So finally, I am making things happen in terms of steps towards another year in Australia. I have moved out to Shepparton, almost 200km pretty much due North of Melbourne, and have so far done one week of apple picking. In chatting to other people travelling around Australia and hearing their impressions, recommendations and tales of where they've been living since arriving here, I've begun to think about how this country has become our home.
Only now, by leaving for an as yet undefined block of time, can I begin to realise that Melbourne has become a home for me. I find the concept of 'home' interesting. I feel like we sometimes seem to be of the belief that only one home, or one true home, can exist in our minds, hearts and lives, but why is that? Of course, any one of our previous of current resting places might feel like the one we feel most strongly drawn to at any one time, but I think we can have many homes, and we can allow this 'top' home to be an entity that is constantly changing to adapt to our constantly evolving lives. Whether that adaptation be geographical, physical or emotional, I like the idea that 'home' is flexible. It means, for me, someone with a desire to eplore, that maybe I can make a home anywhere, and although my previous homes are elsewhere, they still exist as long as I want or need them to, and can always be revisited.
So through our lives we don't hop from one home to another, but rather we add to our list of homes, we collect them, to whatever extent we wish, and the important and necessity of each individual home is fluid.
This way, the whole world can become our home if we wish, which of course, in a way, it already is.
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Beautiful Australian countryside, which actually looks quite similar to the area surrounding my home in England.
Photo found here
