Moving to better pastures.

The lopped top of our birch-tree which threatened the gutters.

If people thought things have been a bit quiet on the Oosterman Treats blog, they are right. After more than ten years of ‘putting up’ with a strange inexplicable  toxic atmosphere, I am moving. Helvi and I both tried to make things work, but with some people that just doesn’t work. Perhaps it makes them happy when unhinging others. The chairperson of this community likes nothing better than to hack away with secateurs and cut down anything that blocks his view of fences and gutters. You will get the picture I am sure!

I am moving a few kilometres up the road where I bought my new abode. It is brand new and so far only a few town-houses are occupied. I met one couple who immediately were helpful and welcoming. Another couple opposite also friendly and jovial. It renewed my confidence in people. I also met very nice welcoming people at the local Bradman Cricket café. A joy to behold and we meet two or thee times weekly for a coffee and exchange of the latest. Nothing serious and oddly enough, no cricket talk, not that I would mind, I just don’t understand the game.

I was so happy with the decision to move away from the present noxious body corporate and so overwhelmed with my friendly new abode, that I bought another town-house, which I will let out to get a bit of income. Good karma so far. Helvi wanted to move earlier but with her cancer and endless hospital visits it did not eventuate. She would be happy to see me move away from this present address.

I am now packing endless boxes and sorting out all the paraphernalia we collected through the years. My goodness, 19 egg-cups, and so many sets of knives, far out. Father Riley’s charity shop is groaning with the superfluous household items of our previous life’s sojourn.

I am so happy to have made this move. I am on cloud nine and no secateurs in sight at my new address.

The outing of words into a real book.

Can one imagine? We all know that much of our world is not really tangible anymore. Even tactility is fast disappearing. It is all  available on the Internet. People can view and feel everything now on a screen. You can chose to adjust the size and distance from the screen to suit your vision. Whole lives are lived in front of a screen. People now ( I have been told) are living entire relationships now within the internet. They never actually meet. It seems that for some that is enough. With fast changing technology, even mutual sex is experienced through the internet with a variety of adjustable vibrating plug-ins and erotic apps. Love is doomed forever to remain elusive but how could Cupid have known its mystery would come to this?

So it is with words. In the past words were either spoken or held on a firm material, often on paper and in books. Remember books? I bought a kindle a few years back and downloaded the entire Tolstoy’s ‘war and peace’ in a split second and it was free. I started to read the story again but gave up after the first hundred pages or so. I haven’t touched the device since. I forgot the password.

Some people are organised with passwords. They keep a little book with their passwords somewhere. They are especially wary of the passwords of their bank-accounts. The password on my kindle is now floating around with so many of my other passwords. I just don’t connect to anything anymore that asks for a forgotten password. It is getting so peaceful.

Lately I am driven to get some of my words on a more tangible material such as a real book. I came across a web-site for self publishing and filled in a form for an estimate of costs. It is of course ever so gratefully acknowledged that so many of you have persisted in reading some of my word order. It is now over eight years since I started writing. I even wrote a book called ‘Frank’s story’ which I sent off to those publishers recommended by Australian Society of Authors. All of whom were supportive but no offer of publication. It is no wonder. It is a very competitive business.

As I said, I am chuffed each time bits of my writing gets read and responded too. It keeps me going and off the streets. I am now contemplating to get a book published that one can actually lift up and feel its weight, turn it around, even fondle it. My daughter and three grandsons will perhaps even carry it around within their lives after I am no longer here. I know they will get our spoons and forks but those will end up most likely donated at Father Riley or the Salvo’s. A future receiver of my spoons is hardly likely to reflect in whose mouths those spoons might have rested or ladled food into.

It just gives me a  glowing feeling that my words might survive in a more substantial form that just swirling around on the Internet. Heaven only knows in whose vibrating App those words of mine could end up in?

In any case, I have asked for a price on just 50 books. I need to re-write and print out the manuscript feverishly. I am so excited about the idea. Any advice will be welcomed. If you know a good editor let me know.

 

My words are eagerly waiting.