Quitting everyday fun

  This comment on a sort of unrelated post on the Camp Creek blog got me thinking recently-

It's a sad comment on our times that we trust our own feelings about things so little. Almost by definition, anything people, especially kids, like a lot is suspect. I had a colleague a while back who kept giving things up because he thought he was addicted to them. His evidence? He wanted more of them. It wasn't a mindset that allowed for the simple fact of pleasure--the notion that it is natural to want to do things you like.

  I could be defined as just such a killjoy, I suppose. I’ve stopped drinking alcohol, don’t have a TV and choose not to have the internet connected in my house. I’m currently even quitting my tea drinking habit. All of this has been because i’ve been ‘addicted’ to each of them in some way-and yes, derived pleasure from them.

  However, the pleasure of each wasn’t real pleasure, hence the quitting. I adore sewing and reading, and have no intention of ever giving either up. But the internet, with its time-sucking, surreal world-yes, I needed to stop that, as much as I mostly enjoyed it. It interfered too much with my real life, and therefore was detrimental to happiness overall. I don’t like anything having a hold over me, and affecting my moods, hence calling a halt to the tea (caffeine and sugar) and alcohol. TV is just crap (and I had to de-zombie the husband, he freely admits that).

  But whereas quitting something universally accepted to be bad, such as heroin, is seen only a good thing, quitting the above is seen as……well, a bit silly. And obviously the work of a boring person. TV, internet, alcohol and tea drinking are completely accepted, to the point where it is socially acceptable (and normal) to spend all your waking hours doing something involving at least one of the above. And for people who do spend all their time involved in them, it is a completely foreign concept to quit. QUIT? But then how would I remain socially connected, if I didn’t have constant Facebook/email connection? How would I relax and have fun without alcohol? AND HOW WOULD I KEEP UP WITH MASTERCHEF?

  It is somewhat socially exclusive-both the husband and I have been out and had absolutely nothing to contribute to the conversation, because it’s all been about TV and movies. Non-drinking is acceptable for a woman, but an Australian man? Freak!

  Ah well-I feel much, much better without any of my addictions, whether others understand them as that or not. And maybe I should just use the husbands response to peoples incredulous questions of just what exactly he does with his time……

  “Have LOTS of sex” (snort!)

House time

  After over seven months of living in a tent, with small stretches gatecrashing other people’s houses, we are in our own (rented) house. It is totally awesome. Lights! Hot running water! Protection from the wind and rain and sun! And we haven’t even got any stuff in here yet-but handwashing inside in a laundry tub is so infinitely easier than outside in a plastic container.

  We saw lots of stuff-some of it was awesome, some a let-down, some surprising. We drove over 35,000kms, well and truly destroying any benefit of our six months of car-free living. We met many people, some of whom have hung around as long-term friends. Two tents were destroyed by overuse, and I don’t think I ever want to camp again. I was well and truly over it before we stopped, and it will take a while to lose that attitude.

  Right now I am being Housewife of the Year-keeping the house spotless, cooking endlessly, and helping the kids adjust to normal life again, and life without their much-adored daddy around full time. Travelling was both good and bad for them, and we’re working on the bad (like table manners, which disappeared somewhere around Alice Springs). I’m also enjoying our own company-travelling means you’re thrown into close proximity with many people all day, every day, and live your life observed by many. As a fairly independent, reclusive person this has been hard to deal with, and i’m revelling in privacy. I imagine my domestic goddess stage will last until our stuff gets here and I unpack my sewing gear, which i’m dying to use. Then the children and house can return to their normal state of benign neglect.

  I am now a South Australian, which i’m lukewarm about. The state itself is fantastic in terms of environmental measures, small farming and education, but the weather is shit. I believe those two are correlated, in that the worse the weather the more the government has to provide incentives to live there (look at Queensland-fantastic weather, shit everything else). The Husband is beginning a new career, here is the best place to do that, so for now i’m wearing my winter woolies in February and wondering exactly how much clothing i’ll need in July………….

  And that’s about as much introspection as you’ll get from me right now-another week of sleep top-up and I should be back to full speed.

Homeless and wandering

  So. We took off for our 'holiday', planning to move back to our property and put a huge effort into selling it, while doing some travelling and searching out a new place to live. Then, it sold. And threw us out completely. Since buying our car less than six weeks ago we've driven over 6000kms-back up to the property, finishing up there, back to Melbourne via northern NSW and everything in between. There's been two deaths in our extended family, a Melbourne job offer we've agonised over and just rejected, and lots more in between. We are tired. And it's looking like we're about to go off and do the travelling without the benefit of a house to go back to and recoup, or half of our camping gear or our roofracks-they're in storage.

But, it's all in the attitude. We have the opportunity to find somewhere where we really fit in, where we're not the oddities of the area. Just being in places where there's been vegetarian take-away and dreadlocks has been exhilarating-look! They're like us! Handmade markets that actually have inventive handmade stuff, gorgeous beaches and bush and creeks to swim in are all out there-time to learn how to holiday and actually enjoy some of it, instead of driving through to the next destination.

If you have any recommendations of beautiful places to go along the east coast, bring them on!

Homeschool snapshot-codes and mysteries

  Cracking the code in Graham Base’s Enigma.

Catapulting ourselves back into impulsiveness

  We used to be cool. Cool as in, waking up on a perfectly normal day and deciding it was time for a holiday. Throwing camping gear, and kids, and clothes into the car and being on our way by 10am. (Deciding to move back to Melbourne from Cairns, and packing the house, putting it on the market and being gone in 36 hours was the pinnacle of impulsiveness. And a major fuck-up-we were back six months later, minus our gorgeous Queenslander, which predictably sold immediately).

  Over the last few years we’ve become boring. More than boring-beige. A combination of an unreliable car, five rather young children and debt on two properties stopped us doing much that could be called exciting. We have been stagnating in a pool of boringness, and it’s showing. Neither of us are much suited for a predictable life, and when the biggest decision of the day is what to have for dinner………well, lets just say I don’t cope very well with that. Obsessive working works well to a point, but I have to snap sometimes.

  Result-notice given to move out, moving truck booked to dump our stuff at the property, bus booked to Brisbane, plane booked to Melbourne. Not bad for an afternoons work. We have less than a fortnight to pack everything we own, get it on and off a hire truck, clean this place and be gone. It’s at least five times longer than we’ve had any other time, so it should be a breeze.

  And I already feel as though I can breathe again.

Homeschool snapshot-embroidery

Thanks to a lovely friend dropping off a stitch book and a whole container of threads!

Bathtub gardens update

As promised, a picture of a bathtub garden actually growing stuff.

This one contains a yacon, also known as a peruvian ground apple, sweet fruit root or jicama (but not to be confused with the yam bean jicama-these foreign crops get so confusing!) Also, it contains five garlics, two Darwin lettuces and a pak choi. All are growing well with complete ignorance from me-thinking of that, i’ll give it a dose of worm wee tomorrow.

  The watering pipes are also proving to be excellent habitat for frogs, we have tree frogs living in each one. We’ve also discovered another bonus-the winter sun on the metal in the early morning ensures the soil is always significantly warmer than the ground. Currently they’re growing much better than the ground beds, probably also related to the fact that our backyard is somewhat boggy and the wetter than usual autumn means it’s just not drying out.