By Virginia Winder
To steal a phrase and then bastardise it, “the reports of my
retirement are greatly exaggerated”.
I found out in the past week that I’m supposedly retiring.
Using the syntax of Yoda: “A mystery to me, the rumour is.”
I’m not certain where that claim from, but I have no plans
to retire. Ever.
There are plenty of people in my life who’ve always carried
on.
My journalism role model is Jim Tucker, who not only writes
a regular column for the Taranaki Daily News, he’s also the author of
books about people’s lives, including his own. Not only is he working on his
memoir, he’s also published a book of his columns called Random Thoughts.
The proceeds from sales went to Hospice Taranaki. 
Jim is always on the go
Jim is way more than a decade older than me and has no
intention of putting down his pen – or stopping. He’s just been working on the
Census. When I taught with him on the journalism course at the then-Taranaki
Polytech, I nicknamed him Action Man. More than 20 years on he still embodies
that name.
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| Rob in his home office |
When faced with a diagnosis of terminal cancer, Rob turned
his focus on helping others.
Calling on his “brotherhood” of New Zealand photojournalists,
Rob inspired a charity auction of more than 120 images, some iconic, to raise
money for Hospice Taranaki. That auction, held on September 24, 2022, raised about
$150,000 for the cash-strapped palliative care organisation.
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| Barbara and granddog Luna |
Last year, she worked on the local body elections. Each Friday morning, she helps prepare breakfast at a local school, and she also does volunteer work at Hospice Taranaki.
There’s much more, including always
being there for family, but what I’m saying, is Barbara has never stopped to
let the dust gather.
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| Elizabeth on her deck |
From her caldron comes a spell-binding catalogue of work – six
novels, six collections of short stories, one commonplace book, a collection of
journal writings, and 19 poetry books, including My American Chair,
released in 2022.
In 2018, her collection, Night Horse, won the Ockham NZ
Book Award for Poetry. She was named Te Mata Estate poet laureate in 2001 and,
in 2004, became a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit and an Honorary
Doctor of Literature from Auckland University.
Elizabeth has no plans to retire.
Beside my desk, I’ve pinned motivating quotes from Elizabeth
gleaned from our interviews.
Here’s one: “A writer always writes. You often don’t know what you think until you write it down. The act of writing opens the subconscious. It teaches you to link… It’s like a river. If you keep feeding it, it will start working inside you and bring up ideas.”
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| "Daisy" Lean |
“There is no end to what you can achieve if you don’t mind
who gets the credit.” – David Lean, former NP Mayor and long-time TRC
representative.
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| Lynn in his garden |
“I think you just need to keep active and engaged in the community and do what you can do. I think you owe the community whatever talents you’ve got.” – Lynn Bublitz, educationalist, gardener and civic leader.
Lynn’s words are a touchstone for me because I love this
community, including every person named in this blog post.
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| Irena on the garden trail in Hawera |
The story ends like this:
Being humble is huge for me (it was a struggle to write this story) because one of my mantras is: “The day I think I’m more important than the people I interview, is the day I should get out of journalism.”
I guess I’m in it for the long haul.
