After more than forty years of being involved with writing as an editor, author and journalist,  I wrote my own life story. It began with a question – as stories always do. Someone wants to know. And it was my youngest grandsons, Daniel and Adam, who wanted to know. Because I was born in England during the Second World War, they asked about my wartime toys. Could I remember? Yes indeed.  The almost bald koala, the wooden sled, the cardboard dolly with cut out paper clothes. What else? Quite a lot, I found. For the first time, I became the story.

I wrote Lost and Found, of searching and finding, the role of families and friends, the power of luck, the excitement of travel - and even a later-life romance. Above all, it showed me that if you do something, something might happen. If you do nothing, it’s certain that nothing will happen.

‘How lovely to get your book! 
I can just hear you speaking as I read…'
​Isobel Macdonald, Isle of Skye, Scotland

On the steps of the National Library of Australia
​about to lodge my book...

I remembered this when I moved from the heart of Melbourne to Bermagui, this small and beautiful fishing village on the far south coast of New South Wales. It was never my plan to live here forever, away from inner-city life, but six months in, Bermagui claimed me.  I have spent over 25 years here now, learning all the time. I have a tree-house office in a spotted gum forest and I still travel occasionally, in Australia and overseas. And I give small Writing Workshops, for those who want to start writing their own life stories. Everyone has a story. Everyone.

​Photos © Jane Sandilands