DANIEL J TOWNSEND
  • About
  • Music
    • Broken Voices and The Eyes of Men (2021)
    • MIdland Highway: The Musical (2020)
    • Songs From The Great Pause (2020)
    • A Tale of Two Cities (2018)
    • World Until Yesterday (2016)
    • Iscariot (2014)
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    • The Little Hand Files
    • Faxes to a Young Songwriter >
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I was a teenage extremist

27/9/2015

 
But so were you, right? Adolescence is all about extremes.

The interesting thing is how you feel about it all afterwards. Some of us are proud of our extreme adolescence. Mostly we feel a little embarrassed. (Gosh. I was so idealistic. And that hair!)

When we become grown-ups we tone everything down. Dulux has hundreds of shades of white from which you can choose to paint your home. (Just so you know, Hog Bristle is very 2009.)

When you were a teenager, you dyed your hair pink - Hog Nose Pink - and felt angry a lot of the time. Now, you tone down your rage to a warm Dulux Natural White anger, but you only use it on your internal walls.

When I was a teenage extremist I learned that my anger is a gift, I discovered "the power of the question" and I lived as if we need to take the power back. Thanks to these guys. 

My hair is its natural colour now. That's all.

Musselroe Bay

13/9/2015

 
Musselroe Bay is a gorgeous little holiday town up on the north-east shoulder of Tasmania. 

At dusk, hundreds of roos and wallabies emerge from their mysterious daytime seclusion to graze, just like they have always done. The wind roars like a forty, just like he has always done, although the wind farm is new.

When I visited for the first time in 2012, the Information Board down near the beach contained a story both unique and ubiquitous to 19th century Van Diemonian coasts. It was all sealers, fires on the coast, tea and flour, kidnapping... There must be a hundred places here with that story.

The story was unique in the use of active language. History, especially the gruesome stuff, reads better in the passive voice ("Lives were lost...") rather than a voice which suggests people actually did stuff ("The sealers killed them..."). 

But the story was really unusual in that the writer had actually given a voice to the Aboriginal people involved. They were polite. Then they were concerned. Then they were horrified. And then they fought back.

Musselroe Bay is a gorgeous little holiday town up on the north-east shoulder of Tasmania. 

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  • About
  • Music
    • Broken Voices and The Eyes of Men (2021)
    • MIdland Highway: The Musical (2020)
    • Songs From The Great Pause (2020)
    • A Tale of Two Cities (2018)
    • World Until Yesterday (2016)
    • Iscariot (2014)
  • Words
    • Podcast
    • The Little Hand Files
    • Faxes to a Young Songwriter >
      • 1-10
      • 11-20
      • 21-30
      • 31-40
      • 41-50
      • 51-60
      • 61-70
      • 71-80
      • 81-90
      • 91-100
      • 101-The End
    • An Old Blog I Found Lying Around
  • House Shows
  • Workshops
  • Store