I finished my last post by saying it wasn’t a biggie – all that change at once – but of course it was.
One of the biggest biggies is the decisions about what to take with you to your new place. You look in your cupboards and under the bed, and behind the laundry door and you think ‘what is all this stuff? Do I really need it?’
What do you take? What do you get rid of or give away/rehome/recycle? I have letters – handwritten ones – from my grandmothers dating back to the 1970s. I’ve carried them with me through the countless moves from NSW to Queensland to Tasmania to Victoria. Each time I pack up to move, I come across them and I get a little frisson of pleasure when I see them.
I have a basketball pennant from 1973 when I played in the Shoalhaven ABA Miniballer winter comp, my Year 12 highschool reference from 1983, and my acceptance letter from 1993 when I applied to university (plus my very first university student card).
I loved playing basketballMy first ever student card from 1993
I have airmail letters from my sister who lived in England for a year in 1992 (apparently I made a tape for them – I’d just started working in radio so probably thought I was very professional!). I have a newspaper clipping from 1994 when I interviewed Jeanne Little and copies of run sheets from the Kick Arts show I used to do on community radio in Launceston in the early 2000s. I have a letter from the Tasmanian Department of Tourism, Parks, Heritage and the Arts thanking me for agreeing to be part of the media team for the Olympic Art event in 2004 which I wouldn’t have remembered if I hadn’t kept the letter. I have letters and cards from former students that bring back floods of memories.
I could throw them all away and no one else would be any the wiser. And I came very close to doing that yesterday when I found them again. But they are documents of a life. Of my life.
When my children are going through my things after I die, I’m sure they’ll ask, ‘why did Mum keep this … and this … and this?’ But I hope they’ll read some of those letters and cards and documents and get a better sense of the life I’ve lived.
One thing in particular I came across yesterday was the script of a speech I gave when I was involved with Toastmasters in the early 2000s. I started with a story of a bird I’d set free when I was five years old and finished with the story of setting myself free many years later. It was a cage of “you can’t” – you can’t go to university, you can’t go to work, you can’t make it without me, you can’t live outside this cage.
But what had been called stubbornness in my youth developed into an ocean of resilience. I believe that the bird I set free when I was five made it … that its resilience and determination to survive allowed it to enjoy its freedom … just as my resilience and determination have allowed me to.
So while lots of change at once is a biggie, I have an ocean of resilience and determination to help me weather it.
And I have documents of my life to remind me of that.
Change can be challenging. Not the small stuff like my Pop used to jiggle in his pocket, but the big stuff … location, house, lifestyle, job, hairstyle, friendship group … that kind of big stuff.
Doing one change at a time can be stressful. Have you ever been to the hairdresser and she suggests you have a fringe? The decision can be agonising and you’re under pressure to say yes or no and you don’t have anyone you know close by to advise you and you just do it and everyone says it looks great. And you realise that the decision was stressful but the outcome wasn’t. It’s just a hair cut. No biggie.
Doing more than one change at a time can be ultra stressful. Your hair starts to fall out, and your stomach is upset more often than not, and your legs ache and you snap yes please when your husband asks if you’d like a cup of tea rather than being polite about it, and your mind whirls at a million miles an hour all night or at least until 5:55am and then you fall into a deep sleep and don’t wake up until 7:30 and that means you’re late and the stress builds all over again and even more hair comes out and suddenly you don’t even want a cup of tea and you wonder what’s happening to you and you suddenly realise, three weeks later, that you’re stressed because there’s too much change happening all at once.
Please tell me it’s not just me.
We bought a house. We sold a house. We ended our lease on a place we’d lived in longer than we’d ever lived anywhere. I got a job. I completed a Cert IV in Real Estate Practice. I commuted three hours a day for a month. We packed. We moved. We unpacked*.
Change of job – in a whole new field (so much to learn).
Change of house – no stairs, a garden, loads more room (so much to arrange*).
Change of location – out of the city (so many places to explore).
Change of friendship group – no more U3A photography group, no more U3A reading group, no more baby cuddling, no more oldies at Tech Tip Tuesday (yet to be replaced).
Lots of change.
Lots of stress.
And then you search for something and find something else instead, and the something else you find is so interesting you sit on the bed in the spare room and read it and your mind goes back all those years and you understand afresh that it’s just a new job (and a new house, and a new location) and you’ve done it all before.
I know the year can now no longer be considered new, but as this is my first blog post for 2020, I thought I might be able to get away with calling it new.
January in Australia wasn’t great … and for many people it’s still not great. The media spotlight has moved on, but that doesn’t mean those impacted by bushfires have had an end to their misery. There is still much work to be done in many communities to rebuild and rehouse and rethink decisions about how to live. And that goes for all of us, not only those directly impacted by the fires.
It felt like the longest month – January – and now I imagine the rest of the year will zip along speedily and we’ll be saying ‘Christmas carols already? How can that be?’. That’ll be April with the way things seem to go in the retail world!
But I digress.
A brave new year.
I stumbled across this (I don’t even know what it’s called – poster, meme, soundless soundbite, bit of fluff from the internet …?) a little while ago and it spoke to me. Loudly.
I desperately wanted this to be my year. I didn’t want another year like last year where it started poorly and didn’t seem to get better. The year ended, for me, with a trip to Caboolture hospital in mid-December after fainting for no reason, hitting my head on the table as I tipped off my chair, ending in an untidy heap under the table. I felt for Hunter, one of my grandsons who’d come to spend some time with us before we headed home. A fainting grandmother is not something any 10-year old needs to see.
A CT scan revealed a tonsular herniation and a brain scan when I came home revealed it was within normal limits. But that was no reason for fainting. Apparently, I just did. And apparently that’s of some concern.
I also had what will now be an annual mammogram and ultrasound and received the all clear. Yay! Things were finally looking up.
Christmas was spent in Sydney with good friends, Mum and Tim, and a few days after returning home we had the delight of having two of our grandsons come to stay for five days. Toi is 6 and Korbin is 4 and both were an absolute joy. I took an extra week off work and it was a wonderful additional break.
Then back to work … and somewhere along the way I read the words above and thought to myself “yes, I do want this to be my year”.
I determined to say yes to things, to do things I might ordinarily be cautious about doing, weighing up the risks and benefits and deciding that it was too outside my comfort zone or too expensive or of little pratical value.
And so to being brave and doing things that challenge me.
Last year sometime, I read a journal article in which the author mentioned The College of Extraordinary Experiences. I was so intrigued I looked it up. It’s a conference that happens once a year in a 13th century castle in Poland. Five days with around 80-100 people from across the globe, all from different walks of life, all learning about and engaging in designing experiences of one sort or another. Unlike a regular conference, this was one you had to apply for.
I didn’t do anything about it for months.
And then I thought ‘why not? If other people have a shot at attending, why not me? I can learn as well as anyone and even if it’s uncomfortable sometimes, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.’
I applied.
I had an interview.
I was accepted.
You cannot imagine how excited I was.
But then I had to see if the university would support me in attending something that is far outside the bounds of a regular conference and would have no easily communicable benefit.
I put in a proposal in which I outlined as many benefits as I could bring to mind.
I waited.
And waited.
Late last year we were having lunch with Alison in North Melbourne. A very cool little car pulled up out the front of the cafe and I instantly admired it. We went to a car yard and sat in one and kicked the tyres. We talked about why we might buy a second car but none of the arguments were compelling enough to convince me. We didn’t do anything about it.
But then Tim said something that provoked me to think differently. He does that a lot.
And so I bought a car.
Well, not bought, but leased.
Not the kind of car I had originally admired outside the cafe, but one that had a much better safety rating and more of the features I was used to.
My new Mini Cooper
Two years ago, Tim (husband) gifted me a photography workshop in Sydney with two fabulous photographers. I learnt a lot and it changed the direction of my photography from that weekend on.
Last week, Tim (one of the photographers who facilitated the workshop), wrote to me saying that he’d watched my progress with interest over the intervening two years. He then invited me to a 5-day photography retreat in New Zealand in late April. Ordinarily I wouldn’t have even responded, but the words ‘be brave’ were still thumping around in my head, and so I said ‘yes, I’d love to attend’. And so I’m heading to NZ in late April to learn more about photography from two very experienced photographers. I know it’ll be a challenging five days, but one that’ll be filled with learning and opportunities to develop my photography skills some more.
I am getting off the couch.
I decided I needed to move more, regain some fitness, lose some weight, get stronger and so I signed up for a weekly Friday morning physio rehab session. Rob, my physio, said it would be challenging.
I went to the first one last Friday. It was challenging, but I’m already beginning to feel better.
I asked Tom, my trainer, if we can get back to doing deadlifts – something I’d had to stop last year when I was told to do gentle exercises only. Deadlifts are not a gentle exercise. I deadlifted 45kgs on Monday and am keen to become strong enough to lift my body weight. Of course, that’ll be easier if I weigh less!
My manager called late on Monday afternoon.
She’s accepted my proposal and so I’m off to Poland in September to participate in The College of Extraordinary Experiences.
I am beyond excited.
…
I’m not sitting on the couch. I’m not waiting for things to happen. I’m making them happen. I’m saying yes more. I’m more positive. I’m extremely grateful that I have opportunities and the means to make the most of them. I’m making changes.
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.
Musings from the cold 