butterflies

I'm feeling slightly sick in my stomach today.

I've been approached about a job in Brisbane ('headhunted,' says Lovergirl proudly) and I want to do it but I'm anxious about the change. I've been sitting out here in my little hill study for a couple of years now, working in my pyjamas, skanky tracksuits for trips into town for supplies, dressing up only for my monthly trips to whichever city. So I've really had it very easy, if somewhat impoverished-ly. Taking this job will double my income but also my required effort! It will be good to stretch myself and it's good to be appreciated - freelance writing is a lot of knocking on doors that turn out to be brick walls. And then when I got excited about being a director's assistant that just seemed like a maze of dead ends. In the end I was working for a friend doing admin to make a bit of extra money and just feeling like nothing was coming together for me. I'm not pregnant and my career is crap so what is the point of my existence?

I need to ring Jeff in Brisbane back in an hour to let him know whether I will take the job. I mean, I will take it, it's just...ringing him of couse makes the decision process complete.
It's only for six months and I've said I want to work one day from home and three days up there. then I'm only away from the bush house and Lovergirl for 2 nights.

There's this whole North Coast thing about trusting the universe and there is a glorious golden life out there waiting for you if only you let it come in. Obviously that's if you don't starve to death in the meantime.

Charlie & Jan the carpenters are here at the moment, hammering and sawing and muttering amongst themselves. Lovergirl and I are having lots of things done to the little bush house, all with the purpose of getting council approval. No council approval = no insurance which is a huge problem in this bushfire-prone area. So we have a banister going onto the staircase and a railing on the upstairs french doors and a couple of other things that are compulsory council requirements. We have a development application into the council to build a new bathroom so we can have a toilet and laundry. I'm quite excited about the idea of having a real toilet! I always feel self-conscious when visitors come to stay. I mean, it's normal to be able to offer someone a toilet, rather than asking them to wee on the grass. We have another system for poo, a homemade composting toilet under the house which is a small brick pit with a sheet of fibre-cement over it. In the fibrecement there is a hole cut, so you squat over it like an Indian style toilet. I don't mind the hole and I don't even mind emptying the pit every six months or so, but it doesn't have any walls and it's right under the deck. We have put up some bamboo curtains on three sides so you have a view of the mountains but if anyone is on the deck having a quiet cup of tea you will certainly be able to hear each other....

Lovergirl tells me I worry too much about what people think and if I am happy with it that is enough. I know this is logically right, and I am being codependent wanting to look after other people's comfort and needs. But...you know, weeing and pooing in privacy are fairly basic comforts, and even without worrying about the visitors I feel uncomfortable when other people are around and I need to...erm, attend to my bodily functions.

The other thing I think is that I have felt a bit trapped, not having a toilet. If we decided to go and live somewhere else for a while, it would be quite difficult to rent out the house. Most tenants expect a toilet.

So even though we will be about $25,000 further in debt by the end of the year I am very excited that all this is happening.

One of the weird things about writing a blog, compared to just writing everything in my journal, is that I am really aware that someone might read it. So I have to be careful with people's names, and places, and also...I filter stuff. It's a different kind of writing. If someone read this they would find out things about me. And I can't write about people I don't like, in case they read it. My writing books say things like you have to go for the throat, the important stuff is the stuff you don't want to write. the stuff that reveals all your worst characteristics. I'm not a very good journaller. When I was having the affair with G I hardly wrote about it at all. Three years as a man's mistress and I have no record of it! Now there is a vein of interesting life-stuff that has just gone by.

Maybe one needs a journal for the really dirty stuff, the gritty underbelly (not that mine is very gritty, more like a tabby-cat's soft white furry underbelly) and a blog for the more mundane stuff that I'm happy for other people to know. But when would i have the time to keep both? It's a mystery.