One Year On

One year ago today, I watched as our home was up-ended and shaken out into the back of a truck and sent off down the highway. I piled my babes into the car, filled every empty space with the last bits of stuff, plonked the fish in its plastic bag on top of the teetering pile on the passenger seat, squeezed in the still-warm foil-wrapped food offerings from my inconsolable mother-in-law, and set off after the truck.

We've worked our way steadily through four entire seasons in our new country home. I've been frightened by a couple, and entirely mesmerised by the others. A pathetic chilly summer that had us questioning the decision to move. Enchanting, misty autumn with all of that colour and crunch. The depths of a winter, the first of many, I suspect, in which my toes will feel perpetually cold. And then spring, incredible spring, abundant spring, show-off spring.

The vineyard on the drive into town tells of it perfectly - leafy green turning to red and brown, dropping back to nothing, then bursting forth again. I grew up in a town with four seasons and, having found myself in such a place in adulthood, now I get what all the fuss is about.

This country life hasn't been all it was cracked up to be. There aren't 27 hours in the day like I thought there'd be. The weeks are still only seven days long. Life is busier than ever, more relentless than ever, as exhausting as ever, just with a prettier view out the window and far, far less traffic. The questions of 'where' haven't been answered entirely. We may have started here, but the decision now is where to finish. This region? This very village? In town or on the land? An old house or a new one?

For now, I'm not going anywhere. A year in and I feel I'm a small part of the neighbourhood. We've made friends, real connections. In a little over a month we'll join the thriving local school community. The people at the local shop know our names. I've finally memorised my own phone number.

And my babies haves stretched from chubby sausages into talking, thinking, proper people, naughty as ever, minds of their own, as ever. My big girl gets to start her formal education in a perfect, tiny country school, with a paddock for a playground and the best-stocked library I've seen anywhere.

There is still much work to do, much to improve. Sometimes it feels like we left so much opportunity behind and I have to remind myself why we're here. Despite it all, one year on, I know we made the right decision.