I just think the company, as a whole, is forgetting why people fell in love with it in the first place. Like everything nowadays Disney has become money hungry.

People have been saying for years that Disney has “run out of new creative ideas”. Personally, I don’t think that’s true. The studio that created films like The Lion King, Tangled, Frozen… doesn’t suddenly lose every creative person capable of writing an original story. Disney still can and does create amazing, well crafted and unique stories. Encanto and Inside Out 2 for example. If they were willing to make more, they would but unfortunately Disneys priorities have changed.

Back when the animation studio first started, Disney built its reputation by taking enormous creative risks. Every film they put out felt like an attempt to push new advances in animation or experiment with a new form of storytelling.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs for example was the first feature length animation film in 1937. Walt put an enormous amount of money and time in to something that had never been done before. And it worked. He then went on to experiment storytelling modes with Fantasia (1940) and would go onto to create heart breaking and emotionally built stories in Bambi (1942). Later movies such as Beauty and the Beast (1991) really set the scene for the animation world, becoming the first animated film ever nominated for best picture. The whole company at this time was not built on being safe.

Irony.

My personal turning point with Disney came when I watched Into the Unknown: Making of Frozen 2 in 2020. The documentary was marketed as the behind the scenes celebration of the sequel to one of the studios biggest productions (Frozen). Disney itself described the small series as the look of the challenges and breakthroughs of creating Frozen 2, following the directors, producers, the actors and the wider creative team as they race to complete the film.

Throughout the series, you watch these people, in particular the writers, scramble to figure out what the story of this movie actually is up until they completely run out of time. Entire emotional arcs, character decisions and whole plot points are still being frantically figured out right until the very end. It feels like a chaotic mess as animators still wait on decisions that haven’t yet been made. There is a moment where the producer Peter Del Vecho just simply goes “we’re out of time.”

I mean I know every film goes through revisions and struggles, this isn’t unusual but the fact Disney did not postpone this movie to give the team more time to polish their story, only because they have to open on holiday weekend, really showed me where their priorities layed when I was 15. You can feel the energy in the entire room throughout the documentary that the creative team was not sure the ending would work even once the movie is completed and I can’t help but feel devastated for them that they didn’t have more time to play around with the amazing concepts and material they had developed.

Now with Frozen 3 announced and the film being scheduled for November 2027, I’m worried the same fate might happen. I don’t want this series to be a case of “how many stories can this franchise continue to generate” rather than “is this story actually worth telling?”. But I like to have faith for it because I do really trust the people working behind it. Time will tell I guess.

Speaking about sequels… can I also just say….sequels are okay! not all sequels are bad. I mean, Inside out 2 and Toy Story 2 are movies I would consider fantastic continuations off the original and amazing movies in their own right.However, there comes a point, because unlike what Disney seems to believe, not every film should have a sequel. It’s why Disney sequels feel so drained and overdone now as instead of building anticipation, Disney created fatigue and predictably with them. I mean Moana 2 is a great example. That would have been a beautiful TV exclusive for Disney+ but instead they had to get their cash grab and now Moana 2 is a movie that just… exists. Please, of you’re gonna make a sequel, atleast make it good.

Moving on from sequels to Disneys most popular ‘discourse’ currently. Their famous live action remakes. I have such mixed feelings about them, similar to sequels, I think some of them are really great like Maleficent and Cinderella but the more time goes, I fear the worst they are becoming and the more it shows how cash grabby they truly are.

Take The Lion King live action, in my opinion one of the worst of the live actions that there are currently.

From a technical perspective the 2019 remake of the success traditional original is extraordinary. The animals are so realistic. The environments are beautiful. It is almost indistinguishable from real wildlife photography. The movie is a remarkable achievement in visual effects, there is no doubt about that.

HOWEVER, it is also one of the least emotionally expressive films Disney has ever put out. The technical achievement does not equal good film. Real animals cannot act like the animated characters. A real lion can’t give you the enormous terrified eyes that Simba has when he sees the stampede coming towards him.

The whole remake prioritises the realism element and in turn takes the whole soul out of the film.

And from the clips I have seen online, it seems a similar thing has happened with the Moana live action. Most of the scenes I have watched, which is most of How Far I’ll go, feel so lifeless, still and almost emotionless. That is no blame on the actress by the way, I’m sure she is great, but what’s the point of making these live actions if they don’t have any magic? OH for the money! yay.

I think the most frustrating part about all this for me is that Disney CAN create amazing stuff. Like I mentioned before… Encanto and Soul are two of my favourite films ever. Encanto gave us a family story that was about generational expectations and identity and Soul explored complex emotions of depth and purpose in such an unique way. I also just watched Hoppers last night and while it’s not the greatest thing ever written, I really enjoyed it and had a fun magical time watching it!

When a franchise is already recognisable, the marketing is practically already done. People already know Frozen, Toy Story, Zootopia, The Incredibles etc. You can put a familiar character on a poster and people understand what they are buying. An original film does not have this luxury and sadly general audiences aren’t willing to spend their money on something they aren’t guaranteed to enjoy. A fun thing about the economy nowadays.

If Disney releases something nobody has heard of, the studio has to force people to care. And if Disney doesn’t give an original film that push, it becomes much easier for people to simply wait until it appears on Disney+ which is what I’m worried to original film Hexed coming out this November.

It is a vicious cycle of the original film getting less marketing, it underperforms and so they do more sequels.. more live actions… to make up for it.. but now even the live actions aren’t doing the numbers that they use to. You can tell Disney is currently going through it. They have not won a best animated feature since 2022. Keep in mind they won consecutively from 2007-2016. For me, I’m not upset about this, it gives way more space for studios like Studio Ghibli, DreamWorks, Laika and Sony etc. to take the award but I can imagine the pressure the creative workers must be under to produce something original that will do well in the box office.

Perhaps this is simply the inevitable consequence of becoming one of the largest entrainment companies in the world. It’s no longer just an animation studio, it’s a streaming platform, cruise ship, theme park and they own the biggest franchises in entertainment. Money is what matters to them now and who knows if that can ever be altered.

Perhaps If you take anything from this post, you should go support Laikas new film Wildwood coming out this year, because wow it looks BEAUTIFUL and i am so excited for it!

I hope you enjoyed this piece<3 Thank you so much for reading! 🌟🌟

This was a topic I wanted to write about for so long and I definitely want to write about it more in the future but ya!! comment below ur thoughts about Disney and everything that is going on because I would love to hear everyones opinions :)

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Love always,

Poppy 💌

It’s not my house anymore but I remember what spots on the wooden floor would make it creak. It’s not my house but I remember how the shower dripped when the hot water was about to stop working. It’s not my house but I remember how hard it was to open up the front door during the cold months because it became too stiff.

It’s not my problem anymore when the garden becomes overgrown, the kitchen ceiling starts leaking or when the bills are due all at once. All these ordinary problems will continue without me.

It’s not my house anymore but I have laughed so hard I cried there, squealed with my boyfriend as he tickled me to the death there, had so many games nights with friends in the living room, cried alone in my bedroom from the stress of life and had deep conversations about life on the front porch outside there.

Will I ever find something this good again?

We only have six months before we move out but impulsively a series of events lead to re-decorate our living room space so now it looks like this:

Soon, there will come a point in my life where I will never see this space again and it will become filled with other peoples things, all of our decorations will be taken away, our furniture will be moved or given to others. The house will still be there but the version of ourselves won’t belong to it no more. We can revisit this house, walk along the footpath outside and point in and tell stories but we can’t recreate the time that made it home.

I remember the day me and my best friend first walked into the house. It was right before we started moving our furniture in. We sat on the floor in our now craft/storage room, talking about all the problems that the house still had to get fixed (including a whole ripped out floor) and we talked about how crazy it is that after living in student accommodation for a year, we finally had a whole house to decorate. Little did we know all the memories that would be made here between us and as we all move onto our different places, I know that I will miss the random side quests and games nights after getting home from work.

I like to think about my childhood bedroom, back in my hometown, sometimes and imagine a child in there now. Do they want their room to be jungled theme just as much as I did? Do they have a small single bed and drawings all over the walls? or is it just a storage room now used only when guests come over.

I wonder who was in the room I am in now before me, did they think the future as often as I do? Maybe this was their favourite place to live in and didn’t want to leave.

If home is constantly changing then perhaps there really is no place anymore I call home. There are periods of life where every place feels temporary and for me I’m living through that now.

My mum moved out of my old home that I spent my teenage years in last year, that used to be the spot I would call my home but now I call the new place she lives in “mums house” because I never truly lived there. My house that i live in now is what I consider to be home but its temporary and the expiry date is coming up soon and when I transition to my new place, how long will it take me to call it home again?

I would love to go into my childhood home and walk around, see what memories come up that I have forgotten and just experience being in that room again but I know it will never happen.

I wonder how I will feel on the last night at my home now. Will I be ready to say goodbye to 2 years worth of memories? When it is time to say goodbye, I want to walk through each room one last time. Soak in everything I have become so use to, everything I’ve learnt and cherish every second of this home.

I hope you enjoyed this piece<3 Thank you so much for reading! ✨

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All my love,

Poppy 💌

my name is poppy sophie and exactly one year ago today I published my very first Substack article, which blows my mind to say. It really does feel like just yesterday that I was debating what my first profile picture should be for my account (it ended up being an image of clairo of course.)

I thought it would be fun to celebrate the occasion by doing a little Get to Know Me, reflecting on my first year on substack has taught me and how I feel i have become a better writer because of it…

first… some fun facts

☆ my favourite colour is green

☆ my favourite season is autumn

☆ my favourite artist is Adrianne Lenker and my favourite album by her is Bright Future

☆ I love sad heart warming media! I’m a film student right now studying at university.

☆ My favourite book is Shark Heart and my favourite film is Aftersun

☆ My favourite shows are Hilda, The Owl House and The Last Of Us (before they ruined it)

☆ When I’m not studying, I work retail. Mostly packing orders for deliveries.

☆ My favourite song is M’lover by Kishi Bashi and it has been since 2021. That song truly makes me feel alive when I am having a bad day.

☆ I grew up in a coastal city in Western Australia before moving to Perth for University. Everything always seems to be happening over east but I have slowly grown a love for this isolated city.

☆ Oh! and I hate AI. Incase you didn’t know.

How Did I End up on Substack?

I have always loved writing.

I was the kid at school who got Principal Award stickers for my creative writing. The kid who finished library books way too quickly and managed to win the school reading prize… only to be disappointed when I saw I had already read the book they gifted me. Anything to do with words completely fascinated me.

Years ago, when I was around 15, I had a fairly large art account on Instagram. After that slowly faded away and more time passed, I realised how much I missed having an online community and friendships. I tried making a Bookstagram several times throughout my late teens but life was just too busy. Instagram also stopped feeling like somewhere I could genuinely make friendships anymore.

Around my first and second years of university, I kept seeing people mention Substack everywhere. In early 2025, someone from my class shared one of their monthly wrap ups they had written on their Instagram story and I remember reading it and thinking, I would love to do that someday. So I wrote “make a substack” in my notes app and immediately proceeded to forget about it. Until one random Friday. I was sitting by myself in my social media marketing class, painfully bored, scrolling through my to-do list which I saw that note I had made months ago.

So I thought fuck it and made my account.

One year later and here we are.

⋆｡𖦹°⭒˚｡⋆.˚໑ ׁ༝ ۫ ׅ𖣠

If You’re Thinking about Starting a Substack / Tips for Substack

People ask me for tips on substack surprisingly often but honestly I still don’t know all the hacks and I don’t think I ever will. I don’t have a posting schedule. I don’t know the perfect time to publish. I just mostly post and hope for the best.

My biggest advice is to simply just keep posting.

The more you write, the more you will start to discover what you want your voice to be and the more your work will reach people. every thing you write it teaches you something even when it completely flops.

when did i actually see growth?

I first started to see growth to my account when I posted this article last year:

That piece was something I genuinely cared about and I think it mainly did so well at the time because it resonated with a lot of people and maybe because Matilda is on the cover has something to do with it.

So for me it really was random that this post decided to reach people. Growth on here is really a never ending rollercoaster. I’ve learnt the only thing you can really control is whether YOU are proud of what you have published. I mean just this past year I have become a much stronger writer alone. Substack has given me the confidence to start submitting to work to magazines, which is something I don’t think would have happened without his platform encouraging me to keep publishing.

Have I overthought about engagement and reach? of course. way more than I would like to admit. (Especially recently as my like count gets lower and lower.)

But every time I get discouraged, I scroll through my feed and read other peoples work and it reminds me why i joined this app in the first place. The people. I’ve made such genuine connections here. I have read essays that have put my feelings into words. I have had people leave comments on my work that completely make my day!!

Even when my reach is dogshit, I still feel incredibly lucky that people choose to spend their minutes reading my work <3

⋆｡𖦹°⭒˚｡⋆.˚໑ ׁ༝ ۫ ׅ𖣠

My Favourite Piece I have Posted in the Last Year ?

It has to be my post surrounding my eating disorder I published this year:

I had always wanted to write about my eating disorder, as it was such a prominent experience in my life, but it took me a long time to figure out how to put those experiences into words. It had always been something incredibly private in my life.

Writing this piece and sharing it was terrifying but I’m also so grateful I shared it. Seeing how many people connected with it reminded me of how important it can be to be vulnerable & I’m so glad it resonated with people as much as it did ❤️‍🩹 definitely a highlight on my substack journey…

My Runner Up….

another emotional one… this one is something I’m still experiencing currently which makes it a little different for me as I feel like I often write about things that have happened in the past but I really enjoyed the experience and the finished product of this article so I wanted to give it its own little shoutout!

⋆｡𖦹°⭒˚｡⋆.˚໑ ׁ༝ ۫ ׅ𖣠

The Beautiful People

I could genuinely spend all day listening names but a few of my favourite writers from the last year are listed here: and so many others (I’m sure im forgetting so many) thank you guys for always inspiring me and being such a support to everything I have done!

And thank you (yes you that is reading) for being here right now…

ᥫ᭡.ִֶָ𓂃 here is a small mixtape of songs that remind me of substack for everyone to enjoy:

https://mixtape-for-you.replit.app/m/325cjobx

What is Next for Me?

Honestly… not too much is changing.

I want to keep experimenting with my writing, spending more time crafting each post and pushing myself creatively.

Outside of Substack, I’d love to continue submitting to magazines and finally make some real progress on my fiction novel. I also want to spend more time studying writing itself.. expanding my vocabulary, reading more intentionally and learning as much as I can about how to become a better writer in general.

I would love to say I will finally stick to a posting schedule but realistically that’s not going to happen and that’s okay. I’m happy to see what happens one day at a time ✨

I’m very excited to see where this little corner of the internet takes me!

Thank you for being here.

Here’s to year 2 🫶

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In another universe you never came to my town and I would have never have had to miss you right now. But then another thought follows me close behind

Would I even still be here if I had never known you?

⊱ ─── ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ ─── ⊰

We’re walking back to class from the assembly area. It was a freezing morning before school and the canteen was selling two dollar hot chocolate which we now had in our small hands.

We were ten years old at this time and about to graduate Primary School. Old enough to think we’re practically adults but still young enough that the future does not feel real in the slightest.

“Do you think you will go to University? I ask. “When you’re older.”

“Yeah. Most likely.”

“I want to study in the UK one day. Maybe in London.”

I’m not even sure why I wanted that so badly as a kid. Maybe it’s because my family is from there and I’d been lucky enough to visit a few times but I think the main reason was because I wanted to be a writer.

London felt like the city where that was all possible. It felt like the place to a small child where people became the versions of themselves they were supposed to be.

“So do I” My friend replied. “I miss my dad.”

He had moved here from England, only a couple of years earlier.

“We can do together,” I said without hesitation. “We can even share a room and write a book together!”

We believed each other completely.

A few months after this conversation, you moved a five hour drive away and we lost contact over the years.

Now we both live in Perth, the closest city to us.

We both go to different universities.

We have met up once since but we don’t speak anymore.

Funny how that happens.

Sometimes I think the certainty of childhood is one of the greatest joys we will experience in life. Moving to the UK seemed so easy back then, I never even had to think about money. I never imagined there would be a pandemic that would shut the world down before I even finish high school.

At least I am still writing even if I never made it to London.

⊱ ─── ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ ─── ⊰

Every time I see a photograph taken just because someones life changes, I become strangely protective of them.

I stare at the photo and think,

you have no idea what is about to happen and maybe that is for the best

I found a photo of myself from 2020 recently.

She didn’t know that in a few months her entire friendship group would still arguing. She didn’t know she’d spend Year 10 sitting at home playing Minecraft while the world shut down.

She had no clue that nothing would be the same again.

Sometimes I look at old photos of my boyfriend and I from 2019 before we were dating. Neither of us had the faintest idea where we would end up.

It’s funny how that happens.

⊱ ─── ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ ─── ⊰

When I was little, I desperately wanted to be a Youtuber. I was obsessed with this online game called Animal Jam.

Animal Jam, if you don’t know, was a website mainly designed to be an education animal game but kids would use it to mostly play mini games, collect these animal avatars, traded for rare items and most people also roleplayed.

I watched popular Animal Jam creators, WisteriaMoon and Julian2 religiously, convinced that one day I’d have thousands of subscribers too. So naturally my friend and I made Youtube channels.

We recorded videos that absolutely nobody watched and those videos are in fact still on the internet. Every now and then I remember they exist and go watch myself from another lifetime.

I feel so much fondness for that version of me because she was so much more fearless than me. Now the thought of even speaking in a microphone makes me question my entire existence.

support my creative work!

⊱ ─── ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ ─── ⊰

Half way through 2020 I was convinced I was going to become an animator or some sort of character designer. Every afternoon I’d come home from school and draw for hours. I even use to have an Instagram account which had a pretty substantial following at the time for my art. For a while, I thought that drawing really was the direction for my life.

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if people hadn’t been so cruel about my art. Would I still be drawing? Because now I find it so hard to not be so critical every time I pick up my apple pencil.

I like to think life was quietly nudging me somewhere where I truly was supposed to be. Maybe losing a version of myself was the only way I’d find another. Maybe I should pick up the pencil again though, for fun this time.

⊱ ─── ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ ─── ⊰

I still remember the first time we met. You were so awkward I couldn’t tell whether you were shy or whether you simply did not want to be around us. Somehow despite that, I felt connected to you instantly. I knew we would be friends.

I remember the last time we said goodbye too. It was so awkward with the tension separating us from what we use to be and I couldn’t tell whether we would get through it or if we were meant to leave it here. I couldn’t quite connect to you anymore.

Soon I’ll have remembered you for longer than I actually knew you and somehow the change still hurts the same. But I know I wouldn’t be here without you.

It’s funny how life changes.

I hope you enjoyed reading these small pieces! they were all small scattered pieces I had in my notes that I decided to make a post with 🧚I tried to do something creative with it by connecting the start with the end… let me know if it worked hahah

Thank you so much for reading 💛

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All my love,

Poppy 💌

By the way heartbreak at fifteen still counts.

Nobody told me this when I was fifteen however.

I saw a lot of adults smile the same tired smile and call it puppy love.

I understand why now. When you’re older, fifteen feels impossibly young. You know how much life is still waiting for you. You know that the chances of that relationship actually surviving is a near zero.

But dating someone for more than two years feels like a lifetime when you have only lived fifteen of them.

You have hope that it will work, you hope for the future, you hope to graduate together, hope to move away together, you hope that you will be the ones that make it out together. You are so unaware that everything will be entirely different before you are even old enough to drink.

I can’t imagine still being with the person that I was at fifteen. In fact it almost repulses me because of how much has happened since. But there was once a version of me who though that was the plan. She wasn’t (entirely) stupid. She just hadn’t learnt how real love should feel yet.

Two years after the breakup we’re driving down the long road that leads back to your house up on the hill.

The windows are down and my hair is flying across my face. The music is blasting. You have your licence now, something your fourteen self would have been so proud of. We are belting I Think We’re Alone Now and for a while, everything feels uncomplicated again. We are just good friends that once dated. I would like to say this title was always easy for us but I can’t deny things weren’t always that straight forward after we broke up.

This moment in the car was one of our last moments before the spiral.

One of our last moments before I had to step back from whatever friendship we had.

I still loved you that day in the car. Not in the way fifteen year old me had imagined I would but as someone who had known every version of me throughout my teenage years. Someone I was grateful to have survived with.

A year before this moment, I had tasted what it would be like to get back together with you.

Roughly eight months after we had broke up we walked from our town to your grandmas house. We are lying on our stomachs in the main living space watching some YouTube video after you were talking to me about your life changes. I don’t remember who moved closer first.

I only remember noticing the space between us disappear.

From then on you would start to blur the boundaries. You would kiss me and when I tried to have a conversation if we would get back together, that i didn’t want to keep going further and further down the hill unless we were, you kept shrugging me off and you would say “we will see”.

Little did I know you had feelings for another girl while saying this. But who am I joking everyone that knew you was aware you move on too fast.

I was just the person you returned to whenever you needed something comfortable.

Maybe I was doing the same thing.

Maybe I didn’t miss you as much as I missed certainty. I wanted something stable. That use to be you.

People ask why I didn’t leave.

I don’t always know how to answer.

Love can become so tangled up with familiarity until you can’t tell which one you are holding onto. We were trauma bonded is the easiest way I can put it.

A voice note was still stuck in my old phone for ages that you had sent. Sometimes when I finally stopped talking to you I would replay it to remind myself how hurt I was by you. I wondered if you even appreciated all those nights I stayed awake in concern for your safety while you slept peacefully.

A year after the moment in the car, we are sitting together again, this time on your couch in the living room. We hadn’t spoken in months. I had quietly cut you off at the start of the year and it felt weird to be having a conversation again like how we use to. We talked for a while about life after high school, our futures and all the problems we were facing. You asked about my current boyfriend who I wasn’t yet dating at the time and I told you all about how I was going to ask him out and how excited I was. This was our last real conversation with each other and it helped me find the closure I needed.

One day you come out of a relationship and you will realise how fucked all it really was. I did and so many of it I will never forgive but there are memories like singing in the car after getting ice cream forgetting about the rest of the world that make you look back at those times and smile. At one point I know I loved you even though I don’t quite understand why.

thank you so much for reading. fifteen and sixteen were such rough years of my life so i wanted to take a moment and reflect on the feelings i felt with my love life at the time. I find reflecting on what happened helps me process and also remember memories that have naturally faded slightly over time.

if you enjoyed this piece consider checking out the rest of my acc or consider sharing and commenting to reach more amazing writers 🧚

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All my love, Poppy 💌

Aurora - Melbourne 2023

My first proper concert. i had been to small gigs / festivals in my hometown but this was my first concert of someone i really loved enough to travel for. i can’t even fully remember how the plan happened but i remember seeing her Australian tour dates in 2022 and being so sad she wasn’t coming to Perth. My best friend (who introduced me to her) felt the same way and somehow we ended up deciding that since we were both on our gap years, we should just fly to Melbourne with my mum and make a whole trip out of it. And I’m so grateful we did. Looking back now, it feels surreal that my first major concert experience was Aurora. There could not have been a more perfect artist to start with.

The concert was at Palace Theatre in St Kilda, an old theatre with so much character and I don’t think there could have been a better venue for Aurora. Even before she came on stage, the room felt so atmospheric with her energy. Then she walked out and I understood why people talk about her stage presence they way they do. It’s genuinely unlike anyone I’ve seen since.

She moves and dances across the stage as though she is completely lost inside her music and somehow it pulls everyone else in with her. There is something about watching her perform that always leaves me feeling hopeful despite the state of the world.

Hearing The Seed and Daydreamer live actually altered my brain chemistry and sometimes I still go back and play those video clips i have on my phone just to feel something. I am not kidding when I say her vocals somehow sound even more otherworldly in person and that she is literally just the sweetest and most beautiful human ever.

I ended up seeing Aurora again 2 years later in Perth in the year 2025 and even though i love her new music so so much, nothing will compare to this first experience with how amazing of a setlist it truly was. Life changing. Speaking of her new music though! me and are doing a post about her latest album “What Happened to the Heart?” so if you love Aurora… stay tuned.

Noah Kahan- Perth 2024

The second Noah Kahan announced his Stick Season Australian tour, I already knew I needed tickets and it is wild to see how much more he has blown up since. I was completely obsessed with his album Stick Season at the time (honestly I still am) and I knew hearing A View Between Villages live would emotionally destroy me in the best possible way. Noah was actually one of the reasons my friend and I moved up to Perth earlier than I originally thought because I refused to miss this concert.

Honestly though, the actual concert experience was quite chaotic.

The venue was up in the hills and there were cars and people EVERYWHERE and because it was still peak aussie summer the heat was unbearable. My friend and I decided we wanted to get close to the stage so we stood up front thinking it wouldn’t be that bad.

We were wrong.

For reasons I don’t think were ever explained, Noah ended up being like two-three hours late on stage. Our legs were in complete agony before the show had even begun. Alas, besides from all that the concert was beautiful. One of my favourite moments was when he sung Forever (one of my favourite songs by him now) before it was even released and his performance of Pain is Cold Water where everyone in the crowd pulled out their phone looked gorgeous at the outside venue we were at.

It was for sure the most physically painful concert experience but I am devastated he isn’t coming over to Perth this year with his latest tour because I would have loved to see him again… hopefully one day.

Laneway 2024 Perth

I had been to Wildlands Festival earlier this year where I saw The Jungle Giants (they were awesome) so i thought i was ready to survive a festival again.

Newsflash: it was so much hotter. (Me and Perth heat do not go well together).

The heat for Laneway, because it is in February, is no joke, I mean you’re basically committing to a full day of standing in the boiling hot sun and in my first year going to laneway i was not ready for it. I spent most of the day feeling like I was slowly melting away into a giant puddle on the ground.

The first act we saw really early in the day was Hemlocke Springs . I think one of my friends put a water bottle on my head to try balance it and lucky enough the artist looked over mid set and said something along the lines of “hell yeah, stay hydrated everyone”. It was such a tiny interaction but I felt so honoured that it was towards me haha.

During the rest of the festival we caught Angie McMahon and then Faye Webster. At the time I only knew a handful of Fayes songs but now she is one of my favourites which is crazy to think about. We ended up leaving the festival just before the main act Stormzy came on as none of us were too fussed about seeing him. As we made the long embark out of the venue, we ran into Hemlocke Springs as she was leaving and we said hi! she was just as lovely as she seemed on stage. It was a great way to end the long day.

Lizzy McAlpine - Sydney 2024

The fact i got to witness lizzy in itself was a miracle. My boyfriend and I had a just booked flights to Newcastle in New South Whales to visit in July 2024 for a holiday. That same night Lizzy announced her Australian tour and one of the shows was in Sydney, a few hours away from where we were going, not only that but she was performing on the last night before we left. It felt way too good to be true and I knew we had to make it work. As soon as her tickets went on sale, I booked them, found us a place for a night and oh my goshhh I was so excited.

The whole night had such a different feeling to most of the concerts I’ve been to. It was quiet, softer. Lizzy’s songwriting is already so intimate and hearing it live somehow made every lyric feel even more intimate and heart wrenching. Chemtrails and Older were my two favourite songs to hear live. I have to say I cried at both of them. Such a beautiful artist and person to witness.

After the concert, my boyfriend and I took over a half an hour walk back to our accommodation, talking about the show while my legs complained after standing all night. Fun fact but I’m actually wearing her merch as I’m writing this. Such a breathtaking live performance.

Hozier - Perth 2024

2024 man. what a YEAR for concerts. starting with Noah Kahan and ending with Hozier was the dream. this is hands down my favourite concert i have ever experienced.

To start this experience, this concert was on the same night that Donald Trump won the election, an hour before Hozier came on stage. It was absolutely horrifying and you can feel the somber and raw emotions in the room from the news. It was such a moment of my life to witness and I could feel the rage and hurt in Hoziers voice throughout his whole performance.

There were so many amazing unforgettable moments during this concert like Work Song, Like Real People do, Almost and Nobodys Solder live was everything I hoped it would be and somehow even better. His voice has so much depth and power that it was crazy to be in the same room as him. Every song felt huge and monumental .

I obviously know Take me to Church would be part of the setlist but I never expected it to end up being one my favourite experiences of my whole entire life?? Hearing so many people in one room scream that song at the top of their lungs all together made me actually want to bawl my eyes out. so so empowering.

The production also deserves so much credit. The lighting was incredible and the stage decision was gorgeous. I really miss standing in that crowd and losing my eyes from signing every lyric. If I could relive any concert for the first time again, it would be this one without any hesitation.

Laneway festival - Perth 2025

Going into Laneway 2025, I was definitely more experienced on how to survive the festival heat. The lineup for this year was insane. We had Clairo, Beabadobee, Charli XCX and so much more all in one place.

(I also predicted Clairo was going to be on the lineup 😏)

Anyways there is not much to say about this festival except how much I miss Clairo… come back to Australia please. My wife.

Gracie Abrams 2025- Perth

i am not the biggest Gracie Abrams fan but i was a huge lover of Good Riddance when it first came out so i booked tickets, not knowing much of The Secret of Us before I went. I actually hesitated if I should sell the tickets before the show because I came to the realisation that she probably wasn’t going to play much of the songs I personally loved but then I heard ASHE was the opener and I had to go. Till Forever Falls Apart was my song in 2021 and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see it live.

I am glad I ended up going because her concert was such a wholesome experience. Gracie had such a sweet way of connecting with the crowd. She had a whole section of the show where she accepted gifts from fans and read our letter and it was so cute to watch. The setlist also didn’t disappoint. I ended up hearing Full Machine and I know it won’t Work for my surprise songs which I absolutely was not expecting!!

and of course the Close to You moment was so sweet to witness In person. Everyone was dancing down by the stage, screaming the lyrics and having the bet time. It was genuinely such a great atmosphere to be in.

Laneway Festival 2026 - Perth

The best festival experience I have ever had.

I’d fully prepared myself to spend the day overheating, especially because I had an injury at the time, I was completely ready for the agonising day ahead in order to see some of my favourite artists.

But the weather was lowkey perfect?

It was still hot but it was comfortable and there was quite a lot of shade in the venue it was at. Beautiful.

And the lineup? It genuinely felt like it had been made for me.

like are you kidding me??? On 15th of February I somehow got to see Alex G, Cavetown, Lucy Dacus, Wolf Alice and Chappell Roan all in one day. And that is not even everyone I loved on this lineup,

If I had to pick a favourite from the day, it would have to be Wolf Alice. Their stage presence was unreal, the energy was incredible and it made me all bittersweet and emotional seeing them live after how much their songs meant to me after I discovered them from Heartstopper.

Plus Lucy Dacus singing True Blue?? Don’t even get me started. Phoebe Bridgers better be there at Laneway 2027 I swear.

Dream lineup next year would be : Phoebe Bridgers, The Marias, Florence and the Machine, Big Thief…. PLEASE.

Lorde 2026- Perth

My most recent concert and easily one of my favourites.

I have been a fan of Lorde for as long as I can remember so finally getting to see her live felt really special. Like Yellow Flicker Beat was my absolute jam back when I first got into The Hunger Games. And after Virgin came out, I somehow loved her even more. Hearing songs like Favourite Daughter and David was everything I dream it would be.

Green Light is without a doubt my favourite experience of listening to a song live. It has been such a comfort song to me since it first came out and my mum and I use to play it on one of those “hits of the summer” CDs on repeat.

I had already seen videos of it performed live before we even bought tickets so I know it was going to be a big moment but nothing could have prepared me for what it actually felt like in the room. The second that beat dropped, the entire crowd and the lights exploded. That energy was addicting.

The whole show really was just so much fun to dance to. I mean she has so many bangers… Team, Ribs, Current Affairs… Lorde will always be one of my favourites artists and after finally seeing her live I love her music even more than I did before.

Artists i want to see next? Some that are really high of the I MUST GO TO are: Big Thief / Adrianne Lenker, Florence and the Machine, Daughter, Sharon Van Etten and TV girl ✨

thank you so much for reading! I know this piece was longer than my usual so if you have stuck around this far thank you so much xx this was so much fun to write about :)

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all my love, Poppy 💌

When people talk about absent fathers, there is usually some story attached to it. A reason why the dad left. A marriage that unraveled. A horrible loss to cancer or a car crash. Usually, even if they don’t know their father well, they at least know who he was as a person.

I never had that. My dad was never in my life. My mum doesn’t know his name and he has no idea he has a daughter.

I was the result of a University party and what i assume was a considerable of alcohol. My mum found she was pregnant too late to have an abortion so she considered giving me up for adoption but couldn’t go through with it so now I’m here.

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Growing up, talking about my dad was never taboo. I love my mum and while we had our moments, i genuinely think she did an incredible job raising me. She was understanding, and supportive at letting me just be me (Even though i made some questionable outfit decisions during my teenage years) If i asked questions about my dad, she would answer them honestly but the truth is, i rarely asked. it would either feel too awkward to bring up or i just simply didn’t care enough to wonder when i was young.

I never felt like i was missing anything. The relationship between my mum and I was everything i ever wanted. We looked so alike that sometimes it felt like i had just been photocopied from her. Like where is my dads DNA? i dont know. There was no mystery in my face and no obvious feature or habit of mine that made me wonder where it came from.

I joked about not having a dad all the time to my friends. Whenever people would ask if it affected me, i would honestly tell them no because i never had the actual person to miss.

Last year, my mum moved in with her boyfriend. They have been together for ten years and I always somewhat knew they would move in together after all of his kids left home. I never called him my step dad and i never saw him as a father figure up until this point. That doesn’t mean I didn’t love him or that he didn’t teach me a lot. It’s just that for my entire life, it had always been only me and my mum living together in our small house. Nothing filled that father shaped hole until they started living together.

Now, after moving home from university and spending nearly a year since they moved in going and staying with them for a few weeks, something in my brain has shifted. Maybe it’s because I’m older. Maybe it’s because I’m slowly approaching the age my mum was when she had me. Or maybe it’s because, for the first time, I’ve experienced what life looks like with two parents under the same roof. it’s made me think of my dad in a way I never had before.

The last time I was in my hometown, my mums boyfriend and I were talking about about how particular my mum is about some things and I was saying how different we are in that regard because I’m much more laid back about general life choices and that I probably got that trait from my uncle. He laughed and said “You know, you might have got it from your dad right?” And it stopped me for a second. Oh yeah. He exists. There is an actual person out there who I’m related to.

As most of you would know, recently Noah Kahan released an album and a new song Willing and Ablewith the lyrics “i wish you could know me. I wish you could know you much more sometimes.” the text on a tiktok video I saw was simply the lyrics in the background with “this song exists it’s about your dad”

I have never thought about a TikTok so much and I still can’t fully explain the feeling. For the first time in my life, I felt something that looked a lot like grief. Grief for a father I never had. Grief of the fact that I will never know him. Having a father figure in my life has made me long to know who my father would have been if he was in my life. For twenty one years I have gone through life without giving him much thought. Now suddenly I find myself awake wondering who he is.

Is he even alive?

Do I have half siblings?

Does he like movies like me? Is he creative?

Would he love me?

The weirdest part is knowing he has no idea he has a daughter. I exist completely outside his understanding of the world.

It’s so complicated because i don’t feel robbed of a father figure. i don’t need those answers to feel complete but the curiosity for something that I’ll never have has been hard to understand lately.

i want to know what parts of me belong to him

i wonder if he knew i existed if he would want me too.

thank you so much for reading!! i would love to hear your experiences with your absent or not absent fathers 💌

all my love, Poppy xx

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control. that’s all I ever wanted. control when things felt so far out of my own reach.

for people whose lives have been shaped by instability or so much emotional pain, the body can become the last part of yourself that feels controllable. food restriction often begins as an attempt to manage overwhelming emotions when nothing else feels manageable.

That’s how it begun for me.

What are Eating Disorders?

Clinically, eating disorders are serious conditions characterized by persistent disturbances in eating behaviours. The most commonly discussed diagnoses include anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorders. But lived experience is rarely that simple, many people don’t fit neatly into one label.

My experience was a mix of both anorexia and bulimia. I actually had a similar experience to that of Jaiden Animations, a famous storyteller on YouTube. I definitely recommend her video where she discusses her experiences, it’s very insightful for people who might not know much about how eating disorders affect people.

Research shows that eating disorders are not choices or phases and they are not simply about food. They arise from a complex mix of vulnerability, psychological traits, stresses or something else entirely. Yet despite this, public narratives on eating disorders remain shallow. Eating disorders are still stereotyped as teenage girls wanting to be thin or just an attention seeking behaviour that can be stopped with enough discipline. These myths are clearly so harmful and silence people for talking about what they are going through.

Control as a Central Reason

For me, my eating disorder began during a time when i felt a profound loss of control. In the year and a half leading up to when things got really bad, I felt powerless over what people said about me, over friendships that slowly drifted away, over the lies being spread about everyone and how others perceived me.

There was a moment when I was 16, a comment from my ex partner, that seemed to break something in me and I wasn’t able to keep strong anymore.

I had people saying they wished I was dead, people shouting at me across the street in my hometown, making comments about my appearance. But the words hurt much more when it came from someone who use to be my safe place. Even if I knew deep down those words came from anger at the world and not truly at me, the damage was already done.

I mean how long can you really keep strong after being on constant state of anxiety for over a year?

Restriction over food created a false sense of control for me. Purging felt like erasing mistakes. Hunger dulled every over other sensation I felt in my soul. It felt safer than facing how everything was affecting me.

Even when my ex and I eventually became friends again, i couldn’t find a way to stop what I had started.

Something I didn’t fully consider until much later is that eating disorders are not sustained by psychology alone. The act of starvation and purging alone physically alters the brain function, reinforcing the disorder. Malnutrition affects serotonin and dopamine leading to obsessive thinking and emotional numbness. And i think this is what a lot of people don’t understand about why recovery for an eating disorder is so difficult.

“I’m Not Sick Enough”

I’m not sick enough was one of the most damaging beliefs I carried. I thought I should be looking and feeling way worse than I was. That it wasn’t ‘bad’ because i didn’t even look that sick.

But I will repeat this until the day I die… there is no single way to look or feel sick. Many people with eating disorders are never hospitalised or never even underweight!!!

People often wait for a dramatic turning point before taking someone seriously with an eating disorder even though most recoveries don’t begin with a major medical crisis. There is a rarely one defining moment, it is more of a gradual finding of reasons of wanting to get better.

Finding a Way Back to Me?

My recovery began slowly.

There was no sudden event that inspired me to get better but over time, I started falling back in love with life. I didn’t want to feel so physically tired anymore.

I recognise that comes from a place of honestly privilege that I could find my spark back again. I had friends who supporting me, a family who cared but even with all those things it can be so hard to find a sense of purpose again. For me, one thing that really shaped my recovery was reading.

I reconnected with the hobby I hadn’t touched before everything began to fell apart. Recovery, in some ways, meant returning to a younger version of myself and rediscovering life from that perspective.

One of the most scary parts of recovery was questioning who I was without struggling from the eating disorder. This might seem like a strange question but I had spent so many months so focused on what I was eating, on how to get everything out of my body and worrying about losing control that it almost became tied with my identity.

Falling back in love with reading and writing gave me language for experiences that once felt so isolating. Journaling allowed my thoughts to exist outside of my overwhelming head and over time allowed me to break away from the hold food had on me.

My eating disorder had narrowed my world down to my pain but literature expanded it again and reminded me there was so much life ahead of me to look forward to.

Recovery is not all that plain black and white . I still sometimes suffer from the same thoughts I did when I was younger but I just know how to respond to them now when they come up.

We need more honest narratives about eating disorders in our world. More real and lived experiences to spread awareness beyond stereotypes and surface level conversations. These stories matter xx

thank you so much for reading this article 💌 it honestly means the world to me that anyone would read this. you are all so loved by me<3 and dont be afraid to comment ur own experience or private message me, i am all ears! ^🧡

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I stand in front of the door I have already walked through countless times before. I’m worried that the door is going to vanish and there may never be a chance to go through again. The longer I stand here, the quieter it gets. The more I know, it’s over. There’s nothing left that can return it to what it was. Nothing left to bring us back. Still, something in my heart keeps trying to reach past the silence, to keep grabbing more time with you.

What am I hoping for?

I sat on the edge of my bed two months ago, five years since we first met, and realised I hadn’t seen your face in a long time. The face from five years ago is gone now and it’s been gone for a long time. Still, I imagine you with that face every now and then.

I’m not hoping for you to come back. I have grown apart from you regardless. I’m past the point of wanting to try again, I know so are you. The version I miss doesn’t exist anymore. But then something comes up and I still find that there is certain news I want to tell you and then having to remember it’s just not possible anymore.

Like how heartstopper, the thing we were really into together four years ago, has just finished forever and how four years ago that would have made us cry our eyes out but now it’s just bittersweet and almost unimportant.

Every one in a while I think what if someday there will be one more conversation to close our story properly.

Maybe that’s why I stand near the door.

I had a dream during christmas time year that you died and I was devastated. Weird dream to have I know but I had the thought, would you feel sadness if it was I that was gone?

I’ve been trying to come to terms with the fact that sometimes there is no proper ending or conclusion or recovery.

But how do you process never speaking again?

That friendship was a huge part of my life. It was real. I have to remember that. The doorway behind me won’t disappear. There’s no need to go back through it now or maybe ever again. i still think of you but I don’t mistake that for wanting you back.

everyone knows of the song purple rain by now.

It’s such a shame our friendship had to end.

With university ending at the end of the year, I’ve been scared. I know i’m going to have to make new friends all over again and also somehow try keep in contact with all the amazing people I have already met which feels impossible as we go on our own seperate ways to hopefully chase our dreams. it’s a rough world but i hope wherever I go i will meet some new awesome people…

hello everyone!! i havent published an article in quite a little bit because of university but here is a small piece to keep my creative juices flowing!!! i hope everyone is doing fantastic!

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all my love, Poppy 🧚

i keep coming back to this question, especially as we just passed the month of February aka. the ‘month of love’. We are often taught that love is the ending, the proof that your existence matters or that you are indeed valuable enough to be chosen by someone else. We grow up surrounded by the storyline of finding your perfect person, getting married in a couple of years and then having heaps of kids. Atleast that’s what I had drilled into me constantly growing up by both my families and books I was reading.

I remember being a small twelve year old, watching my best friends panic and genuinely sob because they hadn’t been in a relationship yet. They were TWELVE and they were already terrified they might never find ‘the one’. It’s wild to me how early we absorb the idea that romantic love is some kind of finishing goal and that without it we will be forever behind.

The longer I sit with the topic of love as i grow older, the less it feels like something purely romantic but more as an experience that we, as humans, share with so many things surrounding us in our lives.

I always turn to media I have seen to try make sense of my thoughts and one that really stayed with me that I watched this year is Past Lives. It captures how love doesn’t always exist to last forever but to shape us and change who we are as individuals.

One of the most persistent ideas about love is that if it’s real and you’re both good people than you should stick together no matter what. I DISAGREE!!!! I’m not saying give up if you have one fight but love is always shaped by context, timing, circumstances and who we are in that moment of our lives. Some relationships, like the one in Past Lives carries the weight of an entire past and unfortunate circumstances of timing. Loving someone can feel beautiful and infinite but also terrifying, especially if you have already been hurt once before.

my boyfriend and I have been dating long term since we were 18 (we are now 21 which is crazy to me) and given we are in that time of our lives where we are both changing so much, it has created a lot of conversations about the future. We both agree if we ever broke up, it probably wouldn’t be because of a big fight but because our lives were pulling us in different directions. Even then, there would still be a love between us, but just because those feelings are there doesn’t mean our relationship is guaranteed to last forever.

Love can exist without permanence!! It can still be real even it wasn’t forever!!!

I see so many people my age being so deeply in love for years and then as soon as they break up, they end up hating each other and reposting all these negative posts about the other person almost instantly. I understand some breakups end badly and I understand I probably have absolutely no right to comment about this but sometimes it’s scary to me how fast people can switch up and turn to hate straight after everything ends. (but i also understand that this can help with healing so you do you !!)

Sometimes love can get complicated and confusing because we are not in love with the person but with how they make us feel or who we are with them. I learned that the hard way.

In high school, I was in a relationship that lasted two years. I was already going through a rough time when we ended things and I didn’t know how to deal with losing yet another important person from my life when they had become so tied to how I understood myself. I didn’t just miss them or our relationship but I missed who I use to be. I became obsessed with trying to get that version of myself back. I tried to start things with them again months and months after it was clear it had already finished. I thought it would fix everything and bring me back to a happier version of myself if we found our way back to each other.

Looking back I can see how tangled it all was and how tangled I was in love and my identity. Despite how much love we had for each other, we didn’t belong together and we weren’t the same people from when we first started and that was really hard for me to accept.

It wasn’t until my current boyfriend came back into my life that I started to trust myself to love again. We had been closer when we were younger, even dated at 11 and 12 years old before he moved away. Still when we reunited, I was cautious. I took my time getting to know him again and making sure my likeness for him wasn’t just because of the past we shared together. We spent six months talking everyday getting to know each other, almost for the first time again.

That doesn’t mean we are perfect now. We are actually very different people who have definitely have arguments from time to time, but what works is that we are able to sit in the discomfort, listen and understand each other.

That, to me, is love.

Not perfection but understanding. Seeing each other including our flaws and not turning away, instead welcoming them in.

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But love isn’t something confined to just one person or one kind of relationship. Love exists everywhere. In families, in friendships, in moments and memories and in nature and anything that makes you feel alive. Everyone carries some form of it.

Something I wish I understood when I was younger is that being loved isn’t what gives you value. You already have that. Love is something you share with other people. I am so inspired by the way the artist AURORA speaks about love… if you haven’t listened to her you should!!! she is such a gorgeous artist with the most beautiful voice. The way she speaks about love is both in her songs themselves and her on stage presence. She talks about love as something natural that we already all carry, saying “And of course: love. If you have love in you, you need to share it.” which really spoke to me. Why don’t we share our love with people more often? Is out of the fear of rejection? Or perhaps embarrassment?

Love is the purest thing that we are capable of sharing. Songs like Exist for Love by Aurora make me so emotional as it reminds me of the celebrations and true beauty of human connection. To connect. To feel. To be inspired.

And that is the bravest thing about loving, that you know it may be temporary but you still share your love anyways.

On top of that, I’ve been dealing with some health issues which started around the same time classes did. These health issues still haven’t gone away even though it’s been a whole month later since they started. It’s nothing too dramatic or immediately deadly but its thrown me out of whack. Most days I have been distracted or frankly just too tired with whatever new symptom or illness decided to show up that day to even think about sitting down to write.

Ever since this all begun, I have been constantly on edge. I have been living day by day with the mindset that something could happen at any moment. Every single day seems to bring something new to worry about, some new question about what might be going on. Apparently, one of the things that could be contributing to this is something I was born with, which I might need surgery for in the future….

All of this has made me anxious and exhausted all the time. As someone who already struggles with health anxiety ever since I moved out of home, having so many things pop up back to back over the last few weeks has been incredibility draining. My mind has been stuck in a constant state of alert.

When I look back at everything that’s been happening, it makes sense that I haven’t been writing much. But the more time has passed without writing, the more I realised those aren’t just the reasons I haven’t been able to start on that blank page.

I think the bigger reason is that lately I haven’t wanted to open up or talk about my emotions. And that’s where most of my writing comes from. My articles are often me trying to untangle whatever thoughts are floating in my head and trying to process them or atleast discuss them. But recently I haven’t wanted to think about anything.

Instead of reflecting and taking the time to breathe after the day, I’ve been living in survival. Pushing down my thoughts, the same way I used to when I was younger, out of the fear of opening another emotional door that will flood myself with thoughts I wasn’t ready to deal with. Writing has always been helpful when life gets messy but actually starting that process when you have no energy or will to talk about myself isn’t easy. I lost a little bit of my passion for honestly everything over the last month.

Last year a friend introduced me to a new medical show called The Pitt. It’s very well known now so you might have heard it been mentioned around. This show has been my comfort every week recently as the new episodes for season 2 come out and there is one scene from one of the recent episodes that really made me think about me and my connection to writing.

You don’t need to know much about the show to understand why this moment resonated with me, so don’t worry if you haven’t seen it.

In Season 2, Episode 8, a sexual assault survivor finishes up her examination with the only certified sexual assault nurse examiner called Dana. Just before the last step in the exam, she emotionally says that she was glad Dana was here today. Dana softly replies “me too.”

Dana is a character that we have seen considering quitting after being attacked by a patient last season and struggling with the burnout that comes with the emergency department. In fact, she actually left at one point off screen during the time between the two seasons but ended up returning.

In the episode before, episode seven, her new trainee nurse Emma asks her a simple question: why did she come back?

This question lingers and Dana doesn’t answer.

Why does someone keep returning to a place that is this intense, exhausting and this emotionally draining?

The show answers that question in this very next episode. There are these moments of human connection that helps someone at their worst point of life. Dana changes the lives of others everyday. That is the reason she keeps coming back despite all the negative that comes with the job. These are the moments that keep her coming back.

Alongside being one of the best scenes in the entire show, it is one of the best examples of good writing and storytelling in general for me. It trusts its audience to understand the audience through the emotional weight of a single exchange (something that media doesn’t often do these days).

Unexpectedly it reminded me why writing matters so much to me. It has always been my way of connecting with myself and with other people (like you guys!) and changing others lives in small ways through my words.

…And that begins with simply writing a word on a blank page. Allowing myself time to feel my emotions and process what I’m feeling, whether its through an article or a journal to myself. I want to make writing a priority again in my life because without it I find everything else goes to shit

thank you writing. i don’t know what my life looks without you x

and thank you to everyone reading. it means the world that yall are still here and still support me. i have been so badly inactive recently and i can’t wait to find the time to read EVERYONES articles and indulge myself with my creative loves again

I’m currently working on a short film that will hopefully go to a few festivals in the future, most likely in Australia. The link for updates on that is here if you are interested in supporting small local films <3

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s childhood books 💌

If you were to ask me what had the biggest impact on who I am today, I’d respond with many things, including family, nature, art, community, and books. While all of these were (and still are) so important to me, reading is what has remained the most consistent and transformative aspect of my life. I can still remember being read Little Women as I attempted to fall asleep, making my way through my first chapter book (Miss Know-It-All, which may be why I am still in fact a know-it-all), rereading the Little Prince over and over again, daydreaming over Little House on the Prairie, and reading Percy Jackson under my covers when I should be sleeping. Every single book that I have ever read is a piece of the mosaic that makes up my soul. For me, my childhood reads are so much more than books: they are memories, emotions, and lessons that have stuck with me and resurfaced when I need them the most.

There is true magic in reading and being fully immersed in stories. With increased empathy and imagination from every book I read, I went through life with a passion for adventure and a deep love of learning. I would not be me if it weren’t for the books that I have read.

And although every book that was a piece of my childhood is so incredibly important and well-loved, the book that has had the biggest effect on me throughout my entire life has been Winnie-the-Pooh. Published in 1926, it was a book that was read and loved by my Grandma, mom, and me. We span three different generations, and each of us is filled with so many differing experiences and interactions, yet we all grew up reading this wonderful book. There is so much beauty in sharing that. This is such a sentimental book for me as I grew up with my Grandma reading it aloud to me. Her act of storytelling created connection, memories, and love that have defined my relationship with her to this day. Now, far older though still young, we frequently reopen our battered copy and dive back into the comfort of the Hundred Acre Woods.

A tale of connection, comfort, and discovery, Winnie-the Pooh taught me so much. I learned the incredible value of friendships and community, of having people to rely on and help out in times of need. Despite many conflicting personalities and some disagreements, communication was prioritized and relationships were always sustained and strengthened. Life takes a village, and every animal was more than willing to be a villager. Having a strong community is so important and makes life so much more beautiful.

Another thing those pages taught me is that the best things in life are the simplest. In a world that prioritizes money, status, hustle culture, consumerism, and being hot, this is a much-needed reminder. The biggest luxuries are our relationships, experiences, rest, interactions, and everything else we take for granted (and honey, of course). Intentionally slow down and take some time to see how much joy and worth there is in everything.

One of my favorite things about Winnie-the-Pooh is how stories are the ultimate form of love and connection. Winnie-the-Pooh was written for A.A. Milne’s son, Christopher Robin. It’s so lovely, to be known and cared for so much that a book is written about your adventures, for your enjoyment. Their relationship has been immortalized and their connection magnified. And just as A.A. Milne told his son stories, so did my family tell me. Sharing these words created a bond that can never be broken.

Connection, love, nostalgia, adventure, kindness, and curiosity have all been ingrained in me from a young age through the books that I have read and the people who shared them with me.

🍯My Response:

This is genuinely so beautiful to read! I actually also still own a copy of Little Woman from when I was very little. It has a quiz in the back asking which sister you were and I remember taking it obsessively (because for some reason I loved having my personality determined by random quizzes). I was always some blend of Jo and then a random sister no matter when I took it which makes sense because I always related to Jos’ spirit in some way. I think that says something about how early stories influence who we think we are because we see ourselves or get inspired by all these different characters and want to be just like them in some cases.

What moved me most of your piece is your reflection on generational reading. How one book can span three lives and still feel so alive. That kind of timelessness feels almost rare now as the world is moving so quickly. When everything changes in your life, it can feel so comforting to go back to a story you remember and just sit in it for awhile. I know I have done this with The Hunger Games a few times now.

This also reminds me of when my mum handed me The Secret Garden, an old copy which once belonged to my grandma. I adored how old the pages felt in my hand and how the smell of the book was just so nostalgic whenever I picked it up.

And of course, I absolutely adored Winnie the Pooh growing up. Piglet was my favourite because i really admired his bravery even despite him being so quiet and anxious (like me because i was such a shy child). He still showed up for his friends and i thought that was really cool.

Thank you, Laura, for such a gorgeous piece xx

favourite childhood book 💌

The Doll People

written by: Ann M. Martin & Laura Godwin

illustrations by: Brian Selznick (The Invention of Hugo Cabret, Frindle, The Boy of A Thousand Faces, & many more!)

Story Summary: “Annabelle Doll has been eight for more than a hundred years. The Doll family, beautiful china dolls, have been passed down through four generations. Not a lot has happened to Annabelle, cooped up with the same doll people for a century…until the Funcrafts move in. Tiffany Funcraft is made entirely of plastic, but she’s an adventurer and just the right companion for Annabelle when she vows to solve a decades-long mystery”

My Personal Adulations: As the oldest and only girl, I grew up with plenty of doll friends. From age five to fifteen I could spend hours and hours alone in my room creating adventures, developing characters, and fleshing out plot lines. I had a front row seat every day, to movies directed by me, with the main cast being made up of Mattel plastic and sparkly dresses.

Dolls were my creative outlet, and eventually led to my love of writing. So, picturing such an obsessed girl, it’s not too difficult to imagine how enamoring a book called The Doll People could be.

In nineteen chapters, Ann M. Martin & Laura Godwin take readers on a cozy adventure that goes back and forth from an English, antique, wooden dollhouse, to a fairly decent sized American, human home. I revisit it every once in a while for its simplicity, and Selznick’s charming, graphite illustrations. As the story progresses, you meet Annabelle Doll and her family. They have been in the Palmer family for many generations, raising each little girl on house-like adventures. The simple approach to characters has always appealed to me. Annabelle, a small, hand-painted china doll, lives with her family, Mama Doll, Papa Doll, Uncle Doll, Bobby Doll, Baby Betsy, and of course Nanny. There hasn’t been much excitement, ever since Aunt Sarah Doll went missing of course. When Annabelle secretly finds Sarah’s journal, she resolves to find her, and to bring her back home safely to the family, believing Aunt Sarah is alive somewhere in the human house! The only problem is, Annabelle is just one girl, and her family very much disapproves of exploring. Soon into the story, the Funcraft family arrives, an entirely new group of toys made fully of plastic. Upon meeting, Annabelle Doll and Tiffany Funcraft decide they are meant to be best friends, and like any other dynamic duo, this means an exciting adventure can begin at last.

I won’t spoil it for you avid readers, but as the story goes on, Annabelle and Tiffany’s friendship stands out as the most endearing. They are loyal to one another, love to laugh, and capture what it could mean to enjoy girlhood forever: frozen in time as eight year old girls.

I have to save room for how much I love the clever cover of this chapter book! The front captures the Doll’s wooden house, complete with a locked latch to keep everyone inside safe from house cats. The back features a pink plastic house with a chaotic blend of pieces coming from all openings. A creative way to spotlight both families, and their differences.

In conclusion, if you are looking for a book that could send you flying back to your own doll adventures, or an easy to follow story for a little reader in your life, I’d urge you to give this one a try. It’s a classic in my household, and might become one in yours too!

🧸My Response:

I have to start by saying I have never actually read The Doll People but reading your reflection made me feel like I understood it anyway. I totally get why it would resonate so deeply with people.

When you described being the oldest and only girl, spending hours in your room building entire cinematic universes, I felt that instantly. I am an only child and the daughter of a single mum, so a lot of my childhood was spent in my own company. I can see myself so clearly, directing and narrating entire dramas with my dolls or figurines. Those storytelling instincts feel like the beginning of where I am today.

Dolls were my childhood too. Especially Polly Pocket. It reminds that there were days when there was no audience, no performance or really any self awareness. I just created because I wanted to.

The way you spoke about friendship with Annabelle and Tiffany really resonated with me too as i adore the themes of girlhood friendships. It actually reminded me of Ivy and Bean, a series I use to read, and how beautiful childhood friendships really are.

I hope one day I get the change to read The Doll People!

childhood book ! 💌

The golden trio that saved my life

There was a boy who lived in the cupboard under the stairs, and I wanted to be like him more than anything else. One grey afternoon I had ventured over to my neighbour’s house to play, and when the rain banished us inside I walked up to their bookshelves and had a gander. Glittering stars on spines and golden lettering attracted me, and after a little bit of pleading I ran back across the street to my house — clutching that paperback tightly under my shirt to keep it dry. By the next morning I was finished and headed back for more. Then I was onto the next one, and the one after that, until I was handed the last four books at once to save my neighbours from my annoying daily knock-round.

I couldn’t get enough of them. Page after page, I kept turning and all sorts of emotions came flying out. I had never laughed out loud at a book until now. I had never frustratingly sighed and harshly turned the page of a book until now. I had never sobbed my eyes out at a book until now. I understood, from the moment I read “4 Privet Drive”, what adults meant by books being able to move you, shape you, change you. And all that these books did, and more.

I wasn’t a frightfully lonely child, but I preferred my own company. I’d take a quiet evening playing my DS in bed rather than playing with my sisters any day of the week. But once I read those books, it all changed for me. I lived through those characters. Once I finished all of the books, I read them all again — eager to soak up all the details again. I was, quite frankly, obsessed. Don’t just take my word for it — I had a Harry Potter themed birthday party, which featured an amazingly realistic Monster Book of Monsters cake and playing ‘pin the plaster on Harry’s scar’.

You may think I’m being dramatic with my title, but I’m really not. I wouldn’t be the person that I am today if it weren’t for those books. I read each chapter with bated breath, trying to suss out the plot on my own before I got to the end. Then I discovered that there were films, and these were watched religiously — and from then on I became the sort of person who prefers the books. Films can never capture all the detail the right way, anyway.

I think that the most important thing that these books taught me was about reading for escape. I craved my Hogwarts acceptance letter more than anything else in the world. Part of me still hopes I get it someday, because better late than never. I would practice spells and doodle what my Patronus would be (a white fluffy dog, to be precise) and dreamed of living in a world where I could be accepted as I am. These books had hooked me and were not keen on letting me go. The golden trio (and the Marauders and Dumbledore’s Army) introduced me to the concept of what it’s like to have good friends, the notions of a loving family, and letting yourself just exist as you are, freak or not.

One day, smaller hands will dust off covers illustrated with magic and wonder — and the cycle will repeat. I will lovingly read bedtime stories of flying with dragons, almost-swallowed snitches, horcruxes, and treachery. My child will be taught about love, friendship, comradery, and have a golden trio to rely on. Ron will make them feel brave, Hermione will teach them to leave no stone unturned, and Harry will show them to stay true to themselves. And somewhere, beneath all the giggles and tears to come, younger Ellen will be snuggled up in that bed too — listening to her heart’s content and ravenous for more.

🪄 My Response:

The moment you mentioned the golden trio, I understand immediately. Those books are so deeply ingrained into my brain too, especially the first one (the one I read the most because it was so short compared to the others).

I resonate so much with how these books were like an escape. I wanted my Hogwarts letter so desperately when I was younger. I actually went to London right before I started the series, and once I began reading, I kept replaying that trip in my head. I would imagine that somewhere between those platforms, there really was a hidden entrance I could take.

Like most people did, I remember taking the house quiz for this series more times than i count. I used to get Ravenclaw and was so proud of it, literally just because I loved the colour blue. I’m pretty sure that I’m a Hufflepuff now which makes sense but honestly I haven’t done that test in so long to know.

What I love so much about your piece is the idea of passing the books on. There are so many series from childhood that fade but Harry Potter feels timeless. I only wish the author was not evil. This series was my Harry Potter growing up and I hope that I get to read it to my children one day and experience the whole thing again ❤️‍🩹 Thank you Ellen for such a gorgeous piece x

childhood book! 💌

the year is 2010. you are eight years old and the concept of lactose intolerance won’t enter your consciousness for another eight years, a lifetime from now. millennials are taking the world by storm, crafting an online presence that is both hilarious and quirky, but will soon be recast as a slur more hideous and offensive than any you’ve yet to encounter—cringe. but that’s a problem for future you (and as you’ll discover at around the same time dairy starts ruining your day, many problems have been kicked down the road to be met by your sorry generation). in the meantime, there are few things funnier, more delicious, or dare I say more relatable than the golden ambrosia itself: cheese.

so let us saunter on down to the trusty public library, where we set our scene.

I can remember the first time I laid my eyes on what would become my bible for the next several years, the glorious tomes known only by the name of their protagonist, Geronimo Stilton. it was an afternoon like any other, and I was absolutely wiped from another day of second-grade toils. when I opened The Curse of the Cheese Pyramid, it wasn’t the plot that gripped me, or even the fact that the main character was named after a cheese (that went over my head for years). instead, it was a spread that those of you familiar with the novels will recognize instantly.

(these images were near impossible to find, literally who is so invested in suppressing the stilton discourse I’m begging for mercy)

I must have stared at these two pages for hours. I knew the name of every rodent on staff at The Rodent’s Gazette (let’s just ignore the fact that they are canonically employing not one, not two, not three, but FOUR children). I daydreamed about these characters–90% of whom don’t even appear in any of the novels–imagining their lives, office drama, and personalities.

the longer I looked, the more hidden details I noticed—these pages were to me what Where’s Waldo was to well-adjusted children. take, for example, the fact that Mousella MacMouser and Kreamy O’Cheddar (#23 and #24) look like they’re related but apparently aren’t… who is setting the bleached-blonde-fake-tan-matching-skirtsuit trend, and who is just jumping on the bandwagon? and is it true that they aren’t sisters? both of their surnames are Irish… maybe they’re married and they changed their names?

and why did they cluster the three heavily racialized characters (Soya Mousehao, Cheesita de la Pampa, and Mouseanna Mousetti) at the same desk? is this workplace discrimination in action, or just some lovely evidence of completely unchecked early-2000s bigotry on the part of the author?

and doth my eyes deceive me, or is Branwen Musclemouse (#13) just a totally average body type?

so aside from the obviously questionable (to say the least) creative choices, I credit Geronimo Stilton with being the source of a lifelong wonder with character development and world-building. it’s not an exaggeration to say that getting to decide for myself the details of these minor characters (char-rat-ters, hehe) is the reason I’m writing on substack.

…and Thea Stilton is the reason I’m bisexual.

🧀 My Response:

Wow. Reading this actually opened up a whole can of worms for me.

I did read the Geronimo Stilton books as a kid (espically the Thea Stilton ones) but my memory of the actual plots is just not there at all. What I remember so clearly though is the aesthetic of these books. The distinct cover art. The fonts. Now I’m frustrated I can’t remember more about these books because i want to yap with you about them.

Also Thea Stilton being a bisexual awakening?

FACTS.

I also remember reading The Invention of Hugo Cabret around the same time and going through a phase where I really enjoyed art and the visuals of a book. I was obsessed with how story and image could blur together. (Maybe that is why i do film now)

Even if I can’t remember exactly what happened in the Geronimo Stilton stories, I remember what they felt like and how much fun I remember while reading them. Thank you writing such a perfect entertaining piece!! ✨

childhood books 💌

fairytales never leave us.

stories never leave us, unless we want them to.

I remember characters from my favourite stories as if they’re friends. I grew up with them. when I read a good book or watch a good movie — the characters always stay. their words echo in my mind. their experiences and lessons become a part of me. If you ask me what childhood characters could I name right now, I would say: Lucy from Narnia (C. S. Lewis dedicating the book to his niece is so sweet), Tinkerbell from Pixie Hollow, Emily from Emily of New Moon, Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland, Hermione Granger and Luna Lovegood in Harry Potter, and Peter Pan from Peter Pan.

didn’t realise I was such a fan of the classics.

thing is, I discovered these stories through movies which lead me to the books. my first love was movies after all.

these stories shaped who I am today.

for instance, Emily Starr made a poet out of me.

The Wind Woman and the poetry that came with her

Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery — famously known as the writer of Anne of Green Gables — was and still is one of my favourite stories and books of all time. read it last year and it still holds up! the prose is so magical and it really transforms you back to being 10. actually, it transforms me back to being 7. you see, Emily was always older than me. I would watch the anime adaptation every year for comfort. the book gives more insight into Emily’s mind. L.M. Montgomery knew how to create her characters.

Emily is described as eccentric and no one really knows what to do with her yet, she remains herself and finds friends who accept her as she is. Ilse — the ultimate best friend and future elocutionist (I always imagined her as a singer because I didn’t (still don’t) know what an elocutionist is) — Teddy future lover boy and artist — and Perry future attorney. their imagination, dedication, and support to one another has lead to their dreams to come true. Emily becomes an author. we follow her journey as she writes poetry, diary entries, and stories. we see her grow up and I grew up with her. her love for poetry and wonder at the world around her inspired me to find a part of myself I never knew existed.

“oh, for the dancing friendliness of well-known stars shining down through her open window!”

-Lucy Maud Montgomery, Emily of New Moon

Still, Peter never came

the second star on the right was a sight I always looked for.

maybe my habit of counting the stars of the evening sky comes from the child within that always sought out Neverland.

“Second star to the right and straight on ‘til morning. ”
― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Peter was the boy that never grew up. did he die and go to heaven? is that what Neverland is: Heaven? well, there are many very dark theories about Peter Pan that paint him out as a child-murderer. I will not allow you people to ruin this story for me! (I was always the annoying friend that told people about all the dark and twisted theories behind Disney movies like Peter being a murderer and Ariel dying at the end.)

I still believe I could fly.

I will never say I don’t believe in fairies so no fairy dies.

I choose to keep the magic alive, even if I can’t see it sometimes.

“The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.”
― J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan

“Never say goodbye because goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting.”
― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

🧚 My Response:

What you wrote about fairytales never leave us, my mind immediately went to Charlottes Web. A story that still sticks in my head today. I think a big theme in children books is that kids often hold the belief that adults don’t have, and like the characters you also talk about, Charlottes Web carries that same themes across.

Fern believes Wilburs life matters even though the adults in her life don’t and this determination is what your reflection reminds me of!

(Also I LOVE Lucy from The Chronicles of Narnia SO much.)

As adults, people love to dissect the magic from stories and darken them. I know this because I am one of these adults most of the time. (whoops) But i do really value how beautiful it can be to choose to keep the magic there. Of choosing wonder and imagination in this awful world brings hope to me.

I love love love how in your piece you don’t treat childhood as something you have outgrown but as something that is integrated into yourself. I really really relate to your words xx

One of my Favourite Childhood Books 💌

As a kid I loved Jacqueline Wilsons books and Lily Alone was one of my standout favourites growing up. It was also the first book I ever purchased online that I picked out for myself.

I don’t remember exactly how old I was when I first read this book but I do remember the way it made my heart panic and made me incredibly anxious while reading because i cared about the characters so deeply. I really enjoyed real emotional stories compared to fantasy growing up and Jacqueline Wilsons books always hit that spot for me that craved something deep.

Lily, our main character, wasn’t a chosen one. She wasn’t stepping into a whole different world. She was just a girl, left alone to care for her younger sisters, trying to hold everything together when it was falling apart around her.

As a child, I didn’t necessarily have the language for it but I recognised something in her independence and bravery, even though I didn’t have any siblings, I related to her and admired her when I was younger for the choices she made.

I really do love books that explore complicated feelings and I really want to read it as an adult and see if my perspective on this book has changed in any way.

HIIIII OMG!! This was a BIG post so thank you so much for reading!! This post was a long time coming and I feel so lucky to have done it with so many talented individuals <3 please make sure to check out their pages!! I couldn’t have done this without them<3

Also I would love to do a part 2 so if anyone is interested in writing about their childhood books, drop a comment below and we will do it!

love you all so much!

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I recognise myself in sad music. It’s such a big part of who I am that sometimes I wonder who I’d be without it. I honestly don’t think that I would understand myself so well. That’s why I wanted to dig into a few of my favourite sad songs and look at why music is such a powerful way to tell stories.

Donut Seam - Adrianne Lenker

One of my favourite songs on the whole earth.

A donut is defined by its hole. A seam is where two things meet, or where they might come apart. Donut Seam feels like the seam of emptiness itself. The song lives in the tension between presence and absence. There is love there but it’s not secure, it’s unstable, it’s a sensation that is flickering in and out of focus.

This song captures something so familiar to me: loving someone without knowing where it’s going to go. The future feels unclear, especially at my age right now, and intimacy can feel like standing near something beautiful that you already sense might not last forever. There is a strange calm captured in this song that arrives before things come apart. When so much has already gone wrong and when the universe is falling apart, there is still this desire to end of a good note, even as you feel it slipping away.

“This whole world is dying, don’t it seem like a good time for swimming?”

One of my favourite lyrics ever.

There is such a soft, devastating acceptance in that line. The way I hear it is: if everything is going under anyway, if life is already hard and uncertain, then you might as well go swimming:. You might as well take joy where you can, even if you can’t swim out of the collapse. Lately i have been feeling the weight of constant bad news from around the globe. Environmental collapse, awful people in power, the dread of systems like AI reshaping faster than i can process. There’s this overwhelming sense of powerlessness i feel to not be able to fix everything at once.

This song explores these emotions for me of existing inside such a collapse and being able to choose small moments of happiness as a form of survival. It isn’t denial of what is happening but learning to find the softness where you can.

Smother - Daughter

Smother is a song about self erasure. About the fear that loving someone means destroying yourself or them in the process.

In the darkness, I will meet my creators
And they will all agree, that I'm a suffocator

This fear resonates with teenager me quite a lot, particularly from my first long term relationship. The love was intense, destructive and overall suffocating. There was no positive relationship with myself, just guilt, fear and the belief that I was somehow harmful by just being me. I felt like loving me came at a cost as I just felt like “too much”.

Musically, the song mirrors this emotional collapse. It builds slowly but never quite explodes. The pressure stays trapped inside like how you drown in your own thoughts, with nowhere for the feeling to go.

“I sometimes wish I’d stayed inside my mother.”

This line still gives me the same devastating reaction of when i first listened to this song. Because it moves beyond sadness into something far darker. It’s not I want to disappear but I shouldn’t have existed at all. You feel as though your entire existence is a mistake. It’s uncomfortable to admit how much I have related to that feeling in the past but that is exactly why this song matters to me. It sits with the ugliest version of self doubt and in doing so makes my feelings feel so seen.

Older - Lizzy McAlpine.

If you’ve read any of my other pieces you know how deeply nostalgic and sentimental i am, especially about themes of growing older. I’m always conscious of how fast time is moving and how everyone is growing up and Older is a song that resonates with me well.

The song really taps into the helplessness of time passing and watching things change. People age, relationship shifts and life is forever unfolding. There is no pause button.

“Wish I was stronger somehow, wish it was easy, somewhere I lost all my senses.”

“Mom’s gettin’ older, I’m wanting it back / Where no one is dying, and no one is hurt.”

It’s about childhood nostalgia but also this element of fear. Fear of time passing, of loss, of realising you don’t know how much time you have left with the people and places that make you feel safe.

Knowing that Lizzy lost her father adds another layer to this song. Older feels like grief and also the anticipation of grief at the same time. Mourning what has already gone while bracing yourself for more that will eventually follow.

“I wish I knew what the end is.”

The impossible desire at the centre of growing older: wanting certainty in a life that doesn’t offer any. Wanting to know where your future will end up while knowing you can’t know until you get there.

Also I’m always blown away by Lizzys vocals, I was so lucky to hear this song live in Sydney in 2024 and it was so beautiful.

Real House - Adrianne Lenker

“I wanted to be an inventor, collected scraps to make a portal / I wanted so much for magic to be real.”

(I have a theme of really loving songs about longing, don’t I?)

I saw on:

this site

that Adrianne wrote that Real House isn’t just about a physical house necessarily but more about the body, mind and spirit of finding home inside herself and on Earth. This idea fits so well within my soul. It reframes home as something internal rather than something you can lose or leave behind.

Wanting stability. Warmth. Safety. And slowly realising that the most reliable place to find those things is within yourself. Adrianne talks about moving a lot throughout her childhood. I have almost the opposite experience where I only had only moved one house until i was 18. Recently however, since moving to the city, i feel like I have been constantly moving and changing locations, learning what it means to feel unsettled. I have had to come to terms with being in motion all the time while trying to stay rooted in myself. Clinging to the idea that even if environments change, I am still myself which has brought me an unexpected amount of comfort.

This song pulls me back into childhood, into old houses and memories where everything felt larger and more alive. I picture myself as a kid in my old unit, colouring in my books on the floor with crayons scattered around me. Outside, there is this massive tree that felt like an entire world on its own that I will probably never see again, or atleast not in the same way.

This line:

I wanted so much for magic to be real.

is my favourite line of the song. I find that longing for magic never really leaves wherever you go, i carry my childhood self inside me.

Thank you so much for reading! Those are just a few of my favourite sad songs. I have so many more on this playlist here if you want some more recs! might also do a part two in the future 🩵

If you are interested in supporting my creative work, check out this link 💌

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Hair is such a key feature of ourselves, it is part of our style and beauty and half of the time I have no idea what to do it. Looking back at old photos, I realise that my hair has been such a main figure of my teenage years more than i thought it was. It holds such a huge amount of memory of who I was and who i have become

This is me at fifteen. The first time I ever dyed my hair ⤵︎

It was 2020 so i blame covid mostly. I picked blue because it was my favourite colour at the time. pretty simple choice. Up until this point I had only had my natural colour but I had grown restless with staying the same and I wanted, for the first time, to change my appearance.

The blue on my natural brown hair came out this greenish swamp colour as you can see. I hated it. I remember staring at myself and feeling an immediate regret. But I do admit underneath all that, there was still excitement. It was my first change and mark to figuring out who I was. When i look at that girl now, I feel almost protective because she had no idea what was coming.

A few months later, I went pink. First streaks. Testing it out ⤵︎

A few months after that I decided to go fully pink…

The pink felt more heavier than the blue ever did. It was louder, bolder and much more impossible to ignore. It is my most ‘nostalgic’ hair colour of my teenage years and holds the most of my memories.

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This period of my life was rough. At the time, I thought dying my hair was helping me survive somehow, but in hindsight it was a cage that was keeping me inside this situation I was going through, trapping myself inside a version of me I didn’t want to live in anymore. I wondered why this bright colour didn’t make me feel any brighter within myself. Every time I caught my reflection I had voices in my ear replaying the words people had said about me, the moments I was trying to move past, the feelings I never fully let surface. The pink was there for all of those bad memories, it almost knew too much about me that I had to let it go.

When I was 16, I decided I needed another change. Things in my life had only gotten worse, my friendships kept shifting, I felt as thought I couldn’t trust anyone anymore, my eating issues started, my relationship had ended and we were in a horrible spot. I felt I needed to find control again. I dyed my hair pure black in an effort to erase myself, like if i changed the outside enough, something inside would shift too.

It wasn’t me.

It was suffocating for me and almost alien like. I had lost all sense of my identity and I can see this reflected in my appearance. It’s weird to look back at these photos and see that as the black began to slowly fade, the pieces of me slowly started to come back. As the colour washed out, so did some of the heaviness. My style began to change in small ways, inching closer to who I am today. I started falling back in love with reading again during this time and crafting and writing. The darkness was starting to fade from my hair and from my life.

Ever since the black completely faded, I’ve kept the same natural hair. Maybe it’s because I’m too scared to dye my hair again because of it’s association with that time of my life but I think mainly my natural hair connects me back to my positive memories and who I feel as a person. At eighteen and nineteen I tried growing it out long just to try it (I had never had long hair !!) It was a fun experiment but i kinda always knew I would cut it shorter again one day.

Just over six months ago now, I cut it short again. The decision was impulsive but necessary. It felt unexpectedly healing. My hair now reminds me of my childhood hair ⤵

Hair is so visible, so deeply tied to our identity. It’s one of the first things people notice (or maybe i’m just saying this because it’s one of the first things i look at on a person). Our hair is a canvas for experimentation, there is a reason why so many people cut their hair after breakups, after loss, after major life changes, sometimes i feel the body needs to change before the mind catches up.

I’m sure some people from that time in my life still picture me with pink hair, even though that version of me has been gone for years. For me, my hair has become a physical diary of the memories and all my feelings of my teenage years. I don’t know what my hair will look like in the future. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything at all, maybe it can just exist. Or maybe it will keep recording who I am as I continue to change 🧡

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Everything written here reflects my personal opinion, and if you disagree, I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments because I love having genuine conversations about shows I love!

Season One.

Season one, in my opinion, is not only the best season of Stranger Things but it’s also the season that understands its own identity very clearly. What makes it work so well is how it balances its lighter moments with its darker ones. The show deals with genuinely disturbing material: missing children, government experiments and moments of body horror, yet it never becomes overwhelming bleak or depressing as everything is filtered through a story about kids fighting monsters.

From my film student standpoint, Season One shows remarkable restraint and control. The series knows when to let silence speak and doesn’t rely on heavy exposition which becomes a problem in later seasons of the show. Information is given to us naturally through character interactions and the humour feels organic as it’s born from the kids themselves rather than a bunch of scripted jokes. Every scene flows into the next and each character beat feels intentional, tying together everything neatly.

Mike Wheeler is my favourite character of the season and stands out as the emotional core and arguably the heart of early Stranger Things. From a character writing perspective Mike functions as the groups moral centre. He believes in people when no one else does and that belief actively drives the plot forward and its what makes the group of main kids feel so close together. His drive and loyalty is what draws us to his friendship to Will and growing bond with Eleven.

Episode Threes fake out death remains out of the smartest narrative decisions the show has made and it was the moment while first watching that made me invested in the show. By fully committing to Wills “death” the series allows Joyce, Hopper and the kids to grieve and doesn’t rush past that pain, instead the audience is forced to sit with it. This commitment raises the emotional stakes dramatically and creates a deeper bond between the audiences and the characters. As a result, when the truth is eventually revealed, it doesn’t feel like a cheep decision but a earnt reveal.

What truly makes Season One the best out of all five seasons is how carefully constructed each character arc feels. Each character has a sense of resolution of their original goal and no one feels wasted, sidelined or forgotten. Season one comes close to perfection for me and on rewatch it’s easy to see exactly why the show became such a big hit. It trusted its audience, respected its characters and understood the pacing needed to keep audiences hooked.

Season Two.

Season two is often dismissed or ranked near the bottom of the series but I’ve never fully agreed with that criticism. While it isn’t flawless, it meaningfully continues the emotional threads and themes established in season one in a way that feels authentic and not repetitive. The show understands that trauma doesn’t simply vanish because the monster is temporarily defeated. The characters carry their experiences forward and this season allows the lingering pain to shape the season, particularly with characters such as Nancy, Mike and Will. Episode 7 of this season is widely disliked and fairly so. It’s placement disrupts the seasons pacing but one misstep doesn’t erase the strength of everything else from this season.

One of Season Twos greatest achievements is the introduction of what becomes one of the shows strongest dynamics: Hopper and Eleven. Their early season conflict feels painfully real for both characters, rooted in fear and unresolved emotions. Their scene in the car at the end of the season as Hopper opens up about Sarah is one of the most beautifully written scenes in the entire show and is a very impactful moment for both characters. Their relationships grounds the supernatural elements of the show by focusing on something deeply human: family.

Will and Mike are also particularly compelling characters this season. Wills possession storyline is genuinely unsettling to watch and Mikes unwavering loyalty to Will reinforces his role as the emotional anchor of the group. It was also really impactful for me to see Mike grieve Elevens absence and how his grief quietly shapes his behaviour throughout the whole season, especially in his strained interactions with Max. His outburst toward Hopper at the end stands out as one of Mikes strongest moments. Its raw, angry and a reminder that he is still a kid who believed he failed to save someone he loved.

Together, I believe Seasons One and Two are the hearts of the show. They deliver some of the strongest character driven moments in the series and understand that tension only truly works when the audience deeply cares about the people experiencing it.

Season Three.

Season three marks a noticeable tonal shift for Stranger Things, and I say that as someone who genuinely adores this season, it was even my favourite at one point. Still, this is where some of the shows underlying issues begin to surface. The season leans heavily into summer aesthetics with the mall, neon lights, fireworks and saturated colours, creating a bold vibrant atmosphere that sharply contrasts with the darker feel of the first two seasons. I’m not inherently opposed to this shift however, if anything the show needed to evolve visually to stay fresh. My problem isn’t the aesthetic change but the way this season treats its characters.

One of the most common criticisms I see for this season is its increased focus on the teenage drama but I actually found this to be a very natural progression for our characters as they grow up. This is their first summer after genuinely believing they’ve survived the worst and now can live in a normal life. The lighter, happier moments where they are just simply being teenagers gives a false sense of stability that makes the eventual descent of suffering in the later seasons feel more impactful as we cherish what could have been. While I do agree that the Mike and Eleven conflict was frustrating (largely because I hate miscommunication storylines and Mike went down a strange narrative path) I think what it ultimately leads to is worthwhile. Eleven and Max’s friendship is something I adore and feels like a natural evolution for Eleven. Its realistic that first loves would go through the jealously and insecurity that they go through.

Hoppers characterisation however is one of the biggest weaknesses this season has. He just becomes louder, angrier and at times genuinely irritating, particularly in how he treats Joyce. The idea behind his arc works: his fear of Eleven growing up and becoming more independent without him. Unfortunately the execution often leans too heavily on humour, turning his struggles into exaggerated outbursts rather than meaningful development. Most of his behaviour this season feels like regression, especially when we have already seen him open up to Eleven in season two so it’s hard as an audience to understand why that emotional maturity he gained just seemingly disappeared. It isn’t until the letter after he dies that I felt his true depth this season shine through. Not to mention, his arc of being scared of Eleven growing up and changing isn’t even fully utilised because they are separated for most of the season.

The strongest moment of this season is Robins coming out scene with Steve. The scene feels so natural and honest. Robin as a whole is a standout addition to the cast this season and her dynamic with Steve is written so well. It’s easily one of my favourite coming out scenes in all media.

The ending of Season Three is also such a beautiful scene and never fails to make me emotional. The groups goodbyes, the hugs and the backdrop of Hoppers letter as the Byers leave Hawkins creates one of the shows most impactful closing scenes. There is a strong sense that their childhood has now slipped away and in many ways I feel I would have been satisfied if the show stopped at this point.

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Season Four.

Season Four contains some of the highest of highs in Stranger Things but it is also the point where I started to feel the show lost some of its heart and sense of direction. While the scale is undeniably impressive, the season often feels fragmented and the separation between characters weakens one of the shows greatest strengths.

Without question, the Hawkins storyline (particularly Maxs arc) is the strongest part of the season. Max’s grief is handled with such well written care, depth and genuine stakes, making her death at the end of the season devastating for the audience to watch. The “Running Up That Hill” sequence is so powerful because of its clear thematic connection to suicide. We can see Max, as she is just about to die, hear the voices of her friends and after isolating herself from everyone all season, we see her remember their moments where they were once so close, allowing her to find the willpower to fight for another day and therefore escape Vecna. Dear Billy stands as one of the best episodes in the whole show because of this scene. The tragedy at the end of the season with Max lying in Lucas arms, saying that she isn’t ready to die after a season of exploring her intense negative thoughts towards herself is genuinely heart wrenching. My only complaint with this storyline is the way Eleven brought her back was never clearly explained or explored afterward which makes Max coming back feel just like plot armour to get the emotional pay off from her death but never actually to kill a main character.

Elevens storyline, though important to the lore and filled with strong reveals in the later half of the season, did feel emotionally weaker due to her continued isolation from the rest of the kids. The idea of Eleven questioning her identity without her powers is compelling. However, resolving that conflict by simply restoring her abilities instead of giving her the time to discover herself outside of the lab didn’t feel very satisfying for me. While it makes narrative sense that she needs her powers to confront Vecna and that she does realise she isn’t the monster, the season misses the opportunity to more deeply explore who Eleven is without abilities.

Her confrontation with Papa is one of her strongest acting moments however and I love the idea that she finally got to start healing from all the trauma she has faced.

The California storyline was the weakest for me and suffers the most from the weak writing. Mike, Will and Jonathan often feel useless and side-lined compared to the other storylines. While the shootout action scene was awesome in Dear Billy, it doesn’t feel it has much meaningful character development. Mike and Elevens argument earlier in the season is initially well written, Mikes inability to say “I love you” makes sense for his character and its understandable that Eleven is upset by this. It makes for an interesting situation for the two of them expect the show does absolutely nothing with it. Mike finally confesses his love in the middle of a climatic battle and the moment is never revisited or shared in a quieter more intimate way which doesn’t make the audience feel satisfied that they have had their romantic moment. Their relationship seems to stall here rather than evolve and again, they missed the opportunity for a more mature, reflective conversation that could have given their arc and relationship more depth.

There is a few more things I dislike about Season four but I have to admit the final battle here was epic, the cliff-hanger was effective and I liked the fact that they lost against Vecna because it makes him feel more threatening. Particularly after finishing Season Five, I can say that Season Four feels more impactful and better written than the final season.

Season 5.

I hate to start negatively right off the bat but Season 5 is the weakest season for me. Volume One showed genuine promise and there were several elements I really enjoyed from this part: Dustin’s arc, the return of main character moments for Mike and Will, Hoppers sacrifice and Holly and Karens sequence with the Demogorgon which was impressively directed. However as the season progressed my enjoyment steadily declined and some decisions they made became impossible to ignore.

One of the seasons most immediate issues is the time skip, which feels unnecessary and underwhelming. While I understand that the cast has aged, continuing directly from the events of Season Four would have created far better pacing and momentum. The time skip makes ongoing problems from last season like Maxs coma or Dustin’s grief feel oddly disconnected as its nearly been two years since everything happened.

Volume two is where most of the seasons issues come up. We were promised a dark and emotional Christmas when it came out but I didn’t really feel any of these heart wrenching emotions. Instead, character motivations become unclear and emotional moments that should have been impactful feel mostly hollow. The reunion between Eleven and Max for instance feels weird and restrained seeing as they haven’t seen each other in 2 years or longer. Like why was Will closer to Max than Eleven? Mikes emotional detachment is never explained, Ted Wheeler is ignored and Jonathan and Nancy are protected by the most heaviest plot armour.

One of my biggest issues this season is Eleven and also Hopper. Separating her from the group once again was frustrating for me because we were robbed of so many intimate bonding moments between her and the party. Elevens death could have been even more devastating if she showed a close friendship with characters like Lucas or Dustin but without these scenes of genuine connection since season 3, it was hard for me to feel this as much as we could have. We’re told that Mike and Eleven are so in love, yet their relationship this whole season was awkward and distant. While I did cry during Elevens death, this reaction from me came from seeing memories of season one rather than anything in the past two seasons which felt like a missed opportunity. Also why was Elevens flashback only Mileven and not her moments with everyone as they reacted to her death? another missed opportunity.

Elevens characterisation overall feels weaker and emotionally flatter than in previous seasons especially as we see Eleven and Hopper go through the same storyline they have gone through too many times now. Her entire journey has been centred for the last four seasons of discovering who she is and becoming independent and so ending that progression with death after all the trauma feels thematically strange.

Another flaw I had was that the final battle scene lacks weight for me, it felt way too over too quickly and the stakes just felt so low because I guessed no one was going to die anyways. The battle in season four felt so much more life threatening and tense. Also the military just let them go? What? That being said, some of the visuals with Eleven and Vecna were very impressive and Joyce, after not doing much this season, killing Vecna was very satisfying and I did enjoy that scene.

I will admit that the finale did improve slightly compared to Volume Two. The final DND game is touching and bittersweet, even if i was slightly disappointed that all the characters, besides Dustins, happy endings were all framed primarily around romantic relationships which isn’t inherently bad but would have loved to see them succeeding in other ways as well. I did shed many tears however during the last scene because I love each one of these characters so much and it hurt that Mike had to lose El seeing as that was his greatest fear throughout the whole show.

Season Five has its strengths: Holly Wheeler is a standout, Dustin and Steves arc is beautifully handled, the Lumax reunion is genuinely so emotional and I really liked Hopper scenes to El before she dies. Still, the number of flaws unfortunately don’t balance out the negatives for me, leaving the season feeling more disappointing than fulfilling.

Overall Stranger Things is one of the best most impactful television shows ever written. There are so many masterpieces of scenes and I’m sure there are tons of things in this review that I forgot to/ didn’t have time to mention! I, overall, will look back with such a great fondness for this show because I grew up with it and I will miss these characters dearly. 🧇

Thank you so so much for reading! 💜 This is one of my longest posts and the first one I’ve done on a particular piece of media so I’m very nervous! Feel free to comment anything about the show anddddd here are some links to support me:

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Thinking about setting up a yearly reading goal for 2026 hasn’t felt motivating at all. Instead, a thought of “this is just another deadline I’ll have to finish for the year” crept into my head. Last year, I was convinced it would be my best reading year yet. I had a huge list of books I wanted to finish and a confident reading goal of 50 books. I told myself reading would be constant and easily included in all my days.

But instead, I fell in a huge reading slump.

Not because I fell out of love with books but reading begun to stress me out.

Every time I logged a finished book, instead of felling proud, I felt behind. I’d scroll through Instagram or TikTok and see people finishing multiple books per month and I felt like I wasn’t keeping up. I wasn’t even close. The reading goal that was meant to encourage me turned into guilt for reading less.

I felt guilty for failing a goal no one else cared about but me. Behind on a number that only existed because I decided on it. Behind on books that have no due date.

I kept telling myself that I was behind but the truth is, I couldn’t be.

Last year, some days the only words I had space for were the ones I was writing myself. Many nights, I want to create instead of consume. But I never adjusted my reading goal to suit these desires. I just blamed myself for not having enough time in the day. The physical stack of unread books beside my bed begun to feel like evidence of my failure to keep up.

But reading shouldn’t work like that.

Reading has seasons.

Some seasons of life are not devouring books, finishing one after another, staying up late because you just need one more chapter.

Some seasons are for carrying the same book around for months, reading a page here and there and moving through it slowly.

Some seasons are for not reading at all but pouring your energy into other hobbies or other forms of creativity.

and none of these seasons should be considered failures.

Funny enough, the year I read the least forced me to think the most about why I read in the first place. I don’t read to hit a target or to keep up with anyone else. I read to sit inside someone else’s head for a little while. To feel less alone in my confusion. I read because stories make the world feel bigger and bearable at the same time.

So for 2026, I’m not swearing off goals for my reading entirely. I still enjoy writing reviews and keeping track of what I read but I don’t want a fixed number goal hanging over my head anymore. I don’t want my reading life to feel like a race to a finish line.

I want to start going to the bookstore and libraries and picking books because they speak to me again and not just picking up books because they are popular at the moment. I want to track my reflections on how a book makes me feel rather than the statistics. I want to care less about how many books I read each month and more about how they’ve changed me or my life.

If this means that some years I read fewer books or take longer pauses in-between reading chapters, that’s okay. It’s not a failure. Just another season of reading.

feel free to tell my what your reading goal plans are for 2026 in the comments! 🧡 You can track my reading progress for the year here:

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what surprised me the most this year?

The most unexpected decision I made this year was dropping out of theatre halfway through and switching to a marketing elective course instead. Theatre has been a constant presence throughout my life, something I grew up with and has shaped my identity to where I am now. It was something I assumed I would always be doing as my elective. University, however, exposed me to a wide range of disciplines, ways of thinking and possibilities for other ways I could use my creative outlets in my future career. Marketing, particularly within the social media space, quickly became an area I was drawn to as a film student. The more I learnt about it the more I fell deeply in love with the work and gained a genuine appreciation for how creative marketing truly is. I love how it teaches you to see the world differently, to observe trends, emotions and human behaviour through an entirely new lens.

Choosing marketing this year felt like I was finally extending my horizons. It was an act of growth of allowing myself to change rather than holding onto a plan only because it was familiar, something I tend to do a lot. I still love theatre so deeply but I realise now that I don’t want it to be my lifetime career. Theatre in my passion, my hobby but not something I want to build my life around.

what relationships of mine deepened this year?

This year took the relationships I already had last year and strengthened them to a higher level. I feel far more grounded in myself and in the people around me than I have in previous years. There’s been less confusion, less noise and because of that I was able to form some truly special memories.

Some of my most meaningful relationships this year were built in casual moments. My boyfriend, my best friend and her girlfriend spent heaps of nights playing games, doing spontaneous sweet treat runs (made even better by living near a whole street full of food) and cooking heaps of dinners together. The comfort of knowing that coming home means retuning to these people makes life feel lighter on the bad days.

Earlier this year, a mutual friend also lived with us for six months and that experience brought us so much closer together. i find living with someone really depends my appreciation for them, mainly because as an anxious person, it allows me time to get out of my shell and become more comfortable around them. Some of my best moments of the year were just us, sharing the same space, being silly and going on little trips to the shops all together and I know I’m going to miss it when we all eventually move out.

what age did I turn this year and how do I feel about it?

I turned 20 this year and leaving my teenage years behind carried more emotional weight than I originally anticipated. At first, it felt unsettling as I wasn’t quite ready to close a chapter of my whole life. While my teenage years held their share of difficult and painful moments, there was something undeniably comforting about that stage of life. Knowing you're young and you have time and you’re not being expected to have clear answers when people asked what I plan to do next.

As the year has gone on though, that fear has begun to soften slowly and I’m getting more use to the idea of being in my 20s. I’m coming comfortable with the idea that growing up doesn’t mean abandoning all the traits of my younger self and starting fresh at all, I can still be playful and curious and soft towards the world like I was as a child. I’m simply expanding on who I’m becoming and not rushing to my future like so many people expect you to do. My only promise to myself is to take every last minute of my 20s and make it as memorable as possible.

What moments will I carry forward as the most memorable?

Travel shaped some of my happiest memories this year. Japan stands out as the most unforgettable experience of my year but Brisbane as well holds a special place in my heart. Our trip there in June felt peaceful and grounding and I loved how full of nature and warm the city felt.

Back where I live, some of my favourite memories include wandering through the Araluen Botanic Park and seeing the tulips in spring, celebrating my boyfriend’s birthday and the night after my birthday in March. That night I went down to the beach with the people I love most and on the way back we were blasting loud music in the car, mostly silly songs and I remember feeling so content and alive in that moment. One of those memories where you pause in that moment and think I’m going to remember this forever.

Another standout memory was the opening night of my show that I directed while I was still doing theatre as my elective. While I wish I could change so many things about the script now, nothing could take away from the feeling of sitting in the audience and thinking, wow I did that, while watching the scenes play out and everything go to plan. Watching the actors perform, seeing everything come together and feeling the electric nervousness and excitement of opening night with everyone was so uplifting for me. The feeling of anticipation before a show is about to start performing is so hard to find anywhere else and that’s what makes theatre so special.

Seeing Clairo at the Laneway Festival was also a core memory from this year. She is absolutely stunning and watching her perform live made me appreciate her artistry even more. I really hope one day I will see her again but this time at her own show because I feel that would be so much more intimate.

what was my least favourite and favourite month of the year?

This was a surprisingly difficult question to answer because there were no real distinct bad months this year and there were so many moments from all months that felt meaningful and strong in their own way. After a lot of reflection though, I’d say September stands out as my favourite month.

Despite the stress leading up to my wisdom tooth surgery in October. September contained some of my happiest moments of the year. It was also the month where I really began to notice a shift in my life where my confidence felt stronger and more settled compared to the beginning of the year. I actually wrote a full reflection of this month where you can read here:

Of course, I can’t help myself so I will say that April, August and December were so close to being chosen as my favourite months of the year.

If I had to choose my least favourite month of the year, it would be May. Nothing particularly bad happened but looking back through my camera roll, I did remember feeling stressed and mentally just not in as good of place in compression to the rest of the year. Though I did LOVE the night this month where my boyfriend and I got his mum to try Bingsu for the first time and she was absolutely obsessed with it hahah!

what does the future look like for me?

Looking towards my near future, I plan to continue renting the house I live in now for the next one to two years. After living in student accomodation in my first year of university, having a space that truly felt like home this year brought so much peace and happiness into my life. I love the location of where I live, who I live with and I feel like I’m starting to belong in Perth.

In 2026 I’ll finish University and that thought has been weighing on me a lot over the past few weeks. With it comes the pressure of deciding what my next plans are and the uncertainty of life without the structure of schooling that has always been there. I just have to keep reminding myself that I need to stay open to possibility, to trust myself and my abilities and to allow a little looseness as I see where my future unfolds naturally.

This year has taught me that growth doesn’t always come in big dramatic changes. Instead it’s important to pause for a second longer to admire how far you have come over the course of 365 days. That’s when you see the real growth.

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We boarded our flight just before 12:30am. After dinner the cabin lights dimmed to a faint amber glow. I remember somewhere behind me someone was drinking coffee. The faint bitter scent had drifted towards my seat as I tried to get some sleep. I rested my check against the edge of my seat, hoping to get comfortable, with a movie on in the background to drown out the loud engine.

I drifted in and out of sleep for the next few hours, the time blurred together, marked only by our numb legs and tired eyes. After our layover in HongKong we finally landed at our final destination: Japan. A whole year of imagining, planning and building excitement collapsed into one single moment. We were here.

I won’t lie, the airport experience was quite overwhelming. Customs were a slow long line of exhausted travellers that felt endless. When we finally walked through the exit doors, it was nerve wracking and thrilling all at once to be a foreigner in a whole new place.

Of course we made the classic mistake of boarding the wrong train on the way to our accommodation which led to us to wander down some wrong streets, dragging our suitcases through the cool night air with tired clumsily limbs. At one point we even went to the wrong hotel entirely (turns out this place was actually a love hotel which made the whole situation even funnier).

Despite this chaos and the exhaustion, there was something so special about Tokyo at night. Neon signs glowed against the darkness and countless vending machines lit up in empty alleyways. I felt small in a strangely powerful way, gently swallowed by something so immersive.

When we finally reached the right hotel we took our first of many trips to 7-Eleven (I had the egg salad sandwich which was incredible) . I fell asleep that night knowing that the next day was the start of one of the best experiences I would ever live.

Tokyo and Shibuya

This morning in Tokyo was crisp and bright, the air had a slight chill as winter crept forward. As we took the train into Tokyo Central for the first time, the world seemed to tower above us. The buildings weren’t just tall in Tokyo, they seemed to be climbing relentlessly into the sky as though trying to reach the clouds. Everywhere, the city was in motion, trains gliding past, people weaving through one another. Tokyo was alive with a precision I had never seen before. Streams of travellers flowed like rivers, merging and separating with effortless grace.

At first, we wandered without direction through Ginza, stopping at the twelve story Uniqlo and the Itoya stationary store where I spent a lot of money. After browsing through the shops, we made our way to Shibuya and this is where I was blown away.

Shibuya was a rush of different sensations. Neon colours. Music. Crowds. Advertisements from billboards smiling down at me. Everywhere I turned, there were charming little shops and incredible food. The Shibuya Crossing, which felt enormous and endlessly alive, was surreal to walk across with so many people. I had that sense as if I was stepping into the place I’d dreamed and drawn about in my sketchbook when i was around 14 years old.

Akihabara and Disneyland

This feeling followed me into the next day when we went to Akihabara. Walking into the area felt like being transported in a universe stitched together from every anime I had ever loved. We wandered through aisles in the shops overflowing with figurines, plushies and shelves of manga. I saw so many characters I used to draw obsessively when I was younger such as Popee the Performer and loads of Danganronpa merch, a game I had once been completely obsessed with. It felt deeply nostalgic to see these fandoms again.

After stopping for some burgers at a small takeaway place, we shifted gears once again and started our journey to Disneyland.

Walking through the gates of Tokyo Disneyland, everything softened. Classic Disney melodies floated through the air, wrapping the park in a warm cloud. Children ran past wearing sparkly ears, some dressed as princesses, others in tiny superhero costumes, their laughter blending in with the melody.

Looking down the main street of shops you could see the famous castle reveal itself. It was the same magical castle I had grown up seeing in countless movie openings, the one I had doodled in notebooks as a child, the one I thought I would never get to see with my own eyes. When night fell at our time in the park, the castle came alive as fireworks boomed overhead in dazzling bursts of colour and animation danced across the castle walls. As someone who is disappointed in the direction Disney has gone in recent years, it was comforting to see that there is still so much magic and hard work that goes into bringing these stories and the parks to life. It felt like real magic, it was an experience I hadn’t known I needed until it happened.

Mt Fuji

We boarded the train towards Mount Fuji early the next morning and not long into the journey, I caught my first glimpse of her. Mount Fuji rose along the horizon, vast and snow dusted, so clear that I tapped my boyfriend’s arm repeatedly unable to look away from her. She felt powerful yet deeply peaceful, a quiet presence.

That night, my boyfriend and I walked to 7- Eleven and got pizza and far too many snacks. We sat and talked on a bench outside for ages. I remember feeling so overwhelmingly grateful to experience such beautiful moments like this.

The Waterfalls near Mount Fuji

The moment I reached the viewing point and saw these waterfalls below, I was left absolutely stunned. It wasn’t just beautiful, it was transcendent. Water poured down the cliff, roaring with a force that felt both wild and gentle. The air was damp with mist and sunlight pierced through the branches overhead, creating a faint rainbow. There are places that are just so beautiful you almost doubt their reality. This was one of them.

Kyoto

Kyoto was my favourite place of the whole trip and if I was to live anywhere in Japan, it would be here. While in Kyoto, we visited Arashiyama, one of the most enchanting landscapes I had ever seen. The bamboo forest stole my heart. Towering green stalks rose in endless lines, their tops swaying in wind. Beyond the bamboo lay a river, a gorgeous blue/green colour that shimmered like something from a painting. Boats drifted slowly across its surface, unhurried as if the place was all in harmony together.

This was the day I discovered my favourite matcha, tucked away in a tiny omelette shop and I also got to visit the Miffy bakery which genuinely felt like stepping into a dream of pastel sweetness!

Late that evening we wandered through bustling markets back near our accommodation, the air was thick of the scent of street food steaming on skewers and the sounds echoed of people talking and laughing with their friends. After some bites to eat, we continued our way to Higashiyama, with its iconic temples and old streets. Walking beneath the glow of warm lantern light, small shops and winding paths, everything felt unhurried and calm. It was such a peaceful night.

While we were in Kyoto, we also took a day trip out and walked beneath the red gates that stretched before us in seemingly infinite rows. Moving through them felt surreal as I had seen it so many times on social media leading up to the trip. When we finally reached the top, Kyoto unfolded below us in a breathtaking panorama. The mountains spread all across in every direction and the wind brushed against my face as if to remind me I was alive.

We descended back down through bamboo filled trails into a quiet suburb, a needed peaceful detour away from the tourist flow. We ended up returning to those markets from the night before for these crepes that cured my sweet craving.

Returning to Tokyo

Returning to Tokyo felt like coming full circle. I felt different walking its streets, more familiar, more confident. We spent our final days in Japan indulging in small joys like 7-Eleven trips, souvenir shopping and loads of different arcade games.

In Shinjuku, we stopped to see the giant 3D cat billboard looming up above the streets and after too much money and great determination, we won a giant plushie of the sweet Sanrio dog, Pochacco at the arcade games there. It was the perfect ending to a beautiful trip.

When the time came to leave back home to Australia, I felt fulfilled in a way that felt almost sacred. I had gained a new sense of wonder and a gentle reminder that the world is far bigger and more beautiful than I could ever fully comprehend.

I carry all these memories home with me and I can’t wait for a day where I will be able to return to this beautiful place.

Tell me, whats your favourite place you have travelled to?

- from my travel journal

🍵 instagram - @poppyalgie or @sophwings

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Up until I was nearly sixteen, I never really identified myself as anything. There was maybe one close friend who I told I might be Pansexual or Bisexual but mostly I didn’t think about it. My friends used to joked that I was “poppysexual” or “(my partners name) sexual” whenever the conversation came up. I laughed along because I didn’t know what else to say, I’d shrug and say “I don’t know” when anyone asked. At the time I didn’t really care to figure it out.

I was in a relationship, fifteen years old, thought I was going to marry this person so I wasn’t really searching for a label. But when we broke up, something cracked open.

The breakup was the first time I started looking at myself. I was alone for the first time and I started to wonder who I actually was. Who did I like? Will I even like anyone again? What do I feel? The label I came to figure out, that made the most sense, that felt true, was bisexual.

It wasn’t this dramatic realization. It was something that just felt right. Like a puzzle piece finally fitting after years of guessing where it might go.

I didn’t think this was going to be a big deal.

Honestly, I don’t even remember how I came out. The only small memory I have is adding “bi” or “bisexual” to my Instagram bio one day. It felt small but significant. I heartbroken and trying to rediscover myself again. For a short moment, it felt good.

But life at the time was complicated. I was in the middle of a messy falling out with a friend I use to be close to. Everything between us had become sharp. Rumours spread. Misunderstandings piled up. Everything I did was always somehow circled back to her.

When I came out, things between us were already tense and every day it seemed like it was getting worse. During this time if I posted a photo, they’d send it around and talk about how I looked. If I went to the park with friends, they said things like “ew” or they need to “do something” to me just because people had left nice comments on a post. Every day it felt like I was doing something wrong.

And when I came out as Bisexual it became something else to use against me.

They said I was lying.

That I wasn’t really bisexual.

That I would never “kiss a girl.”

That it couldn’t be true because I wanted to marry and have kids with my last partner.

I remember reading the words that they had texted to each other and feel my chest tighten. They had taken something fragile and made fun of me for it.

I know we were fifteen and I know it most likely came from the anger they seemed to already have against me but I couldn’t wrap my head around how they could say those things, especially when some of them were part of LGBTQ themselves. Like I had to prove my queerness to people who should’ve understood better than anyone what it meant. And what hurt the most was knowing they knew I’d never labelled myself before.

It was like they were turning something deeply personal into a a joke or a performance.

I started to feel ashamed.

I didn’t want to talk about it anymore because I didn’t want to give anyone another reason to hate me. I felt so lonely. I started doubting myself. I felt this constant ache in my stomach, like I had a mistake I couldn’t take back. I wanted to pretend I’d never said anything. I started erasing myself to make other people feel comfortable.

Deep down, I knew I wasn’t lying. I knew what I felt was real. That didn’t make it hurt less.

A few weeks after I came out, someone new joined our friendship group for the new year at school. This person, at the time, identified as a female. We became friends, and over the next few months, I started to gain feelings for them. It scared me but it also softened something inside me. It was this quiet reassurance that I wasn’t making it up in my head. I was bisexual. I always had been.

That friendship, even though it didn’t last, meant a lot to me. It was like I could start breathing again.

I think about fifteen year old me a lot. The girl who was scared and defensive, trying to make sense of herself. I wish I could tell her to speak louder.

Years later, I still identify as bisexual. I have a boyfriend now but that doesn’t make me any less bi. I don’t feel the need to defend that anymore.

If you’re reading this, you don’t need anyones approval to exist. Sometimes it takes time until you are ready. Sometimes you might hate feeling different and that’s okay. You are human.

I used to think the goal was to have a label and be proud but I realise now being 20 that the goal is just to feel like yourself and have peace with your own skin 💌

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When I look back at where I was this time last year, I feel a sense of pride arise in me. I was lost in so many ways, anxious, unsure, bored, searching for a shape to fit into. And now I’ve found my footing a bit more, I feel like I’m moving with intention. Life overall feels better.

media i’ve consumed this month 🎥

October was a rough month in terms of my hobbies as I was so busy with university and my wisdom teeth surgery that I didn’t get much of a chance to do things that usually refill me such as reading and writing. I didn’t finish a single book this month which I’m honestly a little sad about. Sometimes when your mind is too full of noise, even the simplest story feels like a little too much to take in.

I did watch a couple of films however. While recovering from surgery I rewatched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) which was pure nostalgia for me.

Then I watched Final Destination 5, I can’t believe I only have one more movie left to go in this series. This film delivered compared to the last one (which i hated). This one included some of fav deaths of the whole series to be honest. Number 3 is still my favourite though.

And then I watch Elio. I wish more people had seen this one. I should do a whole article about Disney because i am so passionate about how much I dislike the rise of the live action movies. I didn’t even know this original film existed until it was on Disney plus because of the lack of marketing. This film was so good. The animation was stunning and the story felt very human and relatable. It reminded me of why I love Disney, particularly PIXAR, in the first place. I actually teared up at one point. Disney needs to invest in more stories like this again more often.

HUGE shoutout to some of the articles i loved this month 💌

Sunday Neurosis by

The Movies we Carry with Us by

In Search of Childlike Wonder by

Scripts are Physcial Mementos -

They Knew Exactly What They Were Doing and They Still Did It -

i love all of the talented people in this community!!

Life Updates: 🪻☕

This month started with pain. My wisdom teeth came out and for a few days I looked like a chipmunk. It hurt but im basically all healed now, im so glad i never have to go through that again. Now i can laugh at the photos and laugh.

Here is the least embarrassing reference photo I have:

University consumed almost everything else of the month. Long filming days, editing nights and living off energy drinks and smoothies. But it was deeply rewarding. I learnt so much more about the technical side of filmmaking and feel more prepared for my final year of university coming up.

One of the best moments of this month was seeing our films projected in the city. It was a fun night with friends and classmates watching and seeing what everyone had created. A reminder of why I choose this path in the first place.

I also now have a new job! I’m now creating social media content for a local café which honestly feels like a dream!!! This is something I’ve always wanted to do in my future and while I’ve put a lot of pressure on myself, I’m happy on how my videos are turning out so far :) I’ve built up heaps of footage so I can keep editing and posting while I’m away from the city.

Outside of all of this there has been many UNO nights, Monopoly wars and two Halloween events that were super fun being dressed up and getting drunk 😆

I also bought a new phone which will hopefully come in the first week of November ! i hate buying new phones to be honest but my storage is so bad I can’t even open certain apps anymore…. so it will be nice to start fresh. Spending money stresses me out so much though 😅

Next month holds two big things

Japan and Home

I have always wanted to go to Japan (fourteen year old would be so jealous of me) and after that I’m going back to my hometown for the first time in so long. I get to see all my family again and visit my mums new house! I also get to go back to my old work family and work there for a month, I think it will feel super cosy and relaxing. I’m going to be reading and writing SO MUCH!

I wish everyone the best of months ahead of them <3

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