#1711 Day 213 of getting there: a quiet beach

I took Hubbie off the beaten track today.

It was a path I ventured down with baby girl some weeks ago. It’s in a popular location, between a big park and a beach.

But the winding, narrow, and pretty path, overrun with shrubs and spring flowers climbing along jagged orange rock, still feels like it’s taking you to someplace special.

And it does.

It was so quiet. It almost felt like it was ours, what with the still air, softly lapping waves, and sun beating down and blinding us as we shielded our eyes.

But people were dotted throughout. Locals, like us.

The pensioners who came around the corner, greetings coming forth happily as their small and excitable dog tried to sprint down the stairs towards the water.

The woman in exercise gear, who kept running up and down the steep path, trying to beat her last sprint every time. She placed a rock at the end of the path each time she made it down, keeping count of her fitness.

The young Mum with her toddler in the waters below, chasing after him as he went from sand to water. Scooping him up in her arms before carrying him to where he needed to be.

It was all so peaceful, so perfect. We stood there, taking it all in, looking at all we had missed out on in the last few months.

And accepting all the beauty that was yet to come. Better. Brighter.

#1710 Day 212 of getting there: escapism

How lovely is it, to escape from real life?

From reality.

To forget.

To go into another world.

And I haven’t been doing this in the way that some may think.

Not through writing.

Not through reading.

I am going passive here…

TV.

TV it is. It’s given me a form of escape, a reprieve from real life, providing a lightness that other things have been unable to give me.

I didn’t expect it. It came so simply. I watched a few episodes of Friends…

And BANG. I was hooked on getting away.

Friends. Angel. These are the reliable repeats that I have been going to time and time again. I know what will happen. I know what to expect.

I know the characters. And I am STILL entertained.

Bold and the Beautiful. The Last Dance, as I shared the other day. These are the new shows, the ones I don’t know where they end up, so starkly different from each other, and yet each an entirely fascinating world of its own.

Immersing yourself in an unfamiliar world, such as the basketball world explored in The Last Dance, is a great way to get away from it all. Because this world is unfamiliar to me, I am concentrating hard, piecing it together, and using all of my head to make sense of something I know nothing about.

But whether I have some idea, or none at all…

The point is, I am getting away from life, into some place else.

What TV show helps you get away from it all? Which characters, which place, take you far, far away?

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#1709 Day 211 of getting there: Monopoly makes me reminisce

This afternoon after school, baby girl and I started playing some Melbourne Monopoly.

In total we probably played for about an hour and a half, and you need to play for this long to really get the game going. Baby girl is getting it more and more, and my God is she a property hoarder. I’m all picky with what I buy, but I find myself having to buy more than I want or else I’d be paying her rent constantly.

We played for so long, that only one property was left unbought from the whole game board. We even had houses – 5 of mine, 3 of hers – laid down. That’s the sign of a good game. When HOUSES appear.

But this was a Melbourne version… so instead of Old Kent Road, you got Hosier Lane.

Instead of Northumberland Avenue, you’ve got the Chapel Street Precinct.

And instead of the exclusive Mayfair… it’s the MCG.

I think it’s pretty cool, and though I’m a stickler for originals (I have the original tattered version too) I came across a card today, and well, it’s just Melbourne:

I don’t know about you, but this made me miss being out and about even more.

Even the annoying hipsters. I think I even miss them. 😜☕

#1708 Day 210 of getting there: The last dance

Many months ago after Hubbie finished watching the first run-through of the Chicago Bulls/Michael Jordan Netflix doco “The Last Dance,” he turned to me and said – “I’d like you to watch this with me.”

PAUSE.

“I mean, I’ve watched stuff for you…”

Back when we were dating, I got him to watch the ENTIRE ANGEL SERIES with me. Of course I had already watched the series, and cried and laughed (mostly cried, with regular gasps) through it all, but alas, what do you do when you really LOVE something?

You want to share it with someone.

Even if that person is not into that genre AT ALL. Like Hubbie. 😉

He went through all 5 seasons with me. 110 episodes. At about 42 minutes an ep, that equals 4,620 hours of vampires, supernatural beings, long ranging story-archs, and a whole lot of funky shit and demonic deaths.

And what did it amount to? He didn’t mind it… but his one line, which I’ll never forget… “It was okay… it’s just not my thing.”

Ouch.

Fast forward to 2020, the world of iso and lockdown and having your butt planted on the couch. I knew he had a very strong case when he asked me to watch “The Last Dance” with him. And at only 10 episodes at roughly 50 minutes each, amounting to 500 minutes, well, I wasn’t going to lose much time.

Especially being in iso.

You know, if he had asked me to watch something basketball-related all those years ago when we were dating, I probably wouldn’t have been interested.

But now, I am a different person. I am ready. And also I realise, it’s not just about basketball. It’s about so much more.

I get inspired by passion. By the greats. By unbelievable stories. By incredible feats of triumph.

And tonight, after only 2 episodes in, I can see this doco has it all.

I was actually spewing at the end, because it was left at a bit of a cliff hanger. And I was like “ohh, damn it I want to know what happens!”

The difference between SmikG in 2020, and Hubbie in let’s say, 2006, is that SmikG is ready.

Do you get where I’m heading???

I am genuinely loving this series, and can’t wait to watch more. Jordan is a maniac of the game and true basketball legend, GOAT, all of it, and if you don’t know what that means, look it up, or better yet watch the Netflix doco!

I am seriously thinking of reintroducing Hubbie to Angel… do you think he’ll bite? (Pun totally intended). 😈

I think now, he might be ready. 😜

#1707 Day 209 of getting there: Declutter day

There was nothing else to do on a day like today.

An iso grey day.

But DE CLUTTER.

It wasn’t even planned. (Seriously, none of my days are anymore).

It all kinda flowed. From de cluttering baby girls toys, to attacking closets, emptying old boxes, organising files, and cleaning out drawers…

I did one after another after another. And considering how grey the day was, and how flat I felt at the start… I felt pretty damn productive and awesome after the day’s work.

There’s nothing quite like clearing and organising your external state, to help fix your internal one. Don’t tell me the two aren’t connected – they are.

#1706 Day 208 of getting there: alone again

It’s been something like 4 months since I’ve had alone time.

I mean alone in the sense of, no hubbie, no baby girl, and NO WORK.

Proper, nothing time.

Because things have been so up and down lately, I didn’t even plan my day out.

It was all, go with the flow.

Enjoy a coffee in the backyard.

Pat the cat Mister F.

Talk to the bird orange-cheeks.

Have a big ol’ long convo on the phone.

Potter around the house.

Watch TV.

Lunch on the balcony.

Meditate.

It was a real chill, real down and taking it easy day, and I very much needed it. 💖

#1705 Day 207 of getting there: meditating with rainbows

I don’t really know how it started (much like everything lately) but tonight, Hubbie, baby girl and I ended up doing impromptu meditations on each other.

I think baby girl was laying across us, and I started with a few light instructions.

“Close your eyes. Take a deep breath in… and out.”

The fun really began when she took the reigns. Here are some snippets of what she said when she was instructing US:

“Close your eyes.

Take a deep breath in… and out.

Take 3 more deep breaths.

Imagine the sun rising up.

And there’s a rainbow next to the sun.

And in the rainbow are unicorns… and kittens… and cats…

And any other animal you like.

Imagine lovely nature.

And when you’re ready, slowly open your eyes.”

OMG. How is my daughter a meditation guru with her soft instructions like that? Maybe something to do with the fact that she does yoga and meditation at her school, and during lockdown, with so much time to fill, she listened to and watched a lot of meditation and yoga videos online…

She totally has the knack. She will relax you and put you to sleep any day… in the BEST way possible. 💖

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#1704 Day 206 of getting there: watch the sunset

I take so many sunset pictures. I took some more tonight.

But I realised, how often do I actually sit to watch them?

Quietly. Contemplating. Observant.

I saw Hubbie was out the front after dinner. He had gone to take out the rubbish bins, and of course was called to stay and do weeding.

By no one, but the weeds.

We are cut from the same cloth. If you know, you know. Once you see one, you pick one, then you pick another, and another…

And soon you have a whole pile of weeds in a clump on the grass.

It’s work, but it’s therapeutic. I sat on the front bench, Hubbie looking for stray grass variety in my foreground, the sunset in the background… and I focused on the latter, with the former bringing me back to reality every so often.

The clouds shifted. The sun sunk down. The air was mild, mixed with the smell of cut grass, earth, and spring.

And the magnitude of life, both it’s simplicity and it’s inherent meaning, settled around me.

In this world, we are very small. But we get to do big things.

If we so choose it.

It was a lovely moment. 💖

#1703 Day 205 of getting there: A Zest for dinner

We had some really yummy takeaway tonight.

I’ve been wanting to try this place out for ages, and it baffles me that I’ve known about them for the whole of lockdown (BOTH lockdowns) but only tonight we got to enjoy the delicious food.

LemonZest Catering. They are local, home-made, authentic Vietnamese food, and are so so SO close to home.

Baby girl and I picked it up tonight. We got the tasting box for two plus some extras. There were bao buns, rice paper rolls, spring rolls and the san choi bowl – the most tastiest ever!

• 

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We inhaled it all. And we don’t want them to move, ever ever ever.

#1702 Day 204 of getting there: She’s back! Part 2

Oh what a morning.

Baby girl was excited. I was excited.

It felt like the first day of primary school ALL over again.

In one way, it kinda was.

On day 79 of my corona ‘getting there’ posts I wrote “She’s back”…

125 days ago.

After the first lockdown.

Of course it felt like the first day again.

Baby girl pranced up the street. Music floated over from the school office. Teachers were all over the place, greeting students with smiling eyes behind their half-covered faces.

Bubbles! Bubbles were floating down the street from the gates, designed to make it that much more special for the kids.

And… the original lollypop man was back! He’s been AWOL, some injury I think, and the little time we got to go back to school last term, just wasn’t the same without him there.

He was happy to be back! We were happy to be back!

Everyone was smiling. 😁😁😁

Still, I couldn’t wait to pick her up at the end of the school day.

The verdict?

She was happy and TIRED.

YES.

Bring on tomorrow!