14 Comments

Hi there! I’m a long time reader of your newsletter but first time commenting! Your email made my morning today, I read your message over my coffee. Thank you. Abi x

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After our chat, I watched a video of Ray Bradbury talking about how you should write from your heart and not your head, so I decided to be honest about my wobble. It's funny how your confidence can wane and then bounce back again. Thanks for being a good friend. xx

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Marg, your thoughtful, excellent writing brings the books you read and the dishes you prepare to life, along with interesting tidbits about your life in Australia. It’s too bad that numbers come into the equation. Good work should be enough.

I also sometimes fall down the same rabbit hole of self doubt after comparing myself to others, both content and numbers. It’s self-defeating but hard to avoid. But you have to remember—no one does it quite like you!

I really enjoyed our little book club meeting—hopefully more folks will join next time. And I think you’re on to something with posting dishes that either fail or don’t look so great—happens to me all the time. And sometimes those make the best stories.

And I’m with you and Hoang—never waste anything! For me, it comes from being the daughter of Depression and WW2-era parents who lived through shortages and rationing and never forgot it, no matter how well off they became later on.

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Dear Ruth. Thank you so much for your kind words.

When I started this newsletter, the Covid lockdowns had just begun, and I had just retired from my full-time job. I was lonely and bored and wanted to connect with other readers and eaters, so starting a newsletter seemed like a good idea.

It turns out it was a great idea! I'm three years in and I've met so many lovely people (including yourself) who share not only a love of books and eating, but are also kind, generous humans.

M xxx

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Marg, I think you must have started your newsletter around the same time as I did. What an extraordinary moment it was! I’m so glad you had the idea to take the leap and grateful for your excellent newsletter and generosity with reading suggestions, recipes, the book club and everything else. So please don’t get discouraged. You have many fans—including me! 🥰

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💕💕

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Hey Marg we have had a shocker of a week health wise RSV but managed to do some baking to cheer us up, funny thing though we can’t taste anything because our sinuses are clogged! Luckily each recipe had fruit texture so at least it felt nice 😊 haven’t been reading though but enjoy your newsletter very much.

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I'm so sorry to hear you've been unwell! That's terrible. I agree that baking is always very therapeutic if you don't try to make anything too complicated.

Thanks so much for your support, I really appreciate it.

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Don’t worry Marg! I have even less subscribers than you. To be honest, I have stopped trying to get more, as I feel like it is a race one can’t win, because there will always be someone who has more than you, someone who’s “better off” than you. So just keep doing what you’re doing and don’t change a thing!

As for food, I’m also like you in that I hate wasting leftovers, and I hate even more when my husband throws away perfectly good (to me) leftovers 😞 by claiming nobody’s eaten it so it’s not good anymore. He’s wrong of course. Haha 😂 and like many of us, I usually only post food photos that I think I did a good job on, not the failed experiments lol.

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Thanks so much for your kind words and good advice. If it's any consolation, your newsletter is lovely and I can see how it has changed over time as you've worked on developing your voice. I also loved seeing your little boy playing golf on Instagram.

I think your mum and mine had similar attitudes to food - waste not, want not. It certainly gets ingrained in your psyche, doesn't it?

As for photos, I dare you to post some failed experiments.

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I looked it up, I read Sweetwater (fabulous) and This is my Daughter (very good) and her bio of O’Keeffe which is excellent. And I guess she’s compared to Cheever not Updike.

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To be honest, I dn't know Cheever is. I'll have to look him up. I'll try to get hold of Sweetwater because if you liked it, I will probably like it too.

I particularly liked the conversations about art and architecture in Leaving.

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Oh my gosh I haven’t read Roxana Robinson in years. I love her stories. I will track down this one and others. I once heard her referred to as the female John Updike. She is very East Coast which I could relate to back in the day after I’d lived in NYC. Thanks for reminding me of her.

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It's so funny you should say that because I was going to recommend this book to you.

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