Tag: moving house

Flat packs

Instructions, screws and tools.

Moving house is detrimental to writing. In my spare time I have been carrying box after box up thirteen stairs, unpacking each of them, flattening the cardboard and taking that down to the stairs to the garage. At one point, I was wading through thigh deep cardboard to get to my letterbox.

The contents of the boxes all had to be distributed somewhere. I realised very quickly that my books would not fit in the number of shelves I had brought with me. A lovely large bookcase I wanted in the bedroom didn’t make it through the door and had to be manoeuvred back down. Another required four people to lift it over the balustrade to make it into the lounge room.

To avoid further such pitfalls, I joined the rest of today’s consumers and began to buy flatpack furniture. As there is only one of me, yet always two people indicated on the assembly instructions, it took me at least twice, if not thrice as long to get the job done. The items from the Swedish furniture giant were the easiest to assemble but didn’t always have all the bits needed. The assembly instructions from some of the smaller companies ranged from woeful to abysmal.

One set of shelves came with three screws to attach each shelf, but only two pre-drilled holes. That confused me for a while until I realised it was them and not me who had made the mistake. Left and right weren’t shown, yet required opposite pieces, holes were too large or too small to hold screws and the Allen keys provided were too short to do a complete turn.

My favourite piece, a rotating bookshelf, came with instructions in only Chinese. The pictures were miniscule and gave nothing away. Then, the QR code took me to a non-existent website, but I didn’t give up. The first set of shelves took me two and a half hours to put together, the second about an hour. Who would have ever thought that a battery drill would become a girl’s best friend?

I have finished putting all the pieces of furniture together now. I’m already beginning to forget some of the pain of crawling on the floor, trying to line up screws with pre-drilled holes, dropping Allen keys and losing my sanity, but not my dogged determination to get the job done. For now, the drill is resting in the dark recesses of a cupboard. Until next time…

End of holiday blues

A six-week holiday is a luxury not many of us can afford. I took some extended leave so I could downsize, declutter, and pack before my interstate move. I was busy for the first three weeks and then time began to slow down to almost a standstill. Suddenly, there was very little to do until the last couple of days when things ramped up once more. And now that I am on the other side of the state border, there are dozens of things to organise, but now I have run out time.

I go back to work on Tuesday. It was a deliberate choice not to start on Monday. I knew I’d need that extra day. The electrician is coming at 8:30, I have parcels to collect and errands to run. The year has well and truly started, and that holiday feeling is but a fast-fading memory. Why does it always end so quickly?

Everything is gathering speed like a snowball about to become an avalanche. No matter how fast I run, I can’t get out of its way. There are now only two days left and I am caught between wanting to relax before work becomes all-consuming and wanting to get as much done as possible. Neither side seems to be getting traction.

Instead, I am plagued by anxiety dreams. They all take place at schools but not any school I recognise. I am either in charge and unable to make cogent decisions or I am in front of a class without planned lessons trying to control unruly students. In these dreams I forget to turn up for playground duties; my students miss their buses and I’m often the last one to arrive to class. This may sound as if I am plagued by anxiety, but if you talk to teachers at the start of a new year, many will have had similar dreams. I’m sure other professions have their own versions of these dreams.

It is not that I dislike my job. Far from it. There are many aspects I enjoy, like going into schools to work with teachers. One of the best things is watching teachers grow in confidence when they implement pedagogical changes, especially when they were sceptical or downright antagonistic at first. Not that I always succeed but when I do, it is magic.

So here I am with two days to go. I have a book I’d like to finish reading, boxes to unpack and I am longing for a lengthy walk amongst trees to replenish my soul. Instead, I fall asleep in my armchair, exhausted. I walk the dogs in the summer heat and return with a renewed determination to tackle whatever lies ahead. I remind myself of what Bob Marley wisely said, ‘Beginnings are usually scary, and endings are usually sad, but everything in between – that makes it all worth living.’

The ‘treehouse’

I have been planning this move for over two years. Thank goodness I had the foresight to buy this townhouse. At the time I really didn’t think I could afford it. Luck was on my side, and I purchased just before prices in Canberra skyrocketed. I certainly wouldn’t be able to afford it now.  

I am enjoying the city after seven years in the country. Mind you, it feels more like a large country town which has made it easier to acclimatise. I love that there are trees everywhere and from my study window, I can just see the roof of a solitary building.

A friend of my daughter calls my place the treehouse. I like that. The mosaic I made depicting a large tree will be affixed to the wall at the front door. It all seems so befitting now as l look over the canopies and listen to the warbling magpies. I am glad the Maggies have followed me here as have the Sulphur Crested Cockies. I do miss my Blackbirds though. Although they wouldn’t quite fit into the deliberately native landscape. There are no Silver Birches, Magnolias, Crab Apples, or Fruit trees. Instead, I look out over Eucalypts, Kurajongs, She-oaks, and Crepe Myrtles.

This makes me think about the possibilities for a garden. My courtyard out the back is presently filled with weeds. It has but a tiny patch of soil and I will have to think long and hard about what to plant there. It won’t be the roses of Millthorpe, nor brightly coloured flowering exotic species. I want to pay respect to the landscape around me so I will find out about endemic plants before I make my choice. There is much to learn.

I have been here less than a week, but it already feels like a lifetime. Maybe it is because I have spent so much time in this city over the past ten years. I may not know where everything is yet, but it feels very familiar. Familiar enough to feel a little like home.

Liminal living

The period between Christmas and New Year is betwixt and between. On the threshold adjoining the old and the new, it is a time of transition and much uncertainty. It is a time for introspection and taking stock of the year past and making plans for the year to come. On one hand, we know it is an arbitrary marker of time, on the other we eagerly await a new ‘beginning’.

This period can be disorienting. We hardly know the day of the week as one day flows into the next. We are both restless and grateful for a chance to slow down. Family ties are strengthened or strained. Sometimes both at the same time. We nibble on leftovers, go to bed, rise at odd times and may have visitors staying for extended periods. Or we may be the visitors wondering whether we have overstayed our welcome. Time stretches, attenuates, and warps which gives this interminable interval such a nebulous almost dreamlike quality.

I too am hovering in this in liminal state. I am ready to move house, but that time hasn’t arrived. Shelves have been emptied and boxes are packed and I am in limbo. My spirit has left this house but not yet arrived at its next dwelling. It is what I imagine purgatory is like – neither here nor there. I am restless, in a state of flux, a fluid, fitful phase which objectively will be over before I know it. In the meantime, I feel as if I am stuck in eternal twilight, like a somnambulist caught in that transitional state between sleep and wakefulness.

Ch ch changes

I plan for changes for a long time before they happen. I just have a gut feeling that I will do something in a few years’ time and then the idea bounces around in my head without taking much shape. Sure, I daydream and imagine what it will be like, but generally I don’t take steps towards it until it leaps up with an urgency I would not have predicted the week before. Suddenly, things seem to fall into place, and I must play catch up to turn the vague idea into reality.

I was like that when I decided to go to university. I talked about it, had a nebulous dream and did nothing for five years. Then I made up my mind from one day to the next and plunged headfirst without testing the waters. While I am not a strong swimmer, I know I can always dogpaddle my way to the side of the pool. I have lived my life by this metaphor and I always make a bigger splash than I ever thought I could.

When I began my teaching career in my early 40s, I walked into my principal’s office on the very first day and announced I would be applying for a teacher exchange the moment I became eligible. I did nothing towards it until that time arrived and then applied on what seemed like a whim. The moment I was accepted, I went into her office and reminded her of the conversation we had five years earlier. She remembered it well and approved my application. That’s how in 2008 we moved to Switzerland.

I have done the same thing when I accepted the principal’s position at Lyndhurst and then bought my house after a cursory glance. It just felt right. I love that quirky house in which I live, and I have enjoyed some very happy years there. I can’t believe that I moved in seven years ago this month! But change is in the air.

That big pool is beckoning once more. Do I dare jump? Of course! For the past three years I have been mulling over where to next. Canberra seemed the logical spot. My daughter lives there and the place has grown on me. The first few times I visited, it seemed cold and sterile, too many apartments and too many roads that go in circles. The CBD felt soulless. It took me quite a while to find the hidden gems, mainly in the inner north but some also on the south side. I have grown to love the dog parks, the lake, the cafés and of course all the culture that only a capital city can to offer.

Without any hope of a successful outcome, I sent an email to the Director in charge of my work unit. I asked whether I could move to Canberra and keep my job at Orange as much of what we do can be done from home. To my amazement and delight she has come up with an even better plan. She has been able to transfer my job to Queanbeyan, less than half an hour’s drive from the ACT. All of the sudden, that nebulous future plan has come into sharp focus. The job starts in January. I will have to get my cottage ready for sale and move within six months.

I have started the clearing out process. I’m filling Otto bins with accumulated papers while some useful items to go to Charity. On the 19th of August, I will hold a garage sale and slowly but surely, I will whittle down excess baggage. After that, I will have to fix all those pesky things I have left for another day.

I have a place to go to, so I don’t have to worry about the Canberra end. After being somewhat inert for a couple of years, I will face plenty of upheaval in the next few months. There is nothing like a deadline to get me going.