Welcome to my new column, Pretty Interesting! Capsule has given me the opportunity to write about some truly epic humans I have met who march to the beat of their own drum and who have genuinely inspired me recently.
I feel oddly proud that I have mended my algorithm enough to no longer be force-fed a constant stream of negative news and collective trauma when I scroll. There is a privilege in protecting your mental health this way, even if it means remaining a little ignorant to certain things. And yet, if I am honest, a lot of feel good stories can lack the punch to really hold my attention. There is a strange duality in wanting something juicy and compelling without feeling like you are reading a glossy puff piece.
This column is my attempt to sit right in that tension – human, honest and a little sharp around the edges.
You can read previous columns – a chat with Kiwi writer/director Taylor Nixon, restauranter, Michael Dearth, writer/director Rachel Ross and Toni Anne Glover, who is one of the geniuses behind the Kinloch Wilderness Retreat.
This week it’s an extra special one, for an extra special week: my mum!
At risk of sounding like Baby Spice, my mum is my best friend.
I say that knowing how easily that phrase gets thrown around but for me it has always felt grounded and true. She is the person I turn to. The one who has quietly shaped how I see people, how I move through the world and what I believe really matters. And the older I get, the more I realise that who she is didn’t just happen. It was formed over time, through a life that held both deep love and very real hardship.
Together with my amazing stepdad Chiefy, they have also become pseudo parents to so many of my friends and our wider community in so many ways. They are welcoming, kind, excited, and genuinely participate in all that my friends have to offer. We travel as a pack, and it is one of my favourite things.
This Mother’s Day, I found myself wanting to document some of my Mum’s amazingness. Not in a big, performative way, but in a way that feels honest to who she is. Because of her, I’ve never really had to learn how to believe in myself. She has always done that for me. She has always encouraged me to try things, to be kind, to bring good energy and to love people through their darkness. That has just been the standard she set, quietly, consistently, without ever needing credit for it.
When I sat down with her recently and asked about her childhood, she said something that hasn’t left me. She told me her childhood “seemed very happy… although the normal was very different.” There was joy in her early years but it existed alongside uncertainty. Her father had returned from war, her family had already experienced loss before she was even born and much of her early life was shaped by his illness and time in hospital.
At seven years old, everything shifted. Her father died, and the way she tells that story is so matter of fact, but it holds so much. She was in the bath when her mum told her, and almost immediately after, she was sent away to stay on a farm as children weren’t often allowed at funerals. She said, “all I had known all my life was the security of my mother, and to be separated from her so suddenly made me very anxious.” When she came home, she wouldn’t let go of her mum’s dress, even when she went to school.
That bond was with her Mum, our Nana Joan. And the more I hear about her, the more I understand that so much of who my Mum is began there.
She described her simply. “She was the best Mum.” And then, with that same quiet certainty, she said, “she had such hardships in her life but she was such a strong personality, and always found a smile… always looked on the bright side of things.”
There is a story that sits at the centre of our family that I keep coming back to. When my Mum was older, her Mum became very unwell and was paralysed from the waist down. A medical condition known as Guillain-Barre Syndrome. She lost feeling in her body and had to relearn how to move. My mum watched her go through that, watched her learn to crawl, and then slowly, painfully, learn to walk again. She remembers the tears, but also the determination. There was no part of her that accepted that this would be the end.
That kind of resilience doesn’t just disappear. It imprints.
My Mum carries that. And she said it herself, “I think that her strength is carried through… through myself and to you and my older sister Rochelle.”
And when I look at her life, I can see that so clearly. Not just in the big moments, but in the way she has consistently chosen how to be, regardless of what was happening around her.
There’s something about her early experiences that feels like the beginning of everything. When you know what it feels like to lose your sense of safety, even briefly, you become someone who creates it for others. And that is exactly who she is.
As a child, she found her outlet in ballet. “I guess my love for ballet was my happy place and my outlet for my emotions.” And that thread carried through her entire life. By sixteen, she had gone to ballet school in Wellington and by twenty she was in Australia starting her first dance studio. She talks about that time like it was nothing, but she was incredibly young, building something from scratch in a new country.
She returned to New Zealand and built what would become the Auckland Academy of Dance. It grew into something far bigger than just a studio. It became a community. Her dedication to fostering young dancers throughout her career over many generations and seeing the enjoyment and love of dance instilled in her pupils.
Alongside all of this, her personal life carried its own weight. There were seasons where everything felt like it was happening at once, where she was simply trying to get through what was in front of her. And yet, even in those seasons, she never lost the way she chose to be with people.
When Rochelle and I tried to articulate what we have learned from her, it kept coming back to the same things. Rochelle said it best.
Kindness and caring. Doing everything without ego, without hierarchy, and always being kind no matter what. Being kind to those who have wronged you, spoken ill about you… that kindness above all else is paramount.
And she’s right.
Because that is exactly how Mum has lived her life.
When I asked her why she is like that, she didn’t dress it up. She said, “I just love people, and try and always see the good side of them.” And when people hurt you, she said, “finding goodness in things gets you a lot further in life than carrying around hurt.”
She also made a distinction that I think about often now. “Being kind feels more genuine… being nice might be a little fake.” And that feels like such an important difference.
She told me that during the hardest times in her life, “there were lots of people around who were there for me… I guess I just want to return that to other people.” And that is exactly what she has done.
And now, watching her as a grandmother, and speaking to her about us as mothers, I see it all come full circle.
When she talks about Rochelle, there is this deep respect and love for who she has had to be. She said Rochelle had to grow up very quickly, that she was always strong, always a great support, even when she was young. And she sees that same strength and determination now, but also this lightness. She said Rochelle makes things playful, that she brings joy into everyday moments in a way that is so loving and caring.
And then when she spoke about me, she smiled and said I’m more like her. Softer. That I’ve always been caring but that motherhood has opened something deeper. She said it’s like “another heart opens up,” and she can see that in me now.
And that feels especially meaningful, because Coco carries her mothers name. Joan. A thread that runs all the way back.
Three generations of women, connected not just by name but by something much deeper.
When I look at her life as a whole, I see someone who has moved through so many seasons and kept choosing who she wants to be within them. She holds onto something her Mum taught her, that life is like a tree. Some branches lead to success, others take you somewhere unexpected, when you get knocked down you always have to be strong enough to get up and try again.
And that belief is in everything she does.
I wanted to share this chat with my Mum for this week’s Pretty Interesting, because not only is my Mum pretty interesting but I think we could all do with a little sprinkle of Jill Arkley in our lives.
And somehow, through all of that, she is still just my Mum.
Happy Mother’s Day
x
