The plant, a yellow clivia, is an unexpected gift. I placed it in the foyer of my home. I wanted it to be the last thing I see when I leave and the first thing that greeted me on my return home. It brings sunlight into my day.
I have always loved brass and copper pot plant holders. I have run out of space in my home to show case them, so I have to stop buying them. Brass reminds me of my childhood.
The brass buttons on waiters’ clothing at our local military club, the local watering hole for the Army folks and their guests, is a fond memory.
I remember women placing brass containers on their head and carrying water home in those areas that had communal water sharing facilities. How heavy that would have been and yet they walked with poise!
The brass scoop that we used to pour water into our glasses was kept spanking clean by cook. In those days brass was kept shining by rubbing vigorously with ash from coal fire.
Yellow is synonymous with welcome, with sunlight, with warmth, with gold.
One of the sayings I love is “Silence is not always golden, it is sometimes yellow”.
May the sun shine on your day in many forms, as it did mine, today.
It is an untidy, straggly looking shrub/tree that is draped elegantly with tassles of pink and one of my favourite native flora. On a cold morning in Collie, Western Australia, the sun broke through the fog and I made a beeline for these beauties that were in someone’s garden. They are exquisite in detail and burst with colour from a tight pod. What’s not to love about them?
I’ve returned home after a few days in the South West. No trip, of course, is complete until I visit the Bunbury wetlands if I’m in the town and I never tire of my experiences there.
One evening work finished a bit earlier than planned and I rushed to the wetlands with my camera just before dusk. I was alone there. Well, not quite. The air it would seem was alive with birds but I couldn’t see them. The tiny silver eye were there in flocks. My prayer each time I’m out with my camera is a simple one. “Show me something beautiful so I can share it with others”. I was not prepared for what was to follow …
I heard them before I saw them. The clickety clack of a bike on the wooden bridge alerted me someone was approaching. I stood behind a shrub and observed, friend or foe, the area being lonely before dusk. She was a young mother, slender as a reed, she parked her bike and lifted her blond haired boy from the seat to the ground. They came around the corner and saw me. They were as surprised to see someone there as I was. We made polite conversation, she being from further south and I, from the city, north of Bunbury. Knee high to me, he was silent as mother and I pointed to the invisible birds to share our delight with him. In a random moment, I got one photograph. “Ohh! look!” I exclaimed and shared with his mother. As we laughed at my fluke shot I remembered him at my knee. Silent and barefooted, his tiny pink toes, gripping the grey footpath, he waited patiently as adults talked and laughed above his head. His patience more impressive as he is not yet two. I bent down and showed him the photograph. His face lit up. He smiled. His chocolate brown eyes shone like stars. As I drew myself to stand up, he made eye contact with me and said, “More”.
I went back to my hotel knowing, prayers do get answered, so I share this story with you.
Life has resumed, as I knew it once, or almost as. And if the social and travel restrictions have had an impact on me, it has only intensified my desire to travel and work. But there has been a shift.
As a child, as young as six, I knew I wanted to break free of cultural expectations imposed on me. I wanted that open road ahead of me where I made my own choices. That feeling is still fresh and alive. But it came at a cost. As I filled in my life with work and my own choices, it left little space for meaningful relationships. I regarded them as a roadblock to where I wanted to be, of course, despite the destination being unknown.
For nearly seven years I have lived out of a suitcase because of frequent travel and returning to a house that has been under constant renovation. Now I can see the end in sight. I have many people who have contributed to this and in many ways have rescued me from myself on some level. My lovely old builder who had my house keys for years and worked to my schedule and budget with utmost patience. The handyman who refuses to accept his fee whenever he visits and gives me a generous discount despite my protests. Oh! how he loves to tell me about his life and give me tips on Italian recipes and, being a former butcher, the best cuts of meat to buy! Then there’s the painter with the most amazing eye for detail and a passion for golf. Last week he left a speck of blood near the ceiling (some 15 ft high) but was determined to fix it. With the scaffolding gone, he left me holding the ladder while he hyperventilated his way to the top! Now the internal painting is nearly completed and the house indoors is taking shape. To live comfortably, I am culling ruthlessly. Keeping stuff for sentimental reasons is perhaps a developmental phase. We reach a certain point in our lives when discarding is healthy. With fewer memories to hoard, I find myself creating new spaces to live in. Life, not space, has become a sanctuary.
To have someone enter my chosen lifestyle not to take up space, but to create space for me, is a sense of elation I have not experienced in years. This morning I woke to a darkened home. Outside there was a patch of moonshine highlighting the beginnings of the ‘writing space’. A gift I will treasure because the creativity and thought that went into this. Labelling that area of the garden as my ‘writing space’ and creating it with that purpose in mind is perceptive and thoughtful. The ‘creator’ would have known I am not someone who relaxes with a magazine. I sit and write.
That open road now has a destination. I will no longer return to my house after each trip. I will return home.
May you find your journey today leads to your home of choice.
There is something magical that happens when a new relationship begins. Each moment is treasured, reflected on, stored in memory, much like those moments in nature when time stands still, and forces you to do so too.
Last night I slept where you had been the sheets still warm from memories when you were gone, I woke to the darkness of dawn silent with shadows but filled with birdsong so I snuggled in deeper, with the memories of where you had once been.
The sunrise is silent caught unawares my thoughts in flight I flick the switch and watch the silibant steam motionless in bare feet immersed in sunmoon light the day is no different than the ones before but I am richer with his arms around me I hear his whisper come closer, you belong here.
At that fluid edge I collect pieces chips, fragments, remnants insert randomly create storm cloud pathways a mosiac, familiar to me The way forward is the way back diverting, mending unpicking threads of thoughts that bind tightly loosening, discarding letting go, letting in forging the path ahead where I want to be with clarity.
It’s been a month of firsts. The first time of staying home for weeks on end and self imposed isolation, so the thrill of gaining essential worker status was genuine. I was needed in the Midwest and my ‘pass’ to move between restricted regions due to the COVID 19 lockdown meant I could travel again.
With limited flights I had to drive over 400 kms to Geraldton. I thoroughly enjoyed the drive with loud playlist for company. When stopped by the cops at checkpoint their laughter was genuine when I beamed and said I was travelling for work.
As we had to travel further north we had to fly in a smallchartered plane. I was with two other colleagues and I was dreading it, but it turned out to be one of the best flights I have ever been on.
The first sight of Carnarvon is always wonderful. I never miss a chance to drive from town to Pelican Point. The sand dunes here are beautiful. River gums trees are now synonymous with Carnarvon. I love the textured trunk and colours of the bark.We drove past wonderful landscaped agricultural fields, just waiting to be seeded.Our early morning starts were spectacular. Coffee, good company, laughter and an eagerness to get back to work, the perfect elixir.Oh! those wide open spaces!And the threat of the worst storm Western Australia experienced in a decade loomed. The dust from the fields added to the ambience when the storm hit. I was without power for ten hours in the hotel room. So I watched nature unleash fury. Oddly enough, it made me calmer.No trip to Geraldton is complete without a stop at St Georges Beach at Champion Bay. I also spent some time in Northampton, an old agricultural town.I love these old buildings.One of my colleagues grew up here and I had to laugh when she told me behind this building is Lavender Lane. Apparently every old town had a Lavender Lane. It is a euphemism as the lane was intended for the cart to come and collect the waste from outdoor toilets, before the days of modern toilets.I drove under the arc of rainbows several times.And found them in my suburb too on my return home.But the most beautiful rainbow was the one over my home, and the rainbeau I found at the foot of my driveway. As they say, when you are least expecting it, ‘it’ happens.
With autumn behind, all I can say is, move over winter … I’m ready for spring.
I wandered around the garden found his footsteps where he had stopped, and looked back thoughtfully wondering would I like a flowering shrub, or a shady tree when the last autumn leaf floated free like me, at his feet and I know he would have smiled at the memory as do I in the garden, he is creating for me.
A Shared Space 
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