Prisoner of the State by Lily Arthur

My thoughts have become passionate words on my blog and also on Goodreads. No frills with this post. The book ‘Prisoner of the State’ was loaned to me and I am grateful for the chance to read it. Written by Australian Lily Arthur, every chapter is shattering and true.

HERE are my own personal thoughts, observations and book review comments on a serious, shocking and quite tragic topic.

FORCED adoption, such a brutal and inhuman thing to do to young mothers. I only had to read the first chapters of this biography to be enraged. Such lies and deceit, such an underhanded and basically illegal activity in the name of social propriety and Church teachings. What were the parents of these girls thinking? Perhaps their 1960s puritanical fear of being socially marked was worse than what happened to their vulnerable young daughters.

SURELY not all hospital staff involved were corrupt and morally wrong? Why didn’t someone speak out? Do they regret not alerting the proper authorities? Everyone turned away, didn’t want to get involved, ‘Not my problem; I can’t change the system; what will the neighbours think?’ Three wrong responses! For badly treated and bereft young women their situation became much worse once their babies were taken from them. Mentally and physically they were broken, drugged, lied to and later doomed to wonder at the cruelty of the Australian city they called home.

IT doesn’t matter your status, all that matters is that you are a mother and your baby is the most precious being on the planet and no person or organisation has any right to lie and take such a living breathing joyous gift away from you. In this 1960s case, steps were taken many years later and a mother, Lily Arthur, sprung into action to find out the truth of what happened to her stolen son all those years ago. Not only for her own piece of mind but for hundreds of other young unmarried mothers who were coerced, deceived and told their baby had died.

AS a mother myself I feel sadness for the other women, the adopters who thought those young mothers willingly gave away their supposedly unwanted babies.

WHO needs a document to say they can birth their baby? Who needs a document to say they can keep their baby? In the past a document, a law, a church or organisation of any kind should not have had the power to decree outcomes which sever a healthy fundamental mother/baby bond. Would a mother give up her new born child if she was given clear options? Back then new mothers should have been given clear, concise information, counselling, legal assistance, childcare support and every accessible help for their future. Instead they got human rights abuse and social stigma. Indeed treated like a criminal when in fact a victim of crime.

CAN a male feel and experience the fundamental changes wrought by pregnancy and childbirth? No. The male attitude Lily Arthur has faced while researching, and in courts of law, has been pompous and disparaging. Quote ‘I felt as if I had been victimised all over again.’ Similar treatment by nurses and those convent nuns mentioned in the book, ruled by priests and made barren by repetition, religious teachings and ancient doctrine. If you or anyone you know is going through pregnancy and facing adoption, forced or otherwise, this is the book you should read for both sides of the story.

LILY Arthur had a long road to travel. She kept going. She is still going and has reached milestones in law courts and certainly shines a strong light on the appalling secrets of white and indigenous baby birth exploitation in Australia. No doubt this appropriation happens around the world but it’s not a case of buying a puppy. Later, of course, disclosing a birth mother is a minefield of emotions for both parties. It worked for my cousin, she found her other family and happiness. Many do not, but in both cases I believe the truth should always be told.

‘Author Lily Arthur still seeks both truth and closure.’
Visit blog https://www.lilyarthur.com/about-author
Published 2025 by Big Sky Publishing Pty Ltd.

💗 © Review compiled by Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

Does Try Try Again Really Work?

Home baked Vanilla Cupcakes waiting for vanilla icing. Recipe ingredients are 2 3/4 cups plain flour, 2 tsp baking powder, 200g unsalted butter softened, 1 3/4 cups caster sugar, 4 eggs, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 1 cup milk. Preheat oven to 170C and line two muffin trays with cupcake papers.
Food by Dot Bernet © Photographs Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025
See website for Vanilla Buttercream icing:
https://www.bestrecipes.com.au/recipe/vanilla-cupcakes-L6950.html

A wonderful children’s author I have known for some time, Cate Whittle, posted on her Substack page about success and failure and trying again. A cooking failure was turned around and she will experiment further to refine her recipe.
Read here: https://catewhittle.substack.com/p/having-your-cake

Home baked Red Velvet Cupcake with White Chocolate Icing. Food by Dot Bernet © Photographs Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

My reply to Cate was prompted by a happy memory and perhaps an old lesson people could use more often. ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, again.‘ Here is what I wrote on Cate’s July Substack page:

“Lovely, just what I needed to read with my cuppa! Your warming newsletter brought back some lovely memories of my daughter’s first foray into cooking. Initially, her first attempts were not that good and one particular dish was a disaster. I said ‘Oh well, let’s try it again and see what happens‘ and fortunately it worked. She is now an excellent cook and will try most recipes including exotic international dishes which are beyond me. We keep a photo file of my daughter’s greatest triumphs. Recently she told me that ‘Let’s try it again‘ day was a pivotal moment for her cooking skills.

Looking forward to another version of your tea cake, Cate!”
Follow Cate’s literary life ‘A Cuppa With Cate’
Substack https://catewhittle.substack.com/

Happy cooking (and eating!)

💗 © Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

Food choice by Dot Bernet. Mandarin from our tree. Bread home-baked © Photographs Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

‘Happy 6th WordPress Blogaversary Cake’ First attempt Battenberg Cake by Dot Bernet © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2023

https://thoughtsbecomewords.com/2023/09/14/review-starberries-and-kee-cate-whittle/
https://catewhittle.substack.com/p/my-books

(1) Strawberries from greengrocer (2) Side Salad by Dot Bernet © Photographs Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

A Day For Mothers

How time flies, my first blog post was 2017 and ideas for blogging still somersault around in my head. On this calm Sunday in May 2025 it is Mother’s Day in Australia.

I am a mother and thoughts of my own dear mother and that of my aunts and women I know flash through my mind. I recall their varied roles in my life, and women who shape the lives of others in millions of families and societies around the world. It is possible to write about the wealth, poverty, injustices and generally low standing of women in most countries including Australia, but what is their true status? What is their role in the history of the universe?

In my opinion, one of the most powerful roles for women, in the world as we know it, is the eternal internal creation. While not ignoring the biodiversity of Mother Nature, without human females, women who give birth, there would be no world. There would be no evolution, there would be nothing ahead. Of course men play a role but generally stand back when events are underway.

Perhaps this creates jealousy? Why bigoted, misogynistic, cruel, political, rule-making men of our current world order put women and mothers at risk by keeping them out of sight, in second place, give them menial tasks, overlook females for promotion, make derogatory comments, portray them on television, in movies and books as the trivial second character, the support, the one answering phones, at home doing the laundry, tidying up or cooking dinner. You can add more diverse roles to the list but usually not a complete reversal although caring sharing life partners do exist.

In 1971 a childless Germaine Greer is quoted as saying:
“Bringing up children is not a real occupation,
because children come up just the same, brought up or not.”
A rather shallow look at the future, I think.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germaine_Greer

With or without conception, the women of Mother Earth are versatile people. Today there are strong female roles and powerful women in all walks of life who do rise above. When they do, it’s a novelty in the press, on social media, and invariably a TV chat show host asks “How do you cope with a family and work?” A man’s world not an equal world yet.

Today I shout out Thanks Mum, Happy Mothers Day because without mothers there would be no living breathing humans in the world today. Including you and me.

💓 Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2025

NOTE: My opinion piece acknowledges birth mothers, first mothers, adoption, surrogacy, LGBTQIA, IVF, child reunification. Parenting is precious. 🌼

Quick Picks for New Year 2025

Best New Year Ever 2025 © art Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

**Watch some hilarious television, a good place to start 2025.**

Fisk is an Australian television comedy series
on ABC Television

**So what if your lips move while you read or you listen to an audio book. In 2025 read all you can and talk about it afterwards.**

Silent Reading and Socio-Cultural Development

**Sherwood Arboretum Brisbane volunteer workers preserving the future. Photograph courtesy of Sherwood Arboretum Committee 2024. Get active in 2025!**

Exercise followed by quiet contemplation does wonders for your brain and your inner self.

Charles Allston Collins masterpiece titled ‘Convent Thoughts’ circa 1851 held by Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Charles Allston Collins (1828-1873) was a British painter, writer and illustrator associated with the Pre-Raphaelite era.

A good nap also works wonders!

**Live demonstration of a cat nap © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024**

And never ever pass up the opportunity for a sweet treat.

**Dot’s home-baked Red Velvet Cupcake with White Chocolate Icing © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024**

The last word comes from the farm…

**Jasper’s advice © image Dot Bernet 2024**

Wishing you the happiest and safest of New Years 2025
and keep writing! 💗 Gretchen Bernet-Ward

The Season to be Jolly

My festive Christmas montage compiled for you with very best wishes 🌲

Happy holidays and fun festivities to all you wonderful WordPress writers and readers everywhere! 💗 © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

It is not the size of your Christmas gift, it is family who really matter 💗 Happy holidays! © image courtesy Sandra Tucker 2024.

Christmas holiday scene 💗 © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

Almond Macaroons baked by Dot Bernet from Emelia Jackson’s Cookbook ‘Some of My Best Friends are Cookies’ https://www.emeliajackson.com/ published Murdoch Books Australia 2024 https://www.murdochbooks.com/ 💗 © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

💗 Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

Tree Orchid Springtime in Brisbane

Our tree orchid is thought to be an Orchid Dendrobium native of the
Asia-Pacific region. Maybe even a Cymbidium Orchid. I have checked various sources (eBay included) and almost went cross-eyed with the stunning varieties but cannot find an exact match. Do orchids change regularly like fashion? Perhaps my WordPress friend (Literary Lad and horticulturist) Graham Wright has the answer. GBW.

Our tree orchid flowers every September, springtime in Brisbane, and coincides with my birthday every year. It features in many, many happy family photographs and it is the most hardy exotic flowering plant I have ever known. It wraps its delicate tendrils around an old Illawarra Flame Tree and they seem to enjoy each others company. Through drought, flooding rains and intense summer heat, it happily covers its stalks in pink flowers, needing no special care, and survives even when the possums take a nibble or two. There are suspicions that the blooms were ‘stolen’ one year when in full flower. It could have been ravenous possums, or a neighbour making a bouquet for a wedding, or perhaps a floral display at the local aged care centre. At least I like to think they were used for something lovely and not financial gain. I myself have never picked them and I doubt I ever will.

💟 © images Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

POSTSCRIPT: https://thoughtsbecomewords.com/2019/09/28/my-tree-orchid-with-pink-flowers/
I discovered that I did a blog post about our orchid during Covid-19, a drought season, which has way more information than I remember gathering! GBW.

Night Walk in Covid-19

“Hands up all the blog writers who wrote about their experiences of living through Covid-19 and its aftermath. Okay, I will join your ranks and become one of those adding something to world history with a personal experience; of course the names have been changed to protect the innocent.”

During the time of the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic, Angela and her daughter Jenny decided they would go for a walk every evening. Just a short one around a block or two, maybe across the park to upset the plovers in the damp grass, then home again. A walk was especially invigorating during the colder months of August in Brisbane. It got them out of the house, away from the air-con heating, into the refreshing chill of the cool night air. They donned jackets and beanies and shoved gloves in their pockets just in case of light rain. The suburban streets were deserted yet the night was infused with noise, the dull murmur of a distant highway, the sound of birds settling in to roost, a possum scuttling across a rooftop, the whoosh-whoop of fruit bat wings as they scoped out a mulberry tree or date palm and then crash-landed into the foliage. Owls were heard but never seen, unlike car drivers who appeared to have lost all concept of care and responsibility, arbitrarily speeding through red traffic lights because the streets were empty. However, while joggers, scooters, dog owners and their canines were tucked up in front of their preferred screens, a full moon would rise and cats would prowl under its glow. It was not unusual for a feline to stroll across the street to check out the two interlopers, then perhaps allowing Angela the occasional stroke of neck fur or chin scratch. These nightly walks offered the duo some unusual sights, the least of which was the activity of a darkened 4WD vehicle continually cruising up and down various back streets. Were they lost, were they scoping out burglary opportunities, or is that impugning a parent teaching their teenager to drive?

Footy training cancelled © image Dot Bernet 2019

Many homes had their living room curtains open so it was easy to see their televisions, replaying the gloomy news over and over again as the fatality statistics grew more and more alarming each night. Often cooking smells hung in the air or the tang of eucalypt competing with the pall of grey smoke left over from backyard firepits, an ill-advised council initiative. Angela was glad her face mask filtered the worst of it. One night they took a different route and Jenny was chastised for impulsively, recklessly walking down the middle of a major suburban road just because she could. Not a delivery van, ambulance or person in sight, only rows and rows of parked cars and houses with twinkling fairy lights strung around trees and across balconies and down driveways. They saw unloved little street libraries, a ghost bus lit up but without passengers, and even a large picture frame hanging high up a jacaranda tree. There was a trend among real estate agents to put either cheery red bows or teddy bears on their For Sale signs. Unfortunately the follow-up maintenance was non-existent so, after rain, ribbons of blood-red dye ran down the advertisements and the poor teddy bears were soaked, left to dangle in macabre poses of decomposition. Indirectly a gloomy statement of that period in history. It always felt nice to return home.

❤ © Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2024

How to Tackle a Toastie

Deconstructed sandwich © Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2023

A person reaches an age where they long for an ordinary sandwich. In this case I asked for an avocado and fetta toastie. This delicious tasting yet very difficult to eat deconstructed sandwich on a slice of toasted rye bread contained half an avocado, chunks of fetta, a whole tomato halved, and rocket garnish on top. It was drizzled with a type of balsamic vinaigrette and had a wedge of lemon to add for zest. It was difficult to eat by hand so I attacked it with a knife and fork. Although a delicious flavour, it was quite a battle to get it to do what I wanted, e.g. stay together long enough so that I could eat it!

HERE ARE THE OFFICIAL INGREDIENTS:

THREE GIRLS SKIPPING—Avo on Toast—Lunch Menu
“Avocado on seeded sourdough with thyme roasted tomatoes, Persian feta and chimichurri.”

Yes, fetta and feta are different. The correct spelling for fetta depends on the type of cheese being referred to and the country of origin of the cheese in question. There is Cow’s Milk Fetta and Buffalo Milk Feta. You can also get local Camel Milk Persian Feta. Nevertheless, I am not exactly sure the chimichurri lived up to expectations but at least my taste buds were made aware of a new flavour.

Visit info@threegirlsskipping.com.au in Graceville Brisbane if you are feeling hungry 🙂 and their soy latte was delicious.

❤ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Entirely unrelated but terrifically tasty from Brumby’s Bakery Sherwood Brisbane—

A. Top left to right: Butterfly Cream Cupcake, Iced Fairy Cupcake
B. Middle left to right: Cream Bun, Custard Tart, Mini Lemon Meringue Pie, Apple & Custard Tart, Passionfruit Tart.
C. Bottom left to right: Iced Fairy Cupcake, immortal Vanilla Slice, Carmel Slice ChocTop, out of shot Cherry Ripe Slice.
Buon appetito, sweet treat connoisseurs!

Mysterious Lemon Pudding

Bush lemons in the balance © Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2022

TRADITIONAL

“Mysterious Pudding”

Wintertime in Brisbane, Australia, and my thoughts turn to hot food, preferably sweet. This old recipe brought back childhood memories!

Ingredients:

50g (2 ozs) Butter
50g (2 ozs) Sugar
1 tablespoon grated Lemon Rind
2 Eggs – separate yolks
125g (4 ozs) Flour
1 teaspoon Baking Powder
1 tablespoon Marmalade or Plum Jam

Method:

First grease a basin or pudding bowl and put jam in the bottom. Cream butter and sugar, add rind and egg yolks, beat well. Fold in stiffly-beaten egg whites. Sift and fold in flour and baking powder. Cover bowl with foil and steam for 1½ (one and a half hours). See BBC website for steaming technique.

Serving:

Carefully remove bowl and tip Mysterious Pudding onto serving platter. Serve portions hot with extra jam, cream or custard sauce.

Note:

Due to hot steam, not suitable for children to cook.
This recipe is from 1978 edition of Edmonds Cookery Book, New Zealand. Another lemon recipe Sweet Pastry Lemon Meringue Pie.

Stay warm and cosy 😀

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Reading Wales and Eating Pikelets

Breakfast budgerigars by Anna Blatman Artworks © image Gretchen Bernet-Ward 2022

The origin of the word pikelet stems from the Welsh bara pyglyd or pitchy bread, which was a dark, sticky bread. The word spread into England and was anglicised to Pikelet.

Very easy to prepare and cook, pikelets are traditionally small yet a similar version to pancakes.

Gradually the basic pikelet recipe travelled far and wide through the world, adapting to different ingredients and varying from family to family.

Australian Pikelets

1 egg
1 cup self-raising flour
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup milk
One drop vanilla essence – optional

First beat the egg then add flour, sugar, milk, vanilla essence.
Combine all ingredients and mix lightly and evenly.
More ingredients can be added to batter for preferred consistency.
Tablespoon mixture onto a greased, heated frying pan or griddle.
Cook until pikelets rise and turn light brown, flip once.

Pikelets are cooked plain then served with a topping while hot and fresh.

My photograph shows a rather lavish topping needing a knife and fork.
Pikelets are normally finger food topped with jam and cream, or buttered, or a squeeze of lemon and dusting of icing sugar.

Children have been known to colour the batter with food dye for a holiday event.

Study Reading Wales #Dewithon22 Reading List—eat, read, enjoy!

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward