Posted May 11th, 2026
Written: September, 2024
Dear family, maybe don’t read this one, ok?
I don’t understand where anyone got the idea that if we don’t talk about something, maybe it will just go away. Bullshit. It never, ever goes away. What you resist, persists. Thanks Dean Carey for that little pearl of wisdom. (Did I just quote the head of my acting school? Yes. Yes I did. That happened and now we’re moving on.) I grew up in a family that didn’t talk openly about much. Or at least, that is the MO I remember. I’m certain it was thought to be a good thing at that time. The stiff-upper-lip kind, you know? Stoic. British. Shit, is that racism? I’m not saying that every British person adheres to it, I am just saying that my background is very British, my grandma was loudly and proudly British and that mindset was common in my family. Shit. Ok I’m just going to sidestep that minefield and plow forward.
Now that I am somewhat older (have I mentioned that yet?) and have my own son and a relationship that I think has only gotten stronger as a result of open communication, I can’t help but look back and wonder about the wisdom of that ‘stoic’ approach. I just don’t like sweeping things under the proverbial rug. They fester. And even though it feels easier in the short term, it doesn’t help in the long term. My mum is a proverbial rug sweeper. Oh dear. Does that mean something I do not intend for it to mean? Oh fuck. Ha! I was thinking of rug muncher. Teehee. Aaaaand moving on. I think it stems from her determination for things to be nice and for everyone to have a nice time. An attitude of ‘you don’t have to dig into things all the time, you can just let them be and move on.’ I mean I was talking to her the other day about dad and I just commented that she seemed to need our reassurance a lot about if the things she had been doing were ok, (getting him into care and whatnot), which sounded to me like she was feeling guilty about the whole situation and so I wondered if she would benefit from talking to a therapist. Her response was ‘they won’t be able to tell me anything I don’t already know.’ Ok. Umm, are you sure that 14 years of study into the science of the mind and how we operate means psychs know nothing that you don’t already know? Mmmmkay. I mean, I get it. I do. Why do we have to stir up the dust for it to go away? Why can’t we just sweep it out the door? But sometimes (most times) talking about stuff makes it bearable, or easier to understand, or helps us to learn to cope and connects us to the present, doesn’t it? If stuff just went away because we ignored it, oh man mental health would be a breeze. Psychs would be out of a job. But it isn’t (a breeze) and it definitely doesn’t (go away if we ignore it).
Do you know, I have just realised that in an earlier entry, I said I wasn’t a confrontational person. Huh. And now I am saying the opposite. Have I learnt to be confrontational? That’s a nice little discovery for today. Sweet little win. Like I just grew a little taller. Good job Jo.
I think my family are more of the ‘brood until you get over it’ persuasion. The bottle it up kind. Let’s just say I learnt passive aggression from an early age and rest assured I became a pro. Without meaning to drop any bombshells, my sister had cancer when she was 15. At least I think she was 15. I was in year 7, so I was 13. Yep, she was 15. For a bit of background, there are 5 of us in my family. First there is my brother; he is the oldest and I have to say, he is a ridiculously good person. He is honest and considerate and level-headed and hard-working and sensible and that’s all so nice it’s practically annoying. He is also a lawyer, so you know…go figure. Then there is my sister. She is stupidly smart. (What a dumb phrase, ‘stupidly smart’. Good writing Jo.) Anyway, I’m saying this with all the love in the world but… she is somewhat highly-strung. And I’m allowed to say that because I am her sister. I’m sure she would be offended for my saying so, but Muggen it’s my whinge diary so too bad. And you always have been, you have to know that! Anyway she’s an anaesthetist so…you know…stupidly smart. We’re just a family of regular, straight-down-the-line, high-achievers.
Then there is me. The actor (without an acting job), with a glorious 5 year old, who is back at uni studying, nearly 40 years old, has no material assets, lives paycheque to paycheque (pay check? Paycheque? Who cares) and is super-duper pumped about her life choices. Especially now that the car just broke down after we had it serviced just one month ago, but because I drove Gman to the airport and, because I just wanted to get us back home, cos it was 7pm and bedtime was looming for a certain 5 year old, I ignored the fact that the engine kept cutting out if I went below 20kms p/hr, and just started it again and again and pushed the car to the brink, and now the head gasket has blown. The NRMA guy was like ‘ooooft, that’s going to cost you’. Awesome.
Anyway, then there is my Dad, who is a big ole can of worms that I’m not sure I care to get into right now, but suffice it to say, he is a very kind, very smart, very gentle and very committed pessimist who was forced into early retirement from anaesthetics (high-achiever) after a shocking heart attack that caused a hypoxic brain injury. He needs to sleep a crazy amount, eats breakfast at 11, lunch at 6 and does the sudoku at the kitchen table before falling asleep in a position that I am certain is not good for his neck. He lives in a day-to-day bubble where only he exists. Not in an intentionally rude way. In a way where he just simply cannot see outside of himself. His brain doesn’t let him. He sort of has the outlook of a toddler. When he gets tired, he gets cranky. Hungry? Cranky. Things aren’t going his way? Cranky. It’s tough to accept. I have diagnosed him with textbook depression but as he doesn’t have the initiative to do anything to help himself, and there is no actual diagnosis, there is only so much suggestion a person can make. And then there is my Mum. She is a stubborn little firecracker. She has dealt with so much shit over the last 18 years since Dad’s heart attack and she simply refuses to slow down. Nor should she. She is always up to something. It usually involves booking some trip that some friend from quilting or bridge suggested, like walking the Camino or, I don’t know, trekking the steppes of Mongolia.
By the way, I love my family. I am crazy proud of them, but this is the diary of a goddamn whinge-artist, I’m hardly going to spend it gloating over their awesomeness.
Anyway, we have a house in Anglesea. It’s utterly glorious. I think Anglesea is my spiritual home. We spend most of January there together. It’s a madhouse and I love it. I genuinely think every year should begin that way. Working from my home away from home, hitting up the beach in between, running around with the kids and drinking bubbles on the upstairs deck under the gum trees. Yep, it has an upstairs deck, with couches, under gum trees. An outdoors living room. I am hugely privileged to have access to this. I know that. We grew up spending summers in Anglesea and I loved it then too. You know those endless summer days with zinc and body-boarding and everyone telling you how brown you are? God this is sounding dangerously wistful. An actor would definitely be staring off into the distance right now. I hate this. But I can’t very well just end it there.
So we go down to Anglesea for the summer and yes, it is summery and beachy and blissful. But it is not without its difficulties. My mum wants to have nothing but a good time. That’s fine. Of course everyone wants to have a nice time. It’s Christmas. It’s summer. People are on holidays. I get it. But just because you want to have a nice time, doesn’t mean things have to be perfect. And if they are not, it definitely doesn’t mean that any not-nice things should be ignored and swept under that pesky, proverbial rug.
You see the whole situation with my dad is complex and let me tell you, it is tense at the best of times. And by tense, I mean reasonably shit-house and never-ending and so much goes unsaid, or is said behind closed doors, or said out loud but all wrapped up in tinsel. Why is it so hard to talk openly about anything? The hostility between my mum and dad just grows and grows and issues don’t get addressed and it’s all ‘we’re fine, everything is fine’ except that we’re on a fucking tightrope, 25 storeys high with a buffeting wind – like that French guy who walked between the twin towers without a harness. Shit. Did he die? I mean, not in 9/11, but in a similar stunt later on that failed? No. Sorry folks. Had to google that one. Philippe Petit is alive and well, living in NYC as an artist-in-residence at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, according to our mutual friend Wikipedia. What a website.
Maybe everyone else in my family just doesn’t feel the tension the way I do. I feel it acutely and it festers, you know? I can’t ignore it. Maybe it’s being an actor and having an actor for a partner and a bunch of actor mates. Have you ever been in a rehearsal for a play? The convos go deep and they go there fast. Everything is mined and questioned. They have to be. You have what, like 3 weeks to dig to the bottom of usually pretty dense character relationships, to nut out the big plot points, pull it all apart and try to see how it fits back together so you can figure out how the hell you want to shape the show. You have to figure out how to be in a years-long relationship between yourself and a fellow actor, who you may have only just met, but who is cast as your husband, who your character is still crazy in love with but so angry at them that you’re about to explode and leave him. Look the point it, there is no time for small talk. Or maybe the grand old problem is that I am just not great at small-talk. There is no maybe about that actually. I am terrible at small-talk. I hate small-talk. Small-talk is bullshit.
So anyway this is where that cancer bombshell comes back into play. I think I am overly sensitive to my sister’s sensitivity. When I think back to that time, it was all so secretive in my house. I cannot imagine what it was like for her and it is not lost on me that I was very lucky to be the bystander in this situation. But it is also very weird and very formative to live in a house where someone is very sick, but no-one is telling you what the fuck is going on. But also maybe I should’ve asked questions. Maybe that’s on me? I mean, I was 13 so there was a lot going on that I wasn’t asking anyone about. A few times I saw mum giving her a massive needle that was clearly really painful, but it was just sort of expected that I stay away. Or that’s how it felt. Mum and Dad never came to talk to me about it, that I can remember. Fuck. Imagine being the parent of a teenager with cancer. How do you cope with that? Ignore it I suppose. Hope to god that it all goes away. (Which it did, in time. Hurrah!) Do you know, I never saw my sister without her hair? That’s a lie. I did once. Accidentally. I went to her room to ask or tell her something, I don’t know what it was, and her door must’ve been slightly ajar, so I saw her without her wig and without her hair. It was for like a second and I think I must’ve just stopped and been standing there staring before she shut the door in my face. I don’t even know if she saw me. We have never talked about it. About any of it really. (If you read this Muggen, I really am sorry, what a shit time.) I wish I had shaved my head. I did years later, but I wish I had thought of it at the time. I would be proud of my former self if I had thought to do that. Hindsight is a bitch.
I remember being at some swim carnival and she was so dark about how she couldn’t swim as well as she used to. She was annoyed at herself for not being better. No, that’s not it, she was annoyed that her body was letting her down. She was a really good sportswoman you see. She was a ballerina, a gymnast, a runner, a netballer and a swimmer. We all did heaps of sport. I loved it. But when I look back, I realise that this is about the time I stopped trying to be any good. It may have had a lot to do with being a regular 13 year old and all the distractions and anxiety that come with the territory, but I also remember not enjoying being good at it, so I just kind of slacked off. I was hugely influenced by my brother and sister. Mum always commented that I was the one who marched to the beat of my own drum, or something to that effect, but I beg to differ. My brother and sister did lots of sport, so I did too. My sister did French and then went to France on a student exchange, so I did too. I worked my guts out to get a decent mark in year 12 cos my brother and sister both got 99. They were captains of everything and prefects and I remember thinking it would probably be embarrassing if I didn’t do the same, but I just couldn’t be bothered any more. I didn’t get any and it was such a weird, huge relief. Breaking out of the mould. I remember sitting cross-legged on the floor of the school hall when the captains were being announced and Mia Cusack looking at me. I thought she was wondering if I was upset or something, but I just wanted to get on with it. Go back to class. Get through school. Get out from under the weight of it. When I got home and my sister asked me what I got and I told her nothing, she laughed thinking I was joking.
Anyway, now I wonder if I am too heavily influenced by my partner, which I have no real issue with because he is fricken awesome. I mean, he is an utterly stunning human being, but I sometimes wonder if I am my own person? I mean I am. Obviously I know I am, but boy do I find myself parroting his funny stories a lot. Or telling people about some awesome new show that I’m watching, which he found. Basically I wonder if I have spent my entire life just copying people around me that I am impressed by. Where has my rant gone? Now I’m just telling you my life story. Why? Oh that’s why. Because I grew up in a family that didn’t talk very openly.