Your page: Readers’ emails and letters
ROAD TRIPS, RESTORATIVE TIME OUT AND A REVIVAL OF THE LOST THE ART OF LETTER WRITING HAVE ALL CAPTURED THE IMAGINATION OF COUNTRY STYLE READERS.
RIGHT TO WRITE
The article in your June issue about Connected Au resonated strongly with me. The connection experienced with a handwritten letter is very special. As a young teenager I established a long-term pen pal bond with another teen from Minnesota, USA. I still have several boxes of our handwritten letters although we have evolved over time to send emails also.
Over the years we have shared many milestones, our highs and lows and every kind of life experience you can imagine. A true highlight for both of us was meeting in real life on my 50th-birthday trip across various states in the US. We stayed with her for a few days and had such a wonderful time together.
I commend the work Mea has done to establish such a wonderful, wide-reaching community service. Linda Jenkins, Beaumaris, Victoria
COUNTRY LOVE
There’s so much to love about Country Style! While every issue is a treasure trove of wonderful stories about the folk who call the country home, superb photographs that have me lingering with the imagined smell of country air, and fabulous recipes that showcase the best of countrygrown produce, your magazine has introduced me to many delightful little villages that I’d had little or no previous knowledge of.
So thanks to the lovely families in the June issue who shared a little of their country life. I’ve discovered the charming towns of Willunga (SA), Carcoar (NSW), Rockley (NSW) and Yarragon (VIC). And though it’s far from our Aussie shores, I also loved your story on Dovecote in
Oxfordshire, England, that gave us a glimpse of another country idyll. Judith Caine, Donvale, Victoria
ON THE ROAD AGAIN
This morning at breakfast I looked through the second volume of
Country Style’s The Country Guide.
I absolutely loved it and am already planning our road trips. The photos, the landscapes and the places to stay and shop are amazing… As I said, I loved it.
One little addition I would like: an actual map after each road trip so I could easily follow the routes. Please add it in your next issue.
Because now I need to get my atlas out and look it up. (It is cumbersome!)
Karin Zilko, Port Melbourne, Vic From Kylie: Thanks very much for your feedback Karin. If we do another issue of The Country Guide I will look into maps.
LIVE AND LET LIVE
I have just finished reading Rob Ingram’s column calling for an end to city folk putting their country cousins down. As a long-suffering Fremantle
Dockers’ fan living in the west, I couldn’t help but mentally substitute “West Coast Eagles fan” every time I read “city folk”, and how they choose to denigrate me simply for supporting a different team.
The mental substitutions and comparisons worked perfectly, right down to geographical profiling and “just passing through”… I’d challenge Rob to issue a redacted version of the column for all readers to mentally substitute their own City Slicker vs Country Folk categories, and I reckon the article could account for most of the great and small world conflicts over the course of history. Great writing Rob, love your work!
David Neck, Palmyra, WA
TAKING TIME OUT
My beautiful mother and I were lucky enough to spend two nights in Hargans Cottage in Carcoar earlier this year. We enjoyed the thoughtful touches, warm hospitality, and the time together. We left feeling restored and revitalised.
As a clinical psychologist, I appreciate the value of restorative time; it’s something we all need, especially after bushfires, plagues, and the isolation many have experienced during the pandemic.
Restorative time might look like a slice of cake and a magazine, a walk with a beloved dog, time with loved ones, or, if lucky enough, a gorgeous weekend away. A chance to step away from pressures – even if only for five minutes.
What a joy it was to open the June edition of Country Style and be reminded of our restorative time at Hargans Cottage.
Emily Matenson, Jindabyne, NSW
WINTER WARMER
I would like to thank Maggie Mackellar (A Day in the Country – June issue) for her beautiful description of how winter starts and finishes with the changing seasons, rather than the official timing. It put a lovely spin on our cold months and made them just that little bit special and far more interesting.
I also thank Maggie for her explanation of why ewes are shorn just prior to winter, something I have always wondered about and in the past have thought a cruel practice. Love your articles Maggie, and my other half always enjoys Country Squire. Madelene O’halloran, Lucas, Vic
WINNER AHEAD OF THE GAME
Recently I was assessing the renewal of my subscription for Country Style magazine. Surely, I thought, I have enough magazines already. I have been reading them for years and have copies in the living room, the bedrooms, in my guest cottage and now in the smallest room of the house, for moments of contemplation.
My mother always had the latest copy of the magazine and she died in 2010. There is only so much we can read! But then I opened the most recent copy of the magazine and read about the places I had just visited on a road trip and thought, why didn’t I read this before we began our trip? I would have known so much more about the area and would have visited the hidden gems that I subsequently missed because I didn’t read the magazine first.
There is so much to learn about this amazing country of ours that there are never enough copies of Country Style to be had. I will definitely renew my subscription. I don’t want to miss out on a thing.
Margaret Arnott, East Ballina, NSW