Author: George Morris
Year: 1848
The last feature I will mention is that of a deeply meditative spirit. There will be comparatively but little of the life without, . the being will be within. It will look deep into principles. Without shunning the world it will love seclusion ; — the retirement of its own sacred depths, where it holds unheard converse with the secret truth of things. It will be often bending over its own thoughts to adjust their polished shaft. The man’s spirit will love to gather round itself the experience of the solemn past, the hopes and struggles of the busy present, the mighty expectations of the pregnant future. Will oft be listening to the pale lips of things long buried — catching something of what they see and hear and do, now that they have gone hence and are to him ”no more:" reading the varied face of what now is with its prophecies of what shall be ; which prophecies, even as they are being fore-told deepen and expand and shape themselves from shadows into probable realities. All the experience he has gathered from’ men and books and things ‘ — from the faults and virtues of his own heart and life accumulate around him till he stand enveloped in it as in a cloud which moves as part of him: — a cloud of mingled hues ; some parts black, some filled with light, some streaked with prophetic fire, — all seen, all felt. Enveloped thus — thus built round about with truth- — thus experience clad, and bearing upon his warm, manly, naked heart the wants, the infirmities, the sorrows of his fellow men he will will go about the world holding sweet converse with whatever of earth is likest HEAVEN.
 OBSERVING THE ART OF CHRISTMAS DECORATION AND RECOLLECTING CHRISTMASES PAST. |
 |
2008 Introducing the musical and partying dimension of Xmas. |
BILAMBIL SPORTS CLUB. |
And the Fully Adult and Tastefully Decorated Christmas. |
 |
 |
 |
|
My own simple decorating technique. |
 |
 |
ON RIGHT. THE TREE AT LORRAINE’S IN WEST TWEED HEADS. ON LEFT. Sub tropical Xmas 2008 for 2. |
  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
2008 – CHRISTMAS AT HOME IN BILAMBIL COTTAGE WITH FAMILY COMING TO STAY.
I am getting something of a picture now. There are :
I shall proceed with my research. Izzy is mowing lawns – a crucial element of the Occasion. He is the pinnacle of Mower matched only by my former DOS in Bilambil.
We have a Baby in our lives this year who hasn’t encountered her first Santa. It appears that he appears in stores on the last weekend of November so he wasn’t there when we ‘did’ Coffs Harbour last week. Week before.
Now a few more images and then a study of DECORATIONS INCLUDING TREE.
 |
 |
|
Mistletoe. |
Holly. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Herein I include one pic of a Staff Xmas Party. That’s something I generally avoid but I was attending as ‘guest of’ and ‘ partner of’. I am only recently cast in the role of ‘partner of’ anyone at all. 2007, the Austlit Staff met at the Blue frog in Toowong for Xmas Lunch.
Looking through the AUSTRALIAN WOMEN’S WEEKLY, I also find that many of the recipes for cakes and puddings do NOT contain alcohol. At what stage did it slip into tradition that it was not possible to make cake without grog ?
|
Considering 2007. And examples of Australian Christmases. The PRE SCHOOL is always a good place for the first Santa Encounters. |
 |
|
I am even considering the ‘artificial tree’ in 2010. I have always been of the traditional ‘ branch of large conifer ‘ school of Xmas tree but am now surrounded by Artificial Tree-ers and can see the Beauty in them. My sister ordered hers from Christmas Warehouse Online. The MOB have been ‘growing’ the one on the right throughout most of the 2000s and even Kati B is going that way this year due to : a: having small child in house b, wrecking the metal bucket last year |
 |
|
The wee lass on the right also sums up the Occasion for me. Overwhelmed emotionally. Distraught. Weeping and Laughing all at once.
|
 |
|
I haven’t even begun considering the LUNCH. I know bonbons are a ‘Must” as are paper crowns. We also have a Xmas day birthday and a Boxing Day birthday to incorporate into the Festivities. |
 |
This one includes OUR 2006 ARMIDALE XMAS which meant HAIL. A NATIONAL DISASTER level of hail.
 |
 |
|
I came from Bilambil on the XPT to Grafton and then up on the Moree Coach to Glen Innes and the MOB picked me up from there, As we drove the 100kms towards Armidale hail came over and when we reached town, it had been TRASHED. |
|
 GAME OF 2006 – BOLLE. |
|
FOR NOW – BACK TO THE PLANNING.
They tell me its going to rain for another 3 months. Then again, when I lived in Brisbane, they told me it was never going to rain again and we had best drink seawater and urine. And , when I lived in Ulmarra, they told me it was going to be the hottest summer ever and bushfires would burn for months.
It does LOOK WET. It IS wet. I have seen a lot of rain during the first decade of the 21st Century despite the renowned drought. In the drought-ridden Brisbane of 2007-2008 – I was on a number of occasions – soaked through to the skin and even carried an umbrella, something which I had resisted doing for most of my 6 Earth Decades. Fortunately, my Mother, who was a kindly mother to me, had given me a Rose umbrella back in 2000. It is with me still and survives despite all manner of adventures.
Its Sunday and its been raining for a week except for Thursday which was hot and fine. Today is back to the Long Wet. Its meant horses hiding out on the verandah with unfortunate residues for us.
 |
 |
| Then I started wondering about UMBRELLAS and hit the NLA Newspapers again. | |
1951 |
1919 |
UMBRELLAS turn out to be the source of amusement I always thought they were. I shall need sources of amusement if the rain continues as it seems set to do. One newspaper has a plan for building an umbrella stand – a caved one at that.
JUST THE LINKS MY SWEET. JUST THE LINKS.
TO THE OLD NEWSPAPERS.
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article5694144
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article13284954
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article5235500
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article9983004
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article29863254
Truly Springtime it is.
FIRST SHOT OF SPRING 2010 AT THE WORKERS’ COTTAGE.
Coming into MY time of the year. I have rarely done an easy August. August has included my marriage, my mother’s death, my separation from my husband, the end of my drug use and various other ‘ challenging ‘ experiences. This year has been another of the tough ones. BUT now it is SPRINGTIME.
|
The chooks are running amok here at the Cottage. I hose the verandahs down and sweep the concrete but still they muss it up. No matter. 92 men have escaped from the Darwin Immigration Detention Centre. Afghani men. Desperate for mercy. They are sitting in protest on the Stuart Highway’s verges. I wonder what Spring is going to mean to them. Here, it is quiet. I have the old washing machine throbbing away. The tractor has passed by with a load of feed for the calves down in the bottom front paddock. ClassicFM is on the old radio beside me and I am home alone now that I have a working man in the household. The last car from the Main House takes off and I continue with my perusal of the NLA Newspapers re SPRINGTIME. The Little Lady is waiting to wear her first Summer Dresses. The kookaburra is back on the lower branch of the Burra’s Tree and Butcher Birds wake me in the morning. I have Venetian Blinds on the bedroom window. I have not yet determined what it is about the Venetian which soothes me – but soothe me it does. The filtered light perhaps and some childhood recall. Similar to the ancient throbbing of my agitating washing machine from Grafton. |
The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848-1954), Saturday 30 September 1933, page 8  |
THE ACCOMPANYING ARTICLE. SKIN BLEMISHES. 1938
|
|
|
 |
Rambling through my mind again. Its almost 23 years now, since I have used drugs or drunk alcohol. Means a lot to me. Its wet this morning. Grey skied but quite warm. The winter is coming to an end with its blunt edged sword.
Now lets do a bit of picture reminiscing.
MY GIFT TO BE OPENED ON THURSDAY 12 AUGUST 2010.
|
Next door to the Workers’ Cottage there is an orchard and Canadian John who lives there, drops lemonade fruit off as he walks past to visit our neighbours. I squeeze them in with the life energy water we get from Queensland and this morning I have a mug full while I sit here in the big room , watching the Satinbirds, listening to Margaret Throsby and waiting for my daughter to ring. Izzy is at work. First day of his first real job in 2 years. The satinbirds are fighting with the doves. I have a bowl of food on a pedestal out front and they are disputing rights to it. |
 |
|
I am still working at low speed internet due to another Telstra mess. I don’t mind the thought of a couple of days a week at home alone. I lived alone for a long time and sometimes feel crowded with someone else in my every day. I rather think that the same applies to him. He, then, is off to a new challenge and new interests and I take time at the table to write and ponder and wait for a visit from my daughter and her daughter. Meanwhile, the various birds dispute.
|
 |
|
I wrestle as always with my own temperament. I have a corral here, where I am living and it seems to me that much of my own life involves me corralling the temperament. Bringing in the wild horses and soothing them, whispering them in. I don’t want to be sanded and silted up like my own river here in Urunga. Mixing the metaphors, I am as my mind moves between images. Coffs Harbour Jetty |
 |
HOME OF J.G. SANDERS AND FAMILY.
That’s where I spent my babyhood before father Bruce Sanders, built 27 Paxton Avenue Belmore.
Just been sent a Domain Link with the property for sale on 2010.
Here are some images.
 |
 |
|
BACK THEN |
2010 |
 |
 |
 |
That’s her as she is today according to Domain. |
 |
 |
|
Now that its dark, I’m wondering where the Ibis are. They are here in flocks at the moment. The white stay together and the black stay together. The grey crane sits in the middle but I don’t know where they go when its dark. |
|
|
I shall do a quick look at JUNE over the last 5 years. My father died in 2005. In June. I was living then in the Cottage at Bilambil. The whiskey grass was growing beside my driveway and I could see all the world from my hill – so it seemed to me. It was a fine place for grieving and a fine place for living. It was here that I did the ONLINE RETREAT and studied the HERMITARY and played with my little granddaughters. Here, I re-encountered dignity and elegance and a simplified living which suits me very well.
|
 |
|
A year on, in June 2006, I was still there and still living alone and it still suited me well. To the East, I could see the Ocean, the Coral Sea, as it is called there. To the North I could almost glimpse Queensland. On occasion, a double rainbow formed and landed not too far from my own cottage. I had palm trees and ponies on a hill and my home was in line with what one young lad told me:
I was also under the wing of my Old Gentleman, whom I loved.
|
 |
|
June 2007, however, I was briefly in a non-postcard home in RED HILL, Brisbane. I had met Izzy and dared to enter a relationship. That led me to Brisbane. I liked that, having never explored Brisbane nor even been there except once as a child and a couple of times on a pass through for other matters. I DID not like living in a brick flat at the bottom of a steep V. Look at the turning circles for the car to get under shelter. I didn’t stay there very long. It was a hectic period and very disturbing. We bought IKEA furniture which was even more disturbing. Damn near as bad a my TUGUN venture in 2004. One sane thing I did in 2007 was to keep the Bilambil Cottage for weekends and ultimately to come home to. |
 |
|
2008 and June saw Izzy’s contract with AUSTLIT at UQ wind up. We did farewell pizza at the ST LUCIA campus and took off to Bilambil. By then, Music was bringing in more money than Academia.
|
 |
|
SURFERS PARADISE |
PIZZA WITH JOAN AT UQ |
|
After a busy year in Bilambil, June 2009 saw me back in Bellingen ( visiting) and living in ULMARRA.
|
 |
 |
 |
|
SOUTH GRAFTON EMPORIUM 2009 |
UNDER THE HOUSE IN ULMARRA 2009 |
|
AND NOW – I am here. How lucky I am !
|
 |
|
RALEIGH JUNE 2010 |
WORKERS’ COTTAGE |
Tonight I shall add to THE GEM COLLECTION and THE OLD PROVERBIAL RECOVERY. and maybe SIXTY EYES 2010.
|
 |
 |
I am going to put a heater on in the middle of the day and also the television. I read an AUSTLIT entry the other day. Austlit is where Izzy worked when I first met him. He was based at UQ in Brisbane. ( That’s University of Queensland). This week two of the Austlit people were giving a paper or somesuch on a matter which is ‘ assumed but untheorised’. Now there is an academic expression for you.
Sometime, way before the ‘assumed but untheorised’ came words like this which I have taken from LUC DEVROYE’s Main Page.
http://cg.scs.carleton.ca/~luc/waltercrowley.html
From Walter Crowley’s "Rites of Passage"
There is another legacy of the Sixties which is often neglected: tens of thousands of individuals who won the revolution at least in their own lives. They live within the system but they are not part of it. They organize their work and existences by their own rules, and have achieved a personal independence of thought, action and moral choice which does not require social sanction. They are free men and women and their examples might be the most subversive influences extant today.
And this from a Professor at the Canadian University where Luc Devroye is resident – sounds like a REAL university.
http://cg.scs.carleton.ca/~luc/juliusgrey2.html
 STAYING WITH THE PELICANS THEME TO REMIND MYSELF OF WHERE I AM. |
|
I am experimenting with new themes again and not striking one I like at all.
THIS WAS ONE FINE LOOKING MEAL BUT TRULY, TRULY HOT. |
|
A brief glance in the rear vision mirror. Its the day that Australia acquired its first female Prime Minister. That is all I am saying about that. Its a cold, bleak day and well suited to one of my at home alone days. Izzy is off up North doing his Music Night at South Grafton Emporium, now known as ALCHEMY, for reasons which sound fine but don’t actually translate well. Here in the cottage, we have critters who come for visits and treats. Its an easy way to have animal company. They go home for major caring. I have been hesitant about writing lately, not wanting to sound too 60 year old woman esoteric nor too cynical and incisive. I was leaning to the incisive – but can’t quite pull it off. |
IZZY WITH THE ANIMALS |
|
I am going to do that “looking back” I was talking about, for an hour or so and do it disciplined instead of rambling around the chambers of memory. I left you with LUC DEVROYE earlier and I return with another link now because FONTOLOGY is the main connection I have to him. Not that he knows that – but I do. I have some of my finest fonts either through his resources or directly as free fonts given by him. He calls his pages ON SNOT AND FONTS. That appeals to me. One day, when I feel inclined, I shall do a Scribus Page or a PAINT.NET and show you some of them. http://cg.scs.carleton.ca/~luc/fonts.html Here is his bio:
|
SCOOB LOOKING TO THE ROAD
OVER THE BACK FENCE |
|
A few years back, before becoming a co-habitor, I did the Ignatian Online Retreat. 10 months it took. http://www.stignatiussf.org/a/online_retreat.htm I come from a long ago Methodist background, in a slack manner, so the venture into the Ignatian World was new to me. Its connected to a University in the States. Creighton. I wonder if any of the American Universities specialise in such gripping courses as TOURISM, EVENT MANAGEMENT etc. How is one supposed to get a Job by doing a deeply spiritual retreat or exploring the depths of mathematics or fontology. As the new P.M. of Oz says – its all about HARD WORK. And more HARD WORK. I, myself, despite being a resident of the WORKERS’ COTTAGE prefer the HERMITARY. |
|
History. Mystery. Research-in-Progress.
Learning to stumble through life without the comfort of booze.
A sweary alcohol recovery blog written by a Yorkshireman
Adventures in Addiction Recovery & Cancer Survival
A woman's quest for one year of sobriety
A mom, wife and professional's journey on recovering from addiction
ACoA Recovery Issues (adult-children of alcoholics & other narcissists)
WHERE TO START WHEN YOU DON'T KNOW WHERE TO START
biographical, non-fiction
Alcoholics Anonymous Meetings in Mountain City, Tennessee
Emotional musings
Expedition website
ever seeking a right-fit life
Simple Thoughts on Life
Shortness of Breadth
Because we’re all recovering from something.
Climbing, Outdoors, Life!
LYNNE SANDERS-BRAITHWAITE 