There and Here

Oh, hi. There you are. If you're wondering where I am, you can find me over at the Artist as Family blog where I am documenting my family's adventures as we ride our bicycles around Australia.

Come say hi, if you please.

Love Miles

Recently, when my parents came to town for a visit, I heard David Holmgren talk to my mother about love miles: the distance family members travel to see one another. With peaking oil, he said, and the rise in cost of fuel, it will get harder and harder for family members to just jump on a plane for a visit.

To help reduce their love miles, my folks are selling their house and are moving to this neck of the woods to be near my sister Kate and I and our families.

If you're in the market for a self-sufficient house in Tasmania that sits on a beautiful 200 acre block, check out their blog for more details.

High 5-ing the World

Resolution? Promise? Goal? I don't know what you'd call it, but a year ago we made one.

In a conversation about where we'd like to be as a family, we quickly realised that the future we were planning didn't include a car.

Three years ago we gave up shopping at supermarkets, a year ago we gave up air travel, two months ago we gave up eating out of season and we're slowly transitioning towards giving up our mobile phones. But giving up our car feels like the biggest decision we have made so far.

It took us a year of preparation. We started a log book so we could see all the reasons we were justifying using the car. We biked, walked, carpooled and used public transport as much as we could, and after surviving the winter, knew that we were ready.

The town we call home has limited public transport options—no trams and no trains—so we knew we'd have to be a bit more organised whenever we wanted to leave. But on the plus side, we live in town, so it's a five minute bike ride up to the post office or library.

A week ago, we drove our car to Melbourne and delivered it to its new owner. The second he drove away it started to pour, and it dawned on me for the first time, the reality of our decision.

The next day, PJ started converting our carport into a bike/tool/potting shed.

After researching and test riding several cargo bikes, we finally made our decision. Yesterday PJ and I bussed and trained to Melbourne where we picked up our Kona Utes. Our first ride was a two-hour stint from the nearest train station, home.

My legs feel strong today, though my arms are a little sunburnt. Not from waving down passing cars to give us a lift, but from feeling so overwhelmed with freedom, I couldn't help high 5-ing the world.

Starry Starry Nose

We have been watching with much delight, each weekly episode of the series Life, narrated by David Attenborough. We have been mesmerised by insects, enthralled by reptiles, and last night we were spellbound by an assortment of animals hunting and hiding.

Featured in the most recent episode is the star-nosed mole. I had never heard of it before, and I definitely hadn't seen one — it's not an animal one is likely to forget.

Isn't it remarkable? Aren't we lucky to be alive at the same time?

Just after the British colonised Australia, a platypus was taken from these shores to the Empire where people couldn't believe their eyes. They thought the animal was a hoax; that the sailors who had brought the specimen might have been playing some kind of joke on them. What would they have thought of the star-nosed mole??

If you're interested in finding out more, here's a great four minute vid:

A Food Forest

My cheesy tourist shot.

View from the 5th floor of the MCA.

As a result of the Artist as Family project we did in Newcastle, I am very excited to share the news that we have been invited to participate in the In the balance: art for a changing world show at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) in Sydney from 19 August to 23 November 2010.

The project we have proposed is a community food forest. We will have a presence in the gallery, though our main body of work will be in a public park.

We have been to Sydney twice in the last month to meet with the MCA and the City of Sydney to discuss the details of our project and to agree on the right site for the work.

We have just updated our Artist as Family blog with our first post of the project. Do check in on us there from time to time to read about our progression. We will be listing the details of our workshops and working bees, so if you're in the Sydney region, please keep in touch and come and join us.

Holiday Happenings

Camper Bike

From here.

And So

I posted this photo on Flickr four years ago. (Since then, we three have met up only twice.) Now we are heading into t-shirt weather and my arms are free to air, I am reminded of such friendships and the way they come and go like the seasons.

Here's the explanation that accompanies the image:

We three Aussies got these tats done a few years ago in Melbourne before all heading off to different parts of the globe.

Kerryn loves Kurt Vonnegut and decided to get "And so it goes" (a recurring line from Slaughterhouse Five) tattooed on her shoulder.

Finally on the other side of three decades worth of bad shit, Gil decided to get "And so it was" tattooed on her back representing the past that she has moved on from but that made her who she is.

And Meg, the eternal optimist decided to get "And so it will be" on her right arm as a symbol of the charm of the unknown.

We reunited this afternoon for a few brief hours before we were once again claimed by different time zones.

From here.

Ogori Mystery Café

On our last morning in Newcastle when we were packing up our things, we had very much in our minds the artist-in-residence who was arriving two days later. When we had arrived, there was some food leftover in the fridge and pantry from previous artists, and we were wondering what the next artist would think about all the goodies we had left in the kitchenette for her.

I felt the same way when we left our home to go to Newcastle and the afternoon we returned. I was conscious of leaving some nice food for our friends who were housesitting, and was thankful for the things they left for us when they departed.

I tell you all this by way of an introduction to the Ogori Café in Japan that operates on the same principal as the above two scenarios. When you order something, what you ordered goes to the next customer, and what you receive comes to you courtesy of the person who ordered before.

Image

The rules are:

1. Let's treat the next person. What to treat them with? It's your choice.
2. Even if it's a group of friends or a family, please form a single-file line. Also, you can't buy twice in a row.
3. Please enjoy what you get, even if you hate it. (If you really, really hate it, let's quietly give it to another while saying, "It's my treat…")
4. Let's say "Thank You! (Gochihosama)" if you find the person with your Ogori café card.
5. We can't issue a receipt.

From the blog where I first read about it:

It forced one to "let go", just for a brief moment, of the total control we're so used to exerting through commerce. It led you to taste something new, that you might not normally have ordered. It was a delight.

A great way to stimulate an outburst of social warming activity, don't you think?

In Newcastle

We each bought a pair of old sunglasses.

Wearing them, we fell in love with the world,

wherever we went,

and with everyone we met,

be they human or non-human.

We fell in love with the ways of the natural world,

our small place within it,

and with one another.

We fell in love with all we have

and with all that is to come.

We don't know what's next.

But we look forward to finding out.

I Didn't Know Her

Well, we arrived home from Newcastle yesterday afternoon and today I am feeling rather melancholic. We had such a fantastic time away and although it is always great to come home to where we live, I feel like I'm coming down off a great precipitous high.

Our garden is overflowing with abundance, our chooks are well fed and laying, and our friends are calling in to see how we are. And we are well. We travelled on planes that didn't crash, on legs that were strong, on bicycles that carried us far. We had a meaningful, productive family holiday, we met great people and learned lessons each day. But today I feel hushed.

This morning was Vivien Hodgins' memorial service. She is one of the Australians who died in the recent Pacific Ocean tsunami. I never met Vivien, though I have met her husband, Rod May, who's a councillor for our local shire and an organic farmer who does weekly vegie boxes.

There are so many great things about our residency that I could tell you today, so many photos I would like to post, but instead, it feels more relevant to post these photos of Rod May's hands that I took several months ago at the local Farmer's Market. Hands that are the colour of the earth.

Infancy to Adulthood

In a recent article, Forbes columnist Peter Robinson describes the scene of driving with his wife to take their daughter to the airport to go to college. It's an OK article, but what has stayed with me since I read it last week is the list of accomplishments Robinson assigns his 18 year-old daughter:

This product, our daughter, could bake a remarkably satisfying peach crumble, speak intelligently about Hamlet and Macbeth, play a shrewd, persistent game of tennis, perform a Chopin nocturne with only half a dozen mistakes, make her friends laugh out loud and braid her little sister's hair three different ways. No election to high office, no commercial undertaking, no literary or artistic attainment – none could equal the deed of nurturing a human being from infancy to adulthood to produce a product like this.

What a list, hey? As an 18 year-old, I would have liked to have made my folks proud with any one of those achievements. But something about this list has not sat right with me and I haven't known why.

We are going away on Thursday and this morning, as I added to our list of what to take, it occurred to me that Robinson's list is merely an inventory of skills that his daughter has learned and perhaps even mastered. As a list of feats, it's rather impressive. But it reads like a report card of competencies, and to me, lacks any kind of meaning.

Is she thoughtful? Does she hold the door open for people behind her? Is she kind? Is she polite and respectful? Is she concerned about her peers and the planet?

Am I expecting an unreasonable intimacy from a writer I've never met? Am I expecting him to value the same qualities in a person that I esteem? Or at 18, is one still too unformed by the world to have any real connection to it?

Self-Portrait With Squirrel

From Abroath:

Melissa Brandts and her husband were exploring Lake Minnewanka in Banff National Park, Canada, when they stopped to take a timed photograph of themselves.

They had their camera set up on some rocks and were getting ready to take the picture when this curious little ground squirrel appeared, became intrigued with the sound of the focusing camera and popped right into the shot.

Rednesday

This year marks a decade since I first became attracted to the colour red. 

In 1999 I returned home to Melbourne from travelling through Asia to settle down for a while; find a job and a home. Regular life seemed so colourless compared to the cities and villages I had travelled in.

I don't remember if I sought out these clogs or if I saw them in a store window and just knew I had to have them. All I remember is that I was home from travelling through countries where red is the colour of prosperity, and I bought these shoes.

In those days I wore them wherever I went, though these days they sit by the front door – easy to slip on when I go outside to empty the compost bucket, check on the chooks or pull the flying fox rope back up for Z.

PS. Plant Me Then Eat Me

Running

There was a cross country running race for a few of the local schools today. I went to cheer on my beautiful niece, Indigo. Here she is, post-run holding the sign I made for her.

It was a great afternoon and I enjoyed cheering on all the kids, even those unknown to me. Though while I was watching, it occurred to me how dislocated we are from our survival. Once, we ran to save our lives – from predators and fire, towards prey and safer grounds.

Then, later this afternoon I sat in the main room of the town hall, while people brought in their treasured possessions for the Not Left Behind exhibition. I cried quietly while I read people's accounts of the fires and looked at all their home-warming sentimentals, including my own.

How lucky we are that we only need to run for recreation.

Not Left Behind

This is a photo of our dear friend Jeff on the front cover of last week's local paper. 

When February's bushfires threatened our town, Jeff packed his car with all the books he is reading for his PhD. Everyone who evacuated because of the fires had a story to tell about what they decided to take and what they left behind.

Jeff and another friend, Alison, have organised Not Left Behind, an exhibition at the town hall of objects, stories, images and reflections of what people took with them when they fled.

PJ and I were among the first to drop off our goodies today, so we haven't yet seen what other people are contributing. After all his promoting and organising, Jeff won't get to see any of the show at all as he flew out this morning to spend the next three months with his darling Cath in Shanghai.

Bye Jeff!

For All the Tea in China

Some days I feel as though I have conquered mountains just lifting my bones from my office chair to go to the kitchen to put the kettle on. 

Oh the lengths we go to for a good cup of tea!

Photos are of the journey to the Hua Shan teahouse in central China.