At the beginning of the month we had a lovely visit from my good friend Marita who lives in Sydney. I got to meet her husband and gorgeous baby girl for the first time. We walked down through our bush to the beach, and then back up and along the bush walk that follows the cliff at the edge of the beach. I still pinch myself sometimes. I can't believe that we live so close to all of this.
I've been taking the dog for a quick walk along that bush walk most mornings. I can leave the kids watching TV for twenty minutes, (which doesn't seem too much like neglect when there's usually at least one other adult somewhere in the building!) and get a brisk walk in the bush.We walk along a winding path and then up a steep set of stairs to get to the view you see in the third photograph. That's a stand of young kauri trees right on the edge of the cliff. They are so small, they really look like they've only just begun and yet they could be one hundred, two hundred years old. Then we walk back down the stairs again and as we descend it's like entering a vast room, with the green canopy above us, and the morning sunlight streaming in, the gaps in the trees our windows.
It's really only just started feeling like summer. It rained for the first half of the month. We are going away to Mum's bach on the Manukau heads today, our first holiday. If we had a boat, we could boat over there in about twenty minutes. Instead we will drive back into town and all the way around this enormous harbour, and get to the other side in about an hour an a half. It seems funny to live on one side of the harbour, and holiday on the other, but would it matter if we spent our lives exploring and knowing only one small part of the world? Would that be any less fulfilling than knowing many places superficially? Actually, I want both. I want to know my corner of the world so well that I can read the land, the water, the trees like a book. And then I want to go everywhere else at least once.
I wrote last time about the madness of cleaning this huge house with the girls home on holiday, but mostly it's been anything but mad around here. The girls have got into this lovely groove of playing together and exploring and making things. They are more content and happy with themselves than I've seen for ages. I know most other mums will be saying that their kids can't wait to get back to school, and that they can't wait for them to go either, but I'm just not like that. The girls are are supposed to start school next week but to be honest, I'm having trouble drumming up any enthusiasm for it. The holidays have left me wistful and wondering, and that's all I have to say about that, for now.
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Hmm not sure how I feel about Lucy heading back to school either. Am enjoying the pleasure of taking each day as it comes. But I did start back at work this week which meant alarm and dragging kids to fit my timetable.
ReplyDeleteYour photos are beautiful. Each time we drive through your township Lucy looks out to see if she can see where her friend lives!!
I heard G may not be in room 2 this year??? :(
I only just spotted this! Those photos bring back the walk to me - the native bush is so beautiful. I've been thinking about both of us, walking and writing, counting steps (I have a pedometer for the 10,000 a day goal, which I manage about 80% of the time) and counting words, keeping track of them both...how walking feeds into writing, and how important it is to have that beautiful place to go to when you're walking by yourself, inside your head and in front of your eyes, so you can think things over. Keep walking and writing, hope you have a great holiday x
ReplyDeleteAnd to you both. I've spent much of my new year (new in many ways) in a hospital bed fighting off numerous infections. The trees are all deciduous, are therefore bare, here in the Midwest.
ReplyDeleteAnd then, as I was allowed to leave the hospital with my wife ( but not to sleep with her or prepare food), the snow. As I came home through the white-coated worsld with the bitterness, and the salt on the ground I felt happy, and missed the native bush. I'll have my arm back, and my leg and be able to count steps or kilometres in time (I sill refuse to count in miles).
But, you, Maritna, Idoya: Thanks for your kindnesses, thaks for keeping the germ of writing alive. Thank you for being alive, and me being able to think of you occupying the same earth.
CJB.