Don't be like Bush Babe (Valentine's edition)

Today was apparently Valentine's Day...

I know this because I went to a dinner last night with my beloved (and our progeny). Not so much a gaze-into-each-other's-eyes romatic dinner, as a sit-around-with-friends-and-get-waited-on-by-schoolkids dinner. It was fabulous.

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It was a fundraiser for a local small school (not ours, a big THREE-teacher school nearby). An event which cost (are you ready?) $35 per couple and $5 per child - fees which included a three-course-meal (really nice and well-served) lots of fairy lights and candles, pizza for the little 'uns and babysitting. We ate and drank while others cared for our kids and cleaned up after us. The best value I have ever experienced!

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So we knew it was Valentine's Day because that was last night's dinner theme. But we aren't really into the whole card-giving, bunch-of-flowers, romantic stuff. Today started and ended much as any other day of the year. Not that we don't feel the love (she hastened to add) but we don't save it for a special day in the year. It's pretty random in our household - when the mood strikes. And let's just say it rarely takes the form of a Hallmark card.

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If you subject yourself to my twittering, you'll know that a few days ago Mr Incredible offered to take care of the kids and cook dinner, while I went out in the paddocks to take photos for a couple of hours. It was the kind of offer he knew would ring my bells. Seriously, I couldn't get out of the place fast enough. My excitement was slightly over-the-top - afternoons (as any Mum of young kids knows) is an exhausting parade of unpacking schoolbags, dealing with tired and hungry offspring through food-and-drink regeneration programs, squeezing in last-minute washing loads, preparing dinner and wondering if that sunset will last long enough for you to get a shot once the kids are out of the bath. (For the record, it hardly ever does.)

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So I went - hastily grabbing my camera bag and thanking my husband profusely on the way out of the door. He gave me a satisfied 'Why yes, I AM Husband of the Year' smile. I leapt into his ute and took off in a cloud of happy dust. I made it about five kilometres before I realised I had forgotten the parcel I was supposed to deliver to my brother en route. (Because I have to mult-task, that's why!).

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So I hauled the Toyota around and headed back to the house. With a wry smile, I grabbed the parcel and waved goodbye for a second time. My family collectively shook their heads at my forgetfulness. The word 'typical' rose in little thought bubbles above their heads.

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I got about three kilometres into the much-anticipated photo trip (I had about an hour's window of great afternoon light) when I stopped to take my first shot. Fabulous cobalt blue skies, soaring jet streams towering over rippling hills of succulent green grass... I pressed my trigger finger. Nothing. I looked down at the camera. No memory card.

Are you kidding me?

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Around I turned again, pressing the pedal to the floor to waste as little time as possible on the SECOND return to the house. Head down, I dashed into the office, mumbling something at my slightly-astonished family (is she EVER going to leave?) and out the door again. I slid the card into the back of the Nikon to check I had enough space - yup. A goer.

Off I headed again (fingers firmly crossed as I drove).

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My main challenge for the outing was to get shots of cattle for promotion for our stud. Lucky for me, the recently branded calves and their mothers were grazing peacefully near the road.

YES. I was in business.

They milled around the ute as I snapped happily away...

Lovely. Green with happy bovines. Sweet.

Pretty polled heads posing in the sunshine.

Happy days.

After gathering a nice bunch of cow shots, I drove off. I allowed myself to indulge in a little 'landscape' action (offering some much-needed relief to those who have overdosed on my Shallow Depth of Field period last week).

Bottle trees reaching above the clouds.

More boabs, rampant green grass and red roads.

Almost a sensory overload.

Well it was actually. For my camera.

It grunted, it groaned.

It stopped altogether.

Flat battery.

Yuh huh.

You heard me right.

The World's Most Impetuous Photographer failed to check ANYTHING.

I immediately sacked myself (several times actually),

And then drove home, muttering furiously about wasted opportunities.

I drove by the magnificence of utterly still water in roadside dams perfectly reflecting the dusky skies above?

You will just have to trust me - it was amazing. Amazingly frustrating with NO CAMERA.

Then I looked down and panicked - the low-fuel light was on.

(I braced myself and called in, only to be reassured via two-way radio that there was a second tank full of fule if I just pressed a button. I promptly sacked myself as a bushie as well.)

So please. In matters of photography, or romance, or country life...

Just ignore me, okay?

Because (to steal a line from a fellow Aussie blogger)

the chances I'll learn from this Valentine's escapade?

Approximately...

(Not the) Bees' Knees

I made an allusion recently (not to be confused with an illusion, which is what I have achieved if you think I have the slightest clue about anything website-related): an allusion to KNEES and CALVES. At the time I made the reference (written pre-branding) I thought I was being fabulously clever. 'Knee-deep in calves' I said. An orthopod's standard line, no doubt.

Har, har-de-har.

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Now before I dive headlong (another very bad pun, as you shall eventually see) into this story, I should briefly mention that I am quite lame. No, really, in a PHYSICAL sense. (You lot are so cruel sometimes). You see there was an 'incident' that involved a major collision when I was six months pregnant with Dash - an incident that left me with injuries to my right leg resembling (according to my surgeon) the outcome of a bad motorcycle accident. Yar.

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Three complete knee reconstructions later (and I'm not talking about wimpy anterior cruciate repairs, people - this was posterior cruciate with lateral corner reconstruction for those in the know. Times three.) I walk with a limp. Some days you can hardly notice it (at least that's what I tell myself) but mostly it's easy to spot. I cannot crouch, I cannot run. The blasted thing doesn't bend properly or hold steady under impact. And it would qualify as the ugliest knee in Australia quite easily - the scars criss-crossing it resembles Frankenstein's artwork. But you know, it holds me up (no mean feat) and many people endure much more than a bung knee, so I try not to whinge too much about it.

(OK, except for today. Today is a whinge-fest. Sorry.)

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Anyhoo. That's the background to this post.

(Need a coffee refill yet?)

Long-story-short: I have one crook knee.

Please note: this photo has nothing really to do with this story, except that was taken about 7 metres from the 'scene of the crime'. And it shows how babies are like narcotics, addictive and they briefly take the pain away.

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Day One of the branding went great guns - everyone took their posts in the production line and with barely a hiccup. One person bringing the calves into the race. One kid opening and shutting the race gate. A man on the branding cradle, with one operating the final race gate and undertaking castration and vaccination duties. One man on ear-tagging and marking duties. Me on tag scanning and data recording duties, with a young off-sider loading the ear-tag pliers and handing them on to the appropriate adult. One calf processed every three minutes (give or take) with little fuss. Smooth as silk, baby.

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Day Two was to be a little less smooth. Everyone was on the same jobs, but the kids were a bit distracted. They kept swapping jobs and we eventually sent them off to play nearby. Then a 10-week-old heifer came into the race. And while she was not huge, she had an attitude. Perhaps she woke up on the wrong side of the hill. Perhaps someone called her names on the walk from the paddock to the yards. We will never know. She was just cranky. Burr under the tail, cran-keeeeee.

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We (well, my brother) let this feisty little redhead out of the cradle after her treatment, and she burst forth with intent, looking for someone to take her pent-up adolescent fury out on. First in line: four working dogs tied up along the fence. Ram. Ram. Ram. Ram. She butted each til they hung back on their chains out of her reach with an 'are you kidding me, we chase YOU, you mad bitch' look on their faces. Dad looked up from his job and saw the dogs were causing a problem. So he went over to move them, not realising the degree of carnage this otherwise-sweet-looking girl-calf was wreaking. She spotted him, about-faced and ram-RAM. The little horror bowled him over, taking his legs right out from under him.

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Everything suddenly went into slow-motion. (I suspect the scene from this moment on would have taken out the final of Funniest Home Videos, had someone thought to roll the camera...). Dad has had a lot of injuries over the years, and while I (logically) realised that a calf wouldn't do enormous damage to a grown man, I couldn't watch him being hit. The other men nearby were looking the other way - watching the next calf come up the race into the branding cradle- and didn't realise what was happening just metres away.

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I think I yelled out for someone to do something as the heifer took aim over and over. No-one heard over the bellowing of the waiting calves. Then, by magic, I was out there, beside Dad, wielding my blue clipboard folder, yelling at the calf and belting it over the head to STOP. Even as I did it, I realised how ludicrous it was. Like a blue clipboard folder was the weapon of the century.

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The calf stopped her assault on Dad alright. (Can you feel what is about to happen next? I knew, but there was little I could do about it. Lord knows I couldn't move fast enough to avoid it.) She looked up, hesitated about 0.002 seconds, and them erupted. At me. And with everything she had, she let me have it. RAM! ... Apparently the blue folder went flying, pages flapping. I also flew sideways and hit the ground like a heavyweight sack of potatoes. Two prone bodies lying there in the dirt, grounded by a cranky calf.

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My brother and Mr Incredible apparently came to my rescue when they finally realised what was going on, and manhandled her off to the rest of the calves. (Where I hope she sorted out her issues with whoever called her names this morning, or at least had a decent counselling session with her sistahs.)

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I, however, did not move. I knew something was amiss. She had rammed me at knee-height. In my good leg. And it wasn't good anymore. My GOOD leg, people... as I tried to catch my breath and waved away those trying to make me stand up, I darned near cried. I moved it gingerly and the pain stabbed hotly radiating from the kneecap, down my shin and up my thigh. Single words floated through my numbed brain.

You. Are. Kidding. Me... Injured. Again. Bloody. Idiot.

(And yes. That is the edited version.)

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I hobbled pathetically back to the chair I had been working from. I iced the knee and tried to elevate it as we continued to work. I discovered I could stand but any sideways movement or pivoting was painful. (Over a week later it still is.) We managed to finish the jobs, that day and the following 5 days. I used a stick to walk as I scanned cows crush-side (the walkway towards the dip where they get treated for fly and ticks) and as we mothered the calves (matched the calf's newly allotted ear tag and brand numbers to their mum's identifying numbers).

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There was no way I was stopping to visit a doctor - who would not be able to do much anyway except tell me to keep off it. Which was not really possible. We don't have masses of people to help and this is the best and most important job I get to do here. If we don't record things right at this point, it makes it very hard to provide the detailed information needed (by buyers or for registration purposes) for our stud cattle. Plus I love it.

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However, I now walk like an old lady - lurching from side to side as my brain attempts to work out which side I should favour as I move. Stairs are a slow task as I haul myself side-to-side, the least-sore leg getting step-and-hauling duties. It's a gorgeous mental picture I know! And I know I need to organise a scan to see what kind of tear has happened to the inside of my kneecap. Gosh-darn-and-blast-it-all.

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So there you go.

Undeniable proof that Bush Babe is the lamest blogger you know.

(On OH so many levels!)

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Moral of the story: be very careful what puns you use in life.

They may come back to bite you in the knee-cap.

(Boom-boom).

Happy Oz Day!!!

Where will you be today - January 26?

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I will drag my weary butt out of bed early, wave Mr Incredible off on another branding mission, hand the kids over to Nana and head to an Australia Day breakfast at one of our tiny local towns. This wonderful event (run by our one-teacher school's P&C) has been nominated in the Local Community Group or Event category for the Australia Day Awards - up against some pretty stiff competition. Our community might be small in numbers and pretty widespread, but they are fiercely involved in keeping the spirit of our often-overlooked area alive and kicking. So it will be kinda like me barracking for Leighton Hewitt last night - be great if we won, but the opposition is pretty amazing so you won't mind if they take home the trophy (or whatever it is you get at this kind of thing).

Anyway - I will be wearing this little number...

True Blue, through and through!

Although it will have a bit of a Dane spit stain on it....

*Sigh*

HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY, my friends.

Tease...

I might have mentioned things are a little hectic and dusty

and frayed at edges here at Granite Glen this week...

It's stud branding time which means that we muster in all our best cows and calves, separate mums from bubs and then 'mark' the youngsters so we can identify them and follow their progress over the coming years.

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It's full on and furious.

It's hectic work.

It's hot work.

It's very, very loud work.

But, occasionally, in the midst of the chaos and cacophony,

you can find peace and silence,

if just for a moment.

And here we have a rare BB image with her most darling baby niece, Paris...

and yes, I was doing a little gentle nibbling here people.

Can you blame me?

She's scrumptious!

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Most posting when the dust settles slightly -

be assured/scared...

there are LOTS of photos...

Granite Glen Greeting...

Wishing you and yours peace and joy.

Failing that, happy noise, much laughter and full bellies.

It's already Christmas Day here.

Santa's not-so-little helper has been very busy wrapping and labelling... and she need some shut-eye! Before the overwhelming excitement of my offspring hits 10 on the Richter Scale.

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See you the other side of the chaos...

Among my many annoying habits...

...is my uncanny ability to land a really good park - it's like an Olympic sport to me.

I despise bad parks.

And I have not lost my touch despite being bush-bound for three years.

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A few basic good-park rules:

Circling is OK.

Stalking IS allowed.
But crankiness is NOT.

Never, ever.

(Good parks come to those who are patient and calm.)

Most importantly, always, ALWAYS go for the best park in the house.

Or in this case, in Chermside Shopping Centre during pre-Christmas madness.

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Despite a few squillion others shopping there yesterday, we landed this little beauty:

Honey, it just doesn't get any better than that.
Step out. Onto the pedestrian crossing. Through front doors.

Oh yeah!

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(Another annoying habit might be my crowing about my parking achievements.

Let's explore that in another post, shall we?)

Roads to Somewhere...

I have a weird kind of fascination...

well, I have a number really.

But the one I am talking about today is roads.

My love for them is reflected in my vast collection of snapshots of them.

I even have a whole blog category for them, for heaven's sake!

(I wonder if there is a name for such a strange fascination?)

Bitumen, dirt, straight, windy...

Smack bang dead-straight in the middle of Australia,

curling lazily around the cliffs of Italy,

creeping sleepily through English villages, or

etched into the openness of American grazing land, I love 'em.

I realise there are more aesthetically pleasing things in the world.

But roads... they promise. They tease.

It's pretty much guaranteed that something fascinating is waiting 'round the corner.

Through the mist.

Over the hill.

Beyond the crest.

Perhaps it's just a row of native gums forming a bush avenue.

Or an old shed guarding the sweep of black tar near a town.

Even roads buried under the weight of slow-moving rubber in a city somewhere, help form a complex web of mystery and sure delivery to somewhere important, exciting, necessary, even life-saving.

My very favourite view of a road, is seeing it disappear into a sky.

You may have noticed?

I don't know why, it just seems kind of magical to me.

The possibilities seem endless and exciting to me.

Almost like an about-to-do-the-rollercoaster-dip tummy churn.

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Of course the most loved stretch of road holds no mystery to me at all.

It's the road home.

MY road.

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What does your road say?

And where is your favourite stretch of highway or by-way?

Facade Fascination

I am somewhere on the road - possibly helping a gaggle of bush kids navigate a theme park as you read this. And I will be endeavouring to find moments that offer the kind of 'zen-ness' described below... wish me luck!

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While it may seem to most of you that I am obsessed with all things cattle and kid-related, there is another side to me I like to unleash every so often...

It's my fascination

with

(you ready for it?)

buildings

Yep.

It's hard to believe,

but I was actually a student of Architecture

for a very brief period in my adolescent life.

(No cracks about how many centuries ago THAT was please!)

While I quickly realised, even in my pimple-faced naivete,

that I was as suited to this career

as an ashtray is to a motorbike,

I have never lost my ability to

glean pleasure from a sweet structure.

It kind of takes me away from the manure and the flies

and the sweat to another place.

A place that mesmerises with engineered lines, sweet facades of man's creations,

erected by those who understand how to carefully impose on and utilise Mother Nature.

I love that buildings can be seriously practical and sweepingly beautiful.

Order and art, if you like.

These shots were snapped when I was dashing through 'Rock Vegas'

on an editing trip for a little project I was doing recently...

many of our coastal centres boast lovely 'colonial feel' structures like these...

I just adore sandstone.

It's possibly my favourite building material.

I just want to touch it.

Especially when it is used with affection and respect and a little vision.

Like this...

And this dome... so lovely.
The design is an incredible contrast to the

painted weatherboard and corrugated iron

of most of the residential structures of the town,

but it still 'fits' this centre in the centre of Queensland.

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And this series of buildings is lovely too...

creamy and cool and solid and strong.

Don't you love the tropical feel of the palms planted into the footpath?

Then, as I drive slowly along the almost empty street,

taking in the arches and the pillars, the mouldings and the balustrades,

I am suddenly thrust back into my reality ...

And with just one sign,

the spell is broken...

And I can smell the red dust of Granite Glen once more.

And I wonder:

What takes you away from your everyday?

Deadlines and (bovine) bonuses...

This last couple of days have been spent away from Granite Glen - if you have been checking my twitters at all, then you might know the lengths to which I went to avoid packing properly til the last minute. It's a specialty of mine, but this time - when our darling son was heading one direction for a 5-day long camp (his very first), our sweet daughter heading another for a 'sweepover' at her cousins', and Mr Incredible and I driving a third direction for various bovine-related business (before Violet and I head for the Big, Big Smoke for a couple of days) ... well, it very nearly sent me into meltdown.

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As you have no doubt deduced, I did not.

Meltdown completely, that is, although my washing machine may never be the same. (I actually boasted publicly that for a brief couple of hours, NOT ONE THING was dirty in my house... laundry, I mean. And if THAT ain't worth twittering, my dear feathered friends, then NOTHING is!)

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So where was I?

Oh yes. Heading northwards towards our bovine business events.

Hopefully with the correct suitcases.

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Among my tasks here (as I tap away on my staggery old laptop in a town 300km from home) is to present a promotional DVD to fellow cattle breeders. The same promo which is (fingers crossed) being shown somewhere in Paraguay this week to promote Australia and Aussie Brangus cattle. To explain, in a couple of years time our cattle association is holding a World Congress (think 'conference' but with heaps of laconic Aussie hospitality, side-trips to cattle properties/ranches, a couple of tourist attractions, and plenty of beef-related gourmet feasts). And we want people to come. From other countries. Or else the 'world' part of the title will look a little superfluous!!

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The promotional DVD for this project has kept me fairly busy in the past few weeks. The aim is to provide the information and intrigue needed to entice Brangus breeders from around the world to check out how us Aussies do it!

(Breed Brangus cattle, I mean... what did you think? Sheesh!)
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I had visions for this clip - grand, grand visions. Sweeping footage of our landscape from snow-capped mountains to vast red deserts, clear blue skies and plains of green grass (oh, and sleek black and red cattle, natually!). These magnificent image would be set to some fabulous background instrumental from our own Keith Urban or Lee Keraghan?

Can you see it?

Feel it?

*sigh*

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It all started off well. We atttended a well-known sale and got some great footage with a real Aussie flavour...

Our cameraman hard at work as the bulls are sold in the timber sale ring.

Please note the green grass - courtesy of a sprinkler! The only green grass outside a houseyard lawn for hundreds of miles!

Bids being taken and RM Williams boots in foreground...

Ooohhh... he's nice!

(But more on him later...)

And even billies on the boil - how 'Aussie bush' is that?

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Of course, as an Aussie Prime Minister once said:

Life wasn't meant to be easy...

and that sure rang true for this project.

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Not only were my timelines extremely short,

and our budget not QUITE up for sending a cameraman around the entire country,

but a guy we had lined up to help out was in a bad car accident

(he is recovering thank goodness,

but gave everyone a terrible fright, not least himself)

and there was THIS little weather event...

... when the lights went out for a few days

thanks to the enormous duststorm that swallowed up the East Coast of Australia.

It put paid to about half of the location shoots we had organised.

The timing was bizarrely immaculate.

Like Mother Nature was messing with me.

(In case you are wondering, I did get a grip and realise that perhaps a duststorm hitting half a continent was probably not aimed PERSONALLY at me.

Cause Mother Nature knows I generally love her work.

But this dust storm business?
Just not funny when you want your cattle gleaming in the sunshine

and your skies royal blue!

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Nonetheless, our intrepid cameraman Brad soldiered through and after a few hundred kilometres and many, many emails, we finally (within an hour or so of deadline) got the thing done. The end result is not EXACTLY what I had planned, but it has sleek black and red cattle, some mustering Aussie-style, bottle trees, kangaroos, and a cute blond kid with no front teeth entreating the viewer to:

"Come to Othtralia, to thee my Branguth".

(Wonder who that could possibly be?)

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And tomorrow - as the promo goes to air in Paraguay - I present the finished product to our event committee...

And I feel just like I did as that final load of washing

went into the dryer late at night Sunday.

Kinda relieved but afraid to relax and celebrate too much...

Sure, it's DONE.

But is it ENOUGH?

Or will it all need to be DONE AGAIN in the very near future!

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Perhaps I could spin a variation on Forrest Gump's famous line...

Life is like a basket of laundry...

You never know if the job is EVER done.

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Oh... and THIS guy...

he's waiting at Granite Glen for us when we finish this week of Mad Travelling.

Cause we found time in amongst all that video stuff to put our finger up at that auction.

And we nabbed this gorgeous beast...

He well might give Elvis a run for his money!

Wee Little Worlds

I am supposed to be getting organised for a humungous week of action.

I am supposed to be folding and labelling and cleaning.

And packing for a whole week away from Granite Glen.

...

Instead I am here sharing some madness with you.

It's all Katy's fault.

Katy Potaty sent a suggestion to me via Twitter (yes, I am all kinds of twit) last week which managed to steal an hour of my time late one night...

It was this link with the following message:

This is a great photoshop tutorial. Great for your ranch photos!
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(Amendment: Katy is NOT American, but seems to have been heavily influenced in her language by all things Yank...my mission is to have her saying 'property' instead of 'ranch' by the end of this week!)

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Intrigued, I clicked and looked and discovered a WHOLE NEW WORLD.

In fact, it shows you how to make your own new worlds!!!

Think I've gone nuts (nuts-er?)?

The tutorial showed me yet ANOTHER corner of Photoshop

I had not explored, and described pretty simply how to turn this:

into this:

How funky is that?? A wee little globe!

With a wee little church and a wee little tree...

(I've gone all Scottish, I'm not sure why!)
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So of course I had to try something else...

This panoramic crop was more the proportions recommended in the tutorial...

Tee hee hee...

This one makes me smile!

It's a bit Ettamogah Pub-ish... what do you think?

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This trick is a little bit addictive...

And I suddenly feel like Horton,

in Horton Hears A Who

(anyone else Dr Suess nuts?)

where an elephant discovers a whole world on a speck of dust.

(I am the elephant in this scenario, in case you are wondering!)

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Shall we try one more?

This one is looking a little more Down the Rabbit Hole meets the Outback.

A little surreal?

Actually it looks a little like an eyeball, no?

It's time to stop messing with the world methinks...

and start packing!

Sounds of Driving...

It's late... my brain is a little fried from trying to help edit a promotional video for our cattle. More on that down the track. First, I thought I might share a little of what I have been singing along to in the Prado throughout my 600+ kilometre round trip today...

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Thankfully, I had the car to myself. Nobody's sensibilities were adversely affected by my terrible karaoke voice - although cannot vouch for those in other cars subjected to the vision of a woman in a white tank top flying past them lip-synching wildly to the following artists:

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Firstly a little U2.. .

Oooooh The Sweetest Thing...

"Blue eyed boy meets brown eyed girl... ooohhhh oh.." *

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Then a bout of Guy Sebastian

"In the Midnight Hour" *

"I’m gonna wait 'til the stars come out... See them twinkle in your eyes..."

That boy can hit a falsetto that makes my eyes water!

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Then, of course, some Dooby Brother's

China Grove...

Truly one of the all-time great driving songs!

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Tell me...

What music do you drive to?

What rocks your socks, makes you jive as you drive?

And (most importantly) are you as bad a singer as me?

Waiting your reply with bated breath...

BB

*Would totally love to show these clips here but the rotten scoundrels have disabled embedding - some music companies are just no fun at all!

Moments... and the Miracle of Motherhood.

I feel a little strange today...

Like I need to share something with my blog buddies, but aware that I am not completely in control of who reads my words... aware that sharing something personal on the web is a calculated risk.

But what is life without a little risk?

And what is a story without some real explanation?

And what is an explanation without the pinpointing of pivotal moments?

So *deep breath* here I go.

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I make comments sometimes in the body of my posts that allude to my past, that assume a knowledge of who I am in the Real World. Which is fine for those who know me in that world. But is no doubt kinda cryptic for my internet friends. Of course Bush Babe is real - a part of me that reflects the bits of me I want reflected... my mother assures me that it's pretty close to the real thing. (I add this just so you know I am not being a total fraud!!) The real me does take lots of photos, does adore her husband and kiddos, does forget things a lot, does strain against rules and authority on occasion.

All this is true.

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But I am aware that I skim. I skim a lot.

It's easy to let a cute photo deflects attention from the real story ... and I am usually so busy I allow it to happen. I think: I really should explain that a bit better, maybe tomorrow, when I have more time, when seventy gazillion people aren't calling out for my attention on two-way radios and telephones and emails and around my ankles?

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I am no less busy today, but thought It's Time.

Time to put a little dent in that shiny, shiny BB facade. Cause Lord knows I am far from perfect. Or shiny. At least in winter (gotta love that oily olive skin!).

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I mentioned in my last post that I am the person (I consider) least likely to be a parent. This is no throwaway line. I feel it to my gut. It's a role that for most of my life was unimaginable.

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I was a tomboy growing up: Dad's 'right hand man'. Never wore skirts or jewelry much. I was a very outdoorsy, physical kid - riding horses, climbing, exploring, swimming. And I always had my head a little in the clouds. Always dreamed and yearned to discover what the world had to offer ME. Ached for MORE of something I did not yet understand.

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So while the girls from my childhood tittered over boyfriends, got married, had children, made homes for themselves... I did not. I barely even had a boyfriend. I don't really know why. I suspect I was quite introverted and unsure of everything except that I needed MORE. I grew up in a family of enormous personalities. I got overwhelmed sometimes. Basically I had not much to offer. I was a stranger to myself.

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So I ventured, timidly at first, into the Greater World. I studied. I worked waitressing to help put myself through uni. I quit study, found a new passion in my photography and journalism, studied some more. Worked at a job, a career, I adored. Met lots of amazing people, delved into new cultures, travelled, exploring the world and amazingly discovering myself.

...

I discovered I am a fiercely loyal friend. A hard worker. And a half-okay cook who adores Italian food. A lover of good chardonnays and long dinner parties and Aussie Pub Rock. A follower of rugby. A terrible golfer. A fun girlfriend. But not really a Potential Wife for any of those boyfriends who would have been Serious Contenders. Can't put my finger on WHY... it always felt wrong. I just couldn't see myself as a Wife. Or a Mother. Sure I liked kids, but was never the one to whom people passed their babies. I didn't cluck. I took photos, nicely distant from the soft, needy, helpless little souls.

...

My father fretted slightly at my lack of plans for adding to the family line. When was I going to stop 'fluffing around' and settle down? I loved my life and laughed at his less-than-subtle hints. I was busy doing Something Important, chasing my career, broadening my horizons. My mother was much more understanding... I suspect if she had born into a different generation she would have been a full-blown career chick too... she gently gave me the space to be the person I needed to be. Encouraging me to ignore the pressure to wed and procreate until the time was right. I think she thought the time would eventually come when her eldest daughter would succumb to Love and Marriage. But her daughter didn't. Not for a moment.

...

I also discovered along my life's journey that I am physically far from perfect. I don't mean this in a cosmetic sense (although that is true also) but in a very real, functional sense. I won't go into full detail here (another confession on this to come, I suspect) but I suffered from a condition that took literally years to diagnose. It was called Arnold Chiari Malformation. Basically my brain had a sort of hernia, giving me crippling headaches, affecting my breathing, and messing with my hormones pretty chronically. I had surgery. Big Deal surgery. And I slowly came back to 'normal'... but the changes it made to me were long-lasting. The doctors knew very little about the condition (I think I was the second person ever operated on for it in Australia) but I was warned I might have trouble having children. That seemed like the least of my concerns at the time - I was happy to be able to spend a day without feeling like my head would blast off the top of my neck. But that fertility warning would come back to haunt me.

...

Even when I met Mr Incredible, I still couldn't picture myself in the roles of Partner and Parent. Sure I wanted to be with him. I fought that for a while too though... our courtship was filled with passion and great food, uncertainty and independence, seperations and heartfelt reunions. It took years before we both quit fighting it, and settled down.

...

And then one day, in the stressy lead-up to our wedding, I saw something. A moment which would change the way I saw my life's path. An ordinary/extraordinary moment when I saw my sister with her daughter. My darling sister was going through a terrible time, trying to support me in my pre-marital dramas while enduring a relationship breakdown. And her sweet little girl, whose birth I had been present at and who I really thought of as Almost Mine, whose enormous black-brown eyes have always been able to reduce me to jelly. They were there at my house together, helping with something or other. Maybe it was making candles. Or stuffing envelopes. I cannot recall and it doesn't really matter. What matters is what happened in that moment.

...

An 18-month-old 'Salina said or did something sweet for her Ma, her innocent, plump face turned upward, eyes pleading, looking for a response from my sister. It prompted Jeanie to lean down and enfold her daughter in her arms. She had this LOOK on her face ... this closed-eye, lost-in-the-moment, relieved kinda look that said:

"I have you... and that's enough".

...

And suddenly I felt it too. A tug. A glimpse. A glimpse of a world beyond Me. A bigger world. Maybe not better, but different. More. Scarier. But absolutely Intriguing. Certainly Special. Something I could possibly share with the one person I had really let into my life. My husband-to-be. And that warning from years earlier came back and echoed silently around my ears. I held that new vision at bay. I couldn't let myself hope. Hoping for something I had never ever hoped for before...

...

Of course you already know the 'end' of the story. We did fall pregnant. Quite quickly as it turned out.... and you've never seen someone more shocked in your life the day I watched that pregnancy test show 'positive'. I must've stared at it for hours.

...

Me? Pregnant? Me? Responsible for a child?

What on earth was God thinking? Didn't He know me at ALL?

It was all some kind of massive joke... the world's least likely mother was up the duff. I was still learning to let one person into my life, and now, here was one that would NEED me 24-7. Scared the beejezus out of me. But there it was. Positively Pregnant.

And was I prepared in the SLIGHTEST for this new role?

Not on your life.

In fact, I had pretty much wasted every SINGLE opportunity to arm myself for parenthood.

Neglected every little lesson offered to me through the 34 years leading up to that moment. And I had no idea where to start studying for this new career. The biggest job of all. A job which would turn out to reveal to me more about myself than any fabulous salaried role ever could.

...

So you see...

When I revel in the tiny moments of connection with my amazing offspring, it's because they are quite literally my little miracles. They were dreamed of rather late. Their mother was comletely unprepared for the challenges and joy they would bring. I never stop being amazed that they managed to enter my world and (despite my shortcomings) make it the place it is today.

A crazy, chaotic, non-perfect, messy, mostly-happy place.

Who'd have thought?

Not me.

Flower confession time

I have to admit it...

I have a strange flower fetish.

It's to do with bunches of flowers...

I cannot leave them mixed.

Our Small Town only offers mixed bunches of flowers

- either lilies-and-gerberas or native-banksias-and-waratahs -

which I purchase and then attack immediately upon arriving home.

I have to carefully separate the lilies

from the gerberas

and the greenery.

Separate vases.

Can't stand them all mixed up.

What on earth this says about me, I don't know.

(And, to be frank, I am not sure I want to!)

So let us ignore my obvious control issues,

and instead let us feast our eyes upon the beauty of the gerbera.

This is surely my favourite flower...

I adore the delicate clean daisy-like formation.

Simple, colourful, striking, non-perfumed.

(I have a sensitive, sneezy kinda nose

- and a it's ludicrous little sneeze at that).

The gerbera were my wedding posy flower - no fuss, no worries.

And you know what - in the garden they are almost indestructible.

They thrive on neglect - utterly my kinda flower.

I predict mass plantings of these plants in the Granite Glen garden.

I am a mass plantings kinda girl too.

Again with the no-mix thing...

Of course the one thing about gerberas is that

when they are done,

they are DONE.

A little like me.

...

What kind of flower rings your bells,

makes your skirt fly up,

or just makes you smile?