Spring Feelings

Some weeks are chockas aren't they. This week included going to see a touring production of "Educating Rita" starring someone from "McLeod's Daughters" and a guy from "All Saints" (ie. two pretty dodgy Australian TV series) and as suspected, it was a bit dodgy.
The woman sounded like Bubbles from Ab Fab, and couldn't even sustain that. Why bother?! Surely there's enough self-awareness to realise that you're doing a shit job and look around for some solutions - would've made obvious sense to do an Ocker rendition, and have her be a bogan. The light and sound production was pretty sloppy, but most people just seemed pleased to have a play to go to locally. We'll forgive a lot to miss out on the two-hour each way drive. I did enjoy myself anyway, a free ticket from a neighbour who works in the centre, and a chance to see who goes to what gets billed locally as "Live Theatre" ...isn't that a tautology? Like so many country things - it was packed with about 4 generations and came with the slight smell of mothballs. Anyway, the beer was cold, and the story was good, so I went with it and had a good time.
As part of the Boonah Arts Festival, there'll also be a "street spectacular" tonight - I'm looking forward to it. The whole region will probably be there - half in it, the other half cheering. I've invited my new nearly-friend who is a volunteer at the gallery, but as he lives in Ipswich, I'm not sure if he'll come. Once again, I expect to be carried by the sheer naive enthusiasm and open-hearted joy of the event rather than any special artistic or cultural vision. Hi-larious. Yes, I am mocking, but not with any venom. As part of my "bloom where you're planted" program I have come to appreciate many more things about this region - particularly as compared to Trash City. As our eccentricities here are accepted and valued, we do tend to live freely, and that is valuable to us day-to-day but also, it turns out, as a curiosity worthy of a day-trip from the city folk.
Ma & Pa's farm to us is a flawed home full of jobs half-done and living things that need tending so they can be eaten later. It is delineated by fences that have hugely important meanings in the eyes of the human laws but which are invisible and insignificant to the lay and the pulse of the land itself. The flows of it, the push of the sun and the pull of the water. This is the broader place that connects us into this tiny box of farm and why it is so very hard to leave in the tough times of drought or fire, because after a little while it owns you in a more permanent way than any contract ever could. When someone visits anywhere like here, anywhere a few hours away from concrete landscapes, the proximity to this power is revitalising. It gets called scenery, or quiet, but we know that it is more. An old more that we don't have a name for now.
Despite still being lonely here a lot of the time, I am actually saddened by the prospect now of going. This connection has been worth growing. Having had a few more days to think about things (since Ticking the Boxes) I can say to my sister "Yes, I am happy."
No matter what happens in the next phase of the plan, or the plan after (!) or what life throws in my path anyway, this has been a good thing to do. It's all ok.