Category: Personal
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The Instant Facilitator
Apart from school debating and one lecture presentation, nothing prepared me for my debut as an instant facilitator. I was an attendee for a computer user conference at the World Congress Centre Melbourne at Crowne Plaza. As part of the Queensland branch of the group, I had been asked to introduce each speaker and then…
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Laughter Yoga
It was the photo of the kookaburra that reminded me. But it wasn’t the kookaburra’s laugh! Our kookaburra laugh : the one we did as a group… At laughter yoga : a group activity where people gather and voluntarily laugh until they don’t have to!!! But how did I find it? By accident. It’s 2004 and I’ve hurt…
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Does The Pen Hear More than the Keyboard?
“I probably won’t be using that.” It wasn’t a derisory or demeaning disclaimer. Just a calm statement: this is not for me. I never was much of a software salesman anyway. I had livened up a not-so-interesting training session by describing an upcoming software feature. It may or may not be in the next future…
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Two Views for the Price of None
I’m running downhill towards the railway station. I cock my wrist to see the time on my watch. It’s too close to 12:45pm for my liking. But I put my head down and keep running. I can hear my feet and my heart pounding as one. I slow down, get my student pass out. All…
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That Love of Loves
I still don’t know how that motorcyclist didn’t hit her. And me too I suppose. Every so often I stop and wonder why. Considering what happened to her later. I just shake my head and muse upon the two memories I have of her. We were standing at a bus stop. Near the Old Treasury Building in…
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An Unusual Visitor from Another Time?
It was a slight tap, so soft I could barely tell. Perhaps the venetians had touched the window in another room. I stretched out with my book and waited. No, there it was again. Perhaps a visitor. I stood up from my desk. I pushed back the chair. I stole to the front door and…
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Where Is My Laptop?
I got the phone call about five minutes before the meeting was due to start. Someone important needed a laptop set up for a presentation. Knowing the type of laptop and the meeting room setup, I knew it would be easy, just plug the laptop in and the screen would show itself in seconds.…
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Death Knock : The Name Has Just Been Released
It’s like it happened in the next room a few moments ago. That is how clear the memory is. I’m ten or eleven. My dad is the editor of the local paper : the Kiama Independent. We’re (five children and two parents) living on top of each other in a three bedroom house. Which left everybody…
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I Grew Up A NewspaperMan
I grew up a newspaperman. My dad was the editor of the Canowindra Star, the local paper in Canowindra New South Wales. He wasn’t the grizzled editor from central casting : think of Perry White in Superman or Benjamin Bradlee in All the Presidents Men. No, he was my Dad (Kevin Whalan) : as he describes…
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Don’t Blame the Media
I arrived at work last Saturday. In the corridors, I heard the cleaners talking about the Paris attacks. I went into the tea room and the TV was showing a rolling coverage. I stopped and watched but as time was short I left. After I finished my training session, I checked the latest news. I…
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I Read a Poet
Time should be standing still. It’s four o’clock on a Saturday afternoon. The soft pre-spring sunlight is warming and relaxing. Around me children are jumping and running on stone walls and grass nearby. Yelling and shouting and sometimes falling : any of whom could land on me. I vaguely notice that they’re playing with foam mats. I…