Category: Archive

January 2024: simple pleasures

Summer in Kosciuszko National Park

Up at the lodge we sit amongst the clouds all day. Lonely crows caw, dishes clink in the kitchen, tea and warm muffins fill the air, while adults and children, previously strangers, become friends over board games. On such a cold, wet, white day, excitement must still be had and so, false tensions are created in order that release may be found in groans and laughter as new games are learned and old favourites are shared.

Continue reading January 2024: simple pleasures

February 2024: summertime

A photo installation down town which celebrates local women in agriculture. This photo features June, a dear parishioner of ours and an expert wool classer

Beautiful, beautiful fresh summer air pours through the open door.

Smokey scents drift through the open window late in the evening. It’s way too early for home fireplaces, perhaps it’s a grass fire following a lightening strike somewhere out of town?

Continue reading February 2024: summertime

December 2023: The wheels are falling off

Cute and wonky playgroup craft

I used to come home from work and water my vege patch and lament the miseries of the world. Now, my self-care activity of choice appears to be cleaning. Today I vacuumed under the lounge-room rug for the first time in a long while. B helped me return the heavy lounge chairs to their places and then I plonked down on one to rest and listen to the rain. It was only then that I noticed that the rug was placed too far in front of the tv cabinet making the room look and feel lopsided. We didn’t bother moving it. Such a tiresome activity will have to wait until the new year.

11 year old boys are weird creatures.

Last night I woke suddenly at 2am feeling as though I couldn’t breathe – our bedroom was a stifling oven. I padded around, opening windows and doors, turned on our noisy evaporative cooler and eventually the house began to cool and I could sleep again.

After days and days and days – maybe ten in all, I wasn’t exactly counting – of 35, 38, 40, 42 degree baking hot days we finally got some more rain to break the tension. It arrived with a hush, then it hummed for over two hours until the air became deliciously cool and sweet.

One of my clients, a student in Year 4, wailed – I don’t know whether to do what’s right by her [a friend]” as she gestured emphatically to her right side, “or to do what’s right by me”, throwing her hands to her left side. Gee, at 10 years old I could have done with the power of that depth of reflection!

Master J called out to his big sister as she left the house to walk to a local cafe and meet her friend for her first ever “coffee” catch up in town – “E’s a cardboard monkey!”. She didn’t even turn around!

This morning I have dropped sewing pins twice, half a packet of muslei and a full basket of washing pegs, all in the space of a few hours. I don’t quite feel it, but perhaps I’m tired.

We are like flowers in a field. We are vulnerable, temporary, transient. But, we are flowers. And we are loved. That’s what I’m contemplating as this year draws to a close.

“As a father has compassion on his children,

so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him;

for he knows how we are formed,

he remembers that we are dust.

The life of mortals is like grass,

they flourish like a flower of the field;

the wind blows over it and it is gone,

and its place remembers it no more.

But from everlasting to everlasting

the Lord’s love is with those who fear him,

and his righteousness with their children’s children”

Psalm 103

November 2023: Joy

Indoor landmines

I got caught in a sun shower this evening during my after dinner stroll. It had been raining just moments earlier and yes, I did indeed note the dark clouds and thunder about but when I stepped out our front door the sun was shining brightly and I gambled (as I always do) that the rain had passed (I am ever the eternal optimist). About halfway along my walk, as I rounded the corner on the Hill, that part where you get the best view of the farmland on the eastern edge of town, it became clear that the rain definitely had not passed and a long sparse sun shower commenced. Sparse because fat drops fell for fewer than five minutes, in full sun. And yet, this was enough rain to send rippled streams down the bitumen on the other side of the hill, streams which joined together to form rushing rivers in the gutters. Gardeners, like me, breathed a sigh of relief as those fat drops fell. I imagined, however, that farmers who are currently harvesting, did not.

The boys have given themselves new nicknames: Germs and Midge (short for midget). And one for their sister too: Bookworm. Hurrah for the Adventures of Bookworm, Germs and Midge!

It was even, but now we have the same amount! Master E declares at the end of a game of ‘chess’.

This afternoon, Master J mowed the church yard lawn. It was so satisfying, Mum! Twenty-five kilos of fertiliser, a few showers of rain and some summer sun had created a deep, lush grass unlike anything he had seen in a long while.

Later, when the shadows were deep under the jacaranda tree and the sun was throwing its golden light on the red bricks of our bohemoth church buildings, Master J grabbed his skateboard (a cheap one from Big W) and cruised around the concrete path that encloses the church hall, earbuds in, Harry Potter audiobook on. It was his first ride on a skateboard. He glided and turned, sometimes smoothly, sometimes awkwardly, testing his abilities -what if I lean like this? what if I bend my knees like that? – figuring it all out. He’s a quiet kid, for the most part, but since turning eleven, since trying out for school captain, since having a pool party at our local with his school friends, he seems more comfortable and happy in his own skin.

At 7:30am in Coles all is very quiet and peaceful and people look each other in the eyes, smile and greet each other hello.

Patrick and Ruby play dragons all the time, and I love it! Says Master E as he chats enthusiastically about all his preschool friends.

The agapanthus, weed though they may be in some situations, are luminescent in the moonlight; their pretty lilac globes glow like hope in the night.

Wild weather and midlife: October 2023

After 18 years of being together, I think we might have finally arrived at the ‘yes, dear’ stage. Not the eye-roll or gritted teeth ‘yes, dear’, not exactly. More like the “yes dear, I know you think it’s more efficient to fold the washing straight off the line but I don’t think it saves any time at all because you’re trying to fold and sort mid-air but I’ll do it your way because you like doing it that way and I love you”. It’s a kind ‘yes dear’, it’s happy resignation based on trust (although it may sometimes still involve a tiny bit of an eye-roll. Just a tiny bit.)

Continue reading Wild weather and midlife: October 2023

“The job that you’re doing now”: July 2023

Master E and I were talking during breakfast and he mentioned something about my job. I assumed that he was referring to my recent return to work in a school but he corrected me – “No Mum, the job that you’re doing now”.

Continue reading “The job that you’re doing now”: July 2023

a lot of things happened: May 2023

Jane Champion believes that creativity is shy, that “inspiration only visits relaxed places”, so she puts a great deal of effort into creating such worlds. SMH, Good Weekend.

“I put my big girl undies on”. Gosh, I’m hearing that phrase more and more these days from women who are my age. Does it mean that we aren’t allowed to be frail or fragile or scared anymore? We just have to be brave and stoic and stuff our feelings down all the time in order to, what? To appear competent? Together? Capable? Mature? More like a man? Are women being taught, by each other, just like little boys used to be, that big girls don’t cry?

Master J is away on school camp. We’ve all noticed that it’s way too quiet.

On my evening walk I passed by the row of sweet scented pine trees, high branches laden with thick set cones. I stood on tippy toes to reach them. They were fairly firmly attached and I had to twist them a few times before they reluctantly gave way, their spiralled scales pressing into my soft hands, reviving my nervous system in an instant. It was so nice to hold them, to feel their simple, solid weight that I didn’t want to let them go.

Everything’s not lost, Cold Play. That sliding bass line. Sublime.

Adding a nine chord or a sus9 chord creates “a little bit of dissonance, adding a richness to the sound of a chord” – Strong Songs Podcast. Is this also true of people groups? Families? Churches? Rewatched Pitch Perfect recently and the use of conflict to create change and eventual success is kind of fascinating. Is the discordant discomfort of change the only path to success sometimes? Why do we fear and avoid it so much?

Made Tomato and Canellini Bean Soup tonight. All feels right in the world while I’m peeling onions. I am quite mesmerised by the thick, smooth, veined skins piling up in waxy, golden swirls beside the chopping board. Yes, all feels well.

Such a lot of things have happened, all at once, while B was away again for work. Was nearly hit by a garbage truck while driving home from preschool drop off, the internet crashed and the printer fell offline at the same time on the exact same day that I needed to print and sign by hand a document that needed to be sent that very day or I would not be able to start back at my new job in just two weeks time, the washing machine filter got clogged with chocolate wrappers and hair ties and the dryer decided not to work until I replaced the handle (thankyou you tube). Not great timing in a week of rain. Oh, and, I backed into a parked car in a car park (with Miss E and two of her friends in the car). This was surprisingly unsettling. I’ve not backed into anything since I was on my red P’s and I backed into a parking sign.

A friend kindly tells me that once, when she was very tired, she ran into the back of a school bus. That helped.

The best room in this house is the study. Its large window overlooks the satisfying silhouette of the old church hall. In winter, the sun snugly moves up and over this mass of red bricks in a perfect arch, throwing warm rays into the room all day long.

Car karma. Someone backs into our Landcruiser while we are stationary in the Aldi carpark.