17. Jul, 2020

Water woman

Change has never been something that comes easily to me. With a mind constantly one step ahead of every move I make it means change becomes overwhelming at times and exhausting always.

My husband and I recently purchased a sea change residence with the idea it will be a perfect transition in the coming years towards retirement.

We have chosen to downsize…literally because our former home of 27 years was on an acre of land in a semi-rural community. And although our block was tranquil and serene, it did take effort to maintain it to the standards we liked. It also had a pool and while this was delightful for me in the summer, the upkeep added to our time-poor life.

I have and always will be a water woman. Having been brought up in a fishing and boating family, I have for awhile now felt the lure of water reaching its octopus like tentacles out to me, so when a recently built water-front reserve house in a suburb only twenty minutes from our acre came on the market, we jumped on it.

You could say that with such little time to act to secure the property, our decision was pretty much made for us. Water is at the core of everything I love, it centres and grounds me. That enticing call back to nature was in some ways a saviour to me over recent years. If you have read a few of my blogs, then you will know that I naturally had to answer the call.

Not much has really come together well for me over the past twelve years. Life has been full of adversity and challenges, so the idea of buying and selling houses after having spent twelve months trying to sell my mum’s after her death was rather daunting.

So, I went into the whole deal rather skeptical that things would go our way, but with a fatalistic view that if it didn’t work in our favour then it was not meant to be.

Do you believe in spiritual signs? My husband and I have commented on several occasions now, that my mum must be looking out for us. The process, as complicated as it seemed, came off without a glitch.

The offer on the new home was accepted straight away, as I had been able to glean some information from the agent that the owners were keen to sell, our finance surprisingly in this market, was approved, our existing house which we had just finished renovating with new carpet and paint sold to the first people who looked at it within two and a half weeks for what we needed to get to come out square. The caravan, which we decided for the moment that we no longer need was snapped up by the first people who looked at it for the price we had on it, and the ride-on mower…well…same story.

So, any wonder my friends and family tell me I could sell ice to Eskimos and reckon I have been gifted with the Midas touch.

I don’t feel a sense of entitlement about all this coming together, rather that something or someone greater than us is looking out for us. Could it be Mum?

A couple of nights after we moved into our new home, I was sitting on my alfresco deck which overlooks the water, I was alone and just as I looked up I witnessed a meteor shower or shooting star flash across the night sky and then the other day I paddled the kayak in our bay, escorted by a pod of dolphins…both were surreal experiences and I couldn’t help but think my Mum was up there somewhere watching out for me.

The transition from tree change to bay stay hasn’t been all smooth sailing, I have also been enveloped by a fog of grief.

As I move into the next leg of my life’s journey, I leave behind a home my boys called their family home and I guess I have felt a bit of separation anxiety. In my darkest days it was my safe place…the place I could retreat from the world and cloak myself in a layer of isolation, where I was able to down regulate my hyper-vigilant and anxiety riddled body, I would almost hibernate or cocoon myself into anonymity.

Now, in this brave new world, people expect things from me. To turn up, to participate, to live and to love life and sometimes that just isn’t me. Sometimes, just sometimes the walls are raised to save me from others and to save me from myself.

Rain falls silently as I tap the keys. Looking out my front window the boats in the bay face south-west. They are my new weathervane. The east-coast low that has rotated off our coastline for the past four days is beginning to settle and calm, the bay waters have stilled and the swamp oaks sway only gently in the easing breeze. Birds chatter, dogs bark, neighbours wave and cars pass and it seems like my new world is never still, for even the calmest of water still has currents circling beneath.

I am the calmest of still water, this water woman who is never still. With all this movement surrounding me I must find new ways to de-stress, to establish boundaries, to settle and calm.

Gently casting a stone in still water, I watch on closely witnessing the ripples. They are the epitome of nature. Forever moving and changing.

This water woman is looking forward to the changing season when the sun warms the water and I can literally regain my flow.

Life for me has changed remarkably over the past couple of years, I have lost my Mum, sold two houses and bought and relocated to a new one, begun studying and these are all big deals, yet although so much has changed, the foundation of my life has remained the same. My pillars, my family and friends still accept and love me and when my mind gets a little maudlin, I remind myself just how far I have come, through often incredible adversity, and that these hurdles I will also negotiate, I just have to give myself time, get back to nature and soak it in to the essence of my core.