Depression in Dijon

This past weekend, we took the Friday off to try and see a different set of four walls and to walk a different set of streets. We are currently in our third version of the Covid-19 lockdown in France and working from home with the supermarket 400 metres up the street and masks now mandatory everywhere we venture outside. Our world had become unbearably small.

Dijon is a world heritage listed medieval town that has been around since the stone age. It has since hosted the Romans, the Dukes of Burgundy for centuries (11th to the 15thC) , survived an invasion by the Swiss in 1513, remained physically unscathed by the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 and was overtaken by Nazi Germany in 1940.

It is the capital of the Burgundy region, the most revered place for wine making in France. There is a route you can drive called ‘Les Routes des Grands Crus’ where eight of the world’s top ten wines are produced. Dijon itself is UNESCO heritage listed not just because of its extraordinarily well-preserved medieval buildings, but because it forms part of the unique climatic conditions for Burgundy wines.

We have been to Burgundy before and sampled a LOT of its wine in nearby Beaune. Not the eight mentioned above, of course, but ones much much cheaper and less of a tragedy for slightly sozzled cyclists such as ourselves to put into our backpacks, wobble into the bushes, land on our backs and smash the recent purchases.

Typical building found in the old town

We had tried to visit Dijon a few times previously, but accommodation seemed to be rarer than deodorant in a crowded Genevan bus. A better idea would be to go the week before Easter before families start their spring break. A break, this year which will not include the desirable locations where the super strict lockdowns are in force. Northern France (Normandy, Brittany, Champagne), Paris and its surrounds, Provence and most of the southern Riviera such as Nice and Marseilles are forbidden to visit unless for documented and essential reasons.

Our home in Ferney is within the Ain department adjoining Switzerland and while we are not in total lockdown we are under ‘en vigilance renforcee’ (enhanced vigilance). ****We are subject to the national curfew of 7pm (recently raised from 6pm due to daylight saving) to 6am and must wear masks everywhere now. That includes when outside alone, even when walking the dog with no-one in sight. In no part of France are bars, cafes or restaurants allowed to serve seated customers inside or outside.(**** We are, as is all of France, in total lockdown since writing this piece. No travel outside of your department and none more than 10km from your home address for anything other than essential reasons. Schools closed for four weeks.)

The anniversary of the Covid-19 catastrophe has been marked everywhere but we wanted to see a different set of four walls. Our research showed that Dijon is considered a safer department than ours but under the same strict rules. On a positive note, Dijon remains extremely proud of their culinary culture and we were informed that restaurateurs and cafes were able to take orders ‘at the door’ of their establishments as long as we cleared the hell away and didn’t hang around outside in groups of more than six people. Their famous indoor Saturday market was still open, albeit with a strict mask mandate and a man stood at the door counting people entering inside the building to keep crowding to a minimum.

Alright then, we thought, we will wander the lovely streets, buy food from the market, and use the kitchenette in our room. Our dog Felix was with us too, of course. It would be a surprise change of scenery for our endlessly-curious Spanish rescue and if walking around sniffing new pee spots was all that was on offer, we were certain that he’d love it.

This is where the risk of sounding like a whining, first world white woman who deserves a slap across the face and a ‘get over it’ ala Cher in ‘Moonstruck’ begins. And I would not blame you.

Sometimes, The Big D (get used to this, I use it to try and take the power away from the power of ‘depression’) and reality do, in fact, go hand in hand. This is particularly relevant during the endless Covid-19 anxieties, mandates and living in a country that has suffered nearly 100,000 deaths and 4.5 million cases with overrun hospitals, clinics and testing centres. The Big D finds it even funnier that the vaccination process is proceeding with confusion, disagreements about shipping some to other EU and non-EU countries and carrying out the jabs of their own citizens at a glacial pace.

The Big D had been loitering, a too little closely, next to me for a few days, despite years of knowing how to fend him off or prepare for his next attack. I felt apprehensive as we drove to Dijon despite Felix sleeping peacefully in the back. This was an improvement on his last car trip as he vomited up his breakfast during our ill-fated Sunday drive to the Jura that was too crowded with French people desperate to walk on snow that the roads were jammed for kilometres with cars parked on the edge of the narrow roads and people huddled too close together for any semblance of social distancing. Hopefully, we were better prepared this time, although after checking what booking.com described as ‘kitchen facilities,’ I also worried that a hotplate, microwave and bar fridge might dampen the enthusiasm of Dean, a rather talented home chef.

We had just managed to find the recommended parking outside of the old town which was quite a distance from our apartment. We dragged a distracted Felix and our luggage across cobbles into the old town to get our key from the main hotel and climb the dizzyingly narrow steps to our separate apartment just as the curfew hit.The room was amazing, part of a 15thC converted glass making factory right in the heart of the old town. La Choutte (the owl) street was around the corner, and the brochures told us to rub it with your left arm for luck, which we did. Gargoyles, palaces, stunning facades everywhere you looked. UNESCO know their stuff.

We accepted that Uber Eats was the only option for the first night and had bought along our own bottle of wine and food for Felix; all seemed good.

Can we get out of here now?

Felix did not agree. We had discovered during a trip to Grenoble (in between lockdown one and two) that he became distressed when we were not at home. Were we getting rid of him? What happened to the routine he so enjoyed and relied on? Where were the parks and fields? In Grenoble he did not pee for three days and could barely be controlled in his harness. He wanted to lead us, but didn’t know where, creating a constant traffic and tripping hazard.

In Dijon there were far less people, so we felt better about how he would conduct himself on a social level. There were much emptier public squares but little greenery to speak of. This place was so spotless you could eat — if you found somewhere open — your authentic French dejeuner straight off the cobblestones. There was a tiny park at the end of our street, but it was tightly fenced off because they were fixing the water soakage problem of the fountain. Dean luckily noticed that some of the park’s greenery around the back had grown beyond the fencing and, after twenty-four hours of extreme discomfort, Felix eventually gave up and did what he needed to do there.

But nowhere else. Outside, as we accepted the empty squares where dozens of outdoor cafes and restaurants had shut their doors and saw the stacked-up chairs against the windows inside, Felix was truly rattled. This was not Ferney. There was not a blade of grass anywhere. He would lunge in agitation at every innocuous passer-by and sure as hell was not going to stop pulling on his lead to let us stop and idly peer into a Covid-19 closed shop or museum entrance. As such, the planned peaceful walks in a new location with Felix were not a success.

The market was open and was magnificent cultural and visual feast for hungry eyes. We took turns going in to look around as the other stood outside near an empty shop-front, trying to get Felix to stop barking, sit and stay calm. Dean bought some freshly roasted pork that came with beans and roasted potatoes, and a bunch of bright green asparagus for good measure. On a stall outside, I couldn’t resist the new season raspberries and cherries. The non-Burgundian wine came from Carrefour ‘city’ supermarket. Dean dashed in to grab some while Felix waited outside and gained unwanted attention. Felix is a handsome young dog and people were interested in him, but he was most definitely NOT in the mood for pats, questions, lingering or waiting. Several times he looked at the sliding doors to Carrefour and howled. Dean’s temporary absence was his last straw.

Back at the apartment we breathed a sigh of relief. I took Felix to the back of the closed-off park where he reluctantly emptied himself before straining against his leash to be taken back to the apartment.

The meal — cooked via microwave and the one saucepan provided — was delicious. The block of chocolate that was included in Dean’s purchase of supermarket wine was also. We draped the couch and bed with Felix’s blankets and he curled up between us as we drank and watched TV.

There’s always wine. Supermarket wine was our saviour.

 

The next two days were the same as the first. Felix only toileting at the back of the closed off park at the end of the street and hanging on in agony for the rest of the day. No wine tasting for us as those shops were closed. No restaurants serving from their doors as we’d assumed.

For Dean, a break from home is the food. Trying the famous local dishes; reading the ‘plats de jour’ menus of every restaurant he walks by, sitting at a table in a little town square with a church at one end, ancient, gnarled trees providing shade and historical buildings and restaurants providing the energy life to watch as he enjoyed his meal and wine. He knew that these past enjoyments were not going to be available, but still thought that some local restaurants might be part of Uber Eats. Not the authentic or good ones, unfortunately.

Pastries and coffees could be purchased from the door in specifically spaced queues at boulangeries, but because no gatherings of more than six people were allowed, all seating options had been specifically removed from the town. Self-consciously standing around drinking a coffee because no alcohol can be sold or then consumed in the streets during this third lockdown with nowhere to sit and take in the sights and having one arm yanked as Felix continuously wanted to run to anywhere but here was not the relaxing getaway we had hoped for.

The Big D loved all of this. He loved that the winding narrow stairs leading down from our apartment gave me a fit of vertigo every time I took Felix out for his night-time pee that took so long as he agonised on how or where or even if he should do it. The Big D was gleeful about the gourmet shops that sold Dijon specialties such as cassis, gingerbread and local mustards were closed as they were not ‘essential’ businesses. He hooted at the shuttered wine speciality shops who still had signs advertising ‘wine tastings’ but that sunshine and time had loosened the sticky tape of those posters and they were rolling up in age and obscurity.

Never one to remain laser focused on just one victim, the Big D loved that Dean had a bout of hay fever that made it difficult to breathe and had a good chuckle at his suspicion that the ‘pet friendly’ apartment had recently hosted a clowder of cats. Night three of Uber delivery inside a room with a window that offered a cold breeze but no view and a kitchen that considered one saucepan and a plastic spoon the key utensils for cooking a meal as Dean coughed and wheezed continuously kept The Big D’s amused. Because we booked online, the hotel receptionist told us they could not refund us if we left early. I cried.

We had just wanted a break. We love it here in Ferney Voltaire, but Dean works from home and, apart from using his computer to look at Facebook and the footy instead of work, there is no difference between weekdays and weekends. I know the walking tracks here like the back of my hand and now that we must wear masks outside ALL THE TIME, I feel guilty taking Felix out on the less-used paths without a mask and quickly shove one on if I see someone coming.

But when everything is closed and the most fun you have is going back to your room, putting on the news and comforting Felix as he wedged himself between us on the sofa, we might as well have been home.

Corona is not going away any time soon here in France. We just heard that Italy is forcing quarantine on all EU countries who want to enter; a new rule that adds to the restrictions or quarantines already in place for non-EU countries. We celebrated our daughter’s 21st birthday over Facetime last year and can’t visit her at university in Edinburgh without an essential reason and even then, we must undergo a ten-day quarantine at our expense.

Both of my parents recently turned eighty and seeing their disjointed but happy faces in Victor Harbor over Facetime hurt like hell. A funeral was ‘attended’ by video link up.

We drove back to Ferney yesterday, stopping only to let Felix leave a piece of himself on the service station grassy area and to get some petrol. Unlocking the door and walking back into our small apartment, I cried again. It had a balcony. A good supermarket and, most importantly, amazing walking tracks through forests and farmland for Felix.

The Big D had me and he knew it. I felt like a loser for suggesting the trip and sorry that Dean was suffering such painful allergic reactions to the hotel room and struggling to rustle up a holiday ‘gourmet’ dinner from whatever the mini market around the corner had to offer. Wi-Fi had been one bar strength at best which limited entertainment options and all three of us had been miserable.

Dear Aussie mates and family on Facebook and all other forms of news and social media. You’ve done yourselves proud. You’re right to stop any of us expats from returning, or anyone else for that matter. You have kept cases and deaths down to levels that are cited by the BBC, CNN and France 24 news constantly. We accept that we will not be celebrating in person with either mum or dad on their 81st birthdays and our daughter’s 22nd birthday, in May, will be celebrated online also. The disorganized, complex and infuriatingly slow pace of testing, tracing and the availability of any brand of vaccines here in France and Europe as a whole has been shocking. The Big D has had one hell of a fun year.

This morning Felix and I did one of our regular walks through the countryside that’s about 500 metres from our door. He found several sticks, did at least a dozen pees, got harassed by bumble bees, sniffed the bottoms of several of his fellow chums and, for my part, I remained alert enough to steer him away from the fresh horse manure that he enjoys as a bonus snack when he can find it.

So even if you Aussies get the vaccine, before or after us Frenchies, please keep acting as if you haven’t. You are still spreaders. Don’t get any crazy ideas about traveling to Europe. Instead, keep the Europe of your dreams in your mind’s eye for now to sustain you and your bank balance because the reality is what the Big D is bent double cackling about right now.

Stay in Oz, keep anyone else trying to come in away from Oz and be grateful you live in houses with gardens, cities and towns with generous public gardens or units with green courtyards. The Big D will go away — I have learned through years of practice and acceptance that he always does — but knowing that we are all trying our best and that here, grateful that our little apartment is the best and nicest place to be, reduces his power to nothing stronger than the stray fly that found its way up to our second-floor. We tried to change our scenery and found that we could not. We cannot change this right now.

The Europe of your imagination does not exist anymore. It will do, but not yet.

Happy to be back home

Crying over Q and As

Some interesting questions from Bev at Sunday Stealing but I'm feeling recalcitrant and might do it on another day of the week.  So it's Tuesday and boy-oh-boy, what seemed like a fun Q and A has become quite emotional for me.

1. An unforgettable day in my life.

When my daughter was born.  She started sending me rather strong signals of her intentions to enter the world at a dinner party on Friday night.  It was all rather exciting and I was happy to share it with the other four guests.  Our prenatal classes had informed us that early contractions are NOT like in the movies, with water gushing and being rushed into Emergency two minutes later, but to stay calm and time them.  These were only occurring every twenty minutes or so.

At home that night though, I couldn't sleep and sat up buffered by every ornamental pillow we'd normally toss off the bed when we climbed into it.  I wrote down the time and duration of each contraction and by Saturday morning, they were every ten minutes.  I still knew to stay calm as our teacher had told us that hospitals sent many excited new parents back home until the contractions were every five minutes.

I tried to stand up against our mantelpiece and look nonchalant as Dean sold our tiny little Suzuki to a local florist, not wanting her to know that a) I was having contractions and b) they hurt like hell.

By 8pm Saturday evening, they were five minutes apart. The Melbourne Women's and Children's hospital was still located in Carlton then and a stone's throw from Lygon Street - the busiest street for bars, restaurants and shops in Melbourne.  Dean drove around the block several times trying to find a parking spot. 

Eventually we saw one, but so did another car - I wound down the window of our 'brand new' ex-government Mitsubishi station wagon we'd bought the week earlier in preparation for parenthood, and asked them if, because I was in labour, if we could take the spot.  They kindly agreed and instant karma was bestowed on them as the spot in front of ours also became vacant.

Once in hospital, the contractions were stronger but I wasn't dilated enough.  To avoid all the rather icky stuff, it is best to summarise the experience as having had three different marvelous midwives help us through it before ending their respective shifts. Epidurals, vomiting from bearing down so much and seeing poor Dean's exhausted, sleeping face smooshed up against the steel grey side of the bedside drawer.  By lunchtime, our baby's heart rate was starting to fade and I then started living a Hollywood movie scene when they rushed me into surgery, Dean wearing what looked like a shower cap and tears in his eyes and he ran alongside us.  Our daughter finally emerged via forceps and me numbed from the waist down in case a Caesarean was needed, at 2.15pm on Sunday afternoon.

She was blue, but rapidly turned pink, with a thin coating of strawberry blonde hair.  We'd made a human being!  I was also selfishly glad that I was still too numb to be moved because the infamous tar-like meconium poop she produced was left to be seen and dealt with by poor Dean.

That was 23rd May 1999.  A week overdue, so if you're into astrology, our expected Taurus became a Gemini.

  

2. My favorite snacks

Chocolate.  In my chocolate reviewing days, I was into dark chocolate, but after a decade in Switzerland, it's milk chocolate mostly.  Not the particularly posh stuff either.  Lindt never lets me down, nor the number that appears on my bathroom scales.  However, nothing chocolate 'flavoured' because that's always a very poor substitute and a disappointment, especially chocolate milk, cake or ice-cream.  

3. My biggest fashion accessory

My gold bangles (three) and perfume.  I've adored bangles (plastic, metal, silver, fake gold, real gold) even as a child and my parents gave me a gold one in 1990 and Dean gave me two others in 2005 which was our tenth wedding anniversary.  I don't take 'em off any more after one once broke, so I'm an automatic candidate for an airport security pat-down.

Perfume.  Unbrushed hair and teeth, baggy tracksuit pants, old running t-shirt and stained parka are my 'go to' clothes during this never-ending French lockdown, yet I still give myself a spritz.  My lifetime favorite is the original Chloe that I've used for over 30 years.  It's hard to find and I don't like the newer versions, so Tiffany, good old White Musk from the Body Shop, Yardley's Violet, Chanel No 19, 4077 Cologne and a few of the Burberry's are also in use.  Chloe is for the bestest of best days.

4. My biggest celebrity crush

C. Thomas Howell.  Ponyboy in The Outsiders.  That adorable face....!  I spent a lot of my hard-earned babysitting money to buy imported UK teen mags like 'Tiger Beat' in order to find posters of him.  He didn't reach the fame or cinematic heights of most of his Outsiders costars but that face.....

5. One hobby I would like to learn

I would have said 'learn French' but my old brain is always working in English. I can't help but automatically read every label, street sign and, to his great annoyance, Dean's iPad when he's sitting next to me.  I love alliteration and thinking up things to write about, so when I did try to learn French my brain just....turned itself off.  I know that you must give things a good hard try and nothing comes easy and you live in France and you're lacking confidence and, and, and.....  If it could be 'magicked' into my brain I'd be thrilled.  

Maybe a drama class for oldies?  A fantasy would be to occasionally get to play an unglamorous but rude old lady who couldn't care less about what swear words she gets to say at shocked youngers.  That seems like fun.

6. My OCD habits

Harrison Ford was a carpenter by trade and he once mentioned in an interview that he can't help straightening books or magazines on coffee tables so that they're in a straight line with the edges of the table.  I do that too.  Even before 'happy birthday' hand washing timings of Covid-19, my hands resembled scaly claws due to the dozens and dozens of times I wipe down the kitchen counter, sink top, table, coffee making machine, spills etc.  The worst decision I've made was deciding on a stainless steel splashback for the stove top and sink because the calcium-rich water here shows up every single drop and I seem to spend every single moment wiping them off.

7. If I could eat one last meal

Dean cooks an amazing spiced coated chicken schnitzel that he serves with twice cooked roasted potatoes, onions, carrots and garlic. The soft roasted garlic oozes out of the skin and doesn't give you the dreaded 'ten feet distance away from me, please' breath afterwards.  Add steamed broccoli and fresh asparagus and sweet corn.  Dessert could be a good baked cheesecake or carrot cake struggling under the weight of the cream cheese icing.  Add a generous handful of fresh raspberries.  Moet to wash it all down with.

8. Working on my fitness

Both of my achilles and both of my (I don't want to say 'bone spurs' because I don't want to have ANYTHING IN COMMON with Donald Trump ever) plantar fasciitis thingies have finally ended my running.  Even with a treadmill on a much slower speed and planned shorter distances, these flare up and I spend more time off recovering than doing any actual running.  The treadmill is a good place to drape bed sheets to dry though.

I have a fitness DVD by Jillian Michael called the 'Thirty Day Shred' that I could probably recite word for word, but after the end of Lockdown One, I lost interest.  My thighs sighed with relief.

During Lockdown Two, we adopted Felix.  As a four year old dog, he's got the body of an athlete in his prime and, as an apartment dweller with a balcony for a garden, he needs and deserves long walks and the opportunity to explore and have a deep think for several seconds before deciding to pee on the wild chives in front of him.  This has been a genuine gift for me.  No, not the obsessive excrement eating or raging barks at elderly folk, but the distances we end up walking each day.  I'm not seeing any amazing weight loss but, unlike Felix, no-one controls what I get in my food bowl per day, so that's on me.

9. What I spend money on

Apart from the mortgage, utilities, credit card and groceries?  Wool for the scarves I've been knitting as a LGBTQI fundraiser.  You can see some of them here at  https://www.etsy.com/au/shop/EverythingWoolBeOk.  

For some reason it's stuck in AUD prices which makes postage estimates from France (especially during Covid) almost impossible.  I've had better luck selling them privately.  I can't knit anything fancy or know how to follow a pattern but the repetitive nature of knitting is comforting and helps stop me from picking at my fingernails quite so often. Elmo's been an enthusiastic model, but as soon as I use up my last batch of wool I'm going to donate them to the French Federation - https://federation-lgbt.org/

10. My favorite recipe

No single one, as I'm not an enthusiastic cook, which means that sensible things like evening meals I have boring 'go tos' like spaghetti bolognese, various soups, various stir-fries and quiche. That's why Dean is the chef in our house: he enjoys it and is particularly good at it.  Favourite recipes for me always involve sweets.  That said, I'm still baking our lockdown bread because I like the hands-on habit of it and the process involved.  But being asked to 'bring dessert' which means make a white chocolate and blueberry cheesecake, tiramisu, pavlova or carrot cake means a happy Saturday afternoon in the kitchen listening to ABBA as I bake.

11. The best part of each season

I'll apply my European view on these, as the seasons are much more distinctive from each other than where I came from.

Summer - fields of sunflowers, outdoor drinking, long hours of daylight

Autumn - the beautiful changes of the leaves.  Cooler nights which are better for sleeping.  Seeing cute little pumpkins sitting on ancient stone door steps and fences as decorations.

Winter - Snow skiing (if not shut down due to Covid as it has been this past season), seeing robins hop along the path ahead of where Felix and I are walking, Christmas decorations and traditions making more sense in the cold weather.

Spring - the violets, daffodils and snowdrops that have somehow survived the winter and emerge into the still not-very-reliable sunshine.  Blossoms.  Felix trotting on green grass dotted with tiny white daisies. Being able to sit out on our balcony again.

12. A life lesson I’ve learned

There's always a tiny grain of truth in stereotypes.  They can be over-generalised and sometimes cruel, but they expose a commonality that a lot of us recognise.  None of us want to be BE a stereotype, but we can sure recognise them.

13. My inspiration to blog

I did it pretty regularly as a way to recover from a full-on breakdown in 2005, before stopping in 2013. My daughter was then a teenager and it didn't seem right to mention her at that time of her life as it was her own.  Plus, my older brother's wife emailed me to say that she'd always disliked me; didn't know why but had decided to therefore cut me, my husband and then thirteen year old child out of her life forever.  Up until then she had been a regular reader and commenter on the blog and I figured that she didn't deserve to see what I was thinking or getting up to if she was OK with making my daughter cry every birthday when she realised each time that her aunt (and uncle) had completely written her out of their lives for no reason that has ever been explained to her, me or the rest of my family.  

My daughter is grown up now; at university in Edinburgh and I'm trying to see if I can write stuff that isn't just relying on what a silly mummy I am.  Therefore, starting up again has been a bit slow and painful. I'm not sure who still reads blogs as about 99% of my old links have disappeared and tiktok just doesn't seem to be the right option for creaky old me.  I didn't know if I had anything worth sharing or saying - I still don't know - but I feel somehow, as though I want something of me put somewhere. If nothing else, having stuff to think about does help with my depression, self confidence and wondering just how and where I fit. 

14. What’s inside my closet?

Pretty boring clothes, to be honest.  Maybe two dresses, but the rest are shirts, t-shirts and jackets. As a teen/early twenty something, I was very much into fashion, but for me it was out of anxiety.  I didn't have the movie star looks of my mother and it was my friend Jo the guys flocked to, not me.  Fashion felt like a teeny tiny way to at least look the part.  After doing the two-year working holiday stint in London, it was travel, rent and cider that was more important to me.  These days, I just want my clothing choices to ensure that no-one runs away from me screaming.

15. Let me brag a minute.

You've got me on a down day, unfortunately.  I have so much to be thankful for, but when the 'Big D' (my sad attempt at nullifying the effects of depression by giving it a disrespectful nickname) kicks in, it can seem like I'm dragging one foot behind the other, stretching my facial muscles to adequately resemble the socially acceptable expression and keep it up until bedtime.  The good thing is that these days or weeks don't last forever.  It has taken me a lot of time, mistakes and incredible personal pain to finally understand that.  

So, maybe my 'brag' is that yes, I have depression.  And yes, it does define me - how can it not?  It is a part of me and sometimes wields a much larger and more exhaustive control over me than I'd like.  Other days I'm only dimly aware of it, but am never in doubt of its existence or that it's lurking there, always waiting and watching.  Maybe the best advice I can give myself - and lord knows I try to - is to say what I'd say to anyone I loved who was suffering.  

"What would you tell your friend?" They'd invariably come up with some pretty decent responses and I'd say, "well, if it's good enough for your friend, it's good enough for you."  Perhaps that advice is something to brag about.

Whaddaya Reckon?

I've been ten years out of Australia now and realise that the word 'reckon' is the one that confuses most other non-antipodean English speakers.

It just means 'think' or 'consider' in a more casual sense but instead of saying, "I think we should have chicken for dinner tonight," we Aussies say "I reckon a roast chook would be pretty good."

Our daughter Carly, arrived in Switzerland at twelve years old and went to an international school with friends owning a lot of different accents and backgrounds.  Now nearly twenty two years old, Carly is partly Swiss, a bit Aussie and in her third year of living and studying in Scotland.  When we facetime each other, she often points out that my Aussie accent and colloquialisms are much stronger than Dean's, despite the fact we both went to country high schools in the same state..

But today, I want to ask youse all something.  Whaddaya reckon about me starting a wee YouTube account featuring me in my Dog Walking Lady-clothed finery, sharing a few not particularly earth shattering (but certainly) true escapades, opinions or bravely revealed personal embarrassments?

Whaddaya reckon?  I'd really like your feedback.  You see, I love writing.  I write serious stuff for a 'living' but 'living' in reality is that Dean has the job that keeps us housed, fed, clothed, educated (Carly) and healthy and I get a bit of freelance stuff that I'm inordinately grateful for and then hate myself for having to politely submit my invoice, wait over a month to get paid and then overthank them for it.  To say that I contribute financially through writing is akin to letting a hedgehog hold the balloons.  Maybe I should just enjoy the opportunity to do it rather than consume my soul in anxiety about not being a contributor financially. (That's a topic often discussed with my psychiatrist).  I reckon that last sentence has lowered the mood a bit!

On a more positive level, writing and talking seem to be a similar thing in my world.  My family are bored to tears hearing my stories over and over, and the mundane or weird ones that I write about on Medium or here aren't ones that they're going to rush to read.  I'm Kath/Mum after all: they see enough of me when I shower with the door open to let the steam out or when I start ranting about 4WD owners who don't have roof racks or two bars and just use them to pick up their kids.

Very quietly, I've had a YouTube account for a few years and only used it to share some old Milly clips and two of Felix. It is, to put it charitably, very neglected and rarely watched.  Not unlike my attitude towards my personal grooming regime.

To start us off, I'll share this one of Felix with you now.  It was posted a few months back but will only take a little over a minute of your time to watch and hopefully end up with a smile.  This Spanish shelter dog that we adopted at three-and-a-half years old literally jumps for joy when it is his dinner time.

That was filmed in October and he STILL performs the same enthusiastic and energetically joyful dance for his evening meal.  Breakfast is different because Dean takes him out for a walk and I fill up Felix's bowl ready for his return. His reaction is to slide around the corner at sonic speed while skidding on the black and white mats, madly skitter around the kitchen bench to inhale his crunchies before I can say 'Hello there, Mr Speckles, how was your walk...."

You can see that I'm avoiding talking about my own old bonce being on YouTube.  I'm not famous, nor a stand up, an endearing animal or a public performer and never have been.  The world needs youth, intelligence, glamour, useful tips and not a 52 year old who still laughs when she sees French shower caps labelled 'douche bonnets.' 

It's Dean's fault, really.  He's known for saying "I love you" at the precise moment when I'm doubled over emptying the kitchen flip top bin under the sink so that only my grey marle tracksuited arse is in his vision, so he's not one for inane compliments or promising me a rose garden.

It was a genuine surprise when admitted to me that he had been reading my old blog back in the day but is also now reading the ones on Medium and right here.  I even teared up a little. He said that he reckons I could try and say 'em out loud, like a short stand up on YouTube.  

Firstly, I ain't short and secondly, the idea of stand up scares the undigested corn kernels out of me.  Vanity isn't something that would be ascribed to me, I don't think, but there's a tiny little 'give it a go, what have you got to lose' voice that sometimes emerges from behind the cacophony of self-doubt.  What if I simplified things a bit and sat down, in my normal clothes, in my own house, and just chatted for a bit?  Would that work, you reckon?

Obviously I'll need to learn how to edit and cut out the erms and ahhhhhs and incessant playing with my glasses.  But maybe we could all have a laugh at an old gal that will try not to take up too much of your time but make you feel glad to be you and not her?

If you could feel the nervous sweat and the red heat of embarrassment on my face as I'm writing this, waiting for the YouTube video to be uploaded, then try multiplying it by one hundred.  It's my first attempt at sit down.  It was done off the cuff and quite rightly needs to be tightened and better edited.  My hands are shaking.

But it's time to give it a go I reckon. I really truly would like your feedback, bad, good or indifferent.  I'm more than happy to stick to the occasional blog and keep my face of YouTube if the world truly doesn't need it.

Honesty is appreciated, but please be kind about it.  There ain't much I can do with this face!

A pad in the hand.....

I'm kicking this new blog off right now. No backstory, no introduction, no summary.

Appreciate the routine and the little things, mental health experts say.  Over and over, if you're online or watch too much cable TV.

Our apartment complex has a rubbish disposal system that's located out in the street but available only to those of us who pay our council fees and have a specific key.  This allows the council to record the number of non-recyclable bags of rubbish that each key holder/household/ratepayer disposes of each year.  Are you gripped yet?

Now, I'm reasonably proud of my effort as we earned a 36 euro refund last year due our ordure amount falling under their estimate for our apartment size and household members.  My ugg boots have worn a regular path along the back alley to the free public recycling bins and, thanks to Coronavirus still dominating 2021 as well as 2020, my lofty aim is to earn an even higher refund this year.  Yeah, that and continuing to make my own bread gives me wild-and-crazy gal status these days.

Every now and then someone just selfishly dumps a heaving bag of garbage by the locked rubbish bin.  It's easy to assume that they're lazy, or refusing to pay for their share of council services or just plain ignorant.  In light of 'appreciating the little things' and trying hard not to scream obscenities up at my neighbouring balconies, my belief is that the dumper has just moved in and is too damn tired to figure out what the tear drop-shaped dongle is on their new key ring. They'll figure out the rubbish process after they've put the slats on their IKEA bed base together and set up the wi-fi.

This morning was one of those mornings.  A full bag, resting hopefully by the locked garbage system, beads of rain streaming off it into the gutter.  I recalled seeing two different moving vans on Friday and assumed - let's be positive and pay things forward - that one of the new tenants left it there; a temporary breaking of the rubbish rules; soon to be amended when they find their bearings and feel settled in.

We're already thirty six euros ahead, my brain reminded me.  Be a nice neighbour and shout them a rubbish disposal.  Give their crap a quick trip down the chute.  Besides, Felix was tugging on the lead, eager to be out walking despite the rain.

The key was waved over the techno receiver thingy.  It flashed green, ready for a new load of rubbish.  I picked up the bag which promptly split and a sticky, soggy item affixed itself to the back of my hand.  It was a sanitary pad.  A bloody - in both senses of the word - used sanitary pad.

Ever the lightning fast opportunist, Felix's nose immediately shoved itself into the frighteningly fragrant mush. No, Felix! NO!  I peeled the pad off and furiously flung it away out of his reach, distractedly noting that it landed somewhere in the hedge opposite before having to grip onto the suspiciously greasy metal rubbish chute whilst hit with another weird dizzy spell.

Yep, my routine of maintaining a 10,000 step walking minimum for the past three months has led to a painful swelling on my left foot and strange fits of unsteadiness if I turn my head too quickly.  Yes, walking.  It makes my heart ache to think that I ran a marathon six years ago and now can't even take a friggin STROLL without incurring a Trumpian bone spur, albeit a genuine one.

As the unpleasant sensations generated by my inner ear canal resulted in a series of imagined somersaults and nervous sweat forming on my upper lip and chest, I had the luxury of time and discomfort to remember a few other things.

The email from my editor saying that payment for three articles written as a contracted freelancer have to be submitted via three separate invoices because their 'budget doesn't cover all three for this month.'  This despite being asked to do all three by the end of January.  I'd dearly like to tell the editor to go jump maskless into a retirement home aqua-aerobics class, but I need the money. I want to contribute and will, of course, humbly and politely resubmit the invoice; thank her for the opportunity to work for her and internally hate myself for the 'please pay me, please' attitude we freelancers have to adopt to beg those who enjoy a regular salary with all the associated insurances and supports to pay us for work already done.

A refund, due nearly a year ago after overseas flights were cancelled by the airline has been avidly chased down, a 'goal' set to ensure that the big guys are kept honest as we little guys get our own money back.  All associated emails, dates and lists of contacts via the complaints system, twitter and phone calls have been saved, as have my communications with the bank, insisting that they check at their end as well.  A bureaucratic challenge that's occupied me for NINE months, only for me to search for the refund via an entirely unrelated online account this morning and see that the refund was paid there, almost nine months ago to the day.  I feel very very stupid, and very very small.

Perhaps the ponky sanitary pad was the universe's way of paying things forward?