My 5th Ever Blog Post

So today is Day Four of our February Blog Challenge.  Here's today's prompt:

Look at the 5th post you ever wrote on this blog.

In hindsight, what do you think about your 

frame of mind and your style of writing?

So here it is.  The 5th Post I Ever Made on My Blog


I decided to start my blog just before we left to come to Australia.  So these posts were still part of my life in Connecticut.  My frame of mind at the time was pretty chaotic.  I had been told for months that we MIGHT be going to Sydney.  Thank goodness I had an excellent employer who allowed me to continue working under all this ambiguity.

So by the time I wrote this post, we had our tickets to Sydney and everything was planned.  We were in the process of selling most of our stuff or giving it away to friends and charity.  So here's how I feel things were going...

ME - totally open to getting rid of most of our stuff due to the fact that we were going to be moving into a space that was much smaller than where we currently were.  I mean, our house was three stories.  It wasn't an overly large house, but very vertical and full of our stuff.

MR. SMITH - open to getting rid of stuff to a certain point.  I mean, the poor man sold ALL of his tools.  All of them.  None of them could be used in a country with different power points anyway.  But I know this killed him.  And even so... there were a vast number of things that he refused to part with.

So this created a lot of tension between us.

And it was definitely starting to sink in...  the reality of what we had agreed to.  This was our first home.  No one could understand why we didn't keep it and rent it out so that it would be there when (and if) we came back.  Truth is... we couldn't afford it.  And we didn't want to even think about how some other family would ruin the house.  When we bought it, it still had bare white walls.  It was a blank canvas.  We had already painted *almost* every room in the house, built a deck and installed a spiral staircase from the lower deck to the upper deck and turned the extra attic space into a HUGE walk in closet that was larger than our bedroom.  We had poured blood, sweat and tears (literally) into creating a gorgeous garden with beautiful blooms, trees and native greenery.

We had two cats (Pepper + Coco) that we had to leave behind.  Thankfully the new owner of our house agreed to adopt them.  I couldn't bear even thinking of returning them to the Humane Society and they were much too skittish and paranoid to put them through quarantine in Australia.  Not to mention that most apartments didn't allow pets anyway.

I had many friends that I had to say goodbye to.  I had lunch/dinner/coffee with Joni, Elaine, Laura, Dottie, Diane, Annie, another Elaine and many more.

Most importantly, I had to say goodbye to Kristy and her two babies.  I had spent so much time with them leading up to this point.  I cannot express how painful it was to drive away from them for what I now fear may be the last time.  Kristy was like a sister to me.  She's quite simply one of the most beautiful human beings I've ever known.  I thought no way would anything come between us.  But the distance has done it.  We've sort of lost touch and I don't fully understand why.  Maybe it's my fault.  Maybe I should try harder.  I know I should try harder.  She's not on Facebook (I know, right??) and I'm quite certain she doesn't read my blog.  I called quite often in the beginning and mostly got her voice mail.  Eventually, I suppose I just stopped.  Just thinking about this now is causing me to cry so hard that I can't see.  So I'm going to take a small break.  :)

Carrying on...

I had the best job of my life with people I truly cared for and I had to quit and leave it all behind.  I know now that I will definitely never have another job like that again, especially not in Australia.  Man, this place is BRUTAL.  I have never felt like more of a number anywhere else.

I was excited.  I was nervous.  I was sad.  I was hopeful.

So that was my frame of mind.  Now about the style of writing.  Listen, I'd be the first one to point out that I'm no literary giant.  I don't use a bunch of fancy words.  I probably use way too many periods in the form of ellipses.  I say LOL and OMG way too much.  I like making smiley faces and little hearts on Facebook.

But I like my style.  I try to keep my tone conversational.  Like you're sitting next to me and I'm telling you a story.  What I type is pretty much how I would say it to your face.  So I hope you like my style and keep coming back.

And please leave a comment if something moves you!