‘practice makes perfect’ was drilled into me from a very early age. Recently, I’ve had to learn the harsh but very valuable lesson that in fact, practice makes progress. Every step no matter how small is a meaningful achievement, regardless of where you end up. It’s action, it’s change, it’s growth.  Until now, I’ve always been trying to move from Point A to Point P(erfection) and guess what, I never got there. Because it doesn’t fucking exist.

I lost my way on the journey to ‘destination perfection’, and got sucked into a dark and horrible vortex of depression and anxiety. So now, I repeat this phrase every single day, in order to unlearn this paralysing perfectionism. Practice makes progress, practice makes progress, practice makes progress… The time I say this to myself the most is during my daily yoga practise which I’ve committed to in order to keep myself from getting sucked back in to the aforementioned vortex.

You’d think that this would be a time to relax and free my mind from daily stress but in fact it’s a battle ground between perfection me and progress me. “If your heels don’t touch the floor when you’re not doing down-face dog then you’re shit at yoga and you’re not doing it right,” I find myself saying. To which I promptly reply, ‘but they’re getting closer, don’t be so fucking hard on yourself, practise makes progress.”

So, whether it’s a short 20 min practise in my living room before work or a 75 minute sweat session at the studio after a long day, I know that it’s getting me from Point A to Point P(rogress) now, which is reassuring and brings me a lot more joy because I know that place actually exists.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

Is this rock bottom? Can life get any lower?  I ask. I’m standing, my legs beneath me and I am NOT huddled on the ground.   I have my children close by and I feel their warmth. I’m not at rock bottom, but I am in darkness. I long for the return of times when I used to sit by the glowing fire and feel the heat warm my body right to my fingertips, sipping coffee while listening to the laughter of my children rolling marbles across the floor boards. Once upon a time there were smiles, warmth and love around me. Now I feel their sadness and their need for closeness.

No, this is not rock bottom. As one day becomes the next I notice the peacefulness of the winter leaves brown and crumbled floating to the ground, after a year of being bright and green and supplying shade.  Yet I’m taunted by the memory of feeling someone else’s anger leaving the imprint of their hand across my cheek.  Leaving me uncertain, hungry and empty.  I long to once again hear the laughter of my children while resting by the flickering flames. My memories help me to hold my children close and feel their breathe on my cheeks. I find peace in the simpleness that we are together. We are no longer want for something more or fear something less. We live with a sense of freedom having nothing to look forward to and nothing to look back on. Although scared and alone I am free to step forward and take any path.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER. 

So I’m supposed to write something for 5 minutes and I start out like it’s a race, more fool me cos then I just have to write more! Who am I racing anyway? It’s not like I can get to 5 minutes any faster. My hand starts to cramp instantly as the frustration of 20 years of no writing tries to burst through my pen and write the greatest free form five minutes of all fucking time. Better back off a bit, don’t want to pull a finger muscle on my first day as a writer.

I resist the urge to look at the person’s page beside me, her handwriting is probably better than mine, she definitely looks like she has her shit together in life, hair brushed and not fat. Already two steps ahead of me – no way am I looking at her handwriting. Man I really have to pee. That spare plate from morning tea sitting there is really annoying me. I’m pretty sure this writing would be better if that plate wasn’t there impeding my creative flow, I don’t know why I don’t just move it. They say life is about working within your constraints though. Oh fuck it I’m moving it.

Okay I just moved it, seriously need to pee though, I’ve had ALL morning to go any time I want and now that I’ve been given a task to write for 5 minutes straight, suddenly my bladder decides it’s the middle child and needs immediate attention. Has it been 5 minutes yet? My writing didn’t get any better from having moved that plate.

Oh I haven’t thought of what my word is that I should write when I can’t think of anything to write, maybe I’ll just write ‘I can’t think of anything to write’. Honestly all I can think about is how good it would be to go to the loo right now, sweet relief! Wonder what everybody else is writing? Are they writing awesome stuff or just how they’re busting to pee like me, am suddenly finding myself both petrified and exhilarated at the thought of being asked to read these out at the end of the activity. Oh fuck who cares? I’m feeling pretty fucking happy with myself that I’m writing ‘fuck’ without getting in to trouble! I love being able to swear, not allowed to at work, I mean I like work, I can go to the toilet anytime there, no 5 minute fucking bladder lock downs for one thing. Sadly swearing is not allowed, at the very least it’s frowned upon. Maybe I could lead a double life of working in a non-swearing corporate job by day and being a crass writer by night! Fuck I’d be a hero then, I’d be fucking Batman, Batman with a catheter so I can write without stopping to piss, but Batman nonetheless.

Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.