sometimes when this place gets kind of empty

Looking back, it's been coming for a while but tonight, with New Order bobbing up on the shuffle, a view of our kitchen in front of me (dishes washed, Steph's painting on the bench) I realise that I've got life worked out. Ba bing.

And do you know, with that, everything has slotted into its place.

It's as if, by understanding my own vantage point, all worries, all concerns, have hoisted their own little white flags.

It feels a bit weird right now, but as I said, I think it's been coming for a while.

The top of my head has flipped open like on that old ad for a toothbrush.

Going. Going.

I'm left with the core.

That's all I need. I'm ready now. I feel ready. More ready that ever, to be truthful.

Crikey.

I feel clean and confident and natural and if I was to liken this feeling to an image that image would be of the (southern) night sky. Not so much an image, but the feeling of being underneath it it in the bush or in the desert country. Open. Without limit. Forever.

Noise is something I've just learned to actively avoid. This is helping. Noise as in extraneous, irrelevant, meaningless facts, information, statistics, etc. By golly this type of noise is pervasive. This very writing is now part of the Earth's noise. Time taken reading and writing is time we are not thinking. Unless we are, I guess.

Is there a struggle taking place? It would appear so. I buy the Saturday paper here and read it over the rest of the week. News of the city is mostly grim. News of the world is mostly grim. Is this what “sells papers”? Do journos and editors set the agenda or do they follow the lead of their marketing department?

But everywhere noise. Junk mail. Junk telephone calls. Junk email. Stereo aural assualt even while sitting at the Test cricket. Advertising bombardments. Absence of time to ponder. Time to think. Do we think?

The Noise and the struggle are linked, I think. Noise, a useless clamour for our attention. Buy 2 get one free. 100 free SMS. New facebook layout. Amex membership rewards. Peter Costello. Credit card payments now by SMS. Now online. Recharge using this card get 75 hamburger vouchers. Sale This Week Only. Inside 50s. Online friends. Clangers. Germ free. Write something about yourself. Make $50-$100/ hour. Easy currency trading. Jacko's brother asked out that girl from video easy. Free trip competition. Wash the bathroom floor. 6 months interest free. The clamour. The clamour. Our attention. Our limited and very sacred attention.

I'm turning the Noise off.

Off.

Footy is a case in point. The overwheling media fixation and (consequent?) population fixation on an imperfect, physically arduous, tedious brand of provincial football growing each year. Now players of that sport are treated by media and betting agencies alike with a significance rivalling and in some cases even outstripping their own (employer!) clubs. Made a bet on the Brownlow voting yet? Filled in your Super Coach team? How many points is he worth per match? Sum the points, watch the rookie, loose ball gets? Someone turn off the Noise.

But hey, I like the game. Love the game. Just take me away from the 7-day-a-week media circus & the audio visual assault at each match. Leave it as a game. (must be local footy, I reckon).

Noise. The Dalai Lama has been in exile for 50 years from his home in Tibet. Global village -style noise. Keeping up with the shared experience of the global Joneses. Posh & becks -style. Liverpool, manchester Utd -style. Do we need it? Do we need it?

Could drop into conversation with anyone on earth – howabout that Obama? Howabout that Fritzl? Howabout that Pakistan?

So i'm learning that a noiseless life is a thinking life and a reflecting life.

Quiet.

Struggle.

Quite a struggle.

You say you want a revolution.

Doorways to the past have opened in the past week. A message from a former Year 8 student that had me laughing out loud. A dear friend not heard from in five years appearing at the door, partner, daughter, staying & playing & eating & bathing together. It's a wonder.

Life is beautiful.

Opening some books.

Talking.

Listening.

Thinking.

That's it.

That's me for now.

I've had a birthday just now yet i feeling younger than before. The sky is open.

put me in a cage full of lions, i'll learn to speak lion

G'day from our rattletrap house,

Have you read any good books lately?Any books at all? Books and reading have made a triumphant & appreciated return to my life in the past few months. Roddy Doyle's "The Van", his "The Woman who Walked into Doors," Christos Tsiolkas' "The Slap," Robert Drewe's "Our Sunshine," and this morning I'm into Richard Ford's "Independence Day."

I've been alongside a couple of Dubiner's setting up a chipper van outside a pub. I've been witness to horrible physical abuse. I've pondered life from the perspectives of a teenage girl, a septuagenarian Greek man and egotistical men suffering mid-life crises. I've ridden with a widow's son outlawed whose requests Must Be Obeyed.

And it's been grand.

The pace of life has slowed here in the past months. Maybe this is due to my new job – I'm certainly not bringing any work home any more. We all feel that like a cold change across the bay on a day of stifling heat. And I'm attending a workplace only 3 days each week; giving me the rare gift of being at work more than I'm not (3 outta 5 days) while also being at home more than I'm not (4 outta 7 days). Presto! What a trick!

Breathing space is noticeable around our place. Unexpected contacts & visits! from long-ago friends have burnt a warm & welcome dizziness. Special to think & to remember & to share. To clap eyes on & embrace & embrace the history & the shared experiences worth more than you can say.

Breathing space.

Running. Running for the sake of running has always perplexed me. Laps of the oval? Something for the greyhounds, mate. But this week I've gone 25km (total) in four runs & am feeling really good for it – if a bit tight around the calves. It's a kind of tiredness that I'd forgotten about. That tiredness that says "yep, you've done a physically tough thing today."

Breathing space.

Stephanie turned 3 in October. Family lunch at our place. She is full of questions and full of opinions. She reasons and rationalises and explains. She remembers. Her standard position is the contrary one. "Steph, would you like the blue or the red bowl?" "No, the yellow bowl." She reads (memorises) her books with an uncannily accurate and fast ability. And she will then sit with Kyla and read them to her. Stephanie loves jig-saw puzzles. And she will help Kyla with puzzles, too. On Wednesday Stephanie drew a picture and wrote the letter M at the top, saying "This is M for Mummy and I'm going to give this picture to her." She takes herself to the toilet now – calling for help when a bum wipe is required. She has started riding her bike (birthday present – with training wheels). She regularly rides to the park now ("Dad, you and Kyla can walk behind me.")

Stephanie knows and remembers. She places people and events better than anyone I know. Meeting up with friends last week she stood in the centre of the gathering & gave a rollcall of attendees, matching couples together as "best friends" ("There's Jack. And over there is Amy. Jack and Amy are best friends.") She can recall events and places of a similar gathering months ago. I find it extraordinary.

Stephanie runs and jumps and slides and does it all with a fair bit of caution. When meeting someone new or going to a new place, Stephanie's retreat for comfort manifests in a kind of baby language – she mimics Kyla's language. For a while that confused us, even annoyed us a bit, but we realised it's just her security net and that she soon warms out of it. She relates to other people well, I think, after the initial feeling-out period. We are fortunate to have close contact with friends and their kids. Fortunate to watch skills learnt from 4-year-olds put straight into practice (You mean I can walk up a slide backwards? Why didn't anybody say so?)

Kyla is about 20 months old now. She is a funny girl who has a sneaky and crafty way of giving you a side-ways glance before making a joke. She is energetic and bold. She is a cuddly huggy girl who loves contact. Kyla slides and runs and screams and pushes trolleys and trains and prams around and around our rattletrap house. Her language is incredible ("Dad, Stephanie has enormous cup, doesn't she Dad? E-nor-mous!") I'm certain that she enjoys the benefit of an older sibling to play with & learn from. Though they have their disagreements (Me: "Steph, Kyla can use those bells in two minutes when you have finished." Steph: "No, she certainly can NOT"), the constant policing of a few months ago has ceased. Squabbles occur less frequently now. Maybe Kyla's language has developed enough to enable clearer communication. Who knows?

Kyla tries things. Climbs. Picks herself straight up when she invariably falls. Stands on top of the tricycle seat and throws her head back, arms out wide. Grins. Trying to placate her writhing wriggling squirminess is like trying to harness a fiery young filly.

Days at home are wonderful. There was a time when the prospect of spending a day at home caused anxiety to rise like a water spout. Nowadays anxiety has dropped to virtually nil.

Other happenings?

With Justine's help (thanks Juz!) CJ has introduced a Sunday night Muppets night at our place. After a bath we all catch an episode of the Muppets on DVD. What a treat.

And CJ & I got away for 2 nights recently – without the kids. Shock! They had a holiday (and a terrific time) at Grandma & Grandpa's house. We had a holiday (and a terrific time) at Airey's Inlet with mates. Extremely restful in a way we haven't really known in years. Talking about it, we reckon that rest came with the complete absence of decisions to be made. Instead we could just BE. We've got a family holiday lined up soon. Looking forward to it very much.

All is well at our place. Hectic activity & uncontrollable screaming spins out-of-control a couple of times a day but this is the natural order of things & something to be cherished. The kids begin their first experience of childcare (1 day/week) in a fortnight from now. No doubt there will be tremors. And so life continues to be entirely about our relationships with other people. Go well.

don't call me baby; don't talk in maybes

It's grand final week and it's school holidays and it's spring and the clematis is roaring up the sideway treliss and every single one of the many callistemon plants around these parts is thriving and is there a more beautiful sound than the magpie in song? I've taught my last class for the forseeable future. Goodbyes at my workplace difficult; more difficult than I'd really gathered. Difficult for the same reason that anything is difficult and that is due to navigating the whirlpool of interpersonal relationships. Some astounding gifts from students, and no doubt some gleeful thanks given by others. The more I see and the more I hear the more emphatic is my view that we are each no more and no less than the sum of our relationships with other people.

In the last weeks of teaching I saw “An Inconvenient Truth” two more times. Confounding signals have again struck me. For (20?) years now I have been aware of this as perhaps the dominant issue of our times. In Year 10 Science last week we handed around a copy of The Age “Good Weekend” magazine that I had saved from February 1989. On the back cover: a full page colour ad, featuring sunset, for cigarettes. On the front cover: a stylised globe of the earth, in the shape of an egg, being heated to the point of severe cracking. The feature article was about something called “Climate Change”. The central points of this 1989 article read almost identically to those of many 2008 articles. It seems that any sense of urgency has been lost in (scientific-popular) translation.

So I'm taking it on as an ACF campaigner on climate. We'll see. I hope not to bombard email addresses or to preach. But i'm not really sure where to start.
midnight oil's “blue sky mining” album is as good a place as any.
The river runs red, black rain falls, dust in my hand.

I expect to teach again. A rich and rewarding and challenging task, pitifully rewarded in our currency of money but abundantly rewarded in terms of the personal. And did I say time-consuming?
But enough – next will come the challenge of water and of spreadsheets and of a new workplace and new expectations and new colleagues and all that goes with them.

But that's next. This is now. This is a Tuesday night having played & cared for my girls this day and having them both sleeping contentedly in this very house while my lady is out with mates. This is an empty lindt wrapper and a half-full coffee mug (alright 2 wrappers). This is feeling is a cleansing feeling & like a healing feeling & like a Top End monsoon in its intensity and in its bringing of joy & of relief.
Breathe.
Music anyone? EP launch in Northcote in October*. Check it out: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=318922283
*yes this is a mate. Yes, check out the site. Songs there. & the details.

A family wedding recently. Stephanie & Kyla taken under the wings of older cousins happy to be playing the role of Big Kids; shepherding, fetching, cajoling. Perspective gained from seeing them running, jumping, laughing, sparkles in their eyes, with neither CJ nor I involved.
Pride.
It seems a great many people in my circles are suffering right now. Relationship breakdowns, illness, combinations of both. Hard to make sense of it all. No point trying, really, as I've learned.
Instead I am here. I am now.
Last week, considering this, it was put to me that it must only be a matter of time before illness/ tragedy knocks on our door here. I guess that's true. But when it does arrive, I aim to have been well rested & well nourished & well musiced & well loving in its absence. Who's waiting?
Love to all.

taaa-kew

A prod here; a poke there. Melbourne Writer's Festival. Growth of language & of arms & of sunlight & it's time for another edition. The sun is heading north again. Galileo would disagree and as a science teacher I shouldn't say it. But hey. Sunlight in the north windows here. The house on our northern boundary was demolished a month or two back. Winter sun fills our northern bedrooms now.

I'm sitting at the kitchen table and it's 9am. CJ at work. Steph sitting opposite me: “there are lots of these textas aren't there, Dad?” Kyla in the highchair: “texta! There-you-go! Ta-kew! Lid on!” Words. So many words. “Ta! Packet!”

What are you drawing there, Stephanie? “I'm drawing lots of pictures.”

Time marches on. Days are blurring together. It feels like we're treading water here. Nothing really happening. But then you look around and Steph is sitting on the potty. Or Kyla is sitting down thumbing through a stack of books.

Stephanie reading (memorising the words) to Meg & Mog; reading it to her little sister. Kyla memorising the sound effects throughout the story & chiming in at the appropriate page: “Whoo Whoo Whoo! Clip-clop clip-clop! Boom!”

The markers of time for me (aside from my work life, broken into 48 minute periods, week1 and week2 tiumetables, 10-week terms) is our girls. Kyla now with a sheet of paper on her head declaring “hat!” SJ laughing: “that's not a hat, Kyla.”

Yet I'm feeling stagnant. All my energy is gone. Family life leaves nothing for interests. No story-writing. No sport (even watching – what Olympics?). No tree-planting. No live music.

A late-night bike ride to catch Tim Rogers on a Saturday night rekindled thoughts of a life now passed. But a recognition that is won't always be thus.

Walking the Merri Creek. The creek has been up lately. Surging eddies and a drowned weir at the Northcote bridge. The CERES sandpit. Fleming Park. Cooking up Italian lamb casserole (again) on a weekend (again) to be thankfully plucked from the freezer on a Wednesday evening (again); Wednesdays being the one day when both CJ & I work, and amid the mad hour of screaming & tiredness the pre-cooked meal that everyone enjoys is worth its weight in prepared gold.

Cooking up lime butter fish in our kitchen in E Brunswick & feeling waves of Top End barramundi memories flood over me.

Flicking on some tunes after tea & the dancing of Stephanie & the copying of Kyla. Somehow, somtime, Jet's “Are you gonna be my girl?” became the default dance track here. Maybe it's the first track on the iPod. Whatever, when those first few bars of guitar ring out, girls run from anywhere into the dining dance floor & get down. It's great.

And I've taken a new job. Teaching is fun & rewarding & structured & family friendly & I think I'll teach again, but I've now taken an opportunity to reenter the water world. Three-days-a-week at the Bureau of Meteorology's new Water Division. A(nother) new challenge awaits.

Next? I'm aiming to experience a professional massage one day soon. Why not? I've heard good things. Also yoga. And to play more guitar.

Right now I feel a shepherd to these two girls before me as they make their way in this world. And that's taking about all I've got.

hand, it's time for bed

It’s mid March and it’s a stinker. 40 degrees today. 39 yesterday. Forecast for more 35+ days into next week. The whirl of time has sucked up January and February and the first school term is almost over.

We cleaned up our house through January. Late afternoon trips to the Northcote pool, girls splashing. Stephanie excited and nervous and jumping in the water. Kyla grinning and clapping and trying to wriggle free and swim on her own.

We enjoyed a week at the beach towards the end of January. Sharing a house with mates & feeling the dominance of children’s sleeping schedules over all else. Lounging around on trampoline, cockatoos screeching, koalas dozing overhead, echidnas rambling along the tracks. Getting down to the beach each day for a late afternoon splash.

Stephanie talking and enunciating each thought and each happening; watchful at the beach. Happiest with spade in hand , filling bucket after bucket with sand. Very wary of the ocean. Small, indecisive steps toward the water and then a sprint back up the beach as the next wash comes through.

Kyla wakeful through the night. A wriggly, squirmy, restless and beautiful little girl. Eating fistsful of beach sand and throwing herself headlong into any hole/ sandcastle/ splash of ocean she can find. No hesitation in her crawls – she seems willing to tackle long-distance ocean swimming.

Night times a struggle as no amount of consistency, teach-to-sleep, control crying, control comforting, blah blah is making a scrap of difference. And we’re rooted.

February and school is back and work is back for me and CJ is working 2 days/week this year. I’m on 4 days/ week. We share the child care – CJ 3 days, me 1 day and mum 1 day. We are both very lucky and very happy to have arranged our lives in this way.

Ky still struggling through the night and CJ & I struggling a lot by now too. Anger? Frustration? Chronic tiredness. No explanations. Flicking from helplessness to unconditional love and support and back again. Over and over each night.

Kyla’s first trip to the doctor. To rule out any medical ailments. She’s OK. When she inevitably wakes, sometime between 1am and 4am, I’m bunking down on the floor of her room, positioned for a good “shhhhhhh”, as she wakes. It’s been a week and it’s working. We’re all sleeping more but the next step is obviously to stop doing it.

Steph calling us by our given names. “Hey Dave, whatchya doing Dave?” “Caf, caf, I’m reading books with Fluffy, Caf.” She has an array of alter-egos these days. When she’s eating porridge, she is to be addressed as “Goldilocks.” (Me: “Have you finished your porridge there Stephi girl?” Steph: “No, no, I’m Goldilocks.”) When unthreading shoelaces, as “the shoelace fairy”. Periodically whenever giants or beanstalks are mentioned, as “Jack”. Sometimes when the mood takes her as “Captain Feathersword”.

Stephanie talks all day, every day. She gives voice to other characters, including her favourite Fluffy and other teddy bears. Each night her right hand joins in a conversation with her left, saying (through Steph) “I want to go to the park,” just as we’re putting pyjamas on. Steph will then admonish her own hand (“Hand, you can’t go to the park. It’s time for bed, funny hand”). Laughs all round. Imagination is beautiful.

Kyla recognizes things as spoken now. “Kyla, where is Paddy bear?” will see her scan the surroundings, locate Paddy bear and then scramble across the floor at light speed towards the white bear. She is pointing. Sometimes I think she says “toot toot”, but maybe I’m imagining that. She is just starting to stand up independently and sway back and forth a bit before falling down again.

The girls are playing well together, though if anything Kyla is the dominant individual. Not responding to verbal instructions puts her out of Stephanie’s control. And her tendency to grab and yank fistfuls of Steph’s hair whenever she can has made her a redoubtable play-companion.

Holidays soon. My birthday soon. Grew a beard over the past 6 weeks or so; shaved it and also most of my hair off last night. Times are a changing here. The nights and days of relentless tiredness and exasperation are ceding to a better life. I have begun to think a little period of Big Challenges might be behind us. Hope so. The last few months have been tricky. Holidays on the horizon now & the prospects are good.

see the ducks?

G’day & all the best for the season.

I’m falling asleep in my chair here at 1:48 on a Monday afternoon.

This year we sent no Christmas cards. Not a policy decision. Not a sign of things to come. So g’day and all the best for the season.

Yesterday I took the girls for a walk along the Merri Creek. We walk out the front door here & less than 5 minutes later we’re on the creek track. The creek was up. It’s been raining. Swirling eddies and fallen branches backed up behind a rushing chute and bubbling little rapids. All this in East Brunswick.

I reckon walks along the creek will be a feature of our life here. I’m imagining a future of late summer evenings with orange & purple sunsets & cicadas chirping and I’m imagining bleak winter afternoons wrapped in a decent coat to hold out the slanting rain & Antarctic southerlies. And all with the creek burbling alongside.

Catching up with mates and hearing stories of theirs. Adding them to my Year of Stories. My first year as a teacher could be called a Year of Stories. Merging into the life stories of 125 early teenagers. Catching snippets of their lives. And the second-hand stories about the friend of a friend. Really it has been a year of forging relationships.

The woman who has just now been left by her husband and the fact that she is right now facing her life at eight months pregnancy and the fact that he’s now living with another woman and the singles (‘specially the ladies) beginning to fret about their domestic futures and the rapid rise in the frequency with which the term “biological clock” enters conversations and the widowed woman who has just moved out of her family home of 47 years and into a self-contained unit and her feelings of loss and emptiness and loneliness and the teacher who spent the last three months facing imminent unemployment trying his hardest to teach a full load of classes and on top of that having to apply and apply and apply and apply again for his next contract position at any school he could find because of the contract system used for employing teachers and the old woman whose son lives in Queensland and who is excited beyond words about his trip down to see her next weekend and the crackerjack student who was deported to Turkey along with her mother in mid-year by our Immigration Department. For example.

The Year of Stories has been wearing. There’s a lot to listen to.

Our new house lies in a quiet street but more than that, it lies within a community of like-minded people. Cakes and visits and fresh rosemary and fresh lemons and 6-year-olds and bottles of wine and handshakes between the drivers of two separate cars through open windows have all taken place within our street community in the past few weeks. We’re home.

Babies dominating my life and the lives of so many people I used to know. Is there a right way and a wrong way? To do anything? What happens if you choose the wrong way? What are the consequences? Will any of it matter? What is best for you right now?

So many decisions.

I feel drained and exhausted. Welcoming an extended break from work and the chance to recharge. Lots of walks & lying around & tinkering with our new house & playing with the girls.

<>

<>Next year I will work 4 days/week. Every Monday off. To be at home with the girls. It feels another step in the right direction. Eventually, I aim to not work at all & instead write & draw & go on long walks & ride my bike very languidly along no fixed path. And I feel about a hundred years older than I did last year.

It’s time to sleep and dream now.
Goodnight to you & yours.
-dave.

om mani padme hum

Funny the things we congratulate each other for. Some mates just told us they were pregnant ("they" are pregnant - not her, note). Congratulations! Do we normally congratulate each other on news of sexual acts? But pregnancy is different, isn't it? We are really saying congratulations for your decisions & the ideas & the hopes & the dreams & all that has gone through your heads up til now. So I guess it's not at all strange to offer congratulations.

Pregnancy is a tricky topic for the early/mid-30s. Who knows someone who is "having trouble"? I reckon most of us. In Year 10 Science this year we found that 1 couple in 6 would find it near-impossible for genetic reasons. So do you talk about it? Avoid the topic? Offer support? Tricky topic. Not for the first time, I feel lucky.

Here, I'm talking less as "me" and "I" and more as "we". It's logical & perhaps to be expected. Bit I'm finding myself fighting it. Would like to preserve my identity, maybe. It's Saturday night here & I've just downloaded paul kelly's latest (stolen apples) and that of radiohead (in rainbows) (and no, we didn't pay).

we had a family gathering here today for the occasion of Stephanie's 2nd birthday. She'll be 2 on the 26th. All is well. Little Kyla (Kyla-koala, Kyla the smiler, etc) is forging a reputation as potentially the next Dalai Lama, such is her apparent ocean-like reserve of calm & tranquility. I've started calling her my little Lama.

We’re trying to live local & live with minimum stress & maximum time for ourselves. It’s tricky. But I find it a comforting ideal. For example, I’m proud that we don’t own more than one car. e have each made choices that mean we work within a 10 minute bike-ride of home. I’m proud of the time that we have chosen to spend with Stephanie & Kyla. I hear a lot of regret from parents whose kids have grown about missing the early years. A Sunday morning with Cath at work & Steph standing amid every single item of Kyla’s clothing that she has just pulled from the cupboard & Kyla writhing in my arms & crying with tiredness, I happily have no such regret.

Catherine & I have noticed a huge majority of people struggling with Kyla’s name. Kayla, Kaylee, Kylie, and they’re just the closest three. I suspected that a non-standard name would cause a few people trouble, but I’ve been disappointed to find such an entrenched trend. I guess she will need to make a name for herself now.

<>Kyla is a beautiful baby. Heard that before from a dad? Well I’m not joking. She is a beautiful baby. As the 6-month date ticked over we were going through a difficult period of sleeplessness in this household. Stephanie was ill, I was ill, Catherine was ill, and Kyla was ill. Two little ones and no sleep – the situation was fraught for many days. It was hard going and there were some dark moments. We decided to teach Kyla how to sleep & it has worked well enough (for now). She has started eating solids & sings da-da-da-da & laughs a lot.

I hope we are still eating solids & singing da-da-da-da & laughing a lot in the days & weeks & years ahead. We're packing up house here - moving on Cup Eve. Our new house & new adventures await. Hope all is well for you & yours.

blanket; on; legs

g'day amigos,

School holidays. No sleeps-in, but many slow days. Days and days of humans being. Planning with Catherine, playing with Stephanie, knowing Kyla. CJ has seen Kyla through the “fourth trimester”; that first 3 month period of life during which Kyla adjusts to our Earth and we all adjust to her needs. Catherine achieved this while also parenting, supporting, loving, and enjoying 17-month-old Stephanie. Daily, I nicked off to work.

So here we are in July and Steph is 20 months old and she is talking. She speaks more each day and learns new words each day. Today her new words included: milk crate, tricky and elephant. Hearing her construct a sentence is constantly exciting. It seems that she speaks using colons; e.g. “Kyla: awake!” or “Hair: caught: bib” or “Steph: slippers: on.” Stephanie is a loving and supportive big sister of Kyla and a handy helper around the house, too. When Kyla spewed over my shoulder yesterday, Steph cried: “uh-oh,” ran to retrieve a tea-towel and used it to mop the floor.

Kyla is now 3 months old. Her emergence from the fourth-trimester twilight zone has been palpable this week. Her eyes blink in the light and head cranes around slowly, mannerisms similar to a Top End sea-turtle. Curled up on someone’s shoulder like a koala. She has settled right in to a great routine and is fit & well.

Life is quite regimented now. At work I live by the clock. Live in the shadow of an imminently sounding bell. At home I live by the timing of routines and needs of the girls. It’s reached the stage where I could nominate with extreme accuracy where I’ll be, what I’ll be doing, and what time I’ll be doing it on any day for the next 3 months. So very different to the sprawling timescales of uni research life & the unpredictability of the single man.

It’s a complete mental shift.

Fitting additional or non-routine happenings into the well-oiled machine of daily life? My first reaction is to resist. Keep it easy. Keep it simple. But recently I’ve taken up some opportunities and they have been a reminder – a reminder that life goes on outside our house. Riding to the MCG for some footy, out for a dinner date with my beautiful bride, several pints on a Thursday night. Music is playing and the vibe is grand.

Teaching has been relentless and it has been immediate. By relentless I mean that the workload and the pressures and the needs and responsibilities seem never to end. Time in the classroom is a minor part of the job, but that is where the true work is done and where the rewards are found. By immediate I mean that every issue/ concern/ catastrophe/ moment of great need that occurs seems to require an immediate response and needs one in a face-to-face context. Human interaction and the human condition engulf me all day every day – a huge shift from the social isolation of a partitioned office on the first floor of C Block with email as the sole umbilical link.

I am loving the humanity in my daily existence these days. Life right now is exhausting and is brilliantly coloured. It’s like a Papua New Guinean bird of paradise in full flight.

Go well. dave

life, a new life begins

Since I last wrote here I have met someone new. There is a new presence in my life and she is breathtaking. Kyla Therese Wilson was born inside the first 30 minutes of 2 April, 2007.
She may never comprehend the drama of the preceding 24 hours; I hope she never does. Yet at the end of it all, here she is.
She came home along Lygon Street after spending her first 3 nights at the Royal Women’s Hospital. She nestled into her capsule as we crawled among the evening peak hour. Single occupant cars everywhere. Darkness but for headlights and street lights and the brightness of shopping strips. Returning home from work. Cigarette smoke out the window. Cutting us off to enter our lane, only to see traffic in their original lane take off. Without them. Trams on the tracks full to the brim. I felt both tired and serene. There was nothing to be anxious about on this journey. Mum had taken Stephanie home, where we would all soon meet again, the four of us. Four of us.

We have all been home for two nights now. This morning Stephanie checked out Kyla in more detail than ever before; pointing out her toes, her knees and her hair. This morning Stephanie said her sister’s name for the first time (Ka-ka). It is a wonderful time of discovery and introduction for us all.

(it’s the next day now. Saturday. Last night Kyla screamed herself hoarse and didn’t sleep in any meaningful way between about 10.30pm and 5.30am. Since 7.30am, she has slept like a trench digger, pinned to my chest in a baby carrier, for over three hours now – it appears she is operating on the London time zone.)

Walking the boards at 4.30 this morning, piercing howl reverberating through the bones of my skull, happily my love for this little one only grew. Carrying her this morning has been a privilege. Meanwhile, Steph has devoured (yet another) hot cross bun, walked laps around her little tree in the back yard and gestured with a finger to her lips that I need to be quiet as Kyla is sleeping. And so the idea of Stephanie as a big sister grows.

The birth process was interesting; we often say that no two birth stories are alike. Kyla’s story was an epic 18 hour labour, the prospect of hormone injection, the facilitation of an epidural to allow that to occur, and then the news that the hormone would not be supplied after all. By this stage, following the epidural, contractions had dropped off and labour had stalled. Our choices? Wait until a different consultant surgeon began their shift (a further 10 hours away) and hope they would allow the hormone; or go for caesarean operation. Having been awake for 48 hours and in labour for 18, the choice was an easy one.

She won’t like me writing this, but I saw determination in Catherine that day that runs very deep. Deeper than any valley I know. I already knew of this characteristic, yet on this day, all my previous understandings of her strength were re-written. If Stephanie and Kyla inherent or learn this from their mother, they will know the value of perseverance and courage. Catherine is the one I choose to have by my side, let me say.

Other things to have happened this year have paled a touch with the events of this week. Suffice to say that teaching is challenging & fun & enjoyable & that life is beautiful.

adios amigos, dave-of-the-south

summer; ahhhhh

Happy new year there,
You know I found an explanation for why I much prefer to read printed words than to read anything on a computer screen. The writer of this article I read (printed, I might say), mentioned that reading printed words relaxes your eyes because they are concentrating on the contrast between passive black letters and a passive white background. Reading anything on a computer screen, however, and your eyes are being exposed to radiation; it’s the same idea as staring at a light bulb (though obviously not as intense). Have you ever had a computer terminal on at night in a dark room? Lots of radiation comin’ outta there.
I guess we’d all better print this onto recycled paper. Paperless office? Maybe we’re heading towards a prematurely blinded generation of office (&home office) workers.

This summer has been a wonderful time, making little trips from our base camp in Coburg. Rather than write about these adventures in too much detail, however, I’m going to take a different tack. Hopefully this will appease the restless thoughts I’ve had regarding people’s privacy & the propensity of internet nasties stalking the e-world.
No, I don’t think this is giving in to fear; though I’ve wondered that, too. I prefer to think of it as an excuse for creativity & the shedding of other people’s concerns.

You know I was once reprimanded by an acquaintance for posting e-photos that included images of her, without seeking her permission. I was taken aback. Was there now some international diplomatic crisis imminent? Was she facing mortal danger as a result? No, it was more to do with “respecting personal privacy.” If everyone’s personal privacy extended to this point, the world and our interactions in it would be very different. No group photos unless authority is signed across to the photographer. No attending major speeches/ concerts/ sporting events as your image may be shown by a broadcaster. Et cetera.

So with that, let me say that, personally, this summer holiday period lived up to stratospheric expectations. Christmas gatherings, a New Year’s gathering, two weddings and a week of walks, food, mimicking bird calls, “take two,” music, bushwalks, more food, conversation, toddler/crawler-watching, chocolate scones and splashing in the surf have left me feeling both wonderfully reflectively happy & completely at ease.

It seems, in writing that, that we’ve been busy. In reality, we have pottered about & taken each day as it has come. The summer has been a hot one and a dry one as we in Victoria know. Yet it has seen our little girl call us: “Mum-mum-ma” and “Dad-dad-da.” And yes, Juz, it makes my heart swell to bursting. When she sees me & points & calls Dad-dad-da, I could simply not be any happier at all. She is walking around. She is waking up earlier than ever. She is singing. She will learn/memorise anything you teach her in about 2 minutes flat. Even to mimic the call of a warbling magpie.

Catherine is back at work part time & is 30 weeks pregnant now. All going well and tiredness taking a firm grip. Not only is there a little one to grow, but there’s a 15-month-old to teach & supervise as well. I’ve been at home full time since the start of November. But next week I’m back at work. New job. New career, really. Teaching. If all the portents and harbingers of advice are correct, you may not hear from me until the Term 1 holidays. I understand I am about to become seriously busy. If that turns out to be true, and I do not post anything further at this site until early April, keep an eye out for message around that time; childbirth is forecast for 30 March.

Hope all is well in your patch for you & yours & for all of ours.
love dave.

chrissy 06

merry christmas from Coburg.
Been living here for over a year now & routines are becoming set.
I feel like I've dropped out of contact with far too many people lately. Whether or not this leads anywhere depends on me, i guess. New demands & new priorities have developed, anyway. Isn't that what life is all about?
We've managed to keep everything pretty simple here. Operating on one car has been fine. We missed one birthday dinner when the car was at the mechanic, otherwise it's been easy. Cath rides to work mostly, except when the extreme weather policy is enacted & the Sydney Road tram is called upon. She's 26 weeks pregnant now. 14 to go (or thereabouts).
I've been stay-at-home dad for the past 6 weeks or so. It's been mostly brilliant, with some tough bits & some (surprisingly) lonely bits thrown in. Stephanie is coming up to 14 months & is walking more confidently each day. She still chooses to crawl (rapidly) when there's a firm destination in mind - she puts her head down & races forwards, knees & hands slapping the floor, eyes fixed on the ground in front, only looking up to see if she's on the right bearing. Sounds of slapping palms and panting breaths fill the house when Steph is about these days. And singing and the musical grunt she produces to direct your attention to something she has/ wants/ would like to show you.
Never did get around to writing Christmas cards this year.
Something I typically like to do.
Particularly with my lack of general correpondence this year... Hope all is well & that you enjoy a break. Adios amigos.

saltwater

Salt water sampling at Dromana.
Ahhh - happiness is a warm beach.

I'm going (a little) stir-crazy at home.
Looking forward to engaging again in the world.
This full-time at-home gig is Tough.

from the south 12

G’DAY from Coburg.
November.
With only one more assignment to submit, the university year will soon be over & I will be qualified to teach maths & science in this State of ours. And I’ll be doing so at Brunswick Secondary College from 30 January next year. I’m very happy about this.
There are many reasons why this is the best school for me right now: I feel it is a terrific fit with me both personally & professionally - AND it’s a 15 minute bike ride away along the Upfield line track. The concrete path, sprinkled with broken glass in places, runs alongside the train track. My daily commute will take in the back of the Brunswick tram depot, the mayhem of Moreland Road junction, parkland at Moreland station, the confusing, narrow, dense pocket of life at Anstey station, the cyclone fencing & factories of underbelly Brunswick and the Brunswick City baths.

Rapt to be close to home, especially as Catherine is now coming up to 20 weeks pregnancy (half way). Stephanie had her first birthday recently (picture - introduction to chocolate cake) & now a little sibling is on the way. This household is already so full of life; I can’t imagine where will put any more…Looking forward to finding the room & living this life very much.

Stephanie is teaching herself balance. She has been cruising around on two legs, holding onto furniture, for a while now. And lately she has started to stand up in free space. Walking will be next. Watching & helping her learn is awesome.

Sometimes on my travels around Melbourne, it feels as though I’ve stepped into a timewarp. Riding around Brunswick & Carlton, especially, where I’ve left so much of myself over the years. Walking through Barkly Square, or past the Kent Hotel. Or riding alongside Princes Park. Remember jogging that path with Titta & trying to maintain enough breath to hold a conversation? Remember inventing soccer ball-golf there with Brent & Catherine? And sometimes the ghosts of the past materialise in front of me. Jess & Nicko standing there outside Safeway last Sunday, talking about trips & nights out. And my Coburg life of a dad and a house and all seems other-worldly.

How many different versions of ourselves are out there in the world, I wonder…? What is the Carlton-me doing this Saturday night? Is Brunswick-me involved in the election? Coburg-me will be walking down to Sydney Road later today to visit the library & to buy a block of Italian parmesan, wheeling the pusher that carries Stephanie.

And what of Fannie Bay-me? We had a visit from Top End mates earlier this week, who stopped in for 2 nights. That was not only a timewarp, but a spacewarp too. Walking with them the streets of Coburg was a strange sensory experience: my expectation was for stifling humidity & glimpses of pandanus; instead we had callistemon in flower, and a coolish wind. Great to meet their little boy. Babies appear in this story with some frequency these days.

Time warp conditions prevailed one hot Saturday recently, when I rummaged through the cupboard for my set of cricket whites; I was rolling out again. Had the emergency phone call on the Thursday night: “we’re short, can you play on Saturday?” Thankfully it was a 1-day match as my joints were seizing up after only 40 overs in the field. Sent down 8 probing, high pace, high quality overs (well, it was 8 overs, anyway) for 1/26. We lost. I couldn’t walk properly until the following Wednesday.

All is well here, water crisis & climate change notwithstanding.
Cheers to installing an energy efficient globe in your place today.
adios amigos, dave.

from the south 11

more sunlight than darkness each day now & a few very warm days already & the driest catchments many have known & reservoirs at single figure percentages of capacity & a bushfire in Sydney & it's only september & it's all pointing to a rough old summer ahead & a rough future if you think about it & perhaps we could all make a difference by making the right choices & by choosing to help ourselves & each other & our common future.
Avoid that car trip.
turn that light off.
live in a small house.
walk to the shop.
buy local.
not preaching, thinking.

Catherine is 13 weeks along the pregnancy journey & the little Munro Munchkin is making it's presence felt. Presently Stephanie is the centre of attention, but I guess that will soon change. Steph is crawling quickly & up steps & over to the couch & there she pulls herself up to standing & dances like Elvis Presley with pelvic thrusts & grins aplenty.

Just had a long weekend at Phillip Island renting out a house with other mates & playing Survivor games & kicking a footy & tasting wine & bowling a cricket ball at stumps & throwing balls into a bin & playing song title pictionary & trying some blindfolded antics in the name of competition. Great holiday.

I'll be on teaching rounds for the next 3 weeks at University High School - my final round of the Dip Ed - and i'll be qualified to teach shortly thereafter. Looking for a suitable position for next year.

Coburg life is brilliant. We've all been riding along the Merri Creek trail together - with Stephanie in a seat mounted on the back of my bike. That seat was my very first father's day present & it is sure to get a lot of use along the picturesque Merri Creek, among the acacias & eucalypts. When the magpies call, it feels like we're in the bush. Chopped down a pine tree in our backyard the other week - it turned out to be a tricky job, but it cam crashing down courtesy of one handsaw, one very long ladder & one axe. The southern sky has opened up to us & the feeling is good.

Had about 14 near-1-year-olds & their parents at our place for a combined first birthday party recently. So much life. So much dribble. And everywhere hopes & dreams & confusion & smiles. I'm writing this on the 26th September. One month from today Stephanie turns One. time flies. life happens. ciao!

south 10

Spending some good old time with music in the air & tokay in the glass. Hey I flicked through the Money section of The Age this morning (v.unusual) and guess what I read? There was a profile article on a fella who had made his fortune on setting up a futures market – forecasting the demand for a product blah blah. The article was a double page spread (successful guy) and ended with five snapshot questions: Biggest break, Best investment, etc. Question: “Biggest regret”. Answer: “I should have spent more time with my children when they were growing up and with my spouse (he is divorced).”
We’ve been neglecting the forecasts of futures markets in Coburg, I’m afraid. But tidied up the garden & recently cooked up two spanking great BBQ lunches with mates soaking up winter sun out the back. Cooked up the booty from my earlier win in the Montague Hotel Meat Tray Raffle – porterhouse, pork snags, lamb shanks, etc etc, for an outlay of $2 on ticket number 88. Et like carnivores at a fresh kill.
The strength of this winter sun is a bit weird. Good if you're into climate change, i guess. Uni life is setting a rollicking beat with assignments & work required seemingly every day. It’s reached a point where no learning is taking place, rather we’re all struggling to keep our heads above water. There’s a lesson there for future teachers, I’m sure. But when a pearl of wisdom nestles home, it’s a great feeling & I’m growing evermore confident about the teaching life.
Catherine is teaching, too. She’s taught Stephanie clapping & waving & turning the pages of books & sometimes Stephanie acts in a way that suggests she knows far more than she has been letting on.
The bad news is that it’s Thursday now and already I’m looking forward to a TV show that screens on Saturday night called RockWiz & we were saying last week that it wasn’t that long ago that we were going to the Evelyn/ Cornish Arms/ Retreat Hotels for a bit of Saturday night live music whereas now we switch over to the Espy from the comfort of tracky dax on the couch! Back in my day?! Crikey – the slide has begun.
Catherine is pregnant now so another little one is due to arrive here at the end of March. Stephanie will become a big sister. These here are amazing times. Ciao all.

from the south 9

So now Stephanie is playing & we’re playing & she’s not crawling but by golly she’s warming up on the starting blocks & we’re dancing in the kitchen under the light of the fluorescent energy saver globe to entertain Steph & we’re loading & listening to our CD collection on iTunes free software & the track right now says: “wake up lazy bones, I’ve been watching you & wondering & now the morning’s gone” & I stick it on random-mode & any one of 2302 songs will play next & we’re home from a Sunday BBQ lunch & we’ve been for a walk around the back streets Coburg & the lemons are all ripening & laden branches are draped over fences & lemons hang within plucking distance & for all it’s low low prices has anyone come across a more disorganized shop than Bi-Lo & the ducted heating coming into it’s own in the depths of the southern winter & memories of bright sun & humidity & whistling kites & pandanus spiralis now quite distant & other-worldly.
Walking along the Merri Creek among flowering Acacias & singing magpies (carna ‘pies) & tracking the curving path to CERES Environmental Park in Brunswick for a cuppa & cake alongside the chooks & walking home to Coburg with the northern winter sun in our faces & then our 9-month old girl contracting the Melbourne chest cold of July 2006 & barking her way through every night for at least a week & CJ celebrating a birthday & going to the movies for the first time post-Steph (Jindabyne) & the dawning realization that life in Melbourne 2006 is very very different to life in Melbourne 2004. Nights at the pub? Nil. Bands seen? Nil. Family days in the cool & grey & green & shade? Every day.
Second teaching placement of the Dip Ed now over & back to uni as a student next week & enjoying the placement & getting some terrific feedback from students & other teachers & very much looking forward to life as a teacher & CJ working 3 days/ week now.
Holidays in the Grampians as a family very cool & very freezing cold with overnight temperatures around minus 3 & the 270km road trip to Halls Gap taking all day with a grazing lunch stop in Ballarat & an afternoon pot in the Ararat front bar & thinking that on the Stuart Highway we would have covered that distance before brekky & loving the tranquil pace set by the demands of a little ‘un & frost & cockatoos & a burnt-out shell of a landscape around Halls Gap with charred Eucalypts as far as sight can see & regrowth sprouting defiant & bushy & green from the trunks at every turn & climbing Mt. Zero in the north with panoramic views of olive crops & climbing in the fog in the south & wheeling the pram to the summit of Mt William & there was no need to take half the gear we did. Slow cooking spaghetti in the cabin at night as the frost came down & Steph sleeping on the floor & all of us bunking in together for night after night in the quiet & the cold. Ahhh, the bush. Ahh, abbotsford Invalid Stout.

south 8 (& feelin it)

"If you think you loved a wild one,
Surely now you knew.." -tim rogers

june. winter in the south.
I feel well pooped and ready for a rest. The end of uni semester coincided with the climax of my job & all of it coincided with some extra teaching & through it all of course were (&are) fun times with Catherine & with Stephanie.

CJ & I dined out at Pearl, saw Lano & Woodley, CJ had a mother's day(!) & we've caught up with people & eaten too much (way too many chocolate biscuits). Winter appears to be the chocolate season. This clashes with my previous understanding that summer was the chocolate season. And more recently I believed that autumn was definitely the chocolate season. Now I know I was wrong both times.

We're re-discovering the Melbourne winter idea of cooking up a roast. knocking off some rosemary sprigs from the garden of a house around the corner & slow cooking a roast. yum. bottle of red. yum. Ah - to feel some cool weather once more...

Riding the bike around in the mornings is taking some psychological fortitude. Fog. Numb fingers. Icy wind in the eyes. Tears & dribble. Hmmm. Bracing.

I'm on a break from uni now for a few weeks. Next placement begins on 10 July. CJ works on for Melbourne Uni as a researcher, moving to 3 days/week soon. Steph will spend 2 days with CJ, 1-2 days with me and 1-2 days with Mum. She's over 7 months old now & sitting up & shoving everything she can into her mouth.

Stephanie's songs & gurgles & squeaks & laughs & cries & yelps & grunts & hysterical wailings & whimpers & whistles & clicks can fill the house. This morning she woke up singing.
Her gaze is intense & her interest in most things really obvious. Her face grows evermore expressive. Catherine & I are loving these days & their routines which involve feeds of yoghurt, feeds of vegies, dances around the loungeroom, baths, walks to the park & chasing the afternoon sun around the house.
We chopped the tops off 3 trees in the front yard last week, to catch some more of that afternoon sun. The winter gloom is more gloomy than I remember it being (back in winter '04).

Loving this winter. With the 'Woods in good form, red wine back on the agenda & a bit of afternoon sun, how good is that?
Hope all is well for you & yours.

from the south 7

G’day all,
It’s a strange time in Coburg. Winter arrived with its colds southerlies & icy rain & low skies & big dark overcoats & dark clothes & dark rooms in dark houses very suddenly here. Four weeks ago it was hot. But it seems autumn has been skipped this year.
Cold-weather footy is back. Went to watch Collingwood in Round 1. Collingwood Football Club was defeated by Adelaide Basketball Club. Chip-chip-chip. Keep possession. Kick sideways. Kick backwards. Chip-chip-chip. Utterly infuriating.
And I’ve experienced high school teaching now, with three weeks of Year 8 Maths, Science and Year 11 Maths. Placement was a great learning experience – so much happening in schools, and a very wide array of teaching styles consider. It was a tiring time for us all; Catherine & Stephanie carried a huge load during that time.
Steph will be 6 months old on Wednesday. Howabout that?!
It somehow makes all the recent meals (visits and visitors) with family & mates feel more special with the knowing of Steph’s little milestone. More & more I’m realizing that these shared experiences are the bricks of life. I think the mortar is probably the attitude or philosophy you bring to a situation. Maybe. I’ll think about it a bit more. Certainly, we have been lucky to make many shared bricks lately.
Listening to Tim Rogers here: “As the social climbers pack their four wheel drives out to the coast/Drag this load out to the bay & just let him float away” …and reading John Banville. Eclipse.
Work & daily life did, I’m afraid, consume a little too much of me lately. But very happy to have emerged from the Frantic Times & to be again writing stories & again strumming the 6-strings & again singing in the shower.
May your shower be full of songs today & tomorrow!
Salutations!
(And many thoughts to those in Darwin as Cyclone Monica tracks ever closer)
http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDD65011.shtml

from the south 6

g'day -
this is the best time of year in Melbourne, I reckon. Cold mornings and bright sunnny days. Haven't seen any fog yet - that's probably still a month away. But
it's been my birthday. 31 now.
We ventured down to the Yarra River last week to check out this reported Games Fever gripping the city. Apart from visits from Mum in her volunteers uniform &
parking her Games car in the driveway, the whole thing had nearly slipped by without us noticing. Last week was the first time CJ or I had hung out in town in at
least 18 months & it has really changed a lot. The city square has again been redesigned. The general hatred & avoidance of Federation Square that I remember appears to have turned around 180degrees - the place was chockers. And someone put parks & gardens on the north side of the river. Good idea.
Melbourne scrubbed up well.
Steph seemed to have a good time visiting her city for the first time, but wasn't too thrilled with the loop section of the train ride. Life is on Fast Forward for the next week or so here, as CJ is working 2 days/week, I am still working for
Charles Darwin Uni & my first placement in a school begins on Monday 27th. I've been placed at Brunswick Secondary College for 3 weeks...
ciao all.

from the south 5

g'day,
I used to think that life flew by very quickly. With a new marker of time, Stephanie, life is roaring by like never before. She’s been with us nearly 4 months now & yes, since last time she has grown & grown & developed & grown a bit more. In the olden days, we gauged the passage of time through events/ places/ journeys. Nowadays it seems we gauge the passage of time through the growing of a person.

We don’t really get out & about much these days; one trip per day is about it. And a walk to the supermarket counts as a trip. These walks are little journeys of discovery & enlightenment such that we, like young European aristocrats, now know the virtues of a parasol on a sunny day. So we spend a lot of time in Coburg. Knowing other parents. Bumping into people at the shops. It’s happening. The feeling of community is at the tips of our fingers.

Meanwhile, the back porch is a happy place to be. Birds twitter and flap around in the aviary next door; the lemon tree we planted last year has established; and two acacia seedlings that we picked up from the CERES market in Brunswick are kicking on. Ruefully, however, I must report the recent death by cat attack of three birds in our very back yard. A ginger cat from 2 doors down appeared in our yard one morning, whose stealthy stalking was screened most effectively by some (admittedly) pretty long grass. And then POUNCE. Whammo. Dead bird. Three times. Terrible.

The big trip of recent times was a three night adventure I had in Darwin for work. Weird to be back there. Back walking the streets we’d inhabited for 12 months. Back in the land of monsoon and iced coffee and the NT News. But back without Catherine. Walking along the Fannie Bay cliff tops without her felt like walking without my shadow, or without my whole self. It felt a bit empty. A bit surreal. I wanted to tell stories & show things, but couldn’t. Touch down in Melbourne was brilliant but even better was being greeted by Catherine & Stephanie as I walked through the plane doors.

And so the days slip by.
Sometimes they glide by.
Sometimes they frazzle by; or perhaps we frazzle through them.
But mostly they pulse from one session of Steph-awake time to the next. These days she breaks into a huge smile when eye contact is made, her legs pump around like crazy, she gurgles & sings. Shed sucks on her own fist. And of course she screams the house down from time to time.
In between, in the quiet times, there are gardens to garden, washing to wash, cooking to cook, work to work & sleep to sleep.
A couple of biggish life changes, hitherto distant, are now almost on top of us. Next week I commence a Grad Dip in Secondary education, a one year fulltime course that will have me out & about in schools & contributing in a very immediate way. Seriously looking forward to this course. And CJ will soon be re-starting work, probably for a coupla days a week.
I hope this letter finds you well.
Happy days to you & yours.
yo.
dave & catherine & stephanie of Coburg.