Who, What, Where, How?

There are so many new things in my life currently and I will write about that a lot in this blog - afterall that's why I started to write these things down, because things are so new and I want to remember them when they aren't so new. I would like to take this opportunity to talk about the new parts of 'me' that I'm working and dealing with at the moment.

In the past I have been through many stages (as we all have). Growing up I was a real tomboy, never wearing skirts or dresses, into everything the boys were into and generally scorning anything I considered girly. I mean my parents even gave me toy guns and Ken doll instead of Barbie!

As a teenager I was into the 'grunge' scene and lived the girly rock groupie lifestyle. It was all about being sexy and soft yet confident and independant.

Finishing school I became involved in the theatre and became interested in studying and the classics and being a 'good girl' and doing the 'right thing'. People who knew me at that time think I am straighlaced and very proper.

After breaking up with my first boyfriend and finding myself in a big city I was lost and scared and found through friends this desire to experience more, experiment more with fashion and music and art.

Living in the UK I became very confident in my life choices, my image, my direction in life and who I was. Annonimity gave me the opportunity to 'be myself' for the first time and I reveled in it!

Returning to Australia and my relationship breaking up I turned wild. The storm of emotions inside me drove me to turn the world upside down. I pushed every boundry, threw off the idea of responsibility and respectability to live a life with no consequences. Not surprising it wasn't very fulfilling, I hurt people I cared about and myself. I don't regret that time as I needed to go through that to come out the other side and I think I learnt more about myself than I did at any other time if my life. Yet that part of my life is over.

Now I have a new life!

I'm learning new things, how to be a wife, to be part of a new culture, being part of a new family and to go back to the best things of all those stages of my life previously.

My wonderful husband is teaching me things I have forgotten. Learning to be more kind, to speak to him and others with more respect. To remember to think about how what I say effects other people. Giving something back to the community. Those seemingly normal things that I seem to have shifted my focus away from.

I am working on being less self-centered, selfish and self-relient.

And I'm loving it! I'm more sensitive and softer and I feel less angry or frustrated than I used to be. I'm calmer and feel less pressure on myself.

I am still dealing with finding my place in my new world. Dealing with such open religion and emotions. Knowing there are parts of myself I need to hide, or prehaps not be so open about. It's hard to swallow my words, to think about what I'm saying almost constantly - like trying not to curse or say Oh My God!. Sometimes it's frustrating not to just be me, and yet i love the me that I'm becoming so much more than parts of the me I was before. It feels like coming home and back to myself. I'm more proud of the me I'm becoming, again. The values I am living and wrapping myself in responsibility and respectability again. It's comforting.

Perhaps I am truly becoming 'me', not a new 'me' at all. The 'me' I've always wanted to be.


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New Seasons

Over the last few days autumn has really begun to take hold. Almost overnight we have extra blankets on the bed and I went out and got more ugg boots for this years cold season.

I say autumn but I guess I should learn to call it 'fall'. It's not the first Fall I've experienced having lived in the UK and yet this one is quite different since it also means Halloween!

To say I'm excited about Halloween is an understatement. I love dressing up and the thought that the whole country will be dressed up just plain rocks my world. Add to that my best friend is coming to visit over Halloween who has been a wonderful partner in crime over the years and you've got an incredibly excited young lady!

Unfortunately it is harvest for us at the moment (along with many other families) so I feel like this season is slipping by without me being able to take part. Friends and family are enjoying pumpkin patches and fun times while I'm sitting in my glass box on a tractor.

Not only do I love dressing up in costume but I also love kitchy, cheesy holidays and I am just itching to get into it! I want to carve pumpkins and decorate the house but I think it will all be over by the time harvest finishes. Boohoo!

My first Fall and Halloween and I won't get to enjoy it?! I guess there will be plenty ahead of me so I'll just set my heart on next year.


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A New Beginning?

So after a long break I am rather keen to get back into blogging. Why the break? Well I think I have used writing in the past to work through my problems, to give myself an outlet for emotions that I felt I couldn't express any other way.

And this time? I feel the desire to tell my new story.

I'm a newly married woman living in a foreign country with new challenges and a new life to learn to live. There's a part of me that wants to keep this memory somewhere other than in my head. Everything is an experience these days and not just the world I live in today but also the relationships I have with everyone I love. I feel like a new person and I really love her, despite her shortcomings.

My concern is that I'm living in a small town and I'm a little worried that I will be censoring myself because I love the people in my life but by stating my real honest feelings I may offend them, worry them or upset them somehow and that really concerns me. Not to mention I don't want to embarrass myself... So I'm not sure how this will go.

I've decided therefor to focus on just smaller events and hope that will do rather than reveal too many personal details... I hope it will still be interesting!

Performance Anxiety

Having now made the move and having been Stateside for almost 5 weeks now I've been having a lot of fun comparing the 2 cultures. Nearly every day I see something, hear something, experience something that just makes me giggle and smile. American's really do have a great way of living their lives, but it's oh so different from Australian's and even Brits!

Obviously everything is bigger here, it's just a fact - the food portions, the shopping centres, the trolleys at the supermarket. It's just plain bigger here - and I've been driving the Boy mad pointing all of the 'big' things out, and probably embarrassing him too by pointing and exclaiming loudly in my brash accent "oh my god, it's huge!" (now don't any of you get dirty minds there). 

After we finally go through the ordeal of finally choosing which tin of tomato's is best, guessing which tube of toothpaste doesn't taste like dirty socks and generally having the Boy explain every second item in the store - then it's time for the register. 

Here's where I have the most fun. People are just so damn enthusiastic here! Firstly there's the hello, where they make you feel like they've been waiting all day for you to walk up and have them ring up your basket of goods, "Why hi there! How's your day been?" and it's like they actually care! You could've sworn you had just arrived at your weekly psych session and settled down onto their couch for some analysis. At times my head bobs up in case I actually know this person (pretty long shot since I've met all of about 10 people so far), I'm so sure that we have some kind of connection, some kind of past experience together - but nope, it's just the smiling face of your local supermarket assistant. 

Now I'm a pretty enthusiastic young lady and I still am just flabbergasted at how full on these people are - at the coffee store it's the most intense. My favourite moment has to be how excited they are for you just to order:

Manic Coffee Girl: "Good Morning! How you doing today?" 

(breathless, no pauses between words at excessive volume for serving someone their first coffee of the day)

Sheila: "Oh hi, I'm great thanks, how are you?" (pushing myself to add exuberance  despite lack of coffee)

Manic Coffee Girl: "Oh wow I'm just wonderful today! So how may I help you?" (beaming smile and staring at you expectantly as if begging you to make them 'helpful')

Sheila: "Can I get a skim latte thanks?"

Manic Coffee Girl: "Great choice! That's great! Now you want any flavours with that?" (So pleased to be able to fulfill my request I expect them to burst from the effort)

Sheila: "No thanks"

Manic Coffee Girl: "No problems, great choice. Any suger?"

Sheila: "Two thank you"

Manic Coffee Girl: "Two? Sure, super, OK! Now what size would you like? Small? Medium? Large? Extra large? Extra, extra large? Gallon? 2 Gallon?"

Sheila: (horrified that anyone would order anything larger than a medium) "Small would be great, that's just perfect! Thank you so much!" (determined to out enthusiasm this woman, nothing will stop me!)

Manic Coffee Girl: "Small? OK that sounds great, can I get you anything else today?" (Enthusiasm dropping a little at the horror of me only ordering a small when you could order one as big as your head).

Sheila: "Nope that's it!" 

Manic Coffee Girl: "Sure thing, you just wait there and I'll be right with you a jiffy!"

By now I'm sagging against the counter utterly exhausted by keeping up this endless enthusiasm. How can it possibly be that I'm not the most enthusiastic person around?! It's been my 'thing'. I'm the enthusiastic, energetic one - I've been described as 'cheerfully annoying' because I'm so damn cheerful?!

I find myself looking inwards, have I lost my spark? Have I become a cynic? Where has my enthusiasm gone? The stress, the pure effort of being enthusiastic is exhausting! I'm having performance anxiety! How can I possibly be more enthusiastic?! I'll just have to come up with a new strategy... perhaps some flair?

Disneyland, Eat Your Heart Out!

It seems these days I'm lost in a never ending rollercoaster ride. My emotions are up and down and all around - to the point that I'm now just numb, the emotions are just too exhausting to continue to follow so I just have to let go and allow them to wash over me, without thinking too much about where they're coming from and what to do with them.

So much of me is focused on getting over to the US. For such a long time I dreamt and wished and yearned to be with The Boy in a normal way, to explore the relationship that gives me so much joy. The idea of living together, of going to work and coming home to cook dinner together has been all consuming for such a long time now. It's been 8 months since we met and 4 since we decided to really make a go of it, and suddenly (or so it seems) it's upon me. I'm about to move to the US, to live with him and make a life together, with the big possibility that it's forever! It's like I have to pinch myself to make sure it's really happening.

Finally the missing and hurting are going to be over, I will be in his arms where everything is good and right. I will be starting a new adventure - the thought of which has been almost as attractive as being with him, and the desire to lose myself in another culture like I did when I moved to the UK has this incredible pull over me. I learnt so much of myself during that time and I want to learn more this time. Today I was reminded of the joy that comes from exploring new places and new things and it has rocked my world how truly lucky I am to have the opportunity to do so again, with an amazing support network no less!

I'm excited! I'm 'up' and flying through the air, my hands raised above my head rushing towards a future I've dreamt of, screaming into the wind and opening myself to the endless possibilities that my life has wide open in front of it.

Yet, faced with the actual moment that it's going to be 'real' I find that it still feels like a dream. Even the house he's found for us, I have photos but he's done a bunch of work on it and now filled it with furniture that he and The Family has picked, none of it seems like it's mine and I feel like I'm standing on the edge of a cliff and about to jump. That same wind in my hair that I've found so exhilarating suddenly turns chilly and I drop my arms and wrap them around me for warmth, looking back from the cliff to what's behind me. Part of me tempted to walk back from the edge, from the fear and take the safe option. I'm 'down' and what was a bright and beautiful morning sky of opportunity covers with a light wisping of clouds, obscuring the sun so it only peeps through at random moments. The joy of standing on that cliff becomes hard, cold fear.

What if I hate it? What if I stuff it up (like I do every other relationship)? What if he doesn't really love me? And scaries of all questions, what if I love it? What if it works? What if he does and will forever? Both options have upsides and downsides that are equally as debilitating and incredible!

If it doesn't work, well then I have the 'I told you so' looks, the significant lack of money (this romance has been a costly adventure), the heartache, the loss of time (again) and facing the prospect of coming home with my tail between my legs. Taking back all those gushing statements of 'forever' and 'love'. The embarasment.

If it does? Then I have a lifetime of missing and heartache ahead of me. Constantly chosing between the country and family I love and the man and life I love. Will it break me? Will it break us? Only time will tell.

These thoughts bring me back to the possibility that I have met the man of my dreams, the one who will be beside me and look after me, who'll love me without censure, completely and surely. The man who I will love, who I'll marry, have children with, grow old with. And suddenly... I'm 'up'! Because he is amazing, he is incredible and makes me so happy sometimes it feels like my skin with bust open and sunlight will stream out for all to see.

And right now all I can do is smile, hold on with all my might to the bar in my lap and wait... because regardless of the outcome it's going to be one hell of a ride!

Where it all begins

And so it begins, I'm now 12 days out from the move and working through a bunch of 'to do' lists that seem to slowly... slowly... be disappearing. It's hard to believe that this time next month I won't be in Australia anymore!

So what take a Bondi girl from her home and whisks her to the other side of the world? Well like any good story it's a boy of course! Whilst traveling through Vietnam in April this year I met a wonderful person and as fate would have it, he's a Yank! Over the last almost 8 months we've corresponded every day, whether it be by phone, Skype, letters, cards, email, chat - you name it we've done it. And after that time it became apparent that we were very much in love, and when you love someone you can't be away from them without it hurting a lot.

I visited him for a couple weeks in August and he's just returned back to the US after being with me for a month here in Australia. Visits sure are wonderful but it's not the way that you can conduct a relationship, and I really, really want a relationship with this man.

That leaves me in a bit of pickle though right? I live in Australia and he lives a bazillion miles away in Chico, what to do? Looking at the 2 situations we're in, it just plain makes more sense for me to move. Why? Well I'm a little 'over' Sydney for one. I'm ready to see more, experience more and learn and grow again and I really enjoy the freedom that living in another country gives me to do just that. I've lived in the UK once before and am pretty happy moving countries. Secondly, he's just starting up his new business whilst I am able to move rather freely in my career choice.

And now here I am, packing up and saying goodbye to friends and family, packing up my life and preparing to head to the insane, wild United States!

I've never really had a big desire to even travel to the US but having traveled there only briefly it really piqued my interest. The mountains that surround Chico are stunning, they're mesmerizing and I'm so looking forward to exploring them with The Boy. The town of Chico is sweet, like the towns I've seen in films but full of college kids mingling with farmers so that it really does look like a film set - one of every demographic everywhere you look.

It's somewhat daunting moving to a new country and the fears do surface often, I remember the loneliness when I moved to the UK, trying to make friends and get a job and just simply figure out how to do the daily things like finding the ingredients for your favourite recipe in the grocery store. But this time I've got a few more things sorted out, I have The Boy to show me the way. I have The Boy's Family to help me settle in and be my support network. And the UK experience under my belt. But still there's a lot ahead of me and I'd like to document that time, for me and my friends. It should be pretty interesting I hope?! Not all doom and gloom but just the craziness and observations that you find are so common when you move countries.
Should be quite a ride!