Well, yes and no. Yes, we made the move
safely, all our possessions and ourselves intact. And here we are, close to our two oldest daughters and their families, ensconced in a rented cottage while across two paddocks our new house
takes shape. So no, we don’t want to return.
We arrived to fanfare, goodie baskets and a welcoming committee.
The last couple of weeks back there and the first
couple of weeks here were hard. I felt bruised. There was the physical work
involved in sorting and packing all our possessions and then at the other end unpacking
what we thought we’d need for the next twelve months, and storing the rest. But mostly it was the emotional work of closing a chapter in our lives. We’d been
in Tasmania for over two decades!
I spent hours, while I should have been
wrapping things in butchers paper, reading over my old journals. I burnt
a lot of them. Right now I don’t completely understand why I did that and
whether I’m going to be sorry later. It’s just that there were dozens, and they were full of whingeing about long-resolved problems. It seemed like
I didn’t even know who that person was any more. I thought if I died (and this
move felt like it might just kill me) then I didn’t want to subject anyone else
to having to read that stuff. And those books took up so much room. Anyway,
there are still a couple of boxes worth to go into my new study, and I'm constantly filling up new ones. It's a habit - or perhaps an addiction.
And now we love it here.
We’re here to cheer up and to cheer on, to help and to be helped, and to enjoy our daughters and their families. We are around to celebrate the small achievements and the huge ones, to bear witness to milestones. We're close to good coffee and a great community, and I'm near enough to my dad to be able to see him regularly.
It's been especially amazing to be part of the excitement of the launch of Vantastic, Kate's wonderful book.
How lucky are we? Don't answer that; I know the answer already. Very lucky indeed!
