What I did on my holidays

We caught planes, trains and automobiles; we visited friends, families, zoos, art galleries; we read books; we ran around and we sat still; we got sick (and no more shall be said about that); we celebrated my 36th birthday (36 - so far, it's not so bad); we lived without email and the internet for five weeks (the liberation!) and we realised that east or west, home is best.

This past weekend was the last before we start two full time jobs (at least in the short term - we're pretty sure something's gotta give) and we went here:



I swam because I was at the beach and by golly, that's what I do at the beach. I swam without a wetsuit, and once the numbness set in, it was lovely. Before the numbness, I could feel the ice crystals forming on the bits below water.

But I think there are few places where I can swim with cows lowing and butterflies and swallows swooping above my head. There are few places where my kids can splash nudie in the shallows,



and few places this orange:



Al and I have resolved to enjoy what we have, rather than looking always to greener pastures. We're stopping the circular arguments of should we stay or should we go, we're stopping the plans for the future, and for the moment, we're nourishing the roots we have here. Thinking back to the weekend, this shouldn't be too hard.

Good night

After dinner we raced through the back streets with the girls in matching yellow prams screaming 'faster, faster', the dogs running beside. We passed the little white cottages on the corner and the owner stepped down from the verandah to give us a bag of passionfruit. He had been sitting, waiting for someone to come by, so that he could share the bounty; tonight, we were the lucky ones.

So this weekend, pavlova.

Off to our nation's capital to skill up for work. For me, two weeks away from home, with time to stuff my brain full of new things and space to catch up with friends and see a movie or two. For Al, two weeks by himself with the kids and a dog, no family support and limited social networks. That's the thing with parenthood: when one person circles out, the other is forced to fold in. Personal time is a zero-sum game: what I gain, Al loses.

I don't feel guilty - I'm giving up guilt like some people give up cigarettes - but I am enormously grateful that I live with a person who not only says, 'It's fine', he says, 'I want you to go'.

Thanks, babe.

Bakers Beach

Another day at the beach, this time in Narawntapu National Park. Hot sun, cold, cold water - but not icy and so I gathered my courage into a ball and dived in, and it was just so wonderful to be bobbing and floating free. The girls loved it too: Lucy is, in her own words, "mad keen on rock climbing" - she's like a beach goat, scrambling about; and Nell spent the time chasing the tiny blue and red and pink crabs in the shallows.



So many parts of the day hit me with memories from my own childhood: the rockpools with their colours and critters; the sand stinging my face and legs when the gusts blew off the ocean; packs of kids ranging about the campsite, brown and ever-so-slightly feral from days outside, up to adventures and filled with plans to be kept from the parents at all costs; red, red bodies, so red I flinch and stare; the flies (the flies, the flies - gah!) everywhere as we barbecued the sausages, cooking and then eating with one hand, the other in constant motion, waving the buggers away; and then that phrase from 80s Australian television, "Remember the Aeroguard and avagoodweekend" (are we still allowed to roll on chemicals or have they been banned?).

On the way home, I experienced what my Mum and Dad must have had so many times: driving and talking quietly while brown kids slept in the back. It was of those moments when I realised, out of the blue, that I am a parent. Sometimes I forget but so many echoes from my own childhood made me stop for a second with the shock of it all: I am a parent and I've just taken the kids to the beach, like thousands of parents before me. It made me feel more Australian, and more pleased to be Australian, than any flag raising or anthem singing ever could.

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It wasn't just the flies hanging about the barbecue. When people ask if I will ever move back to the mainland I burble on about swings and roundabouts and pluses and minuses and give and take and work-family balance but really, this is why I will stay:



Down here, I know where to go so that I can show my kid something that makes her heart stop with joy.

My summer holiday

Just before Christmas, Mum, Dad, Al, the girls and I went down to Bicheno, a small town on the east coast of Tasmania, and Freycinet National Park, for a few days by the beach. I remembered just how lovely it is to live here.






But the beach holiday in Tas. is a different experience to those I'm used to. Growing up, summers were spent in Queensland, where there is heat and surf and bikinis. I miss jumping in the water without fear my bits will drop off in the cold, but there is something very free about visiting beaches here, which are often really wilderness areas that just happen to be next the ocean. All the sexual energy and lethargy, the bikinis and posing and judgments have no place on the sand; there's an intimacy and an expansiveness as we tear about, the only beings in sight.

Peace and quiet

Last week, in order to escape the logical consequences of Nell refusing to have her morning sleep (ie meltdown in suburbia), my Dad and I took the girls to Woolmers, the remnants of a once huge estate. It's quite a remarkable place. The house consists of a neo-Georgian annexe awkwardly attached to the original humble, and to my mind more elegant homestead, surrounded by the outbuildings used in its previous incarnation as sheep station and then large scale apple farm. Through the quirks of the family's residential and building choices, and by virtue of the fact the place was kept on down the line, the insides remain intact, tracking the changing styles and growing (and declining) wealth of the Archers.


The house is remarkable but I really like the outdoors - an open air museum where kids can run far and wide, where swifts swoop through broken windows, and where it's always quiet even then busloads of tourists arrive to see the buildings and visit the rose garden. The smell of it reminds me of my childhood - the heat on the ground and the scent of particular types of weeds drags me back to age eight again, running with my brothers through the paddocks.


Mostly, though, I am intrigued by the tidiness of the place. This is true for the grounds and gardens - well mowed and well tended - and for the history. I've taken the guided tour a few times, and the eventual decline and then end of this branch of the family tree tends to be presented as a bit of a tragedy. It's not something I weep over (generations of privilege supported by slave labour and dispossession - surely the family had a good run) but it is fascinating to look at the photos of boating parties and see the elegant gowns.




Woolmers is a bit like Tassie itself in this way, a veneer of beauty and ease built on exploitation (see for example, forestry practices). A friend was looking at houses to buy and she came across shackles, mortared into the walls of the cellar, used to hold the unfortunates who misbehaved - it's that kind of place, you live with the history even as you are seduced to forget it. I'm someone who mostly lives my life without being overly aware of what came before me, but the disjunction between the manifest and the latent stops me short and makes me think again of what it means to live in this place.

Broadening my horizons

On a happier note …

Since I conceived Lulu three years ago, our lives have circled inward. For me, this has been a choice, informed by the emotional vulnerability of pregnancy and parenthood, and a state enforced through physical problems carrying Nell in particular, finances, time, feeding and sleep routines. We’ve been happy, on the whole, with our micro-focus. But lately, we’ve begun to look beyond our backyard.

This past weekend we took our first holiday unconnected to family obligations and support. We went here, Cradle Mountain, and it was glorious.



Lucy chugged about, being a train along the track, charming trail mix off other walkers (“Mmm, apricots. So delicious”), and making an argument for an attempt on the summit (“I can climb it, I will fly to the top like a fairy and play in the snow. I will do it by myself”). Nell bobbed along behind me, pulling my hair and spitting up her milk with abandon.



Things have changed in the past three years. Al and I are not outdoorsy but we have on occasion ventured into the wilderness. Back in the day, anything less than a five hour walk was a bit soft really, we spurned boardwalks and touristy circuits, and we always returned well under the estimated times. Hell, we’ve even camped in a tent and peed in the grass. But now, a Parks-designated one to two hour walk at a ‘relaxed pace’ takes us two and a half hours, most of which is heavy slog; anything uphill makes us grit our teeth and look for a rescue helicopter; and a gravel path can feel like rough terrain.



And camping? Well, that’s also in the past. We stayed in a cabin with a spa and easy access to cold beer (project eat clean was suspended for civilised post-prandial drinks) – the Tasmanian wilderness experience at its most inspiring.

As we walked along, I kept lifting my eyes to the mountain, which is a remarkable presence, towering over the track. But more often, my eyes would drift downward to the child in front of me, gambolling and bossing and make believing, and the one on my back, cooing and bouncing; even under the broadest of horizons, my focus is pulled to the tiny things at the centre.