Category: Life

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “A Mystery Wrapped in an Enigma.”

My sister, as part of her blogging, often responds to the Daily Post’s writing prompt. I read her most recent post this morning and am taken back to that time, although not to the same place Deb was, as I didn’t study French and so wasn’t on the trip. I do remember our own trip though – Dad driving like a maniac to Sydney to pick Deb up after it happened. I didn’t know that Deb bought her wedding dress that day though, so you really do learn things through reading others’ blogs.

I don’t have any bravery awards to write about, but I do do something that you possibly don’t know about.

I walk to work (and catch two trains in between the walking).

No, let me finish, that isn’t it.

I walk to work and I know it’s almost time for me to start blogging again when I start narrating my walk.

Not out loud you understand, but inside, in the private space of my mind.

It started again one day last week when I came across a tree full of buds … and one leaf that lingered on the branch. Clinging on for dear life, not wanting to give in the inevitability of winter.

It was at that point my narration started. I started composing (not a story – just a narration) of the leaf. I played alliteratively with language, and then my attention was caught by other things: two crows on the lid of a wheelie bin, their beaks tearing into the plastic bag poking out from the top, the old lady bent almost double struggling with her gate “here, let me get that for you”, the L-plater on his motorbike wobbling to a stop, the young bloke in the furniture van being told off for going into the wrong gate, the baby’s feet sticking out from under the blanket that’s covering the rest of her in the pram, the number of coffee drinkers waiting edgily outside Egyptian Al’s coffee place.

As my eyes take in the world around me, my mind narrates snatches of story, descriptions, dialogue, explanations, silences, musings …

I walk to work and narrate my world.

And then some days later I consider writing a blog post.

I most often don’t make it that far though.

 

This post is written in response to the Daily Prompt from May 28.

Daily prompt post: A mystery wrapped in an enigma

Quote• Posted on by Sharon
Posted in Life, Writing

Spreading the (belated) love

Posted on by Sharon

My sister is a blogger (amongst many other things) and she’s taken to blogging like the proverbial duck to water. Deb is a community minded person; she loves to be part of things, to join in, to interact.

What that means for her blogging is that she gets involved in events and challenges and she responds to people and they respond back.

What it also means is that Deb gets nominated for blogging awards and to join in blogging challenges. One of these was to ‘spread the love‘.

These challenges/events have ‘rules’ which in this case were:

RULES

  1. Write ten four word sentences about what love means to you.
  2. Share your favourite quote on love.
  3. Nominate ten other bloggers for the same.

I was reading Wide in Tights’ blog just now and saw that Jen responded to Deb’s challenge, and so I thought I’d give it a go too. Plus, Deb had nominated me to participate in the event.

It’s not something I often (ever) do because I have a really hard time thinking about what to write when I’m given a topic to write on. But I’m going to give this a go. Except, I don’t know 10 bloggers so I’ll conveniently forget about that particular ‘rule’.

So here are my ten four word sentences:

1. Knowing Tim’s always there.

2. His warm, warm hands.

3. All of my children.

4. All of my grandchildren.

5. Spending time with family.

6. Summer warmth after winter.

7. Christmas at the beach.

8. Road trip to anywhere.

9. Being connected to others.

10. Dancing on the inside.

The challenge also called for a favourite quote on love … to be quite honest, I don’t have one, but I do like that Oscar Wilde said: “Never love anyone who treats you like you’re ordinary”.

It possibly doesn’t fit with the spirit of ‘spreading the love’ but it speaks to me and so I thought I’d share it.

****

There you go … my first blogging event/challenge.

Posted in Life

Revelations for a new year

Posted on by Sharon

This is a blog post.(#) It has words. They are carefully and deliberately put together from thoughts, ideas, nuances, shards of memory, sideways glances, fluff on the carpet, cliche.

It has a point. I don’t want to get to it too early and give the game away; but rest assured there is one. 

Unless there isn’t. 

My sister celebrated 35 years of marriage a week or so ago, as did her husband. I remember that over-half-a-life-time-ago day. Deb arriving in a horse-drawn cart, carrying a parasol, looking petit and feminine. Grant in his white suit. Mum falling, or did she faint? Maybe she was pushed. 

That memory sparks another. Grade 8: “You’re nothing like your sister, are you?” Mr Murphy, my geography teacher, providing an exemplary example of good teaching. Yes, in front of the whole class.

It wasn’t the first time I’d been asked that question, or a worse one: ‘Why can’t you be more like your sister?’. They’re not really questions I’ve ever felt capable of answering beyond a sullen ‘I dunno’. But they’re questions that never cast me in a good light. It’s like when my mother says, “you’re just like your father” in that tone she has. The one where I can tell she doesn’t mean the nice things about him. 

My sister is good. If I wasn’t like her, then I must be bad.

That’s how I grew up – as a living comparison to my good sister. 

Deb is fiercely competitive. She loves to be the first one to do things, and she likes to come first when there’s even a hint of a possibility that there might, perhaps, even slightly, be a chance of a second place. 

That was my place. Second. 

But this isn’t about Deb. This is about me. The above was just a bit of context; some background information to place what comes next. There’s a technical term for it, but my mind is drawing a blank at the moment (the blank my mind is drawing has a border around it – a pretty kind of green filigree – but the bit in the inside is still blank).

You see, something happened the other day: I had a thought. A revelation if you will. It surprised me.

I was walking to the train station not really thinking about anything, in that ‘I’m walking with a purpose and my mind isn’t really present’ kind of way I have, when a thought popped into my mind. Just like that.

Pop.

‘Sharon’ the thought said in that spooky way thoughts speak to you (not that my thought spoke in a spooky voice. Rather it was spooky that my thought addressed me by name). ‘It doesn’t matter that you aren’t like your sister. And’ my thought paused for dramatic effect (now that I think about it, I probably added the pause in later) ‘being nothing like your sister doesn’t mean that you’re bad’.

“Well that’s a relief” I said. Out loud. In that way old ladies do when they’re having existential conversations with themselves on the way to the train station. I smiled at the young man walking past to show that I wasn’t really mad, but his look suggested that he thought I was on the verge. 

‘And.’  Oh, my thought hadn’t finished. I’d better pay attention. ‘Being just like your father doesn’t only mean bad things either’. 

“Humpf” I said in a surprised kind of way. Again I said it out loud. The young man looked around to see that I was still trotting at his heels. He sped up. 

It was a relief, to be honest, to know that I could think of myself differently: not in comparison to my sister (who hadn’t been married first (that was me) but whose marriage had lasted almost three times as long as mine … Deb: good/me: not so much), but that I could think of myself as my own self.

And don’t bother asking why I hadn’t come to that conclusion many years ago. That’s as much use as a teacher asking why you aren’t more like your sister. A mumbled ‘I dunno’ is about as good as you’re going to get and I don’t suppose that’s the answer you want. 

So there you have it.

I’m okay not being like my sister. 

She’s cool and all that, but I’m okay too.

(#) this is in response to my husband’s recent blog post which wasn’t, in fact, a blog post. 

Posted in Life, Writing

Trying for a thing of beauty

Posted on by Sharon

I string words together on the clothesline of this blog. Sometimes these strings of words mean something … other times, I’m not so sure. 

Number Six presented us with a tin of magnetic words as part of her Christmas present; magnetic words to make poems with.

I made some poems. Strings of words that don’t mean anything but that make interesting associations, or that I like the sound of when they’re together. I also like the freedom these magnetic words give me to play with language, to not have to make literal sense, or figurative sense either for that matter. I like the randomness of the words on the fridge door – the unexpected nature of what emerges from my imagination in response to the words at my disposal.

Let me back up just a moment though. When I say ‘I made some poems’ I don’t know that ‘poem’ is the right word. What is a poem? Well, people with more knowledge of the art-form of which poems are a part have argued over a definition for more years than I’ve been alive … so I’m not going to try to define it. But I do like this, written by Mark Yakich: When we come across a poem—any poem—our first assumption should not be to prejudice it as a thing of beauty, but simply as a thing. 

So, here is the first thing I made on my fridge with my new magnetic words:

Goddess chant,
Luscious whisper.
Languid through forest cool.
Achingly sweet crush,
Head over life.
We sing these dream music shadows.

The magnetic word feedback I received was:

Gorgeous language,
Enormous peach friend.

As you can see, the magnetic words on my fridge door allowed me to write a ‘thing’, but not necessarily a thing of beauty. 

Since then I’ve written more poems, some using the magnetic words on my fridge door, others using words from the fridge door of my imagination. 

I’m going to share one with you, but first, some context. 

As Tim and I emerged from the cinema last Saturday we noted, with some alarm, the blackness of the clouds speeding towards the city. Weatherzone was consulted and we discovered that a severe thunderstorm was heading our way. We decided not to dawdle. Number Six had asked about the film we’d been to see and I responded that we were rushing home before the storm hit. She texted back: Run Sharon.

Two words. Enough to make a poem with. Here it is. 

“Run Sharon!”
She shouts through her fingers.
The sky darkens, the air cools,
The clouds bunch up
In metaphoric glee.
We run, giggling like schoolgirls,
Rain nipping at our heels.
Light zigs up the sky,
Its roar stops our breath.
The air stills.
We wait.

Exhale. 

****

The one poem started a string of others. Here’s one more, titled ‘Domesticated’.

A dead saucepan litters the sink.
Mugs of mostly drunk tea,
Spoons from Tim’s coffee.
A glass, a plate, a knife
That earlier today
Spilled the blood of the rhubarb.

Rhubarb juice pools on the stove,
The smell of burning stronger here.
The purple pulpy mass glowers
From the bottom of the saucepan.
Sardonic. Resentful.
I was expecting remorseful,
Or perhaps even apologetic.
I’m not entirely sure why.

****

Words strung together on the clothesline of this blog. Some make more sense than others…

… the ending is open to allow for possibilities.

Posted in Learning, Life

For richer or poorer …

Posted on by Sharon

In a throw-away society, it’s affirming to witness things that last; that endure; that go on … that despite setbacks and difficulties and challenges, keep going.

Fads come and go … fads in fashion and food and where to go for coffee. One day ‘this’ place is in favour and you wait half an hour for a table (if you’re lucky and if you can be bothered waiting), and the next day it’s empty; tumbleweeds blow through eyeing the perplexed owner with disdain as he sits with his head in his hands wondering what on earth went wrong. The tumbleweed has no answer and blows right through to the place next door which, at this very moment, has a queue of people out the door, all prepared to wait at least half an hour for just the right blend of MoroccanBrazilianHighlandofNewGuineaUnderwaterPoland coffee that’s suddenly all the rage.

Big hair is in; then it’s out. Shoulder pads come and go, more or less subtle at each reincarnation. The ripped jeans that I wore in the 70s are back, this time with more rip and less jean. I’m waiting for a resurgence of the gozunder – the pot that’s squished into the under-bed space, along with the bulbs waiting for planting, and the kids’ Christmas presents.

And then there’s marriage. It seems to go in and out of favour, depending on which celebrity endorses (or trashes) it. And most of the marriages we hear about – the ones featured in magazines, not the ordinary ones we live – don’t last. We seem surprised when they do, or maybe we just don’t hear about them very often and because it seems so usual to hear about the ones that fail we are surprised to hear of the ones that don’t.

But weddings still happen and marriages are still celebrated. My son Daniel and his wife Cathy just celebrated their first wedding anniversary. Tim and I have just celebrated our fourth.

And yesterday, my parents, Noel and Sheila Pittaway, celebrated their 56th.

Yes, 56 years together. Through richer and poorer; in sickness and in health. They’ve been together through the tough times and the good times. Through the Navy years and the many years since then: learning to live together after sometimes months at a time living apart. Through the business years driving up and down the coast, and helping people make happy travel memories. Through their own times spent travelling and living overseas. Through the work years and the retirement years. Through living on the south and north coasts of NSW, into Queensland, and back to NSW. Through raising three (gorgeous) children, and welcoming a flurry of (gorgeous) grandchildren (ten at the last count), and the same number of (gorgeous) great-grandchildren (I don’t know how they keep up because I’m not sure I’ve counted them all) into the family.

At his wedding just over a year ago, Daniel (grandson number 2) paid his respects to his grandparents when he spoke about them in his speech, acknowledging their place in his life as role models – for their love and commitment to each other, and to their family.

It seems fitting then, that to celebrate their 56 years together they should spend the weekend with Daniel and his wife Cathy, together with other grandchildren: Eliza and her partner Shawn, and Chase and his wife Megan, along with two great-grandchildren, Hunter and Lily.

The younger generations, spending time with the family elders – learning what it is to work hard at what matters most, sharing quiet moments together, laughing, eating, doing the things families do. Celebrating those things that count.

Happy anniversary Mum and Dad. Still dancing after all these years!

Newlyweds Noel and Sheila Pittawaystill dancing
My sister wrote a beautiful tribute to Mum and Dad earlier in the week. In her post she said that ‘I love the fact that I am a part of them’. It’s a sentiment I share. Thanks for putting it so beautifully Deb.

Posted in Learning, Life, Studying, Teaching

Do unto others …

Posted on by Sharon

My husband, Tim, and I are different.

One of my colleagues highlighted this difference when she said, “Tim’s nice. And Sharon, you have good ideas. Together you make one decent person.”

It’s become something of a refrain for us and we joke about it at odd times in that way couples do when the truth of what’s been said hits us between the eyes.

It serves to bring our difference into sharp relief.

Tim is nice.

And I do have good ideas.

***

In our work as teacher educators, we assess a lot of student work. Tim writes nice comments on the work he marks; his language is positive and his niceness exudes through his words. When students receive their assignments, they feel reassured.

***

He loads his presentation, gathers his papers and asks me if I’m ready.

I am.

I love listening to Tim’s presentations because his thinking is so clear, he uses language beautifully, and the connections he makes are interesting ones. His voice is soothing and controlled and warm.

My mind flashes back to November 23, 1999: the first time I heard Tim speak. It was his Honours presentation and I was impressed by the clarity of his thinking and the way he communicated ideas. Even though I didn’t know him then, I was determined to introduce myself to him afterwards. Three months later we meet again, both new PhD candidates, in adjoining offices. I listen to him speak on numerous occasions over the next few years and he impresses me each time.

This presentation is different though. It’s not Tim at his best. He finishes and looks expectantly at me.

I am not nice.

***

I load my presentation, gather my papers and ask him if he’s ready.

He is.

I start and a few slides in, I stop. I had had an idea. I tell Tim I’ll be back in a moment.

A few minutes later I am back, and I start again.

Tim listens respectfully. I finish and look expectantly at him.

Tim is nice.

***

I give Tim some feedback on his presentation: “I was confused by this slide because it didn’t reflect what you were saying”, “the information you spoke about [at this point] was very complex”, “on the fourth slide the information you present is in the opposite order to what you say and that distracts me”

Tim is upset.

“Do you have anything nice to say?”

***

Tim gives me feedback on my presentation: “It’s great. Well done. You’ll be fabulous. I really like how you have organised your ideas”

I am upset.

“Don’t give me nice. Tell me how to make it better.”

***

And there’s the difference.

Tim wanted me to be nice. He needed to be reassured.

I wanted Tim to be critical. I needed to be better.

***

Tim’s feedback to students reassures them. They feel that they can do ‘this’, that they can succeed, that they can achieve their goal of getting through university and being a teacher.

My feedback is anything but reassuring. It points out how they can improve their work, how they can communicate in writing more clearly, how they might connect their ideas in more logical ways … it doesn’t reassure.

Tim placates.

I challenge and question.

I struggle to write nice things. I object to the ‘bollocks sandwich’ approach (as one student described it): the say something nice, then say something constructive about how the work could be improved, then finish with something else nice.

To me it feels like I’m writing platitudes and empty words: “Thank you for your submission. You have used a clear font and met the word count.”

It feels wrong to me, and not at all reassuring.

And it’s because I wouldn’t want to hear it. Don’t tell me stupid stuff, tell me what I can do to improve my work – don’t waste my time with things that don’t matter.

***

We are taught from a young age that we should do unto others as we would have others do unto us.

But that’s quite patently wrong.

What’s really at work here is this: do unto others as they would be done unto.

When I ‘do unto others as I would have them do unto me’, I give the kind of feedback that I want to hear.

But there are plenty of students who want something different: they want to be reassured.

***

Tim is going to have to get more critical.

And I’m going to have to learn to be nice.

It’s going to be a struggle for both of us.

Posted in Life, Uncategorized

On Zumba

Posted on by Sharon

Zumba, in case you’re not in the know, is a form of dance exercise. Dancercise perhaps? Or maybe exerdance?

Anyway, it’s something mostly women do and it’s about moving to music in a choreographed way.

I went today. Yes, to a Zumba class.

I moved to music. I want to stress that I didn’t move in the choreographed way the others in the class moved, and when I say ‘moved’ I’m not using the word in the usual way the word is used.

After a time the instructor looked at me and mouthed (over the loud, thumping Latin rhythms) “Sharon, you’re supposed to be moving”. I took umbrage. I was moving!

Yes, she said, but you have to move on the outside as well.

Oh.

I looked in the mirrors filling the wall in front of me and where the instructor’s arms were above her head, mine were flapping in the vicinity of my waist; where her hips were swivelling at a hundred miles an hour, mine were shifting somewhat erratically; where her feet were going right foot tap to the front, left foot tap to the front, right foot double tap to the front, mine were going right foot … what? Just … what?

And she wasn’t just doing these things in isolation … she was doing them all at the same time. In time. Quick time. And then she sped up.

Crikey.

I looked … well, not like I was dancing, that’s for sure.

But I was dancing on the inside. And that has to count for something.

Doesn’t it?

Posted in Life

On clutter …

Posted on by Sharon

I don’t like clutter: things scattered haphazardly on any available surface, all inviting tiny molecules of dust to settle on them, all moving of their own accord to look out of alignment and to crowd together in a state of general untidiness.

On Thursday morning last week, Tim and I arrived back in the state with a car bursting with … well, it’s not the technical term but I’m going to call it “stuff”. The man at the quarantine check in Devonport had been mightily impressed with my packing skills, saying that he’d never seen a vehicle so well-packed. If a car could be said to be stuffed full – our car was it.

Tim had to go back to work that morning and I had to collect a hire car to drive for a little over two hours to do a school visit. Our car stayed stuffed.

On Friday morning Tim headed back to work and I only had an hour’s drive to visit another school, so I spent half an hour unpacking the car.

A full thirty minutes and there was barely a dent in the stuff still packed in the car. In fact, Tim walked past it that afternoon and didn’t even notice that the car was no longer bursting.

But when I walked into the lounge room, I could tell. Stuff everywhere. Bags of unidentified belongings, pillows, doonas, blankets, sheets, photos, canvases, others’ art works we’ve gathered over the years, trinkets, clothes, old school reports, information kits of one kind or another (do you reckon it’s too late to do the bowel test I got a kit for two years ago?) … even a bag of coat hangers. All dumped in the lounge room, and the hallway, and the bathroom, and our bedroom, and the guest room and my study. Oh, and the kitchen.

And look, even in the laundry. How could one car hold so much?

It reminded me of what my house used to look like when I was the mother of four young children. Stuff everywhere. No semblance of order. No rhyme or reason why any of it was where it was – it just was. And it was mostly covered in dried weetbix or porridge …

When we lived in Queensland, the neighbour’s little boy once told his mother that he really liked my car … because it had everything you could ever want in it! A very polite way of saying it was a mess.

And that’s what the house looked like on Friday morning. And it looked exactly the same on Friday evening when I returned from the school I’d visited. Tim arrived home from work, had a spurt of energy and finished unloading the car. There was barely enough floor, couch, table, bed, desk space for it all. We cleared a space on the couch to sit, and did our best to ignore it all. It oozed untidiness from every corner.

On Saturday morning, despite the prospect of a four hour drive north, I was up at 5am putting the bathroom in order. You can only imagine the strong sense of satisfaction I felt when everything fitted in the cupboard in an orderly way!

Out of the safe (i.e. tidy) confines of the bathroom, I felt burdened by the piles and piles and piles of things. What is all this stuff? Where did it come from? Had the neighbours added to it while I wasn’t looking?  And where was it all going to go? We’d thought the house was already full, but now we had to find extra places for the litter of possessions covering every surface.

Now that I no longer have little children, I like things neat. Well-ordered. Straight. A bed that’s made makes for a much neater room than an unmade bed; a kitchen bench that’s unencumbered with every utensil known to humankind is a delight to behold; a lounge room floor that is not a trip hazard makes me a happy girl. Pencils lying on a desk look better when they’re straight. A box of tissues on the fridge looks neater when it’s straight. A pile of mail on the table … you get the idea.

And so to Sunday morning. De-clutter day. What a great day! By Sunday afternoon we had bags and bags (and bags) of things we didn’t want, ready to take to an op shop; we had bags and bags of rubbish (why did we keep that and that or … goodness, what is that?) and best of all we had beautifully organised cupboards and drawers.

And yes, just in case you’re wondering, my sock drawer has straight rows of socks. If I was home I’d take a picture – it really looks that good!

Even my mother, the queen of unclutter, would be impressed.

Just don’t open that cupboard Mum!

Posted in Life

On illness …

Posted on by Sharon

My sister and I were talking yesterday.  In person. (We can do that now that we live closer to each other.)

We were discussing how like our mother we are in relation to illness. Mum has no truck with people who are sick. It’s all in their heads. If they wanted to get better they would, and if they’d been more determined they wouldn’t have been sick in the first place. You sneeze and say I’m getting a cold and Mum would respond with ‘stop it. You’ll talk yourself into getting sick’.

Deb and I are like our mother. People allow themselves to get sick. They don’t talk themselves out of it. We have an absolute conviction that illness can be stopped with the right attitude. In fact, Dad used to say it a lot when we were kids: mind over matter. We developed strong minds.

Deb and I are doomed – it comes from both parents.

I felt good yesterday to discover that I wasn’t the only one with this attitude (besides my mother). Deb has it too. We joked about it, and felt good about being so self-aware as we wondered down the main street of Bright, laughing that it was only in this that we were like our mother.

Our self-awareness hasn’t changed our attitude though.

And without wanting to jinx ourselves, Deb and I tend not to get sick. And neither does Mum. Everyone around us might be burning up with fever, coughing and sneezing their hearts out, have throats red raw, be laid flat with whatever’s going around and we tend to sail on through unscathed.

When we do get sick though, we get sick. Mum was sick earlier in the year. Her and Dad were visiting Tasmania and then our new place and she wasn’t at all well. But would she take it easy? Not on your life! No giving in to a cold, no spending time resting up … taking it easy is for wimps, and by golly our mother is not a wimp.

Sickness is for the weak, and she is strong.

Let me just say, as an aside, that people who have this attitude are very bad patients!

Deb and I have, it seems, inherited her attitude. And thankfully, her constitution. We rarely get sick.

We joke about our attitude, and in mixed company pretend that we really don’t think that sickness is for the weak and that if you really wanted you wouldn’t get sick in the first place … but in our hearts we know that it’s not pretend. It’s a truth we live with.

It’s not an easy thing to admit so openly. Turn it around for a moment and imagine how hard it must be for us, having no patience with a loved one curled up in a ball on the couch, red-nosed and sounding like Shirley Bassey on a bad day. Imagine how difficult it is for us to make soothing noises, to make chicken soup, to fuss over the pain-ridden … oh forget it, you obviously didn’t look after yourself properly and you’ve let yourself get sick. Stop giving in to it.

There, I’ve said it. It’s out there.

But, we know about our attitude and we are pleased that as we get older we’re better at biting our tongues and being sympathetic.

Or so we think.

Our husbands, it seems, think differently.

Posted in Learning, Life

On moving …

Posted on by Sharon

On August 18, 1986, as a 24 year old mother of four young children, I moved from Brisbane to Tasmania; from being surrounded by family, to a place where we had no family; from a city to a sheep farm; from the relative warmth of a Queensland winter to the depths of a Tasmanian one.

I felt sentenced, although unsure of the length of my sentence.

****

It turns out my sentence was 27 years, 10 months, and 22 days (or thereabouts).

On Wednesday 25th June, 2014, my sentence ended.

Despite the ‘sentence’, Tasmania ended up being a good place to live – a cold one and I have complained often and bitterly over the years about the cold – but looking back it’s easy to focus on the good parts of living in the state that’s been the butt of mainlanders’ jokes for many years.

During my 27 years and a bit years, I (in no particular order):
* ran a general store in a very small country town
* had a fifth child
* worked in community radio
* completed an undergraduate degree specialising in English and Drama teaching
* taught in a high school and a senior secondary college
* got my bus licence
* taught Drama and English and Tourism Studies
* completed Cert IV in Workplace Training and Assessment
* worked for ABC Local Radio as a producer and presenter
* began A Kick in the Arts – a weekly community radio arts program
* returned to university and completed a PhD
* became an academic and took on a range of leadership roles
* was the chair of a local theatre company for a time
* lived in the north-east, the north-west, and the north – and then the north-west and then the north and then the north-west
* divorced
* re-married 19 years later
* undertook the year-long Tasmanian Leaders Program
* travelled to the mainland whenever I could
* travelled to New Zealand twice, then Scotland and England one year, to Paris and Germany the next and then to France, Italy and Germany the one after that
* published a number of journal articles, book chapters, and conference papers
* edited a textbook
* presented papers in Christchurch, Glasgow, Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Hobart, and Launceston
* welcomed eight grandchildren into the world
* taught more students than I could ever remember
* supervised four PhD candidates to completion
* put on lots of weight
* lost even more
* met some truly wonderful people
…

****

I moved to Tasmania because of my (then) husband’s job.

Almost 28 years later, I’ve moved away from Tasmania because of my (now) husband’s job.

****

It’s unsettling, this moving business. Sorting out possessions stashed in dark corners of cupboards; throwing out; packing up; spending weekends in Melbourne and week days in Burnie; moving between … between living with my husband in Melbourne on weekends and living with one of my daughters and her two sons through the week. Not feeling like either place is home … one new place that isn’t really mine, and the old, familiar place that is now filled with boys’ toys and laughter and tears and hugs and bubble baths – changed, in a good way, but not really mine. Moving between having my husband cook me dinner on the weekends and cooking dinner for my daughter through the week … between gyms … between relying on public transport and having no public transport … between there and here … and here and there.

My husband and I called two different places home … it was confusing for a time. Where? Oh, that home.

A long time in transition – four months of living between. Not long, looking back … but it felt long living through it.

And now it’s done. The final move … three trips across Bass Strait in five days, each rougher than the one before. Unpacking the car, finding dark corners of cupboards to stash our things, having one home rather than two.

I don’t feel sentenced, in this new place.

I already feel more connected.

And less.