How many new habits did the Pandemic start in my life?  How many did I let go?  Here, in Tasmania we had an unusual pandemic, as an island closed to the mainland and to the greater world - except with special exceptions that we did not need to or want to navigate- this for two years.  I fretted from afar, was grateful for all friends willing to talk or text to me what was happening where they were, but I felt too self conscious to post my own experiences- I said my private gratitude- but kept them to myself.  The blog was definitely not a place I was going to log my life.  But I needed to look up some part of my life "pre" instagram, and here was the blog- still existing.  I will say a public Thank You for that - and probably fret over whatever resources I am taking up by this place holder- That is a habit of Year 3.

Instagram and the not so subtle manipulations of tech

 2021 and I have finally found a way to get photos back onto my computer.  At this point in my life I use just my phone 90% of the time.  Lately I get messages several times a day urging me to buy cloud storage.  It is a statement to my lifestyle that I have the time to be bothered by these constant pop ups.  I found out that gmail doesn't erase message, so each time over the years I had swiped emails to what I believed to be a method of removal, I was only sending them to some archive function.  I then, spent, hours and hours going through and erasing tens of thousands of emails dating back to around 2013.  Yet still the prompts about storage kept coming.  Then I waded through whatever this newest version of the podcast storage works...deleting many shows I no longer listen too, or that ended.  Still prompts each day, soon I started looking at all attachments, messages, photos, still the prompts.  

I have now put the issue of storage and whether or not I need the cloud in my 'let it go' column.  I resisted the cloud for years, but now if I want to use my mac email, the one email account I have paid for over the years, it must be forced to the cloud...to be seen on my phone, as this is the same company that would take my money for more storage, that makes sense.  All these coercive methods of tech bother me.

Which in turn reminded me of this blog, which I used to resist instagram.  I recently went to MONA the week they re-opened after Tasmania re-opened its borders.  The first instagram photo I ever took was there, in 2011- then I didn't use the account until 2014.  It is funny to think that I was using Facebook, but worried about the security of instagram, or I was less worried about security but I could see how it was going to be monetized before I could see how that would happen to facebook, but then when more than three people I loved were using insta regularly, I gave in.

I think 2021 will be too much like 2020 as far as our ability to leave the island so I am going to use the blog this year, if only for my own journal of events.  Plus, I have erased a lot of email...which has prompted a lot of memories that I was to mull over.  The photo is from a flowering plant somewhere in the area of the Tarkine.  

I think that I will rarely edit or re-write- at least until winter- there is too much to do and too much sunshine to sit at a computer for long.

...Newer Computer...and still no photos

May 2020 a year from my last post-  propping up an idea that I have always had, that my memory works from the same cues, Autumn here, in Australia reminded me to see if I could still view this blog.  I was surprised that I could actually still see my entries.

I seemed to have lost all my photos from my computer, I didn't want to upload to a server somewhere- and I was using a program that was not the one that came with my computer.

These days, the app Instagram serves as the visual diary of my life.

I have thought to do some posting here, for myself- as my social circle has caught up to me, and especially these days, I get to talk to people directly.

Gone over the past decade are limitations on data, resistant to texting or phone call apps.

Where once, I had to navigate each persons accessibility to send a single photo, often having to re-size them, now I can text them directly to their phones- instantly.

I, have, of course been thinking about feelings of being connected, and impressions of being isolated as Tasmania is still closed to non-essential travel.

We luckily, had changed our flight to return to the island about 36 hours ahead of the government telling citizens to come home.

When I first moved to the island, I joked a lot about the likelihood that we would last on any global calamity (this turned out not to be true), and that we were pretty self-sufficient and sustainable even if we had to pull back to this hemisphere only (this feels true).

I am still typing slightly in jest- but I find it difficult not to feel very fortunate compared to many other countries that are dealing with the pandemic.  

I also have to acknowledge that in recent history, I have wished to be able to stay off a plane for an entire year (which I had done, almost, with ten months between trips)- and I have wondered many time, when and if my partner would ever be here for winter.  This looks like it will be his first.  As he needs to travel for work- we don't speculate beyond one month at a time.  Our state could ease restrictions in the next week or so, but that is far from the airport opening up.  

I have gotten up twice, while trying to type this to spot birds from my yard.  I think, because in the early years here, 2006-2009 all I had for connection was the computer.  I even listened to my podcasts from my computer- pre-iphone.

I have over the years, gotten in the habit of not being on my computer, and not using my phone needlessly, if I can do anything else.  Now, at a time my friends are questioning how much they are using phones or looking at screens either computer, phone, or T.V.- I've already let go of that habit.  This is an excellent time to look for birds, and I am fortunate they come to my yard.  My sense of "urgency" is I think, much higher than most people here.  I listen to a lot of news from Europe and the U.S. - and although I understand why people here are not worried- I can't really join in.  

When restrictions ease, my only goal is to hike, in areas I hope will not be even 25% as crowded as the neighborhood has become.  Each week, since our fourteen days of mandatory house stay ended, I have taken a walk that is normally not crowded and seen at least twenty-five to thirty-five people.  The stores are the same way.  It is hard to see a difference.   I am keeping to errands like getting our flu shots, donating blood / plasma.  I don't think too far into the future, because they idea that we might not get to leave the island for an entire year is hard.  

Meanwhile I am my usual 50-50.  I'll do an online yoga class, or exercise dvd.  Eat a salad or something healthy- but then make a margarita at 2 p.m.  Which is my plan...now.

 

What is a blog without photos...and poor old computer limps along

Here I am in May.  May 2019.

My computer continues to work, sort of.

We had visitors from Sweden during Christmas.  I thought I did a magic trick considering that no decisions were getting made and the time was getting closer.  Tasmania is no longer a place you can do what you want without advance preparations.

But I had just been volunteering on Maria Island, so I knew that there would be no ferry service on Christmas day, and that they expected people to arrive on Boxing day.

We had a really lovely time, and our visitors got great weather, good food, excellent wines and close encounters with young Tasmanian Devils. Or at least the one.

Only my instagram account shows how many places we or I have been since then and I still can't get photos to transfer.  But if we are friends, you probably use instagram or we talk by phone (that is once again, a thing one does!).

2019 is very much like the years before- Tasmania feels unfamiliar, I am having trouble knowing how to get things done, how to use the right about of firewood, how to drive after dark in the many pitch dark roads.

I fear this will become one more blog that is just dropped.

It served it purpose during the years of less internet access and friends with less knowledge of how to use technology effectively.

 I am happy with being about to text message and talk with people far, far away and spending less time thinking out loud.

 

...and so it has come to this after all these years...

My computer is trying to give up on me.  I can't shut it down, and therefore I can not update it.  I am having trouble importing photos, or finding them after the computer says the import is complete.

This has all added to my not updating this blog.  I really have resisted moving on to a different platform.  I have hoped or expected blogger to update.  I have thought it was amusing, looking through the blogs that are still here, all mostly religious in nature.  I needed this blog when an internet connection was hard to come by, and I couldn't email photos to all my friends unless I did a mass email, which always seemed to make people unhappy.  Since the time that I started this blog, Instagram has started, everyone I know finally started using apps for phone calls or to text.  Our long distance plans got inexpensive, so that I no longer even need an app.

Therefore, this blog turned into a place holder for me and my inability to grasp my own timelines.  So let me update myself.

This year I haven't been looking back.  I turned 50 and thought to myself- if now is not the time to be content and grateful- when is?

I had some really good personal events happen that I wouldn't share here except in a really cryptic form.  I met my sister in person.  She came to Stockholm with another of our siblings.  This turned out to be really good, and really important, I think to all of us.  I was also able to see how far I have come as a person- and I had a renewed sense of appreciation and love for my partner and all he has brought to my life.  

We have a plan to stay mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, so I took every opportunity to travel through Europe while I was there.  I tried to be present during all travels- and update Instagram just enough to later rekindle my memories. We essentially closed up our Swedish life, but I know that life is changeable and nothing is really over.

Here are some highlights in case I need to remember October-November

Moscow

Paris

London 

Amerstdam

Saltney-Chester

Friends helping

Apartment staging

Avoiding good-byes because they make me sad

Reconnecting with people I am genetically linked too

Reconnecting with my past in ways that felt appropriate and just fine

An attitude of adjustment...trying to be nicer to myself and others and not feel the need to waste time on trivial things-  

Clearing out closets - literally and metaphorically

Mentally laying down ideas towards a more purposeful life - where we are

All with the idea of 2019 starting anew

 

 

The start of the Farewell tour

Millesgården, Olga and Carl Milles

The grounds and cafe by themselves are worth the long trek out to this property that once belonged to the artist Olga and Carl Milles.  

They donated their property to the city of Stockholm.

Carl's statues are other places but they look best here.

 

Strangely across the water is all industrial- I wonder what the area looked like even fifty years ago.

 

 

 

"If you know the way to blue?"

Have I already written about the sorting, scrubbing, sanding and packing?
Apologies if I am repeating myself.

On one side of trying to sell an apartment in SE versus AU or the U.S., there are only set days for an open house.  Having someone come by on short notice would be a rarity and only if the seller is quite keen to sell.

Sending items from your life on a long sea voyage is as stressful as the time before.

Having to have the apartment 'staged' for photos was a lot of work (we had help from friends)- but having the apartment look anything like the staged photos will be even trickier.