June 30, 202 · Episode 73
1 Hr, 0 Min, 53 Sec 

Summary

What’s the difference between making art and living artistically? And could that difference be the thing holding you back?

This week Lyndon brings a topic Breallyn hasn’t heard — a portrait of someone who never called herself an artist, but created more than almost anyone he’s known. It turns into one of the most personal episodes they’ve made.

They also somehow end up at futons, icebreaker questions, and the undercover security guard at Myer. It’s that kind of conversation.

You might want to listen if:

• You’ve quietly stopped calling yourself creative
• You wonder whether what you make is “serious” enough to count
• You’ve lost someone whose way of living still teaches you things
• You’re carrying guilt about not creating enough

Pain In The Arts is a weekly Australian podcast about creative life — as it happens. Hosted by Lyndon (musician, studio owner, producer, guitarist) and Breallyn Wesley (copywriter, Masters in Creative Writing, writing her debut novel). One of them never knows the topic until recording begins.

Love this conversation? Get exclusive podcast episodes on our Patreon and support the show!

Transcript

Lyndon: What do you say when someone goes, “How’s your week been?” Or, “Have you been busy?” Or, “What have you been up to?” Do you have, like, a standard thing that you say, or do you have a rehearsed thing that you have in case someone asks you? Or is it something you never have to think about?

Breallyn: Oh, no. It’s always such a difficult question to answer.

Lyndon: Shouldn’t it just be like we’re humans and we can —

Breallyn: Just talk? ‘Cause it’s just a greeting, isn’t it? It’s a polite greeting.

Lyndon: It depends on the context. Like, if they come into your home.

I’ll tell you what I don’t wanna do, ’cause I have been doing it a bit lately, even when my brain says, “Don’t do it.” So someone comes over, “How’s it been going? What you been up to this week?” I’m like, “Had a migraine last night.”

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: I don’t wanna be that person.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And I was that person.

Breallyn: No.

Lyndon: You know?

Breallyn: Depends who it’s —

Lyndon: No.

Breallyn: Who’s asking, like —

Lyndon: I know. Yeah. But I don’t — it’s just, like, I don’t know. I don’t wanna —

Breallyn: It’s such a tricky one.

Breallyn: Like, I find that very rapidly my brain goes through a whole list — it’s kind of like prompts and criteria for answering the question. So at first I’m like, “Don’t say fine or busy.”

Lyndon: Yeah. That’s true.

Breallyn: Also, who’s asking? So what context it might be in. Because one of Birdie’s therapists might be saying, “So how’s the week been?” So they don’t actually care less how my work week is going, or — well, not that they don’t care less, but it’s not relevant to them how my work week has gone or any other things in the family. What they’re asking is, how has Birdie’s week been? What’s been happening that’s of relevance to her life, and specifically to what’s been — what our kind of therapy is.

Or else it might be a parent at the school, or it might be an actual friend, or it might be a work colleague. Do you know what I mean? So all of a sudden I’m trying to assess what can I say that is interesting and relevant and actually provides them with some information that they might, A, need, or B, be interested in, or, you know, C, will be a springboard for further conversation.

But also, I filter it through — if it’s somebody that I actually really wanna find out how they are, or I think it’s gonna be more important to find out what’s happening in their life, I’ll do something like, “Yeah, everything’s been great, but what about you? How’s things been?”

Lyndon: Yeah, you’re good at that.

Breallyn: “How did that thing go?” You know?

Lyndon: You’re good at that, whereas someone says to me, “How are you going? How’s your week been?” I go — well, this is what I did the other day. Yesterday someone asked this of me. And I said, “Pretty, pretty good.” And then I thought —

Breallyn: Yeah, ’cause I — like a villain in a Bond movie.

Lyndon: No, it’s like a — you know, Curb Your Enthusiasm. It’s a Larry David thing. But, you know, I’ve always said “pretty good.” Everyone’s sort of stock standard answer is “pretty good” or “not bad.”

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And then you do come across people that make a point. Remember Big Steve? Yeah. He would really make a point of saying something that was very uplifting.

Breallyn: Yep. He’d go, “Fantastic.”

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: “It’s been great. What a week to be alive.”

Lyndon: Yeah. And you knew sometimes — not that he was lying, but you knew that, you know, like he was just a normal bloke. Do you know what I mean?

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: He didn’t own, like, 30 homes and have a yacht and everything was fantastic. But yet he didn’t want for anything more.

Breallyn: No. He was very, yeah, good at enjoying life and being like — I dunno, just yeah, seeing all the blessings and all the great things. Yeah. “How are you, mighty man of valor?”

Lyndon: That’s what he would say.

Breallyn: Yeah, that’s how he would greet you.

Lyndon: Whereas in my situation the other day, I’ve gone, “Pretty good,” when asked the question. And then I went, “Actually, I’ve been great.” And they went, “Oh, you upgraded to great.” I said, “Yeah.” But then walked off. Didn’t ask them how they were.

Breallyn: You need to channel the Big Steve greeting.

Lyndon: But you know what? It’s like a lot of things. I’ve kind of gone, you know — I’m middle-aged now. I’ve tried for a long time. There’s no point.

Breallyn: That is just so rubbish. And talk about give yourself an out. No, no, no, no. You don’t get to do that one.

Lyndon: I’ve tried too hard.

Breallyn: No.

Lyndon: Anyway, I remember Dad, years ago, said to me, “You know, instead of asking someone what they do for a living” — you know how that often comes up? Like in social situations where you might not know the person you’re talking to.

Breallyn: Mm.

Lyndon: And it’s like, “So what do you do?” And he was like, “Rather than ask that, ask them how their week’s been.” He goes, “It’s a bit more personable. A bit more interesting. And it’s not like you’re just sort of getting an answer of what they do so that you can make up your mind about them or judge them on what they actually do.”

So it was more to do with who they are rather than what they do.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And I used to — yeah, so I was like, that’s actually really good. That’s nice. And I’ve always done that. But over time I’ve discovered that it feels like everyone does that. But it just depends who, where you’re mixing, I think.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: ‘Cause there’s definitely some situations I’m in where I’m dying to know what that person does. Like if you’re at a wedding or something.

Breallyn: Yeah, it’s one of the common kinda questions.

Lyndon: It probably doesn’t matter if you’re not gonna see someone again. Or what about if you’re at, like, a conference and it’s a specific thing? You might wanna know where someone fits in the company and all that. Like if you don’t ask some of the actual sort of normal questions — like icebreakers — you’ll walk away none the wiser as to anyone you’ve met and whether, you know, someone might be good to have in your circle.

Icebreakers and Awkward Meetings

Breallyn: I watched a reel the other day — it was like a Zoom call and there was four people on the call. And then it was like a new manager with a new team, and he started out by saying, “Oh, hey, let’s start out with an icebreaker.”

Lyndon: I hate icebreakers.

Breallyn: And he asked the icebreaker question which he’d made up, and it was something bizarre like — what’s the most influential fruit that you’ve eaten? Or something stupid like that.

Lyndon: An influential fruit?

Breallyn: Yeah, something completely nonsensical.

Lyndon: I wish that was the question.

Breallyn: I don’t think it was that, but it was something like that. And then he just sat there going, “All right, look, I’ll go first to, you know, make it easier.”

Lyndon: Banana.

Breallyn: And then he was just sitting there going — “influential.” Oh, I — now I know I asked this question, but I’m a little bit stumped by it. And he just sat there for — was this a real recording?

Yeah, like it was, you know, when you have a call and you record it.

Lyndon: So it was a real real, not a fake reel?

Breallyn: No, it wasn’t fake. It was like a real recording of a meeting with a team, and he just sat there for like three or four minutes trying to figure out the answer to his own question. And then at the end he was like, “I don’t think I can think of anything.” And then very rapidly the other three people just left the meeting.

Lyndon: Why not?

Breallyn: Yeah. If this is what our time’s gonna be used for.

Lyndon: I feel like that’s exactly what meetings were like when I worked at Myer, like in the menswear department.

Breallyn: Oh, yeah?

Lyndon: That’s exactly what it was like, where I’d just be sitting — but you’re in a room.

Breallyn: Yeah, you can’t just, like, walk —

Lyndon: Out easily. You’re in, like, effectively a cupboard with the manager and like one of the women who’d be like — “So what’s their relationship?” And, “Why am I sitting in here being asked what my most favourite fruit is,” or whatever the —

Breallyn: The most influential fruit you’ve ever eaten.

Lyndon: I think the question was, “So, where do you see yourself in three years?” Or something like that. And I was like, “Not here.”

Breallyn: They weren’t happy with that answer, I bet.

Lyndon: How long do you reckon I had that job for?

Breallyn: Eight months.

Lyndon: Eight months of folding jeans.

Breallyn: Yeah. Surprised you lasted that long, really.

Lyndon: The most interesting thing about that job was the undercover security guy.

Breallyn: Mm.

Lyndon: He was probably about — I was a lot younger then, so he was probably only 50, but he seemed about 75. And his job was just to pretend that he was shopping. So he would just wander, loiter around and —

Breallyn: Watch out for shoplifters, essentially.

Lyndon: Mm. A very unassuming sort of guy, kinda dressed like your father or your grandfather. Like, you were just not — and yeah, I saw him catch a few people shoplifting, but I was like, “Man, that’s such an easy job.” It just looked more interesting than the job I was doing. ‘Cause I had to stick to my department.

Breallyn: He got to wander around and actually check out the new merch.

Lyndon: Yeah. And then years later, we went to the same shopping centre and we happened to be in Myer, and I saw him and I got way more excited than I should’ve. ‘Cause I knew who he was. It’s like, that’s not a real shopper.

Breallyn: Did you try to act a little bit suspicious so that he’d —

Lyndon: You were there.

Breallyn: Oh. Yeah. Was I acting suspicious? I feel like it’s — one of the stupid things we would’ve done is, like, pretend we were about to do a heist or something and —

Lyndon: I tried to get you thrown in jail. But you’re still here.

Breallyn: Damn, fail.

Lyndon: Yeah, yeah.

Lyndon: Welcome to Pain In The Arts, where the pursuit of meaningful art meets the unpredictable demands of real life, and where one of us finds out today’s topic the same moment that you do.

Breallyn: That’s right.

Lyndon: You’re listening to Lyndon.

Breallyn: And Breallyn.

Lyndon: My other half. I’m pretty sure that’s the saying.

Breallyn: Much better half.

Lyndon: Is it the better half? You gave me an anniversary card this year that said, “From the best decision you’ve ever made.” Yeah. I couldn’t argue with it. Mind you, I put it on the — I put it on the bedside table, which you refurbished.

Breallyn: I didn’t do much. I cleaned it. I did nothing really.

Lyndon: No, you did put some wax on it. You know what you did put in there? Treats in a bowl.

Breallyn: I did. Little treats. I actually — and I did drawer liners. I definitely cleaned it and, yeah, did like a minimal wax.

Lyndon: I had to put a perfumed candle in there — not lit, just to get rid of the — ’cause it smells like it’s from a deceased estate.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Most old furniture has a — so when I go to bed, and when I get up in the morning, the smell that’s there is the smell that I associate with a really old person. And so it makes me feel old. But anyway, the card — I put it on the book that you put there as part of your stylings when you said, “Happy birthday. Here’s the deceased estate thing I got on Facebook Marketplace for free.” And I was so very grateful.

Breallyn: Until you opened it.

Lyndon: No, until I looked at the book that you put there as I’m trying to go to sleep, with you not in the bed, ’cause, you know, you have to sleep with Birdie most nights.

So I lay my head down on the pillow and I look across, and the book is For the Term of His Natural Life. So I’ve got this book you’ve put there, a little bit of a passive aggressive kind of — you want me to call you the better half. So this book says, “For the term of his natural life,” and on top of it is a card going, “From the best decision you’ve ever made.” For an anniversary. And I’m like, “What’s happening here?”

Breallyn: Yeah, you know, sorry, I didn’t even realize. It was just — I always buy books with old covers, cloth-bound books. I love old books and old stuff.

Lyndon: Subconscious.

Breallyn: Just as well. It’s that saying that people go, “You get less years for murder,” or something.

Lyndon: Isn’t that what people say? I’ve never said that.

Breallyn: For the term of your natural life, that’s what you get now.

Lyndon: I’m just saying what the book said. I mean, of all the books in the world, this is what I’m thinking. Of all the books in the world you could’ve put there. What about either of the three I’ve read?

The Shiralee — now that would’ve been appropriate.

Breallyn: Have you read that?

Lyndon: Of course I’ve read it. Well, I watched the movie. Bryan Brown.

Breallyn: No, have you read the book?

Lyndon: Can’t remember exactly. I think I have. And I’ve definitely read Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And Vixen Blixen. Is that bad? Oh, gosh.

Justine’s Pancake Tradition

Lyndon: All right, I’m gonna take us back to a time — tell me if you remember this, ’cause I don’t remember what it was called, but you will remember this for sure. Easter breakfasts at Justine and Phil’s home.

Breallyn: I do remember those.

Lyndon: Yeah, yeah. What’s your memory of that? I was thinking about this the other day.

Breallyn: Well, I remember — so Justine is your sister, and Phil is her husband. And we’ve mentioned before on the show, Jussy passed away four years ago. But back in the day, when they lived a couple of suburbs away from us, and all our children were very young, they started a really cute tradition about Easter Sunday. Was it? No, it was Easter Friday, wasn’t it? I think it was.

Lyndon: You’re asking the wrong guy.

Breallyn: Actually, I’m fairly sure it was Easter Friday. And —

Lyndon: Which I think’s commonly known as Good Friday.

Breallyn: Yeah, okay, Good Friday. But I remember we would — or you would bring our coffee van and make coffees for everyone.

Lyndon: Oh, yeah. You know, I literally forgot about that. But I think also there was a time — she would’ve started this probably before we had the coffee van.

Breallyn: Yeah, maybe a year or two before.

Lyndon: And I was like, “Thank goodness I got the coffee van now. I can actually have some good coffee.”

Breallyn: Yeah, and it just made it — yeah, a bit more of an event. And everyone was welcome. Like, anyone. It was a lot of people from our church and that kind of thing, just friends, neighborhood people. And everyone brought their kids. Yeah. And Jussy and Phil would make up heaps of pancakes, and then we would often bring toppings, like strawberries or chocolate syrup or maple syrup or that kind of thing, and all the kids would play. And I’m sure there were Easter eggs as well, but yeah, pancakes and coffee is what I remember.

And it was usually a bit cold, but still nice enough weather. Just a really good time to get together.

Lyndon: Yeah. And actually, it would’ve been Good Friday, ’cause isn’t that a thing, that people do pancakes on Good Friday?

Breallyn: Yeah, I think it is. Yeah. I was thinking Hot Cross Buns, maybe.

Lyndon: Hot Cross Buns.

Breallyn: Yeah. When are they? I don’t know. When do people just have fish? Is that every Friday if you’re Catholic?

Lyndon: That’s — is it definitely Good Friday? But yeah, I don’t know. We weren’t having fish. We were having pancakes.

Breallyn: For breakfast, yeah. And but there’d be lots of pancakes being cooked.

Lyndon: Yep. And lots of different toppings, and there’d be all sorts of things to put on them.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: I’m kind of a cinnamon sugar or lemon and sugar sort. I keep it pretty simple.

Breallyn: I mostly remember spending time with all the kids and, you know, our kids having time with their cousins — Phil and Jussy’s girls — which was really, yeah, just special.

And knowing that we were creating special memories for the kids, that was such a big part of it. We were at a stage in our lives where we were quite intentional about making sure the cousins got a lot of time together as children so that they would have that special connection and have those memories.

Lyndon: Yeah. And over the years, like it only took a few years and it just became an event, didn’t it? Like anything like that starts out of, “Hey, do you wanna just come over to our place and have the, you know, we’ll do pancakes and hang out.” And then it was more people, and then more people.

And their home wasn’t that big either. It was actually quite small. So everything would sprawl out to outside. There’d be people in the lounge room, in the kitchen, in the —

Breallyn: In the —

Lyndon: Garage —

Breallyn: Kids in the garden.

Lyndon: If it was open, depending on the weather.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Yeah, the kids would be messing around in the garden or the sandpit. And other memories have popped up too, on Facebook, when you see your kids when they were young, like, running around.

What Justine Always Knew

Lyndon: I’m titling this topic, “Here’s what Justine already knew.”

Breallyn: Oh, okay. Yeah, cool.

Lyndon: Here’s what Justine already knew. She was, in my mind at the time, and in retrospect too, a person that lived a creative life, and she just did it. Like, she wasn’t creating things and looking for — she wasn’t necessarily interested in people’s opinions on it. She wasn’t doing it so that she could get a pat on the back. She wasn’t doing art or living that way for anyone but herself and her family and her friends, and it was just part of what she did.

And if you think about, maybe, your memories of some of the actual art things that she would do — my memory of it is it was crafty and homely, and if she did happen to do a painting or something like that, it always felt like it was whimsical almost, or in my mind it would fall into, like, the folk art kind of thing. But a lot of the stuff that she did was either practical or it would be around cooking. She’d always be trying different recipes.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And if it didn’t work out, it’d just be a point of comedy.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: You’d just laugh about it. Like, she wasn’t afraid to bring over a dessert that hadn’t worked.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: You know? Things like that. What else do you remember?

Breallyn: She definitely had all of those things, and she was quite spontaneous with whatever she did. Like, it wasn’t like she would be planning a painting or a craft thing, you know, a quilt or something like that, for months or weeks, and then collating everything, and then starting.

It was more like think it, do it, see if it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t matter. She kind of had a joyful approach and didn’t take it too seriously. It was more about the process and the enjoyment of trying something rather than seeing whether the outcome was something to be showed off or not.

Lyndon: I think there was sometimes, depending on what it was, some impatience.

Breallyn: Quite a bit of that.

Lyndon: Sometimes when you’re spontaneous about something and then you realize that, oh, this isn’t going as planned, you’ve got licence to just go, “You know what? That’s good enough for now.”

Breallyn: I do remember we were cleaning out her — she had, like, a little back shed. It was kinda like a little lean-to shed thing, and it was her, like, creative room. And I mean, as you said, their house wasn’t big. And they were renting this place, and it was a very wonky old Coburg house. Like, you know, literally — when our kids were all learning to walk, they’d all trip over or fall because the floor was so wonky. There’d be slopes in and out of the bedrooms and stuff. But it was very, you know, really cute house, lots of character.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: The little back shed was set aside for Jussy’s projects and creative stuff. And I remember when I was over helping pack stuff up when they were moving out, and there was a bunch of just projects shoved in the back, like — oh, yeah — you know, half-abandoned and half-done. Just because that’s what crafting life is like, I suppose.

You start something. You go, “I’m gonna take up sewing or knitting this thing,” or whatever. I’ve got a bunch of those things as well.

Lyndon: But even when you go to, like, an artist’s studio, like often it is that sort of environment, you know? Even some musicians’ studios. But when you go to a gallery, you can kinda get the idea that artists are really, like, neat freaks, and everything’s so ordered and so deliberate — it’s all framed. You might be shocked to actually see what things look like behind the scenes.

Breallyn: Yeah. What things look like.

Lyndon: Yeah. And there can be all sorts of things going on before the work is realized.

But yeah, she did have that shed. My memory of it was like — was this a former chicken coop? Like it was — do you know what I mean? Yeah. Like you said, like a lean-to.

Breallyn: Yeah. And it was sort of this big vine kind of covering it.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: And it sort of gave that impression like, is the vine pulling it down or holding it up?

Lyndon: Yeah. It wasn’t propped up against the house like an actual lean-to.

Breallyn: I remember — yeah, as I said, Jussy was very joyful in the things that she did, and Phil shared a cute story at her funeral about one day he’d come home from work and Jussy and the girls had been collecting snails from the garden ’cause it was raining.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: And then painting their shells, like painting colors all over their shells. And Jussy just having a big laugh about how they’re setting them free and the neighbors are gonna be nicely surprised when those snails rock up in their garden.

Lyndon: Yeah. It was actually like her having the girls was a really good — oh, what would you call it? It just gave her more licence to be creative, and she could sort of spread her wings that way.

Breallyn: Yeah. And lots of very practical and day-to-day child-raising things. We used to get together and cook and do crafts with the kids. We had a moms group, you know, where we’d be bringing creative projects for all the moms to do together — to make a bag to take home for your kid’s library book or just different things like that. We did screen printing and just heaps of stuff. Yeah, we were always doing something.

Lyndon: It wasn’t like she was ever a person that would be sitting around going, “We need to do something creative, or we need to do something with the kids. What on earth could it be? Let’s just get a DVD.” She was never out of ideas.

Breallyn: She always had — no, she always had ideas. And always just ideas. We used to talk about things a lot, like what can we do, especially for our moms group, or like, you know, school holidays are coming up, do you wanna get together? And, like, oh, what did I have the kids doing? Making puppets, we made swords, wands, all sorts of things. Just making stuff.

But Jussy’s Instagram handle was CreativeJus.

Lyndon: Oh, it was too. Yeah.

Breallyn: Yeah. And I think it wasn’t like she was walking around identifying herself as, “Hey, I’m a creative person.” It was just more like the outpouring of this is who she genuinely always was. And she didn’t need a whole lot of money to do it.

Lyndon: She just needed some snails and some —

Breallyn: Yeah, some paint — old face paints or whatever. Yeah. And the things, the bits and pieces that she’d collect in order to make stuff were from the op shop or discards, you know, stuff put out on the nature strip as junk and things like that.

The Nature Strip Garden

Lyndon: I actually did wanna talk about the nature strip now that you bring it up.

Breallyn: I love a nature strip crawl.

Lyndon: If you go to the street where she used to live, there’s a little garden that she would attend to, or that she created, on the opposite side of the road. And it’s right on the nature strip, isn’t it?

Breallyn: It is. Like, I think their street — and they had a great little neighborhood community over the couple of streets surrounding.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: But I think they were given a very small grant from the council.

Lyndon: Is that right?

Breallyn: Yeah, and then they together kind of figured out what they wanted to do. I think the council might have chipped in for some of the plants and the mulch or something like that.

Lyndon: And wasn’t there a, like, a birdbath that my other sister made?

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: A mosaic?

Breallyn: Yeah, your other sister got into mosaics at some point, and she was decorating, yeah, old basins and even —

Lyndon: Like from the ’50s kind of thing.

Breallyn: Yeah, like just abandoned bathroom stuff, and turning it into garden sculptures or useful sort of pieces.

Lyndon: Yeah, she was, um, fascinated with Michael Leunig, who is a famous — he’s Melburnian, isn’t he?

Breallyn: Yeah. Pretty sure, yeah. He’s like a cartoonist, or a satirist really.

Lyndon: Yeah. But he has some characters that are very stylized, and —

Breallyn: Famous for his ducks and things like that, which I think both your sisters really connected with in some way.

Lyndon: Yeah, we had a couple of ducks. Lucky Ducky. Yeah, so that garden there — that’s still there.

And I think what that garden shows is actually the sort of community mindset too that Justine had. And when I say community, I mean her very immediate community. And I think Coburg, at least it was — I’m not sure now — but it lent itself to that.

Breallyn: Yep.

Lyndon: You know, you could sort of walk to the schools, you could walk to the shops.

Breallyn: Yep. People are sharing their sourdough starters and, you know, extra zucchinis that they’ve grown.

Lyndon: Yeah. You can walk to Sydney Road, catch a tram all the way into the city, that kind of stuff.

Breallyn: Yeah. There’s Asian groceries and Middle Eastern spice stores and fabric stores and lots of op shops and that kind of vibe. That’s right.

Lyndon: So it’s quite conducive, I think, to sort of finding your people.

Breallyn: Yep.

Lyndon: And getting a probably good cross-section of the community there as well. And so the way that she lived creatively just permeated through all of these different activities.

And I think that garden is a good example of where Justine was never sort of looking to create something artistically and put her stamp on it and go, “This is my work.” That’s not what she was about.

And I hadn’t actually thought about her Instagram being CreativeJus as well. But it is a nice little reminder of her and the community that she did have. It’s quite nice and very different to, you know, sometimes you see a park bench and it’s got someone’s name on a brass —

Breallyn: Yeah, a little plate.

Lyndon: Plate. And it’s like, in memory of, or whatever. It’s nothing like that. It’s just there’s this little garden.

Breallyn: Little garden. I think there’s herbs there, so if you need some thyme or some rosemary for your roast dinner, you can just go pick it.

Lyndon: People still nurture it and —

Breallyn: Care for it. Yeah, I think so. Last time I went past, I took one of her daughters there when she came down. They live in New South Wales now. But yeah, we did a little bit of a tour around all of the old places — the old op shops and the schools and all the little cafes and the library and things that Jussy would always take the girls to.

And we just kind of went around and did all those spots, and that’s where we ended up, at the house and where that garden was. And we picked some nasturtiums, I think, and a few little things. Just a really special place to visit, ’cause it actually feels like even though it’s not a memorial garden, it has that feel about it.

And I know your other sister has also visited it as if almost visiting a cemetery or something like that. Like, it’s that kind of — I’m going to visit Jussy, you know, at that place. Yeah.

Redefining What Art Means

Lyndon: I wanna talk about maybe the thing that I missed, or didn’t value, perhaps, in all of that. And it probably stems from me having a narrower definition of art maybe.

I think over the course of doing this podcast, it’s made me have to really question, like, what is art? What is creativity? And what’s the purpose of creating something?

Like, is there more value in someone that dedicates their life to creating paintings — and of course, there’s so many different styles of painting, so many different subjects — you know what I mean? It’s like that’s a whole other thing. And just like as a musician, you can dedicate your life to an instrument knowing that you’re never gonna reach the end of the learning.

And it’s the same with art. Like, is that more valuable to have in the world than someone who — the way that they live and the way they approach everything and the way people see them — is just creative?

Just doing this podcast has naturally made me think about these things, if that makes sense.

Aesthetic Standards and the Pressure to Create

Lyndon: Like, I was someone who if I didn’t practice guitar for at least four hours a day, I would feel like I was a failure, you know? Like I just hadn’t lived up to what I knew I needed to do. So I put a lot of pressure on myself. I was a little bit single-minded, but I also had a very strong aesthetic — and I still do.

Breallyn: Yes. Yeah.

Lyndon: The aesthetic of something is really important to me. In everything.

Breallyn: Yeah. Sometimes, yeah, that kind of more slapdash, close-enough’s-good-enough ethos — that is good for getting things done quickly, having a go at stuff, doing craft with kids, all that sort of thing, like that works for that.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: Doesn’t necessarily work in a home aesthetic or a more fine art type approach, I guess.

Lyndon: Yeah, no, maybe it’s just, you know, when you’re a details person, it can creep into other things. Even like — that child’s painting, you’re not expecting detail in it. It’s not like I’m without understanding that different art serves different purposes at any given time.

And I do have — I joke about this regularly ’cause I just think it’s funny, the idea of when a child brings artwork home. And lots of people do this where they kinda go, “Well, it’s not good enough to put on the fridge.” Like, when is it — I don’t want my fridge looking like a daycare centre. No, thank you.

Breallyn: Weirdly —

Lyndon: The best thing you ever did was —

Breallyn: That’s exactly how —

Lyndon: Bring home a fridge that’s glass on the front and no magnets stick to it.

Breallyn: That’s true. That’s when all the fridge art died in our house when the fridge didn’t support it any longer.

Lyndon: Yeah. Hey, is that a life hack? For all you young fathers out there that just can’t deal with the amount of rubbish art coming back home from primary school.

Breallyn: I love all that stuff. I actually really enjoyed and found so much value in even the youngest child’s, you know, drawings and them putting paint and stuff down. I think it’s great.

Kids’ Art Archives

Breallyn: Like, you must have hated it when I decorated the entire upstairs in all the kids’ art.

Lyndon: No, I didn’t actually. I liked that because it was curated.

Breallyn: Yeah, I definitely chose the best bits. And, you know, I’m not gonna say a hoarder ’cause that’s —

Lyndon: There’s time.

Breallyn: Different. But I definitely have always kept all the kids’ work through the years. All their school books and all their projects and their artwork and everything. And then at the end of every year, I would have a massively hard time trying to figure out what to keep and what could actually go in the recycling. And mostly I’d keep stuff.

One time our eldest child was so prolific with her artwork that I literally had to lay it all out on the floor, just take a ream of photos of it — and this was the work that I wasn’t gonna keep — and I still kept a massive stack of stuff from that year.

Lyndon: There’s a box of my artwork from when I was at high school. I don’t know if that’s the only thing that’s in it.

Breallyn: Yeah. I’ve also got one as well.

Lyndon: Big box as well. In the garage, and we’re needing more space in there. And honestly, you know how bad I am at going through stuff and going, “Okay, that’s gonna be thrown out.” I am a little bit like someone who’s lived through the Depression.

Breallyn: Keep that jar of bits of string ’cause you can tie them all together one day.

Lyndon: I loved hearing that story about someone who said their father or their grandfather had their, yeah, jars of just different things — string and nails and bits and bobs and whatever. But he also labeled everything. And so there was the string, and the label on that jar was, “Pieces of string too short to be of any use.”

I give him an A+ for organisation.

Anyway, so I’ve been thinking about just getting rid of my box. Like, why — do you know what I mean? Like, I’ve looked at it every now and then over the years. My tinnitus has just kicked in.

Breallyn: Oh, damn.

Lyndon: My right ear is ringing like an alarm. That’s disconcerting. Anyway, I’m gonna ignore it.

Yeah, you know, over the years I kind of go, “Oh, what’s in this box?” Or you’ll be reorganizing something and I go, “Oh, yeah, that’s that painting I did in year 10, and that’s that pencil thing that I did.” And the amount of satisfaction I get from seeing it isn’t a lot. And as time goes on, I look at it and go, “I thought it was better than it was.” But it’s like — can’t I just free up that space? ‘Cause I’ve got camping gear that needs to go up there.

Breallyn: We’ve got a box for each member of the family.

Lyndon: Yeah. Soon you’ll have a box for Lacey and SF Nubs III.

Breallyn: Oh. Well, I tell you what, Birdie’s getting very prolific at the moment with her stickers and drawing — well, I say drawing, she — coloring — she paints everywhere. We’ve discovered the paint pens. Yeah. That’s a good idea. Paint pens and a little spray of paints — oh, we talked about that the other day, so yeah, getting some more things going. But yeah, she, there’s pages and pages of her stuff. I’ve already thrown out a whole lot because I can’t keep it all.

But you know, the worst thing is it just represents hundreds of dollars of stickers.

Lyndon: It really does. She’s the only person I’ve ever seen that in a sticker book she stacks the stickers up. So like a page that’s only meant to be like one and a half millimetres thick ends up being almost a centimetre thick.

Breallyn: She does.

Lyndon: She just plasters them one on top of the other. It’s very funny.

Breallyn: And the child in me who got, like, one sheet of stickers for the year at Easter time or Christmas time, and then would spend the rest of the year in agony trying to figure out what piece of my equipment — like my pencil tin or my desk — is worthy of a sticker.

Lyndon: 100%. Yeah.

Breallyn: And then I would never use the stickers because nothing seemed worthy enough.

To see Birdie just take sheet after sheet and just stick them while she’s listening to her music and she’s got her disco lights going and —

Lyndon: I know.

Breallyn: Yeah. It’s a little bit painful. I cringe on the inside. But then I love that she’s doing craft, so.

Lyndon: Yeah. Yep. She’s not doing it for anyone either except herself.

Breallyn: Takes after her Aunty Jussy in that way.

Lyndon: Yeah. Maybe, maybe.

Making the Best With What You’ve Got

Lyndon: Back then, I completely understood her design style and the sort of making the best of what you’ve got kind of attitude.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: I got that, and I’m the same way in many, many regards. And I actually think that’s a really good quality. Like, I’ve always said to you that I feel like you and I could live anywhere and under any circumstances.

Breallyn: Yeah. And we’d just make the best of it and —

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: We’d be able to curate whatever into something that we enjoy aesthetically.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Home Style Fixations

Lyndon: And I do worry sometimes — you know how you get so familiar with your own surroundings? Like, so for instance, in our dining room, when you moved that hutch just in front of the window, and I hate things being in front of curtains.

Breallyn: Mm.

Lyndon: But anyway, you’ve moved it there, and at first I was like, “I know that’s not staying there.” And then you’ve put plants and things on there, and now when I look across there, I go, “Actually, that looks pretty good.” Like, how much of that is because I’m just used to it being there, and how much — like, does it really need to be moved? Is it actually gonna be better if that space wasn’t taken up by something that was never intended to be there?

Breallyn: I mean, it will look better.

Lyndon: Yeah. You know. Yeah. I know you’ve got plans for that.

Breallyn: Yeah, I’ve got plans. It was funny the other day, we have some new bed linen, and we were making the bed, and I’m showing you how far to turn the top down and all of that.

Lyndon: I hated that. But this is what happens when you stay at an Airbnb and you go, “Ooh, these sheets are nice.” And you’re like, “They’re linen.” I’m like, “Isn’t everything linen?” And you’re like, “No, we have cotton sheets.” I’m like, “Well, we need linen sheets.”

Breallyn: That’s right. It’s finally happened in our 50s.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: We’ve upgraded to linen. Well, it was very fortunate ’cause I found that — like, I’d started looking up that particular brand of sheets, and then — oh, I’d actually heard of them before. Very ethical, eco-friendly brand. And then they came out with a 50% off sale, and it was only open for five hours. And I started looking, and then all of a sudden all of the different colors were getting sold out, so we had to quickly choose some colors and get the new sheets.

So now we have them, and they look good. And you said to me at the time, “Have you ever thought of painting our bed frame?” And like a — well, um. I was like, “Yeah, every single time I make the bed.” ‘Cause it’s never been done, and it needs to be. It was one we got for 50 bucks at some point and it just needs an update.

Lyndon: Did we have it at the old place?

Breallyn: We didn’t need it. We just had the base that we had from our first bed, which was a futon.

Oh, yeah. So it didn’t actually have a bedhead or a bed end. How did they go out of — do you reckon any millennials know what a futon is?

Lyndon: Jeez.

Breallyn: For those wondering, we used to sleep on — don’t have that look on your face when you talk about it.

Lyndon: Don’t have that look on your face when you talk about it.

Breallyn: We were so uncomfortable for a decade.

Lyndon: It was very good for our backs.

Breallyn: I don’t know that it was. We’ve both had bad backs ever since.

Lyndon: Oh. Regrets, I’ve had a few. I didn’t think I’d had any regrets until you brought up the futon. I thought that was great. I thought a lot of things were great, though, and then you see a photo of me sitting in, like, patchwork pants on a couch that was got from the side of the road. And all you can see is my torso. You go, “Where are my legs?” They camouflaged in with that horrible couch.

Oh, there’s a couple of regrets.

Breallyn: Just two.

Lyndon: Just two. That’s pretty good. Not bad. That’s one every 25 years. I can think of others that I’ll never, ever disclose to anyone. Oh my gosh. What were we talking about? What’d we get onto though?

Breallyn: Futons.

Lyndon: Oh, the futons.

Breallyn: Because we didn’t actually have a bed frame, we just had the slats.

Lyndon: Well, we were just talking about as much as I have an eye for detail and a particular aesthetic that I like — which I guess is also in some degrees a particular standard — I do really love what she did with her stylings. And I love the way that she dressed her kids. You know what I mean? It’s like all of that stuff. I like thriftiness as well. I like when you’re able to take something and create something new out of it. I like creativity coming into that, rather than just sort of going, “Oh, we’re just buying this stuff from the op shop because it’s still good and it’s more affordable, and it’ll do.”

Breallyn: Yeah, there’s more to it than that.

Lyndon: That’s different to, you know — it’s like I was saying before, if something’s curated, that works for me as well, because there’s that creative and artistic intention.

So that’s where we were. But this is what I think she modeled. It wasn’t a fearlessness of like, making something and not caring what someone thought —

Breallyn: Mm.

Lyndon: And/or not caring if it didn’t meet her expectations. She wasn’t performing creativity for anyone, so there was no audience whose approval she needed.

Breallyn: No. And she’s quite open about that anyway, like just generally with things. Yeah, she didn’t care less really what people thought. She just said what she thought and laughed about it.

Lyndon: Yeah. It’s not like she was building a legacy. It’s just how she lived. And so, like, that legacy is — I don’t even know if that’s the right word, but it’s incidental, isn’t it?

Breallyn: I mean, I’m just gonna refine that, I think. Because I think there was definitely an intentionality about it, especially the legacy she was building and leaving for her girls. She definitely was someone who thought about memory and the impact that, you know, generations kind of make on people. And she would talk about your grandma and your mum and the aunties and all of that kind of thing, and talk about the things that she was and wasn’t doing in her kids’ life, you know? Like, as a result of what she wanted, what kind of memories she wanted them to have.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: Things like that. You know, she was very intentional about keeping the girls safe and yet brave and, yeah, just a lot of things like that, I think.

Lyndon: She had a value system, didn’t she? That —

Breallyn: Yeah, very much so, yeah.

Lyndon: And if she saw that in other people, that really resonated with her.

Breallyn: Yeah. And so she was still into, like, letter-writing and all that kind of stuff, wasn’t she?

Lyndon: Yeah, she always hand-wrote cards or hand-made cards even, like — yeah, even if it was a picture she cut out from somewhere, and then she’d layer it up in a card or something.

Breallyn: Well, I’ve got coasters here that she made for me, and then made a little box as well. Oh, they’re just up there on the corner.

Lyndon: I know she’d made me a little, like, cakes and pastry stand at one point. She’d bought some plates and cups from the op shop and then glued them together so that they would form, like, a tiered —

Breallyn: Well, like —

Lyndon: Cake platter.

Breallyn: Yeah, so — she’d made one of those.

Lyndon: Yeah, that was good.

Breallyn: And just, yeah, she’d, you know, ’cause she’d often be at the op shops, she would pick up just different items and be thinking about new uses for them and things like that.

Living Artistically

Lyndon: Is there something we lose when we get too serious about being an artist? And does that label actually get in the way? When I was thinking about Justine and her life, in a way she wasn’t making art, but she was living artistically.

There’s a difference, and that difference might be the thing that holds a lot of us back, even when we’re creating art.

So do you think that, yeah, does the label get in the way?

Breallyn: It certainly can. But I also feel like the artists that I know — you know, whether it’s a writer, a visual artist, a musician — they usually call themselves those terms only because it’s kinda like this quiet realization that they’ve come to, and then they start to dare to use that term about themselves, that label about themselves.

Lyndon: That’s interesting.

Breallyn: Like, I feel like people who might start to use that term, “Oh, I’m an artist,” because they want other people to think they’re good — like, ’cause they’ve got more pride about the term rather than the work or the thing that they’re producing — it doesn’t seem that genuine, I think.

Yeah, I don’t know. I’m sure there’s some people that have built themselves up to be an artist of some description and then it can be a bit of a stumbling block to just being freer and happier in the creativity maybe.

Lyndon: Yeah. I remember, as I was saying before, how I put a lot of pressure on myself as to how much I practiced each day. And when I was 17 and I got a job as a guitar teacher — so I’m getting paid now for something that I had been dedicating a lot of my time to — it was this label thing, like, so when someone would say, “What do you do?” I wouldn’t just say, “Oh, I’m a guitar teacher.” I’d say, “I’m a professional musician.”

Breallyn: Oh, yeah.

Lyndon: You know? Which is sort of what you’re saying.

Breallyn: Yeah, like you’d thought, “I’m now embodying that thing that I’ve been working at so hard for so long and —”

Lyndon: “Is so important to me.” Yeah. I was never working at guitar to be a guitar teacher. It was just something that came along.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And I was like, “It’s better than picking up —”

Breallyn: Yeah, now that you’re getting paid for guitar —

Lyndon: It’s better than picking up rubbish at 7-Eleven, you know? Yeah. But yeah, you’re right. And over time — it wasn’t long before I was like, “Oh, that’s a pretty stupid thing to say, ‘I’m a professional musician,'” because — I think, you know, the struggle going through high school knowing that you wanna be a musician and having it not be apparently a legitimate thing to do.

I think that was part of it. It was just like, I felt like I was always going, “I know what I wanna do. I don’t feel like I even need to be here.” So then when I was getting paid to do something that I had been fiercely defending to teachers, and parents, and friends’ parents — I think that’s what it was that made me go, “I’m a professional musician.”

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: You know, you need to know I’m doing this, and it’s bringing in money. I’m not a fool.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: But over time, and this happens to everyone I think — like, I don’t even — I never refer to myself as an artist or like, you know, any titles even that I might put on an Instagram bio. I don’t use those verbally with anyone.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And I think maybe, you know, you need to have your elevator pitch. You need to have that sort of statement so that when you are in circles where someone’s legitimately wanting to know what you do in the industry — I guess that’s when you say it, and that’s when I’m always the least prepared ’cause it’s not something I ever say or need to say.

But yeah, when you’re 17 and you’re at school, and you’re now getting paid to teach — sometimes people that are grown men — guitar, it’s like, “Yeah, I’m a professional musician.” But I know what you mean. Like, you see it a lot these days too, just people can say whatever they want online about themselves, and you don’t know how true that is.

Breallyn: Yeah, that’s true.

Lyndon: Hmm.

Breallyn: Look, I feel like the artists that we tend to know, or have had enduring friendships with — it’s such a tension in life all the time. Like, what am I creating? What are people seeing? What do I want to put out and put my name to? Why hasn’t that idea worked? Why haven’t I done enough things?

You know, it’s this constant sort of thing. I think you might be right that the label and the expectation that goes with that — of like, artist or creator or writer or something —

Lyndon: Hmm.

Breallyn: Can be another, yeah, stumbling block of going, “Oh, I’m supposed to be this visual artist. I’m supposed to be a —” whatever. And I haven’t even, you know, put anything up for six months. No one’s seen what I’ve done. All I’ve been doing is hiding in my studio doing this thing that might not even work out.

Yeah, so it can be another thing that makes you feel like the distance between what the output should be and what you’re actually doing can feel further, because you have this label of what you’re supposed to be.

Lyndon: Yeah. I think the first question I asked — ’cause I kinda asked two questions in one, didn’t I? Is there something we lose when we get too serious about being an artist?

That’s probably more pertinent, isn’t it, to what we’ve been talking about — in terms of someone like Justine, who lives her life creatively and has arguably more art output than I have done. Do you know what I mean? Like, in terms of tactile things, in terms of actual creative works going out into the world — she actually would put me to shame.

Breallyn: Yeah, with different things. She had a little jewelry-making business at one point and —

Lyndon: But just anything — like even the snails. Yeah. Some of those snails reached more bodies than my music.

Breallyn: And faster.

Lyndon: Oh, laugh-cry. Ah, it’s — yeah. Yeah. Bre, my supportive wife. I was just singing your praises the other day, but after today’s episode I’ve realized how wrong I was.

Breallyn: No, Jussy definitely was always making something — a cake, or a bag for a kid, or a something. She was always doing something.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: Her Instagram handle was CreativeJus, but she wasn’t going around saying to people, “Oh, I’m a creative artist,” or whatever. Like, yeah, if you asked her what she did, she’d go, “Oh, I’m a mum.” ‘Cause she was — yeah — at that stage of still raising children in the home.

She didn’t have a paid outside job, and I sort of really hate kind of nailing down those terms, ’cause obviously mothers who work in the home work harder and longer than anyone else.

Lyndon: Yes. It’s not like ’cause she was a mum she had all this time to do these creative things. What she was doing was almost always directly related to the home, and to family, and to friends.

Breallyn: Yep.

Lyndon: And it was literally that shed being organized as her space was somewhere for her to be able to put all her bits and pieces, and then sit out there when she had the time with a cup of tea, and to do some more deliberate projects. And that didn’t really last super long, and she didn’t get a lot of use out of it because she’s a busy mum.

Breallyn: Yeah, that’s right.

Lyndon: Like you. So the fact that she was able to find a way to — and it wasn’t hard for her to have all this creative output. That’s what I’m saying. Like, she literally put more stuff out into the world than I’ve ever done. And I’m, like, the creative one. You know? Like, I’m meant to be the one doing this for a living.

Breallyn: I mean, I think you’re being really hard on yourself, for a start, with that kind of thing.

Lyndon: But yeah, you know what I mean.

Breallyn: But yeah. And I think —

Lyndon: She’s putting out stuff weekly.

Breallyn: Yeah. Also we were living very close, proximity-wise. We would be seeing all the stuff she’d be doing for her kids and that.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: We probably remember the things that she was doing more than we remember the things that we were doing for the kids.

Lyndon: That we were doing for our kids.

Breallyn: Yeah. Right. And her kids, you know, like — or the kids generally. I mean, I think at one point we were —

Lyndon: Well, you’ve done a lot, for sure, in a similar vein to Justine. Like, you’ve, you know — ’cause when you’re raising kids, you’re putting a lot of your own personal aspirations to the side for — what, I guess in the back of your mind you go, “It’s for a period of time.” And then for you, that period of time has extended out to probably forever.

But at the time back then, you’re sort of going — once the kids are at this stage, I’ll go back to study, which is what you did. So your creativity finds its way out because it has to, doesn’t it? Is that part of it?

Breallyn: Yeah, it does. I mean, I think if you’re a creative person, you’re always gonna be doing something.

There’s a couple of things that came to mind then. One was that Jussy would prioritize creative stuff over other things. So for instance — and this might sound bad, and I don’t mean it in that way — but if I would go over there, she might be making a new recipe or whatever.

Lyndon: Right.

Breallyn: And the kids would be working on some crafty thing. But the house would not be — like, it wasn’t like she’d waited until she’d vacuumed, mopped, put the washing on, made the beds or like —

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: It was like, no, the fun stuff came first, the creative stuff, and the rest of life just had to catch up whenever. Which is a bit different to me. Like I tend to —

Lyndon: You’re your mother’s daughter.

Breallyn: Yeah, I definitely am. And for me, visual clutter makes me really anxious. I just can’t even think creatively if there’s stuff to be done. I need a calm visual palette too. And then I go, “Oh, look what can be done. Look at this space that’s ready to,” you know, have a thing done.

Lyndon: Mm.

Breallyn: But kinda looking back — like, if Jussy was having this conversation about us back in that time, she would go, “Oh, they set up music areas for their kids.” There was always this nice mix of instruments in a spot that, you know, with a chair that the kids could sit at comfortably or a this or a that.

Lyndon: Right.

Breallyn: You know, and they had these craft drawers with all the things laid out. There was always something for the kids to do. They had a nice space to make things. The girls would come over, we’d pick up leaves and, you know, make the autumn craft things that would decorate the dining room for a few weeks or whatever. And, you know, I made bags for the kids that they still use to this day.

Like all sorts of things. So she would probably be able to have that same conversation about us.

But what is really lovely is when you live in a community, when you have friends, family, people in your community that you kinda live alongside — especially for a period of time that’s as important as the young years of raising your children, when they’re really at that developmental stage and very impressionable — what’s beautiful is that you live bearing witness to their lives. You see their character, you see what they do day after day, what choices they make day after day that build a life and build the foundations of their children’s lives.

And I think that’s actually one of the most magical things in the world — to be able to have that experience, and to have people as lovely as Jussy and as fun as her to be able to live alongside, to do that, to have those memories of her, to see how she did it, to have the stories to tell her kids when they’re a bit older and maybe they’ve forgotten some of the things that they did with their mum.

Lyndon: Mm. And that’s almost like a universal truth too, isn’t it? It’s something that you hear all the time, especially from older people that have, quote-unquote, “lived their life.” That’s all the stuff that they go, “Remember it, cherish it.” When you happen to be in that moment, notice it.

Yeah. Thanks so much for joining us this week. We will talk to you again in a week’s time.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Take care.

Breallyn: Talk to you then. Bye.

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