A love letter
A bumper Christmas edition, words about love and care and tenderness and kindness, and a gift from me to you – an end-of-year offer.
Krishna Kisses Radha: Page from the Boston Rasikapriya (Lover’s Breviary), circa 1610. Ink, gold and opaque watercolour on paper (held in The Met collection, in the public domain).
A love letter to you, to all of you who have been part of the Vamp community since I launched on Substack six months ago – you are one of nearly 3000 people on my mailing list now – a fact I find quite extraordinary!
Thank you, biggest of hugs🫂, to those of you who have contacted me recently and told me what Vamp means to you and given me a boost when I’ve felt momentum slipping:
“I truly look forward to Vamp every week … it brings me so much joy. Thank you for making it happen. Of all the Substacks I read, it’s the one where I tend to meet someone and, minutes into a conversation, realise whether they would be a potential Vamp fan or not, and then implore them to look it up and subscribe.”–Y.L.
“When I see the email from you in my inbox I think, ‘yes I’ve got an hour tomorrow free of obligations and some croissant or sourdough to enjoy while I submerge myself in your words’ … I enjoy your writing style so much!’.”–A.C.
“I LOVE your newsletter, I look forward to it every week, and even though like so many I’m struggling financially, I’d happily pay double what I currently pay.”–H
Thank you, to those of you who have paid for a subscription, helping sustain what (I hope) will be an ongoing project … I hope you can feel the big love I’m sending to you through the ether. It’s not just about income (although that is mightily appreciated), it’s about the boost to my confidence your coin gives.🙏 🙏🙏🙏
Big love to you all.
On the subject of love, it seems the right time of year to share a few stories of love … let this be, if you will, a love letter from me to hold close through what might be for you, as it is for many people, a tough time of year. Let these stories below serve as a reminder that we are all deserving of love, big love; that even if we are not receiving the love we perhaps might like right now, we can still give and receive love in any number of ways; that romantic love is not the only sort of love.
In my local community, love has a sound, it’s the sound of women’s voices drifting over my back fence. I’ve written about the a cappella group before and how, in many ways, singing and music are secondary to its function as a support network, a tight circle and community of women. This year, the group stepped up its program of love: for some months now members have been part of a “food train” to help another member going through a tough time. There’s a roster, the WhatsApp group shares information about who’s cooking what for her family (tacos and spag bol and spinach and ricotta bakes and Greek marinated roast chook), meals are delivered. “She is feeling very loved with her food train – this is such a beautiful thing that you are all doing,” one singer noted recently.
This big love in my neighbourhood reminds me of a Substack essay titled “A Shortcut for Caring for Others (and Being Cared For Yourself)” written in 2022 by the American writer Anne Helen Petersen. The essay notes that many of us are actually bad at asking for care, for help, and looks at some of the reasons why, including “independence and self-sufficiency have been or have become a core part of your identity” and “previous attempts at reaching out for help have been rebuffed or ignored, and it hurt so much that you never want to ask again”.
Says Petersen: “Some of these struggles are deeply psychologically embedded – and no matter how much structures change, no matter how much you seek out community, you’re still going to be battling the fundamental belief that you’re a burden.”
Petersen’s essay explores ways to make it easier for people to ask and receive help and love, and, drawing on readers’ ideas, includes a link to a Google form – a “Personal Emergency/Tough Times Guide”. The idea: fill the form out and share it with your friends/family so it is completely clear how they can help you. Questions include:
Petersen notes: “A form might seem clinical, but I find that the remove allows people to answer honestly in a way they might not if, say, you were asking them these questions in person. It also helps us move away from the dead-end of ‘let me know if there’s anything I can do’, which, for various cultural and inter-personal reasons, most often results in no one asking or doing anything.” It sounds like love to me!
Meanwhile, an exertion of inspired creativity was behind an act of love I read about earlier this year …
A few months back, the clever Australian stylist and all-round-brilliant-creative-being, Megan Morton, shared an Instagram post about her birthday. She wrote:
“I won’t ever get over this year’s birthday. I was looking at a quiet day solo but woke up to a bedside sweet card and note that directed me to a coffee shop. Said coffee shop was attached to a bookshop where I was gifted a birthday book and my favourite coffee. As I was leaving, I was given instructions to the next spot and this happened all day long! It was a Turkish treasure hunt, I did 6 amazing stops at the most incredible things. It ended at an early reservation at a restaurant that handed me an envelope filled with messages from all the people that I love. I am still agog. If you love someone, don’t give them a present present, give them a treasure hunt! Thankyou so very much @millicentsmail, unforgettable, astonishing and incredible.”
Morton’s daughter, Millie, had planned it all out. (“I can’t take credit because I got my gift giving from my Mumma,” was her reply to a comment on the post.)
Of course, I can’t ignore stories of wondrous acts of love within romantic relationships. I will never forget an old colleague’s story of her fiancé’s act of love ahead of his deployment on a long overseas assignment. Before he left, he wrote a note to her for every day he would be gone; her instructions – open one note a day. Each note was dated, each note – and there were dozens of them – contained a different declaration of his affection.
Maria Popova outlines a not dissimilar story on her incredible website, The Marginalian: When Monica Searle fell ill with an aggressive form of breast cancer in 1969, her husband, the English artist/cartoonist Ronald Searle, started a project that would continue throughout her chemotherapy: he made a love drawing for each session, a “Mrs Mole drawing”.
“The Mole idea came after the couple discovered a large cellar in the decrepit house they had just bought in the south of France,” Popova writes.
Searle said of the drawings: “Everything about them had to be romantic and perfect. I drew them originally for no one’s eyes except Mo’s, so she would look at them propped up against her bedside lamp and think: ‘When I’m better, everything will be beautiful’.”
The love treatment was successful. Monica died decades later in 2011, her husband a few months on. And, while never intended for publication, his drawings are gathered in the book, Les Tres Riches Heures de Mrs Mole.
From Les Tres Riches Heures de Mrs Mole.
And here’s another love story: in late November, The Washington Post published an article about Andrew Duhe’s gift to his wife, Jennifer:
According to the Post, Duhe wanted to do something to celebrate his wife’s 40th birthday besides buying typical presents such as jewellery or flowers:
“The couple volunteer every weekend at Chesapeake Animal Services in Chesapeake, Virginia, and it was during one of those visits about a month ago that Andrew suddenly hit on the perfect idea: The animal shelter had 40 dog kennels that were always full. What if he were to pay the $110 adoption fee for each of the 40 dogs?
Although it would cost a total of $4,400 to cover the costs of spaying, neutering, microchipping and vaccines for 40 dogs, Andrew said he knew the gift would mean more to his wife than anything he could buy in a store.
‘I was incredibly touched that he did something on that large of a scale, knowing what matters the most to me,’ Jennifer added. ‘It’s honestly the most sentimental and perfect gift I’ve ever gotten’. ”
In a world where an increasing number of people are living alone and/or do not have life partners or children, perhaps we need to start thinking about how romantic acts of love might be adapted/repurposed for platonic relationships. And perhaps we need to expand our circles of love to embrace people who might have a love deficit, especially at this time of year.
Sharing the love, if you will.
My love and best wishes to you. SX
This will be the last Vamp until February. To thank you for your support, I’m offering 20% off all paid subscriptions for a limited time – save up to $22. A paid subscription gives you access to something special – the Vamp community, a bunch of super-interesting, creative and loving-lovely people. You’ll receive all newsletters in full, unlock my archive of posts, and be able to join Chats, post comments and be eligible for twice-yearly subscriber-only Zoom group chats. Offer ends January 31. Vamp is a reader-supported publication and paid subscriptions are the juice that will allow it to continue.
🎵Mood
Wow … Wicked is fabulous! Came home afterwards and spent hours going down rabbit holes … Cynthia Erivo’s story, the extraordinary set design (spot the influences: Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Ottoman Empire, Venetian Palazzo, the inner workings of clocks); the dazzling costumes (oh my, the eyewear too!); Galinda’s magical suitcases and vanity cases … And, this lovely song. Plus: a great thought piece from Jacqueline Maley at The Sydney Morning Herald/The Age. Why your daughters must see it: “It serves to show everyone (but especially young girls), that we can reject the tyranny of niceness. We can choose to be green-skinned, sardonic, clever and wicked.”
Oh, and I guess I’m a bit of a weirdo … I just checked out my 2024 Spotify Wrapped … my top artists for the year … 😂
Wild thing
This is gold. Merry-fucking-Christmas scammers.
Reading
ARTICLES:
A trio of great reads from The New York Times (worth the subscription price just for these):
A riveting piece about “it” girl Zoë Kestan who had a heady, year-long relationship with Hunter Biden: “She found Mr. Biden funny, smart and charming: a history buff who wanted to talk about Genghis Khan and Cleopatra … an exhibitionist who loved posing for selfies as much as she did, and mused about posting explicit videos of himself to Pornhub.”
A Times reporter takes Angelina Jolie to the New York Metropolitan Opera to see Puccini’s Tosca; Jolie is starring as opera’s legendary diva, Maria Callas, in a new Netflix film, Maria. “To play Callas, Jolie took voice lessons for seven months; learned arias by Puccini, Verdi, Donizetti and Bellini; and studied clips of Callas on YouTube, mastering her smile, her posture, the way she moved her hands, her peculiar way of speaking.” Says Kevin Fallon in the Daily Beast: “… it is sumptuous in every sense of the word, shot in Paris with every frame dripping with as much glamour as the phrase ‘Angelina Jolie playing an opera diva in Paris’ demands’.” (From December 11 on Netflix.)
An extraordinary, heart-wrenching story … what happens when, after an IVF embryo mix-up, you discover the baby you are raising is not your own: “May and Zoë were no longer newborns but babies who had, by then, spent three months hearing their siblings laugh, smelling their mothers’ scents, seeing the particular shade of dark that descended in their rooms when night fell. Could the parents now possibly rip them from all the comfort they’d known, in the name of some genetic allegiance?”
Plus:
In The Sydney Morning Herald, a generous, decent, pioneering “crazy aunt’s” amazing bequest: a little old 1930s house kept out of the hands of developers, a missing link in a coastal walk completed. “Nephew Joseph Waugh said his aunt loved the coastline and had been critical of previous councils that had allowed concrete and glass homes to be built on the cliffs.”
Also in the SMH (and The Age), an investigation into medical misogyny. “I’ve watched a man with a carpal tunnel be written up for 20 mg of iv [intravenous] morphine but a woman with a full reproductive system removal gets written up for only a max of 10 mg of iv morphine. We are treated different and are often labelled as emotive or anxious.” (If you have experienced medical misogyny, the reporters would like to hear from you.)
In a deliciously voyeuristic edition of her “Fresh Hell” Substack, former Vanity Fair and New Yorker editor Tina Brown writes of the moment when someone leaves the human race forever – when they acquire a private plane. “After flying private a few times with gilded friends, I am convinced it’s the single most seductive experience in the world. You realise there is no one you wouldn’t kill, betray, or sleep with to ensure a lifetime of luxe relief from the armpit of mass transit.”
A long-read from The Guardian on nature reclaiming abandoned places … what happens when the people disappear: “Across the street, one house has crumpled inward, like a cardboard box left in the rain. Inside, that morning, nesting barn swallows orbited a bedroom. The front door had been knocked off its hinges, still carrying an enamel plaque: an award dispensed by communist-era local authorities, reading ‘exemplary home’.”
Oh, and just a little bit of news … Fake the TV series nominated for six Aacta awards, Australia’s screen industry awards. (So delighted that the brilliant Anya Beyersdorf has been nominated for best screenplay.)
Plus: for all the cat ladies … in the literary journal VQR, a wonderful essay on cats, life with cats, life without children. “Even given kibble, pâté, scritches, catnip mouse, dancing laser, and endless bowls of fresh water, a cat sulks when their favorite is missing.”
BOOKS:
On my reading list for the holidays, a jumble of things: Miranda July’s All Fours (“a spectacularly horny story about pursuing sexual and creative freedom”, says New York Magazine’s The Cut); Cold Enough for Snow by Melbourne-based writer Jessica Au (published 2022, “at only 98 pages long, Cold Enough for Snow is narrated by an unnamed young woman on holiday in Japan with her ageing mother, exposing both the tenderness and the distance in their relationship,” says an ABC story announcing that she’d won the $100,000 Victorian Prize for Literature … thanks A for the rec); Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver (which I have been putting down and lifting up all year … it is bleak and difficult but brilliant and I don’t want to give up on it); and the short story collection Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte (“sexual failure has never been this funny,” says New York Magazine’s Vulture.) Plus … Middlemarch in my ears …
The 1871 classic by George Eliot (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) frequently appears in lists of the best novels ever written (“this cathedral of words stands today as perhaps the greatest of the great Victorian fictions”, says The Guardian).
As I wrote earlier this year, I’m finding listening to audiobooks a great way to get into novels that might be more challenging in print for my concentration-shattered brain. I’ve done Lincoln in the Bardo and Bleak House (narrated by Sean Barrett and Teresa Gallagher) and have now started on Middlemarch (brilliantly narrated by the English actor Juliet Stevenson). I read Middlemarch a few years ago and frankly, found it a bit of a battle uphill, but Stevenson’s extraordinary voice and character switches brings it to life. And god, the language, that “cathedral of words”. See how George Eliot articulates, for example, the emotional resonance of colour in a scene in which the sisters (pious, earnest) Dorothea and (sweet, simple) Celia Brooke look at their late mother’s jewellery:
“How very beautiful these gems are!” said Dorothea, under a new current of feeling, as sudden as the gleam. “It is strange how deeply colours seem to penetrate one, like scent. I suppose that is the reason why gems are used as spiritual emblems in the Revelation of St. John. They look like fragments of heaven. I think that emerald is more beautiful than any of them.”
“And there is a bracelet to match it,” said Celia. “We did not notice this at first.”
“They are lovely,” said Dorothea, slipping the ring and bracelet on her finely turned finger and wrist, and holding them towards the window on a level with her eyes. All the while her thought was trying to justify her delight in the colours by merging them in her mystic religious joy.
“You would like those, Dorothea,” said Celia, rather falteringly, beginning to think with wonder that her sister showed some weakness, and also that emeralds would suit her own complexion even better than purple amethysts. “You must keep that ring and bracelet—if nothing else. But see, these agates are very pretty and quiet.”
“Yes! I will keep these—this ring and bracelet,” said Dorothea. Then, letting her hand fall on the table, she said in another tone—“Yet what miserable men find such things, and work at them, and sell them!” She paused again, and Celia thought that her sister was going to renounce the ornaments, as in consistency she ought to do.
“Yes, dear, I will keep these,” said Dorothea, decidedly. “But take all the rest away, and the casket.”
She took up her pencil without removing the jewels, and still looking at them. She thought of often having them by her, to feed her eye at these little fountains of pure colour.
Listening
I’ve mentioned before, but will again, David Sedaris reading George Saunders’ Love Letter on The New Yorker Fiction podcast is just wonderful. (Could not be a more appropriate story for our times.)
I’ve mentioned before, but will again, the great new podcast (hosted by the very funny clever people, Sophie Gee and Jonty Claypole), The Secret Life of Books, particularly the episodes on Jane Eyre, The Great Gatsby and Hamnet.
I hope over the holiday period to spend some time with William Dalrymple’s podcast Empire (of the few I’ve listened to, I especially loved “Lady Mary: Our Woman in Constantinople”).
Watching
Looking forward to seeing A Real Pain with the fabulous Kieran Culkin (“[Jesse] Eisenberg has generously gifted his co-star with the sort of raging-id role that most actors could only dream of, and Culkin rewards his director/cast mate with the single greatest, funniest, most cringe-comic and heartbreaking performance of his career,” says Rolling Stone; released in Australia December 26.)
Looking forward to seeing All We Imagine As Light (due in Australian cinemas in December), the Grand Prix-award-winning film at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The story of three women who work at the same Mumbai hospital, it is, says The Guardian, a “glorious film … both dreamlike and like waking up from a dream.”
Plus, a catch-up of stuff I’ve been wanting to mention for weeks:
Just started to watch Bad Sisters. Hooked already; will be seeing it through to the end.
Want to come back to Slow Horses. … got distracted earlier this year.
Looking forward to catching up on the Martha doco on Netflix; mixed reviews, especially from Martha Stewart herself, who told The New York Times (among other criticisms): “Those last scenes with me looking like a lonely old lady walking hunched over in the garden? boy, I told him to get rid of those. And he refused. I hate those last scenes. Hate them.”
I’m considering an immersion in Rivals (streaming in Australia on Disney+), the adaptation of the 1988 Jilly Cooper novel. It is, says Pandora Sykes who is presenting “the official” Rivals podcast, “daft deliciousness”.
Shogun: dying to see it. All reports are that it’s remarkable.
Might go back at re-watch Ripley ... I can’t remember – have I mentioned previously just how wonderful it was, like watching a piece of art, sinister, powerful, stunning? It is slow. It is in black and white. But Andrew Scott (who will forever be known as Fleabag’s “hot priest”) is mesmerising and I couldn’t take my eyes away.
Plus, plus, on the ABC:
A fantastic, important ABC piece on an affordable housing project for women in Bellingen. (Click through to the story for a really moving short video about the project.)
A great documentary on Midnight Oil – The Hardest Line.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Fisk (free on ABC iView).
Three Beautiful Things
Via Instagram … click through for gorgeous video; the photographer/videographer, Jay Manning, leads dive tours off Laguna Beach, southern California, should you be nearby.
The remarkable ceramics of the significant mid-20th-century design figures, the late Jacques and Dani Ruelland, known collectively as Les Ruelland. Some of their works, including the 1980 “Ensemble de deux vases et trois bouteilles” (above) featured in a Christie’s auction in Paris on December 3. (The “ensemble” sold for EUR 37,800 – about AUD$62,000.) When I sent a ceramicist friend a link to a photograph of the pieces she replied: “Tall and narrow vessels are devilishly difficult to make.” She also pointed me towards the work of the Austrian-born British studio potter Lucie Rie (I could not love Rie’s circa 1960 stoneware coffee set, below, more).
Via Instagram, from the lovely account @le_jardin_robo … “textile fragment of a cushion from Skokloster church, Uppland Sweden, late medieval, Intarsia Wool on linen, 90x80cm, collection Swedish History Museum.” It’s the red that gets me, and the pattern.
Food
SNACKS: Very happy with these little Savoury Herb and Parmesan biscuits. Tried out the recipe yesterday … quick, easy, although the dough needed a fair bit of love, a fair bit of kneading to incorporate the fats (butter and parmesan) with the flour (the recipe makes that part of the process sound faster and easier than it is … stick with kneading). Perfect, I think, with an Aix rosé, a lovely little combo. (If I were to try again I would up the butter/parmesan/fat content just a little, perhaps knead a bit more, rest a bit longer, then season more vigorously with sea salt). Having herbs in your garden is helpful. I found listening to Middlemarch as I kneaded helpful too.
Plus: More end-of-year-party-season canapé ideas here.
COOKBOOKS: I have not bought a cookbook for the longest time. (Internet, online recipes, endless, time poor, money poor.) But if I were to buy a cookbook for myself or someone else right now, god, this list is dynamite. First choice would be Tony Tan’s Asian Cooking Class. Tony’s recipe for beef rendang is incredible (spend more time cooking down the paste, adding more oil than you think might be necessary, a bit of sugar can help to, getting that paste really gnarly, before you add the beef and, for god’s sake, don’t try to make your curry paste with tough old galangal … if you can’t find tender young galangal, you’re wasting your time … I’ve learned my lesson well on that count).
MUFFINS: Next up in the Vamp test kitchen, rosemary garlic focaccia muffins. Will be most delighted to hear your thoughts if you get to test before I do.
Travel
BANGKOK: If you weren’t already planning to travel to Bangkok to eat, you might want to after reading this intoxicating article from the travel website Prior World – “Where the city’s Thai chefs love to eat”. Words and photographs by Chris Schalkx. (Photo above: Sri Tat in the Phrom Phong district.)
SYDNEY: In Bondi, a new “subterranean bath-house”, Slow House the Bathhouse. Includes three magnesium pools (at different temperatures), a Finnish sauna, a steam room and two ice baths. Also, says Time Out: “If you want a few moments alone, you can book one of the private infrared saunas – one which can be set up with a yoga mat on request.” (To simulate the Bikram effect I guess?) From $55 for 90 minutes.
HIKING IN EUROPE: On Sarah Wilson’s Substack, This is Precious, a guide to some of her favourite hikes in Europe, including in the French alps, in Slovenia and Switzerland, and on the Greek island of Sifnos: “The island’s community have funded the maintenance of a web of tracks that are super well-marked out and take you on great adventures down to secluded beaches, between villages, thinking out ways to connect the trails to the bus routes.”
Christmas shopping
A BAG: From the Sydney-based Among Equals – a not-for-profit providing artisan weavers from Papua New Guinea with a platform to sell their Bilum weaving and earn regular income. “We are a brand directed by women, united in our efforts to support some of the most marginalised women in the world,” says founder Caroline Sherman. (More about Sherman here.) Amazing range in the Among Equals online shop, 20 Goodhope Street, Paddington, or at a range of other stockists in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and South Australia. (From $170.)
A BOOK: Released earlier this year, Wendy Sharpe: Many Lives celebrates the life and work of the wonderful Sydney-based artist Wendy Sharpe. I’ve interviewed Wendy on a few occasions, including for a 2015 piece for The Sydney Morning Herald about her activism and work to support asylum seekers. (Visiting her studio is something else!) I was thrilled when Wendy and her co-author, noted Sydney arts writer Elizabeth Fortescue, asked me to contribute an essay on her activism for this gorgeous book. Includes stunning reproductions of her work plus essays from other writers including art critic John McDonald and ABC journalist Scott Bevan. Available in good bookshops, art gallery shops and online (Wakefield Press, $80).
A SUBSCRIPTION: To a magazine, say The New Yorker, Gourmet Traveller or National Geographic, or a newspaper, say The New York Times. Or best of all (!) consider giving the gift of Vamp, this newsletter, my newsletter, which I think of as a modern mini-magazine and which I pack with good things every week, including my reflections on life, issues affecting women, current affairs, culture, food and travel. Click the button below to give a gift subscription to Vamp, support my work as an independent writer and make my dayChristmas!
Plus: For ocean/water babies, a brilliant Christmas gift guide on the Ocean Film Festival website (ideas include snorkel and goggle sets, a free-diving course, a crafted wooden bodysurfing handplane …).
Socials
(via the Instagram account @bigtreehunters … “the Majesty Oak or the Fredville Oak” in Kent, one of largest oak trees in Britain. What heaven.)
(via Threads; I checked, it’s not April 1 … and there do seem to be these businesses about … Scratcher Girls😳)
(via Threads … and the super-interesting comments too … “death anxiety” … I’m feeling it. Perhaps more on this in the New Year?)
(Via Threads; story here)
And finally, via Threads, a public service message for the holiday season …
(Please don’t stand right next to the baggage carousel …)
Stolen words
“A man who cultivates a garden, as Voltaire wished./He who is grateful for the existence of music./He who takes pleasure in tracing an etymology./Two workmen playing, in a cafe in the South, a silent game of chess./The potter contemplating a colour and a form./The typographer who sets this page well, though it may not please him./A woman and a man, who read the last tercets of a certain canto./He who strokes a sleeping animal./He who justifies, or wishes to, a wrong done to him./He who is grateful for the existence of Stevenson./He who prefers others to be right./These people, unaware, are saving the world.”–by Jorge Luis Borges (via Susan Cain’s The Quiet Life)
My great uncle was in Changi prison with Ronald Searle and I’ve always loved his writing and illustrations… I scour second hand book shops for more. I didn’t know about this chapter of their life so there’s another book title to search for.
Thank you for your considered and tender observations and sharing them with others. Enjoy your time away from deadlines.
LOVED LOVED LOVED this Christmas edition of Vamp Stephanie!! Wishing you and Lola a vey Merry Christmas xx