GETTING READY TO MOVE .........

FROM THE SHOALHAVEN RIVER TO BOLT STREET - April 2022

MY VERY DEAR GERALD AND SANDRA   ALL I CAN SAY AT THIS TIME IS...

WOW!!!!!!!!!!

You are in my prayers and I hope the tide (no pun intended) turns soon.  Hold tight to the good memories and take strength from the love of friends and family.  This time will soon be a memory that will also include good moments of joy and pleasure. Take a deep breath and know that it will all be in place soon.

love,

Beverly

PS I do wish I could be there to give you and shoulder and a helping hand.

Hi my darling Friends,

Forgive this ‘group’ email but I am feeling under pressure with so much going on and I just wanted to connect, albeit briefly.

Thank you for your emails which I read but go unanswered, I am so tired of being so busy -  they mean the world to me, and keep me going.

We move in 12 days and the ‘new house’ is as yet unfinished and we have to be out of this house, anyway.   Every day Gerald is driving the project and getting things done, but with builders sick with Covid or their families sick with Covid, shortages of materials – of absolutely everything, as everybody is building or renovating, and there has been little coming into the country for two years.  And there are ships carrying cargo which are awaiting entry to harbours as there are so many, everyone is short staffed, so materials are thin on the ground and delays with absolutely everything - its been an absolute nightmare.  Not the enjoyable creative experience we have enjoyed so many times in the past.

We’ve had rain, rain, rain for months on end - and had two more floods five days apart a month ago, right through the downstairs of our house.  We had the second one just after we have finished cleaning everything up and putting everything back in its place.  It was physically and emotionally exhausting.   We are so depleted of energy and time, the last two years has been so disruptive with four floods, bushfires, ill health, house sales, packing, unpacking, renovations – and its been hard on us.   Hopefully we are getting to a place where some day soon, we may be able to sit down and relax and read a book, or go on a trip somewhere for some rest!

And its still raining.   I hope the Weather Gods smile on us for the move, and we get some sunshine.  We moved into this house during a flood – and THAT is definitely not something I want to repeat.   Sloshing through knee deep water in our house. 

We had another scare with Gerald, I found another nasty looking ‘thing’ on his leg which he casually said he’d had for a month, and I had him in the clinic as fast as possible.  After a really good talking to, littered with the “F” word.   It was removed two days later, and fortunately, was not a melanoma, but a large squamous cell cancer.   It was very stressful and then he had to sit down and do nothing for ten days, which nearly drove him – and me insane.   Trying to stop him lifting and carrying and using the stairs.   I had another strong conversation, and this time, broke the world record for four sentences strewn with the “F” word used so many times, he sat back in his chair and didn’t move an eyelid for an hour.

We are now surrounded by boxes of our precious things we have packed, the packers will do the rest in ten days time.  It disrupts my heart and soul – I haven’t felt at ‘home’ for over two years.  You will know how I love to be organised and tidy and am forever the Preparation Queen.   That’s gone out of the window during these last two years where it seems every single plan has been cancelled, changed, or disrupted.  

The house is looking lovely inside however – the outside remains an ugly duckling, but we will change that.  Hopefully we get our carpets down today, the builders clean tomorrow, and the drapes and blinds next week.  But we still have no bench tops or tiling or sink in the kitchen, we’ll have to manage without until they arrive.

And it seems it’s the time for many of my friends Mothers to be sick, and or dying, or have died.   Five of them.  A funeral tomorrow, and visits to beautiful elderly women who have been such a gift and an influence in my life.   And our darling vet took his life a month ago.   So much sadness just in this small community, without looking at the news for the traumas of our world.

Joshua is well and so is Tori, they are very happy together, and just went to Bluesfest in Byron Bay where Joshua filmed for an international magazine, and last weekend they were in Tasmania for a wedding.  They are building a rehearsal studio in their garden for Tori to practise in (she’s with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra as a violinist) and for his weights, formerly a smaller shed called ‘The Bulgarian Institute of Pain”!   It is wonderful to see them so connected and so supportive – we’d just love to see them down here a bit more often.  But their lives are so busy with concerts and performances and all the things you love to do when you are young and have no children!   He didn’t want us to sell this riverfront home, with the jetty and the boat …. But its time for us, this is an end of an era on the river, and whilst it is very sad, and we will miss the water views and the sunrises and sunsets – its time.  Its way too big and way too much maintenance.   And we WILL NOT MISS the floods or the trauma and stress of that.

But I am grateful for so much in my life, including that I have you, and you have me.   I want you to know I love you and I think of you, and recall our times together, our happy memories, and always with a full heart, a laugh, and gratitude.   Thanks for always being there and for your love over many years, I love you.

With all our love and hugs

Sandra and Gerald and Cino and Clover