Fieldwork

Things are changing in the Land of Meg. For the next three years, PJ will be a student again, undertaking research for his doctoral thesis in the areas of ecology and poetics. Part of his research is to document our family's transition from being oil dependent to as self-sufficient as we can be in terms of water, energy and food.

Here is the nerdy student this afternoon building some small raised vegie beds along our permaculture swale.

He is lucky enough to be on scholarship for the duration of his studies, which means he won't have to work and I'll have to work a lot less, which will give us both a lot more time to work on our individual projects and a lot more time to work on nothing, together.

Down and Dirty

I have an article in the current issue of Bicycle Victoria's Ride On magazine. It's for a section called Women's Spin, aimed at raising the profile of cycling among women.

This is the photo of our chook Louie that accompanies my words:

The gist of the article is that when I lived in Melbourne, I considered feminine to mean unruffled, neat and delicate. "If I could have sat side-saddle on my bike I would have."

But now that I live in the country where I grow vegies and keep chooks, you will often see me pedalling around in my dirty gardening clothes. "In the city I would check myself in the mirror before going out in public, but now I wear my soil-covered clothes and straw-filled hair like a flag I wave proudly to proclaim who I am."

I hadn't thought twice about it, until yesterday afternoon when Z and I were talking about the men and machines that have been working opposite our house for the last week. It has rained every day that they've been there and I commented to Z that I would much rather be warm and dry and working from home than drenched and cold and slipping around in the mud.

'But don't you like getting dirty?' Z asked me, stunned. And that’s when I realised that although I love the dirt and may even define myself by that love, I can't actually say that I like getting dirty. Not in the same way that a seven year-old boy can, anyway.

The Rotary Test

The local Rotary club had a big function on last night. I wore all black and worked there as a waitress. I brought people food and collected their plates then I ate delicious leftovers and laughed until my cheeks hurt with the kitchen staff.

I came home late and was all sped up. I talked to PJ for hours about all the minor details of my evening; about the fussy eaters who kept me going back and forwards to the kitchen, about all the staff (including me) taking buckets of leftover scraps home for all our different animals, about the gas stove not working, about the large waistlines of so many guests that made it impossible for us waiting staff to squeeze past them.

Between the kitchen and the dining room was a tall side table pushed up against the wall that gradually became filled with gifts that people brought. I thought it must have been someone's birthday, but after we cleared the main course plates, they started raffling them off. Leaning against the wall on the tall gift table was a piece of A4 paper in a plain black frame. I wanted to tell PJ what was in it when I got home but I couldn't remember, so I jumped online and found it:

The Rotary test, which has been translated into more than 100 languages, asks the following questions:

Of the things we think, say or do:

Is it the TRUTH?

Is it FAIR to all concerned?

Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?

Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?

Dancing in the Right Direction

I started an exciting new contract today and spent all day writing like a champion. I feel so invigorated and inspired after yesterday. For the second year in a row I volunteered at the local primary school for Art Attack day; just like sports day but for art, my sister Kate who also volunteered described it.

Just as it was last year, it was a great day of making, playing, dancing and singing. It was a great day but it was just one day. But why? Why is it that we still teach our kids the same things we learned and we learned the same things our parents learned? You'd think somewhere along the line we'd stop and think: Now hang on a second. We have fucked up the planet good and proper thinking this way, maybe it's time to teach our kids to think for themselves and to value what's vital, not what's going to get them a job in an economy that's sucking the world dry.

The other night in bed, PJ read me this passage from Derrick Jensen's A Language Older Than Words:

A primary purpose of school – and this is true for our culture's science and religion as well – is to lead us away from our own experience. The process of schooling does not give birth to human beings – as education should but never will so long as it springs from the collective consciousness of our culture – but instead it teaches us to value abstract rewards at the expense of our autonomy, curiosity, interior lives, and time.

Art Attack day is a step in the right direction, but it's still one step forward in a straight line, when maybe what it needs to be is a dance.

I am the Door

I took this photo down a side street in Braidwood last weekend.

I am not the door, though last night I was the door whore at The Palais, where a couple of Melbourne bands played, including the fabulous Tinpan Orange. 

When I wasn't charming the patrons, selling tickets or crossing names off the guest list, I journalled, knitted, listened to the music, sipped champagne, felt thankful that smoking is no longer allowed inside music venues, sold CDs and thought romantic thoughts about my man in our cosy home putting the finishing touches on an essay due this week.

The Dorm Room Spy

A decade ago I spent a few years travelling around Asia on my own. I loved how the language barrier forced me inside my own head. It was fantastic for my writing. In journal entries from those travels I refer to myself as the Dorm Room Spy. I was always looking, looking, recording.

It's not very often that I can tap into that objectivity, but last night I could.

I spent the night working at a wedding with my friend B. We wore long black aprons and poured drinks, cleared plates and called everybody Madam and Sir. I wondered beforehand how I'd find it (I loved it) and if I'd cry in the speeches (I did).

I was as interested in my own reactions as I was those of the formally dressed guests.

It felt like theatre; the proclamations, the conventions, the sentiment, the ritual. I observed the intimacies with tenderness. They made me soft, a softness I observed with exactitude. It fascinated me to look at myself looking. Taking note of how I was taking note.

OH&S

PJ is about a quarter way through rebuilding an old shed and turning it into a dwelling for a friend. He was working on the roof today, so I was recruited to be the Occupational Health & Safety officer. I spent the afternoon standing on scaffolding and helping. 

The morning was springlike, dreamy and still. I sat on a rug nearby.

I read

 and took this photo of my hand.

The Sit In

Yesterday I wrote about having my own personal body double, as I was having a hard day.

Today I would like to introduce you to James L. Harris, a guy I just read about, who is accused of stealing public buses in Miami.

According to police, Harris took the buses from several bus depots and drove them on their routes, picking up and dropping off passengers along the way. He then returned the buses at the end of the day.

Police said Harris didn't raise any suspicion because he was dressed in the uniform of the bus company. And because he didn't steal any of the fares.

Nooks and Crannies

I used to shop at garage sales and op shops and markets.

I still do. But where I used to do these things to save money (I had a travel addiction I was always saving to fund), I now do more as a way of living.

I choose to live in a small community where there are no chain-stores or billboards. Not just because I am anti-consumerist, but because I am not a fan of the visual intrusion.

I have just had my contract extended another week. I am thankful to have more time to work on the project and to work with my team.

Although I knew what I was getting myself in for when I took on the role, working in Melbourne is hard. Getting up early to catch the 6.30 bus and getting home 13 hours later is exhausting. And is something I will have to do every day next week as my home computer is still broken (though Apple is sending me a replacement).

A month ago when I was thinking about how I'd go working full-time, I wrote: "I don't want quality time or me time," which I now see was just naive.

When I lived in the city I was good at this - filling my time to the brim. But I am a country girl now who still loves shopping at garage sales, but needs a lot more quiet to live in.

Considering Consideration

Just over a month ago, I wondered how I would go working full-time. Last night on the train home from Melbourne, I was thinking about all the experiences I have had during this time. All the people I have met, all the hours I have spent travelling between home and work and back again, all the things I have learned.

Every day at 10.30, the people in my office have morning tea, provided by one of the staff members. Yesterday we had cake and muffins made by N, who's a vegan.

In each carriage of the trains I catch, there are several seats arranged facing each-other. These are the seats I avoid as they are usually occupied by people with irritating idiosyncrasies.

Working productively from home on rainy days during the school holidays is difficult.

I love what I do. I love language and content management systems and getting a grip on challenging tasks.

I get stressed when I don't get enough sleep.

I love the solitary nature of being a writer, and a reader, but one of the things I have been reminded of again and again this last month, is how bearable anything is, when we are accompanied by good people.

As my friend J likes to say/spray: Never is consideration insensitive.

For the Love

As a freelancer, I am always on the lookout for the next interesting project to work on. As a mortgage owner, this often means I have to say no to some great contracts and yes to ones that are a little more dull, but that offer higher remuneration. 

I have recently been approached to do some work that I have had to decline. The work is great, the company is great, the people are great. But unfortunately, the pay isn't. 

And so this morning on my walk in the rain, I once again found myself indulging in the fantasy that money didn't own us, and that we owned ourselves.

But until the time when governments talk about their citizens' happiness and personal growth before economic growth, in the realm of fantasy my daydream will remain.

On Nervousness

I started my new contract today and felt nervous all morning. There are so many names and job roles and faces and seating arrangements and procedures and systems and passwords to remember.

But even if there weren't, I know I would still be feeling like this.

I have been here before - day one of a new job and feeling confident I can do the work but unsure how I am going to do it. This has to be hard, I know that. This has to be challenging and this has to be unfamiliar. I know that that's the only way I'm going to improve my skills and learn new things. But it's also human nature, well, it's in my nature, to want to make make the difficult things more easy. And to feel nervous that I won't be able to do that. Even though I'm glad that they're so hard.

Motion Sickness

I am about to begin a month-long contract. Usually I work on projects for a shorter time - a week at most - editing or writing content. I am looking forward to immersing myself in the work, but also have reservations.

One of the habits I have happily unlearnt during my time living away from the city is scheduling. Working full-time doesn't just mean that your job takes up the most productive hours of your day, it also ensures the commodification of the rest of your hours, and the need to plan your unplanned time.

I don't want to live like that. I don't want to be busy or managed or pencilled into appointment books. I don't want my business = my busyness. I don't want 24/7 scheduling or accountability. I don't want quality time or me time. I don't want to have it all.

I just want dead air time - the silence that I used to avoid.

I mean really, the only timetable we need to live by is the seasons.