"May you live in interesting times" is a term that purports to be a translation of a traditional Chinese curse. While seemingly a blessing, the expression actually wishes someone to experience much disorder and trouble in their life. I must have made this wish sometime before I was born.

 

I certainly wasn’t interested in living in 'uninteresting’ peace and tranquillity growing up in Sydney’s conservative north shore. From the get go, I needed to know how the world works...and particularly people, how did they work? How did they organise life and decide what was important and what everything meant? Only in my 40s did I come to listen to, and understand, these quiet but incessant curiosities. 

 

The first decade of my working life was given to the public service after graduate study in economics and political science. I worked in policy analyst and advocacy roles in environment protection, social housing, public health and community support services. I was motivated and inspired by needing to bring a sense of community and social responsibility into how businesses and governments worked.  

 

The chasm between the reality of working for the government and my youthful idealism was large. It was the turn of the century. The edict was to optimize happiness and growth by bringing much of what was private or non-commercial into the market. The 2.3 kids and a house package had no appeal to me though it looked very much like the default choice for most.  Communities were becoming more isolated, life was becoming digitised and getting faster by the minute. I was getting/becoming sicker.