I told myself I’d never leave again. And I haven’t.

I’ve spent many hours recently thinking about living here in my home. I’m reading Wendell Berry’s inspirational and powerful book, The World-Ending Fire, about living in ‘his place’ in Kentucky. Wendell - one of America’s most thought-provoking writers, never bought a computer, a mobile phone, or even an answering machine. He wrote all his books with a pencil and notebook, and with his wife, maintained fields with horse and plow, grew his own vegetables and meat, preserved food, collected water and became content and settled because of it.

This is the tastiest tomato I've ever grown. Medium in size and a flavour bomb.

I’m eight years younger than Wendell but I strongly hold on to “my place’ too. In fact, now I recognise that it’s one of the things that’s made me who I am and which has given me a solid starting point every day.

Homemade laundry liquid costs $2 - $3 to make 10 litres. It does an excellent job with three simple ingredients and none of the chemicals in the supermarket products.

These flowers are native Iris. 

Gracie, doing her daily rounds.

When I was much younger, Hanno and I lived in Germany for two years. We travelled there so I could meet his family and intended staying for two months. But we ended up staying two years and towards the end of our stay, I was yearning to return to Australia. We returned married and with our first baby. When I stepped on my homeland again, I told myself I’d never leave again. And I haven’t.

One of my new linen aprons.

But as it turned out, it wasn’t the wide brown land of Australia I was yearning for. It was this specific parcel of land at the end of a dead-end, one-lane street in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast. When I walked onto this land, I knew I was home. We bought the house and land and moved here a few years later when I was 49 years old. I’ve lived here longer than I’ve ever lived anywhere else. I know every inch of this land and I am part of it. This week, when I brought in my bins from the street, I stopped to close the gate behind me and a local butcher bird, a bird I see every day, flew towards me, circled me and flew towards a baby bird already sitting in the closest tree. I hadn’t seen it until the mother bird introduced me to the baby. But, as I walked away from that wonderful encounter, I realised I’m part of the nature of this place and I have no doubt that on that day, the baby bird was introduced to many other living creatures who live on this land.

Everlasting spinach.

When I first set foot here in 1994, I didn’t understand that I had discovered my true path and I was walking towards the mother load of happiness and contentment. I recognised a feeling of excitement but I didn’t know why I was excited. The house was a drab slab house with absolutely no other features. I loved the creek and the remnant rainforest in the backyard immediately but there were no fences, gardens, tanks, or verandas. All that was still ahead of us and, as it turned out, would help shape the people we became.

I will stay here until I die and my sons will inherit my home. It will then be sold and another family will come to live here. I hope they see how special it is and how it can help them slow down and live well. Not everyone can see those things, but in the words of Wendell: “Slow down, Pay Attention, Do good work, Love your neighbours, Love your place, Stay in your place, Settle for less and enjoy it more.”  We created a life like no other here - it was a new way of living, an example for us and others of what could be done with work, attention, fewer expectations and reaping the ample benefits of happiness and contentment.

I’m pleased with the familiar way every day unfolds here. I grow the same foods, I cook the same meals, I talk to the same people and I never crave for new, better or more - I want fewer choices not more of them. I want old and familiar. Especially in these unstable times it suits me to be in my place with the gate shut, picking roses for the house, staking foxgloves, reading, writing and getting to know the baby birds.

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