“I was born in Lismore Base Hospital in 1968 and raised here. The first 6 – 8 months of my life we lived in SouthLismore above the old Flourish shop and eventually lived at 40 Bridge St, Nth Lismore. I was caught in both the 1974 and 1976 floods, evacuated both times by boat and I still have recollection of being handed out the window by Dad. It really resonated with me those flood waters. We had 12 foot high ceilings in the house and the water was above the picture rails. When the flood waters receded they would roll up the carpet, hose it off outside and put it back in. They would wash the walls and the wallpaper came back fine. It was bizarre.
We moved to East Lismore not long after that. I went to Lismore Public and Lismore High and I left school in 1985. Four of us including my girlfriend who ended up becoming my wife and the mother of my 2 boys, all bundled in a train and moved to Sydney. My first job was at Just Jeans in Bondi Junction. I worked 3 years there but in between I travelled overseas with another Lismore mate. We went to Sweden to visit a friend who was here as an exchange student for a while.
We made the first attempt to come back to Lismore in 1996 with our son who is now 19 and I was working with Northern Rivers Regional Tourism on a 12 month contract. When my tenure finished in the June of ’97 we took off overseas again with a 4 month old through Europe. It was interesting with a baby.
I ended up back in Sydney and became a stay at home dad for 8 months. I looked after our son while Kris went back to teaching. It was fun but also stressful when you don’t have anyone else around, your child is crying and you don’t know what’s happening with him. I would go to the park with all the mums. I’d be the only dad, I loved it! They’re all pushing there kids gently on the swings and I’m pushing mine almost 360’s. I looked forward to it. All the mums would have their thermos’s of coffee and eventually I’d bring a bottle of champagne, cheese and bikkies at 11am giving the girls a glass of champagne. It was fun but I needed to work.
I started doing a bit of PR with John McGrath in Sydney. I ended up 7 years with him in a part time capacity. Following that I took a role as National Sales and Marketing Manager with Best Western Hotels. I then moved onto Australia’s Wonderland theme park which was built in the 80’s and closed mid 2000’s. We had a couple of million people a year through the gates. It was huge. That was a really great job. I had 40 odd staff and it was very theatrical. I recall it with a smile because you could be a kid. I had an advertising agency for about 10 years and my business partner wanted to move back to Sydney and for me there was no way, I have no interest to go back at all. I loved it for the 20 years I was there but it’s so much more hectic now.
The role I am in now which is Lismore’s City Centre Manager actually came up a couple of years earlier and I did try to pick the job up then. It fascinated me working in my own home town where I grew up and coming back with a lot more knowledge, experience and lots of ideas of how I could change it so this time when the job came up I went for it. I’ve been in this role since the 14th April 2014 and I love it. There’s not too many aspects you can’t not love because it’s different everyday. I get to spend a lot of time on the streets with shop owners and consumers so you get a good feel for what their needs are but because of experience and knowledge you can see what’s missing. We can then introduce those elements like the Thread Fashion event in the Back Alley Gallery. That was awesome! A funky spectacular. Eat the Street has become a phenomenal success. The first year 8 – 10,000 people and this year to double again to 20,000 people. It screams out that people want to be a part of this social network out on the streets. We did a pop up at and food discussion also in the Back Alley Gallery with Aboriginal artist Digby Moran and chef Clayton Donovan. That was a sell out as well totally fascinating and it went off. The beautiful food from Clayton and the artworks from Digby. There’s a lot more plans for more of that here because there is a major demand for it.
We’ve moved out to Wollongbar on 120 acres and it’s so peaceful. We bought a couple of goats so I could fatten them up for the BBQ but my partner has fallen in love with them. They sit on her lap like dogs. These goats have to be put in the shed at night because they cry, they have blankets, no hope for the Barbie. I always promised some friends I would do a spit roast with a lamb so last weekend I had the lamb done, made the rustic home made spit, cleared the area around the fire but obviously not enough so the grass caught on fire and under a minute I had to call 000. Three fire brigades later and about a hectare burnt it became a Mumford roasting from a dozen people. I have friends here that I went to pre-school with and they’re still mates. We’ve all been and gone, kids, divorce, travel and we’ve all come back.”