3. Liberty is not a dirty word

Change – variation, modification, transformation

I have what is considered by others to be an “adventurous spirit.” I have always sought out challenges and wanted to be a part of new experiences. Travelling has always appealed to me and I was particularly taken by the story of my grandparents, who sold up and took off in an old Holden Ute, laden with camping gear and supplies, soon after my mother, their only child, married in 1956. They travelled around Australia, often on unmade tracks, camping where they liked and picking up work when they could. Much like the travelling swagmen who chanced their luck in the Great Depression, (something my grandfather had also done), their life wasn’t easy but they had plenty of adventures along the way. They returned to Melbourne in 1959, when my mother was pregnant with me…

Liberating – redeeming, rescuing, saving

In 1995, when I lived in Orange, my children were in early Primary School and my husband was feeling dissatisfied with his job, I suggested we try our own Around Australia Adventure. We rented out our house, bought a small camper trailer and hit the road. Having never camped before, this was quite an adventurous thing to do, but we felt “liberated” as we drove along the highway heading for places previously unseen by us. We explored every state and capital in Australia, making an anti-clockwise trail around then heading up the middle, taking a tent when the roads weren’t suitable for the van, visiting every site we could manage in our twelve-month adventure. As a school teacher, I felt confident I could provide my kids with the educational basics and the countryside would teach them more than they would ever learn in a classroom. We visited mines in far north Queensland and Western Australia, convict settlements in Tasmania and southern WA, old gold settlements in Victoria, went whale watching in South Australia and marvelled at Aboriginal Art in the Northern Territory. We climbed Uluru, swam with dolphins at Monkey Mia, snorkelled the reefs. It was a year to remember forever.

Returning to our home, the children happily settled back into school, sport and friends but my husband struggled to find suitable employment until he was offered a short-term contract in Melbourne. Several short contracts and a house break in later, I decided it was time we joined him, so we sold our house and moved south. Unfortunately, the husband had found “greener pastures” elsewhere and I had uprooted the children and myself from our comfortable life in Orange to somewhere where I knew nobody and had no support nearby…

Resilience – flexibility, spirit, toughness

With a New South Wales teaching degree, I found it difficult to get work in a Victorian primary school, but a certificate in “Teaching a language other than English” and my high school German (plus a lot of luck!) got me a job I probably didn’t deserve but was determined to do well. I taught German two days a week and shared teaching grade 1 with the PE teacher. After a couple of years, and once I had references to prove I was competent, work became easier to find and I moved on, bidding Auf Wiedersehen to the school that had given me a chance. I became a Leading Teacher, then a teaching and learning coach, then a professional learning coordinator and program developer with the Catholic Education Office.

Life became fuller as my children got older and more independent too, and I made many friends at work and in the community. And then, in 2002, I met Martin: a single dad with kids roughly the same age, we shared many interests and enjoyed each other’s’ company. We went camping together and had some lovely overseas holidays. He also had a small runabout and we spent many weekends exploring the waterways of Westernport and Port Phillip Bay. We even towed the boat up to NSW in the school holidays to explore Nelson Bay and the Myall Lakes. In 2010, we got married, and in 2011, Martin bought a flybridge cruiser, “Manooka”. This allowed us to take the boat out for weekends and holidays, just like a caravan but on the water. We explored more, travelled all around Port Phillip Bay and dreamed of going further afield…

Liberty – permission, right, freedom

I retired from the Catholic Education Office in 2017. Martin had retired previously and we had bought a newer, better boat, “Manookatoo” – more suitable for long distance cruising. We had already made some trips through Bass Strait and into the Gippsland Lakes, but now we had both finished work, it was possible to dream and plan for greater cruising. So we rented out our house and we travelled from Lakes Entrance to Cairns, stopping at almost every port along the way. In the next five years we spent a lot of time exploring the Queensland coast, from the Gold Coast as far north as Lizard Island, and having lots of adventures. In 2022 we upgraded again, to “Liberty”, a slightly bigger flybridge cruiser with two cabins, so friends and family could join our adventures. And in 2023 we sold our house in Melbourne, having decided that we didn’t need a house big enough for our whole family any more as they had all left home and had families and houses of their own. We bought two smaller apartments, one in Melbourne, one on the Gold Coast, so we can enjoy the best of both locations – and Liberty has a marina berth just near our front door…

A series of changes in my life have been liberating – taking the kids and travelling Australia, uprooting the family and moving interstate, meeting Martin and embarking on new adventures. It has not always been easy but it’s been interesting! I credit my “adventurous spirit” – and my resilience – for the opportunity to enjoy the many liberties I have today.