Transitioning

We're moving.

And it's bittersweet.

Being part of a family, it's tricky to balance everyone's needs, dreams and desires.

And it isn't always a case of the one who shouts the loudest gets heard.

Pete and I have been having a recurring conversation about moving for many years, and now it is finally happening.

We moved from Melbourne to the Peninsula 13 years ago when I was pregnant with River.

Apart from Pete I knew no one who lived here. I think I'd only been to the Peninsula a handful of times.

Pete was connected to the ocean and land here through his surfing and photography, he had some long time surfing mates but they weren't people we spent a lot of time with.

I didn't really care, sure I'd left a big life and network in Melbourne that I'd created through my work in restaurants and as a journalist but I was ready for the next chapter - having a baby and becoming a family.

If I look back on the transition it wasn't without its tears, fears and frustrations but I was deeply happy in other ways because being a mother and creating a family was a deeply held dream.

It's taken a long, long time for the Peninsula to truly feel like home and ironically now that it does, we're leaving.

In the July school holidays this year we went on a camping trip to Waratah Bay and were instantly charmed.

We stopped in at a cafe in Fish Creek and were surprised and happy to find it owned by an old friend of mine from restaurant days in Melbourne. I knew Pete would be thinking this a 'sign' we were meant to be here.

Sure enough he did and the conversation about relocating to South Gippsland began.

This move is our compromise.

Ideally Pete would have loved us to be moving to southern New South Wales to the Bermagui / Bega area.

We have friends there living the life that Pete dreams of - sustainable, self-sufficient, in an artistic, creative community.

After many months of Pete trying to convince me that moving to southern New South Wales would be a great idea I had to find in myself a capital letters "NO"for him to understand that it was not something I was ever prepared to do.

Southern N.S.W. is eight hours drive from the Peninsula, 5 hours to Sydney and 3 hours to Canberra -that's not a location I'm excited about.

Now, one of the things that first attracted me to Pete way back when was his focus and determination to make his visions become a reality. I admired that. Any project or book he dreams up he stops at nothing to see it through.

Trying to deal with this quality when Pete applies it to a vision he has for the family is like trying to contain a tsunami in a paper cup. It has tested me.

And so, I feel like we are transitioning as a family to a new place and I am transitioning to a new place in myself.

A place where I learn to know myself better at this stage of life in my parenting, in my marriage, in my work. And it's scary. And exciting. Filled with challenges and opportunities.

It's time to grow. And sometimes that takes changing places.

Life is full of new beginnings. It's up to us to embrace them.

It doesn't erase what has gone before, it adds to it.

To quote Helen Keller, "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing".

And so off we go on a daring adventure. I'll be taking you all along with me :)

picture: Agnes Falls, South Gippsland.