In Loving Memory of Mom

To my incredible mother: she made business an art form, treated travel as a classroom, and lived a full, exciting life.

Mom, your dedication to travel, adventure, and broadening our horizons shaped my entire world. I cherish the memories of our journeys across the United States, and I will always be thankful to you for making exploration such a priority. Looking back on her journey, it’s clear she was truly extraordinary—a trailblazer, a visionary, and a woman of immense courage, warmth, and determination. She lived life entirely on her own terms, moving across the world, forging a new life in America, and bringing us along with her.

Mentor-wise, I never had to look further than my own mother. She had a brilliant eye for design, fashion, interior decorating, and business, particularly in boutique hotels, tourism, hospitality, and customer service. She loved her family deeply, she adored her cats, and she brought an unmatched standard of excellence to everything she touched. Her courage to move to a new country, her strength in carving out her own path, and her unwavering commitment to creating a loving, supportive home were the greatest gifts she could have ever given us.

She also passed on her deep curiosity for technology and communication. I’ve been in interactive media since 1994, when Mom supported my education at the University of Georgia. I remember in 1995 when she visited me at the Grady College of Journalism, and I showed her a webpage I had built in the early Netscape browser. I tried to explain that this page could be viewed from anywhere in the world—that, much like a fax machine, it becomes powerful once everyone is connected.

Years later, when I returned to New Zealand in 1999, she was thriving at Atlantic and Pacific Business Travel. Over the years, as my career took me from working with Tourism New Zealand on early digital projects to working in London alongside podcasting pioneers, Mom was always there. But the truth is, she was ahead of all of us. Long before mainstream media adopted long-form audio, and decades before blogs, podcasts, or Instagram existed, Mom embraced the tech of her time. She traded pen and paper for a stereo and a microphone, recording her life on analog cassette tapes to send back home.

Recently, 47 years after she first started, I found the box of cassette tapes she recorded between 1978 and 1981 for an audience of just two: Nana and Grandad. I’ve spent the last three months digitizing those tapes into 22 episodes—30 hours of audio covering politics, family, current affairs, and everyday life. Turning those recordings into nearly 200,000 words for a book has allowed her voice to echo right back to us today.

I’ve made these recordings available online so everyone can hear her stories, which you can find at www.atlantatapes.com, and you can listen to the original recordings directly at www.atlantatapes.com/episodes. I've also transcribed her audio diary entries into an e-book, and I’m more than happy to email the PDF to anyone who would like a copy. symbioagency@outlook.com

Mom, you connected us all through your warmth and foresight. You did life your way, and you did it wonderfully. Your voice, your strength, and your love will stay with us forever.

A link to the stream.