40 years

 Monday 10th October 1983 at 7am, I got on an Ansett flight to Kalgoorlie with 3 suitcases. Alone. Age 17. Not knowing what I was going to, but knowing I didn't couldn't stay where I was.

One parent was trying to instill fear of the flight; her fear of being alone, of having a child fail at life, of where the child would be.  She even had a fear of my address being in a street called Nemesis.

One parent told me I would always be ok, to go and live my life, and that I was loved.

One grandma smiling silently and nodding as I was now in a career path she had followed over 60 years earlier in the Post Office. I never rose to the dizzying heights of Post Mistress that she reached, but she was proud.

My first plane flight. My first room in a house not with my parents. My first experience living with others. So many firsts all hit in that one day and the weeks ahead. I tried to work out who I was as all I had done was care for others from the youngest age, and to people please to keep the peace and yet feel a failure at everything. 

My weight, my hair, my handwriting were all compared to my mother's memories of herself at the same age. Always, always being reminded of my failings. 

This was new, as nobody knew me and they were looking at me for the first time, as I also looked at myself for the first time.There were so many people who were friendly and supportive, and kind and loving. It blew my mind and I felt like I was home. I had a spring in my step. I fell in love with the architecture, the landscape, the people, the sky. The most liberating feeling I had known. I was home.

In my first week I met people who even today, I have no hesitation in picking up the phone or sending a message and would be lost without them. 

I really, really wanted to go home to have this 40th anniversary in my place in the red dirt. But guess what? I'm still caring. I just care for different people. I still feel stuck, but in a different place. I still have others lives that take precedence over mine. My standard comment is "It is what it is". 

It's true too. It is what it is. My choices in life have lead me to this place. I had an amazing offer of help so I could go, but right now I don't want another quick fix, I want real change. So I said no to the offer, and instead I'm in plod along mode. I miss who I was when I was excited for the future.

It might be my 41st anniversary, or my 42nd anniversary of that first trip to the red dirt when I get to go celebrate. I will wait, and I will do it my way. On my timeline, not rushing, not racing to any one else's times that I need to borrow. I get told not to wait as life is short. 

Yes it is. But compromise lasts forever.

So when I do break away it will be on my time, to my places and with no compromise. 

I deserve it.

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