November 30, 2017 - March 8, 2018
I'm sitting in front of the window getting ready to continue updating this blog...playing catch up is really what I'm doing and I find that I am quite adept at finding new ways to procrastinate. Please forgive me if I begin to be redundant, I can't remember what I've written and I'm choosing to just let my mind relax and allow whatever is to come to come naturally.
Wilson and I have been at this house sit since the end of November. We took over the sit from a lovely English family who had spent the Australian winter here (Jennie, Alan, and Charlotte, Charlotte who loves ice cream!). I had had reservations about taking over from another sitter originally but Jennie & Alan passed on a great deal of information and I felt much better. We had never spoken with the owners, communicating only through email, and our first communications once we arrived were a bit challenging as we needed to inform them of several things that were in need of attention. All of those things have been taken care of and things are running much smoother. We thought that we would meet the owners upon their return but unfortunately they needed to postpone their return for another month. Another couple, Louise and Max, who are from Belgium, will be taking over the sit thus sandwiching us in the middle. We've worked hard to maintain the property and the animals and I hope for a good review, but the fact that the owners will never meet us, get a true sense of us, doesn't sit well with me. I chalk this up as a lesson learned.
Although I speak of lessons learned, Wilson and I both agree that we are happy that we are here and neither of us has any regrets. Perhaps it's the thought of having no regrets that has prompted this post. I'm sitting in front of the window having just watched some sort of hawk chase a flock of birds around and I feel at peace. It's not the first time that I've had that feeling whilst here, but it seems more significant to me today as there is so much sadness and worry surrounding me right now.
Without going into too much detail, I am alone here right now Wilson flew to Philadelphia as there was a death in our family. The day after he left I was informed that my cousin had a heart attack. Both of these things came on the heels of concern for my sister's step-daughter and her health issues. Someone recently asked if there was anything that I missed regarding our current lifestyle and my answer was nothing, we're just happy to be healthy and happy to be able to see the world. A couple days later that answer changed....I miss being physically available to my friends and family when they need comforting. It's true that I often felt, even while present, there wasn't anything I could do but I realize that sometimes just being around is all that is needed. I don't think that I was ever a very comforting person and not because I don't feel, rather I feel deeply and just don't know how to externally communicate it. Sharing feelings doesn't come naturally. I often fear (times like this exacerbates it) that my choice to leave my life as it was behind is sometimes judged by people as a sense of abandonment, perhaps even a lack of feelings. If this is true for anyone who might read this, please know that that is not the case, when I am needed I am there in Spirit. That presence of Spirit is, I believe, a much stronger presence than my physical person could ever be and I hope there is some comfort that can be found in that.
I know that I veered off from discussing life in Port Fairy but I felt it necessary to somehow share a bit of my state of mind....Back to Port Fairy...
We are taking care of a Shetland Pony, named Chelsea along with four horses, Jet, Jellic, Echo, and Jade. Chelsea is very friendly but the other four are a bit skittish around people. I have worked hard at getting them to trust me, allow me to walk amongst them, and touch them. There is a great sense of accomplishment that goes along with gaining that trust not only in having achieved it but also in alleviating some long standing fears that I've had (I fell off a horse when I was a child).
We also have five chooks (that's chickens in Australian) and a rooster. Well to be honest we've had two roosters as our first rooster died. Rocky, as that is what we called him, was the best rooster Wilson and I had ever been around. He wasn't mean at all, just went about his business in taking care of his ladies. We're not sure what happened (the owner thought maybe a snake) but I went in to let them out of the enclosure and he was dead. This is the first time anything like this had happened and it truly sucks to have to inform someone of the death of one of their animals....it's even worse when you find out it was one of the kid's. I also felt the loss too, I regarded Rocky as my own and I had some how failed him. I didn't even have a picture of him...having meant to take one, thinking I had time, but never did. Rocky took care of the five chooks; Mary, Martha, Jackie, Abigal, and Michelle. Wilson having named them after first ladies. Once the chooks were on their own Mary and Abigal proved to be the more dominant of those who remained. They wandered off in places they had never gone before and at one point I had a panic attack thinking that we had lost them....Wilson and I searched all their "hiding spots" to no avail. Wilson walked along the road calling them and I searched in the taller grass on the property just to find them in the paddock behind the garden area....Clearly these girls need a strong male presence 😃. The owner had a friend with an extra rooster, which she delivered to us. The new rooster, I named him Samson, is only a few months old and has yet to exert himself as the dominant. For the first two weeks he would sit on top of the food bin, pooping, running away anytime one of the chooks came near. Mary and Abigal are the worst tormentors, although I think Abigal has a secret crush. You can hardly blame Abigal as Samson is a most handsome rooster....but really, what would John think? Samson is now coming into his own but I think he still has a long way before becoming the ruler of the roost....he's not even crowing yet.
I have found great joy in watching not only the horses and chooks but all the other animals that we watch...so many beautiful birds; Cockatoos, Galahs, Australian Magpies (they're huge, about the size of a seagull, they're loud and mean, but still beautiful), hawks, wrens, and our personal favorite, the willie wagtail. We also wake up to bunnies in the yard (although they poison the bunnies and we've found three dead along our path around the property). We've seen one snake on the patio and signs of others...interesting but not bothersome. We also found a dead rat in one of our water troughs...we have poison in the shed to get rid of the rats...he was dead so it wasn't a big deal.
Things that are not so nice and/or interesting to find or be around are the flies, moths, grasshoppers, crickets, and spiders. We could not be outside at times because of the flies swarming everywhere. We attempted to take a bike ride and had them flying in our mouths, ears, and nostrils....Lou, our neighbor, was so nice he brought us some bug repellent and gave me a hat with corks hanging from it. Prior to the hat I had bought some mosquito netting and was tying it around my face to keep them out...The flies not only swarmed on us, they attached themselves to our clothes and would find their way into the house. There seems to be different hatches that happen at different times because once the flies decreased we saw an influx of moths then crickets. All of these things happen inside as well as outside, as the house is not very tight. By far the worst for me is the crickets in the house. They are the size of a nickel if not a quite a quarter and they jump around the house annoying/startling me. Their movements are so random they catch me off guard. They also make a lot of noise. Lastly we have spiders in the house (out of the house too, one especially big furry one startled me at the coop yesterday but Mary snapped it right up and ate it. We had one in the car too). We've found two of the big furry ones in the house all the others have been little ones creating webs in corners. Right from the beginning we worked hard to control the spiders having bought a brush that cleans around the ceiling and regularly vacuuming. All of these creatures Wilson has tried to relocate outside if possible while I mostly just vacuum them up. I tried "saving" the crickets but it got to be too many of them and it's a whole lot easier to vacuum them up. I really hope all this insect killing isn't bad Karma.
Along with taking care of the animals and "taking care" of the insects we take care of the house and gardens. We share and in some instances divvy up the duties; dishes, laundry, cooking, vacuuming, dusting, etc. Wilson grew a garden filled with lettuce, radishes, tomatoes, spinach, chard, beets, zucchini, regular peppers, jalapenos, and cucumbers. It's amazing how fast things grow here, we've been eating regularly from the garden. Unfortunately the high winds that came through here last week did a bit of a number on some of the plants...they continue to produce but don't look as pretty as they once did. The garden is also infested with little green stink bugs and these black and red bugs that we were killing on the patio. I don't think there's much we can do and with Wilson away I'm even less inclined to do anything...I go out and collect the fruits of his labour but get creeped out by the crawlies. While Wilson maintains the vegetable garden I maintain the lawn. I water regularly in an effort to keep the lawn green. Areas which the hoses do not reach are all dried brown. According to Lou and Isobel the lawn has never looked so green at this point in the summer....this makes me feel good. I also mow the lawn which is not a big deal because for a period of time in the middle of the stay we didn't need to do it as it did not grow in the heat. It's cooler now and has rained a bit so I'll need to mow one last time before we hand over the reigns. I mowed a week and a half ago and thought that would be the last, but not so. It was requested that we prime the posts on the patio, which I did. It was also requested that we get rid of thistles in the paddocks, which I'm working on. This sit is not a normal sit...it's more of a caretaking situation as the owners are basically living somewhere else the majority of the year (a five year deployment as I understand it) and come back here only for a short period of time. By far the house and garden/lawn work take up the majority of our time vs. the animals. It's been like having our own home...but it's not. For some reason I actually find it easier to take care of other people's homes. I feel better about doing something nice for someone, while I could have done the same thing with our home and it felt suffocating. It's not that I didn't love my home, but knowing that you're doing something short term and because you want to is far different then feeling like you have to do it all the time.
Enough for now....I'll follow this with some pictures of our Australian home and pets along with photos of some of the places that we've been....I also promise not to get too deep in my thoughts. Having written some of them down has allowed me to let some of them go and/or look at them differently. For those of you who don't write or journal I suggest you try. I find I get to know myself more and more the more I write...especially if I can stop myself from over thinking things and let what will flow, flow.
