'I turned 30 this year. Eurydice Dixon should have too.'

Warning: The following story deals with sexual assault and murder, which may be triggering for some readers.

Today would've been Eurydice Dixon's 30th birthday.

But she never got the chance to see it.

Eurydice was walking home through Melbourne on a winter's night when her life was taken from her.

She was just 22-years-old.

It was Tuesday, June 12, 2018. Nine degrees and clear; the kind of crisp cold that makes the city lights feel sharper.

Inside the Highlander Bar, a small underground comedy night had just wrapped.

Eurydice was one of the performers. She was a comedian, a writer, a daughter, a friend.

Eurydice was an aspiring comedian. Image: Facebook.

She said goodnight to her mates, pulled her jacket tight, and began walking home through the city she loved. 

She texted her boyfriend just after midnight as she walked.

"I'm nearly home safe, hbu?"

The words were typed out quickly. 

But she never made it to her nearby apartment.

In the early hours of June 13, 2018, Eurydice was attacked, raped and murdered in the darkness of Princes Park by Jaymes Todd.

The then-19-year-old had stalked Eurydice for more than four kilometres — through Melbourne's bright grid and into the darkness where she was murdered. Her body was found on a sports field around 2.40am.

Todd is now serving life in prison, with a minimum parole period of thirty-five years.

I won't waste words on him. What matters is her and the world that failed to keep her safe.

Listen: 'I turned 30 this year. Eurydice Dixon should have too.' Post continues below.

When Eurydice's father, Jeremy Dixon, spoke outside court after the sentencing in 2019, he said he wanted — as his daughter would have wanted — for the man who killed her to heal.

But he also wanted the world to remember Eurydice for who she really was: her wit, her courage, her kindness.

I didn't know Eurydice. We didn't even live in the same state.

Today would've been Eurydice Dixon's 30th birthday.

But when her name appeared in the headlines, a shiver ran through me. 

Because it could've been me. Or one of my friends.

So many women I know have done as she did.

Have walked home after a night of art, a gig, a friend's birthday.

Texted a mate to say, "I'm nearly home."

Pretended to talk on the phone.

Held keys between our fingers.

Chose the longer, better-lit route.

Calculated safety with every step.

We've seen this before. Jill Meagher in 2012, and more recently Audrey Griffin, who was murdered in March this year.

They have different names, it happened on different years, in different circumstances — but each of their cases has the same devastating truth; these women should have been safe, while walking home, yet they were killed by strangers.

That still hasn't changed.

In 2012. In 2018. In 2025.

When did we accept that women have to manage their own safety just to exist in public space?

A few weeks ago, I found myself thinking of Eurydice. As I scrolled through her Wikipedia page — a strange, sterile archive that documents her death more than her life — there it was, her date of birth, November 10, 1995.

She would have turned 30 today.

It stopped me in my tracks. Because I turned 30 this year too.

And while I've never been sentimental about birthdays, 30 feels different. It's a marker, a transition.

You start to know who you are. What matters. What doesn't.

It's the year I got engaged. Friends started families. Some of us bought our first homes, paid off our HECS debts, travelled the world, and complained about the trivial things that make up an ordinary, safe, beautiful life.

Those are all things Eurydice never got to experience.

Her family never got to celebrate with her. Never got to see who she might have become — the jokes she would've written, the causes she would've championed, the life she would've built.

She never got to grow older. To rebuild. To just be.

Eurydice's father, Jeremy Dixon told Mamamia, he's just grateful for the time he had with his daughter, as he recalled her courage, humour and empathy.

"Eurydice, my daughter, was not one for wallowing in grief. At the age of seven, when her mother died, she was a rock of courage and humour," he wrote in a statement.

"In the difficult years that followed, her unsentimental but unflagging love and loyalty and care kept our small family unit afloat. Now the treasure of our family was in the process of becoming the world's treasure."

"What she could have done with her intelligence and righteousness and empathy we will not see. But we can imagine, and we can mirror and magnify those qualities as best we can."

"I'm not going to try to ventriloquise Eurydice's views, which were in any case in development. But she was a feminist, she was not satisfied with easy answers or humbug, she was not a hater."

"The books she was recently reading include works by Althusser and Foucault and Hunter S. Thompson, as well as books on music, pop culture and feminist histories of makeup and fashion."

"From a young age, Eurydice had a flair for clothing and self-adornment and this was also an intellectual interest. Her taste, when she happened to die, ran to an upbeat version of Goth. Her clothing was also a vehicle for humour and thought."

"She had a plain tattoo on her arm saying, "this is a tattoo". I still don't know exactly why that is funny, but it is."

"I'm grateful beyond words that Ridi lived at all and will try not to cry too much about her early death."

So today, on what would've been her 30th birthday, I'm thinking about her.

And about all the women who never made it home.

I'm thinking about how turning 30, just being here, is a quiet kind of privilege.

And maybe that's the legacy worth holding onto — not the violence that ended her life, but the light she brought into it.

If this has raised any issues for you, or if you just feel like you need to speak to someone, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14, or, 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) — the national sexual assault, domestic and family violence counselling service.

Feature image: Facebook.