Weekend Coffee Share – Happy New Year!

Welcome to Another Weekend Coffee Share & Happy New Year!

That said, I think it’s a bit early to declare 2021 a Happy New Year just yet. However, perhaps if we speak positive words over the coming year, it might just come to pass. Not that 2020 was a particularly “bad” year for us. However, we have had some absolute shockers in the past, so it had some pretty stiff competition. Also, Australia has largely managed to contain covid, and we haven’t experienced the terrible suffering and numbers of deaths seen overseas. However, that’s also because we’ve been cautious and established tight preventative measures often at a voluntary level. We’ve seen what the virus has done overseas and we don’t want to catch it. I particularly don’t want to catch it due to my severe pre-existing medical conditions. That’s just logical and if I have to delay some gratification for a bit, such is life. I’ll do it. I won’t complain and I’ll make the best of it. Indeed, that’s what I’ve done and my WWI research is powering along, and we’ve also made great headway with renovating our loungeroom and clearing alot of stuff out of the house.

The renovated loungeroom.

So, we start 2021 with new beginnings. We’re opening up our home, and inviting people over instead of locking the doors and barring the windows and hoping no one ever dares to pop in and knock on the door. We had my parents over for Christmas Day, and with covid restrictions down to 5 visitors, we had four friends over for dinner and after midnight, there was a change of the guard and our daughter had two friends stay the night. She hasn’t brought these friends over before so this was a big step forward. We’d rather she brings her friends here rather than hanging out locally. I’m sure I don’t need to explain that to anyone out there.

Trying on glasses at Specsavers wearing masks…our brave new world.

Another new beginning for 2021, is that I’ve gone back to extensive journal writing. My journaling has taken on different forms throughout the years. Traditionally, I’ve just used a free form notebook. However, for awhile there, I’ve gone to printed diaries with a day to a page, and on other years, a week to an opening. I use my diary writing as a mixture of recording what happened as well as exploring how I feel about things, and it seems quite a lot of storytelling. For awhile there, I’ve been fine with just doing my online blogging and haven’t felt a need for a private space. However, that changed towards the end of last year, when I started becoming more aware that there was stuff I just wanted to share with myself. I didn’t want someone else’s response , opinion or suggestions. I just wanted to sit with myself in this still pond of thought and just be, although being a writer, of course, that involved shedding lots of words, letting the emotions flow. These days, I don’t feel the need to share these feelings publicly or even to one soul. I’m quite happy to let life bounce along on the outside and leave it be. Besides, other people generally don’t have the time to listen to the whole story, especially when the story takes days to tell. You’d be needing to have toilet breaks, nap and meal breaks or a supply of ultra-strong, intravenous coffee.

Anyway, as it turns out, even I don’t have time to listen to myself. I’ve been writing in my new journal for hours some days, and providing pages and pages of back story going back 20 years to when we first bought the house, and why our renovation plans were so badly scuttled. Life is complicated. Complicated isn’t quick. Well, that’s unless you go for the bullet journal approach, which could be rather brutal when things aren’t going in your favour and you’ve travelled down snake after snake without landing on any ladders.

There’s also another reason I’ve been reflective lately. My great aunt, Louise, passed away on New Year’s Day. She was such a wonderful woman, and I regretted not keeping in touch more. I regret not having the self-confidence to just ring up and say hello. I have no trouble talking to strangers and yet feel nervous calling people I know. Silly, isn’t it!!

My grandmother second from the right with her siblings at the Glasshouse Mountains, Queensland around 1940.

Anyway, her death triggered a search through the old photo albums, and by the end of the night, I was feeling quite upset. I won’t use the word depressed, because what I was experiencing was grief. Not only that my aunt had died, but how that whole generation had now passed away, and along with them a way of life and big sprawling families with lots of cousins and connections. I was particularly close to my grandparents, and I missed them all over again too. That’s not to say that looking up the photos was a mistake or a bad thing to do. It just acknowledges that I’m human, not a robot. When we love someone, it’s natural to grieve. It’s naturally to think of the bigger family picture they were part of and miss that too. It’s also a reminder to make the most of the living and stay connected, particularly at the moment when we’re much more disconnected during covid.

1919 Spanish Flu Outbreak, Sydney.

Meanwhile, I’d like to encourage you to check out my previous post. I found a letter to the editor from 1919 talking about lifestyle restrictions in Sydney during the 1919 Spanish Flu Pandemic. It was a great piece, and way too relevant to us now.

Well, that’s enough from me.

Wishing you best wishes for 2021!

Rowena