Melinda J. Irvine is an Australian freelance writer, poet, and blogger writing for corporate clients, small business, and real people all over the world.
Need something written? Mel has the words you need to shine your business out of the search pile, and quickly tell a first-time reader who you are — and everything that’s awesome about what you do.
What do you need to do?
Hire a writer? Start your own Writing Business? Get free content hacks and social strategy? Click any of the sliding images below.
The Backstory
In January 2014 I quit my job, sacked my clients, shut down my freelance writing and consulting business, and spent every cent I had volunteering in the Philippines after Typhoon Yolanda. I returned home to Australia 2 months later obsessed, changed, uplifted, and depressed all at the same time.
I sold my stuff, played music in the streets (you may call this busking), and received donations from family, friends, and people I had never met. I used all the money to create my own humanitarian projects helping the children I had met and their families.
Somehow I did three trips to the Philippines in 2014 — what a year!
Having shed all but a few material possessions (and my business too), I had planned to travel from country to country exploring my creativity, playing music in the street, and writing stories of the people and places. But a fatal car accident, followed quickly by the suicide of one of the children I had been helping, shut me down. Overwhelmed by grief I found myself unable to write, or play music at all. I went into hiding.
Finding Jerry (and my way back)
Then a little Ilonggo boy (only seven years old) came into my life and changed everything. He didn’t even own a pair of thongs (flip/flops), his mother was dead and his father semi-paralysed from a stroke. Their house — all their things including his dog and 8 new born puppies — had been totally washed away in Typhoon Yolanda. He asked me (someone who had never EVER had children) to stay with me and live at the house. At first I said no!
Somehow, I found myself in my mid-forties a mum for the first time. He couldn’t speak English and I could barely say hello in his mother tongue Hiligaynon (Ilonggo). It has been a challenge learning to be a parent, but along the way found release and fulfilment by writing songs, poems, and blogging my struggles. And somehow — at last — real joy in returning to my work as a professional writer.
In early 2017 I re-opened my freelance writing and consulting business, and now live between the Philippines and Australia — serving clients from all over the world
This website and blog is a story. It is my love of self-expression through music, art, and poetry — recording my travels and dual lives between Australia and the Philippines. It is the place to engage the services of a professional writer and business blogger. It is a collection of inspiring stories of love and kindness (from the people I meet, and the places I see). But most of all, it is a narrative of a little boy who has changed my heart forever.
Click on the following links to learn more about Jerry, how to hire a writer (me) for your next writing job, or how you can help disadvantaged kids go to school.
