On change

Change is hard to write. It is harder to live.

Happy sheep

Here I am, looking out my new window over the river and up into the mountains¹. For most of the day my view has been a study in greys. Clouds stacked on clouds. The river still and quiet. In this new pocket of Tasmania we’ve been sheltered from the ferocity of the easterly system pounding the east and south. It was strange to watch the forecasts roll in and not have braced for the worst. And though we are far away, my mind still runs in familiar grooves. Such a forecast would have us moving mobs of sheep, bringing some into the shed, moving others to paddocks with good shelter. I’d take my retirees off the creek flats, find an extra rug and give them an extra saucepan of grain. We’d hope the low would weaken and deliver (miraculously) the right amount of rain. And when it arrived we’d lie awake and remind ourselves of the storms our old house has weathered. One hundred and ninety nine years of them.

Which story do I tell you first?

Here’s one.

Once, about six years ago, I had an orphan lamb who was strong and healthy. Then he was hit by a young work dog who was not where it should have been. The lamb was instantly paralysed, it’s back legs useless. I threw pine cones and curse words at the dog and carried the lamb into the shed. The lamb wanted to live, I kept feeding it and standing it on its four legs. I would do this maybe five times a day. It could stand supported but otherwise it just dragged itself around on its front legs. Every second day J asked me if I wanted him to knock it on the head. No, I’d say. Every third day I would ask J to knock it on the head. No, he’d say. And on we went. After a long time it could stand without me holding it up. Then it started to walk again. Ever since he’s lived in the front paddock with Frank and a few other favourites. He scuttles like a crab. He lives, for every one I haven’t been able to save, a life of relative luxury.

This week, last week, I don’t know…time has taken on a different shape, that lamb, now an old wether, was loaded on the back of the ute with a motley group of other favourite sheep. I carefully drove them north. Three hours later, J and I lifted him off the ute. We watched him scuttle sideways, his crablike gait the only sign of the months he’d spent paralysed and when he dropped his head to snatch at the thick green grass. I turned to J and said, well, it’s home now.

*

Here’s another one.

On the day the removalist truck came and loaded the furniture from the house, the same day we loaded the horses, the day we loaded another lot of sheep, the day the children were still here to drive in five separate vehicles towing various things, up to our new home, that day, a raven escorted me up the driveway.

That’s not clear. Let me try again:

On the day we moved out of the place named for a Raven, a place that was my home, a raven flew in front of my car all the way up the driveway. It was quite deliberate. It flapped lazily, an escort. A witness. Before I pulled onto the highway, I got out of the car, turned to the bird in the tree and bowed my thanks.

My hands shook. My eyes cried.

Or, perhaps I could write this:

We return to stay in the empty stone house to keep moving the farm stuff. Its new owners have some plans to bring her into the modern day, to make her more comfortable for their busy family. But before that, J and I sit in two old armchairs that had belonged to his grandparents (nobody wants these chairs, they haven’t been sat in for years, but here we are, sitting in them). We draw them up in front of the fire. The empty stone room glows. Later we sleep on a mattress, our breath making patterns in the cold air. In the morning I clean for the last time. It’s a parting benediction, soon the house will be filled with builders and painters and new plans, but I can’t leave without washing down her concrete floors, wiping the wooden benches, the stone dust from the window sills and thanking these solid walls for the privilege of sheltering within them.

*

All of which to say, the farm is sold. A new phase of our lives is unfolding. We have found a spot a few hours north on the river, or did the spot find us? More on that another time.

There’s old trees. There’s an old house, though not as old as our last one and significantly more user friendly. There’s beauty and there’s peace. The move has been intense and it’s not quite finished. But we are nearly here. There’s many, many boxes still to unpack. The animals are here. The sheep have settled in. The retirees think it’s marvelous. Frank is not so sure. And me, perhaps I’m with Frank, or perhaps I’m with my old wether, just grateful to be somewhere that’s easier.

I’ve grieved for the space and the wildness. I’ve said my goodbye and whispered my thanks. It’s deep in my marrow.

I have a new view and a river to learn. I won’t be cooking for shearers. I won’t be tackling ewes. I won’t be checking mobs of sheep or water holes or all the jobs I’ve loved and which have taken me away from the words that are sitting in my chest.

What a privilege it was to live that life. I will carry it with me.

Always.

mm

Reading

It’s been comfort reads for months (Gerald Durrell, Catherine Gaskin, Elizabeth Goudge, Georgette Heyer) but the other book I’ve been reaching for is Barbara Blackman’s certain chairs, or it’s long title the little lives of certain chairs, a table or two and other inanimates of our acquaintance. It’s illustrated perfectly by her husband Charles Blackman and the chapters have headings like The Chest with Three Drawers, The Good German Stove, The Blue Checkered Drapes, The Threadbare Green Rocker. A friend left this on the passenger seat of my car wrapped up in a blue ribbon, which matched the cover. It’s the most perfect memoir after wrestling with the fates of so many pieces of furniture for months. Blackman takes seriously the inanimate objects that make up our lives, and mostly outlast us. Hard to get hold of, but keep your eyes peeled in the used book shops. It’s a treasure.

Chris Flynn, Here Be Leviathans, short stories. So far I’ve met a grizzly bear that is gifted the memory and soul of the human teenager it ate, a genetically modified platypus family, a ship dodging a pandemic, a plane seat….it’s fun. I am on a panel with Chris and Peter Singer for the Bendigo Writers Festival called Animal Rights and Wrongs and also with Matthew Evans, whose new book Milk is top of the TBR pile.

I finally paid my 6 dollars and watched Wicked Little Letters on Prime. It’s as brilliant as you’ve all said. I loved it so much.

Brandon Taylor’s latest essay on Alice Monro and the art monster discourse has stayed with me. It’s measured, perceptive and intelligent.

And finally, some lovely news that Graft has been Highly Commended in the National Biography Award (which, despite its name is open to memoir also). The judges report had wonderful sentences in it. You can read it here if you’re keen. There are also some very interesting looking biographies on the short list, (none of which I’ll get around to reading).

Thank you for reading this long Sit Spot. mm

1. I’ll open up the last few Sit Spots to non subscribers so you can read back over the last few weeks.