Fourteen years old in a paddock
Fourteen years old, laying in a paddock, the sound of music from a distant stage on a festival site so vast it felt like a city, I turned to my best friend and said, “This is what I’m going to do when I grow up.”
We were sticky with dust, middle of the summer break, surrounded by strangers who somehow felt like our people. A sea of sunburnt faces, cold drinks, the occasional random conversation we would strike up with passers-by while we perched on the edge of the train tracks that wove their way through the site - it was chaotic, electric, and totally perfect. I didn’t have the words for it then, but I knew something had ignited in me, and going home back to normal life was something I didn’t want to give thought to. That was the moment. I didn’t know how, but I knew why.
It was the energy. The way music could stitch people together, complete strangers rammed into mosh pits, dancing in moments like old-time friends. The atmosphere was thick with possibility, and happiness, and a little bit of mischief. I remember thinking, this isn’t just fun, this is magic. I’d never experienced anything like it before.
Fast forward nearly thirty years, and I’m still chasing that feeling, only now, I get to be a part of creating it.
I’m 42 now, and 16 years into a career in live events, 8 of which I have crafted my own path as a contractor and business owner. In the early days I dreamed of running my own events and sitting in that all so scary risk taker seat which I have only recently started to dip my toes in. It’s a new high. And a story that will continue to evolve. But I sure as hell am loving the creative process of it all after working on other people’s events for so long.
This career has taken me across many stages, into ticket offices, directing trucks, onto city streets and winery lawns. I started out managing tickets and venues, pouring drinks and wrangling staff, learning everything the scrappy, hands-on way and putting my hand up to volunteer at any opportunity that might connect me with that next person. There have been twists and turns (and let’s be honest, the occasional meltdown), but I honestly couldn’t imagine doing anything else.
Because that 14-year-old in the paddock? I’d tell her now she was onto something.
There’s something wildly beautiful about bringing people together through music, about creating moments that don’t just entertain, but leave an imprint. A really good event feels like a story you stepped into. There’s a rhythm to it. A heartbeat. And when it works, when the sky turns pink, and the crowd hums as the sun is setting, and someone closes their eyes just to feel the memory that the song playing brings just for them, you know you’ve done something worth doing.
That’s the high I still chase. That perfect storm of sound, people, and place. The sweet spot between organised chaos and spontaneous magic. No matter how many times we do it, it never feels like just a job. It feels like meaning, wrapped in music and shared experience.
What I’ve learned over the years is this: listen to the voice inside when something feels right. Even if you don’t know how to get there yet. Especially if you don’t. That day in the paddock, I didn’t have a five-step plan or a business model. I had a gut feeling and thankfully, just enough stubbornness to follow it.
And sure, it’s not always dreamy. There are logistics, and permits, and portaloos. There are budgets and postponements and long nights spent stuck at the computer. But at the core of it all, there’s still that same wide-eyed wonder. The absolute privilege of curating a space where people can show up, let go, and feel something real that brings a pause to their normal life.
Sometimes, when I’m at one of our events, watching someone dance barefoot in the grass, or raise a glass to the stage, I catch myself smiling in that moment and pause to appreciate the why. Because I know exactly where it started.
If you’d told that 14-year-old kid with grass in her hair that one day she’d be on the other side, creating the kind of moments that first lit her up, she would’ve grinned and said, “I know.”