The phone rings in the middle of the afternoon. I answer on the third ring, holding the receiver between my shoulder and ear while shutting the window against the wind. Her voice arrives before the sound of the latch.
“You never answer the phone,” she says.
[Read more]A door is open or it is closed. A person is employed or they are not. An application has been approved or it has been rejected. These are the categories institutions prefer, and the preference is not irrational. Binary outcomes are tractable.
[Read more]In the 1990s I worked with two other people on a prestigious Australian magazine. The publication ran to eighty-four pages, appeared monthly, and went to press on time. The lead time from brief to printed copy was four weeks.
[Read more]Emmy van Deurzen observes that psychological frameworks make judgement easy. They supply definitions—of sanity and its absence, of healthy development and its arrest, of the parent who went wrong and the psyche that bears the consequence. The definitions arrive pre-formed. The practitioner applies them. The person being assessed is seen through them.
[Read more]The phrase “Domestic Violence and Coercive Behaviour” suggests reach. It implies a system that sees into ordinary rooms, private routines, quiet control. But definition limits everything. “Domestic”, in the legislation, means romantic or de facto partnership.
Violence that occurs elsewhere is renamed disagreement. Control between flatmates or colleagues is not domestic. Dependency is measured by affection.
[Read more]Fred shared my data. When I objected, he said: No ill intent meant.
The sentence was offered as a defence. It functioned as a dismissal.
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