volume one hundred and sixty

country roads

📍Written and sent from Kaurna land (otherwise known as Adelaide), while multitasking. Always multitasking.

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I was on the bus alone. I was with other kids headed to other homes, but I was the lone sibling on the bus. A bus with burgundy faux leather seats that my bum would stick to on the hot summer afternoon rides and that the cracked windows did nothing to relieve. The timeline is blurry and so much happened in a short period at this time in my family’s lives that I was the same young age for so much of it. Because of that, multiple options are possible as the reason I was alone.

Maybe my older sister was at work after school, or with friends, or maybe with her daughter if she was already born. Maybe my younger sister was at an after-school activity, or with Mum not even old enough to be at school yet, or at daycare. All I know is I was riding the bus without either one of them, but that didn’t worry me so there was a reason.

We lived out of town, in the even smaller town out of town. After taking a right turn at the last shop before there were no shops, a longer drive from there, is where we lived. We used to live up the hill, straight ahead past the shop, but that was before Mum and Dad lived in separate homes.

So this afternoon I was on the bus, and one of the maybe half a dozen scattered stops on this long daily ride — before it turned around empty and headed back to town — was mine. It didn’t turn far after my stop. I could see where it turned from a certain point in the front yard. This was good because I could see it go past in the morning and know we had about three minutes to catch it on its way back if we were running too late to get it the first time.

I climbed down the metal stairs to my gravel driveway and walked along the road to check the mail. I walked across the stretching green front yard towards our home, then through the undercover area, past the pool table, outdoor dining set with a pink plastic tablecloth pegged in place and the store room turned cubby house then unlocked the door with the not-so-well-hidden key. It wasn’t unusual to be home alone at this time of day. It was never for long. Mum was always home just before me or moments behind. And if not her, my older sister was around. It was mostly my older sister around.

Immediately after I plonked my school bag down, the phone rang. 

It was Mum, in a worried panic. She told me she was stuck in town, my sisters were with her I think, or at least my younger one was, and my Dad was also stuck, unable to access the road to our house. The storm had knocked down trees and they were waiting to get home. There might be a blackout soon. She was so sorry. She would be home as soon as she could. Or Dad would come over. Whoever could get there first, would be there. Was I okay? Was I scared? Was she forgiven?

This is when I noticed it was storming outside. I hadn’t realised yet. I hadn’t smelled the water on the hot tar road. I hadn't seen the torrential rain setting in, or the winds howling through the cracks of our old farmhouse, or the cat nowhere to be seen because he was hiding, or the rattling of the glass on the windows, or the branches flying through the air outside, or the lightning bolts striking in the hills right behind us followed very closely by roaring thunder that shook the tin roof. I hadn’t noticed how loud all of this was getting over the sound of Mum’s voice.

It was just another day.

Growing up in Australia, big storms were a part of life. I hadn’t thought much about it. Granted, fallen trees weren’t a common occurrence, but was I scared? Not at all. Was I okay? Of course.

Like every storm, I knew this would pass. I also had it on very good authority that the sound of thunder was Santa’s tools making our toys, so I thought “Let him go!”

I don’t remember much of what happened after that. I think we lost power for some time. I think I ate more Nutella than I should have because no one was around to tell me otherwise. I think I found the cat under a bed and was hissed at by him but he did that storm or not. I think I watched The Saddle Club while we had power or Degrassi depending on the time. I think I probably stayed in my school uniform for a while because no one was telling me to take it off so it’d still be clean to wear another day, but that I likely changed eventually so I didn’t get in trouble once someone got home. I think I unpacked my lunchbox, filled my water bottle and put it in the fridge for the next day. I don’t know if I did my homework. I most likely did some reading on the swivel armchair, brown and itchy and second-hand that I hated then because it was old and embarrassing but now I miss.

It was Dad who got there first. His road between his home, our old one, and this home, our new one, had opened from up the hill before Mum’s had from town. I don’t know what shop or house Mum had walked into to make that first call, but she did because our family had no mobile phone, yet. No mobile phone meant I had no concept of how long I had the house to myself, no texts to say “On our way!” or “The road just opened!” but that is how I saw it. I saw it as that I had the house to myself and while I did, there was a gorgeous show being put on outside.

Dad came through the door panicked. He didn’t knock, just called out “Loz!” as he burst inside. He didn’t panic easily. He still doesn’t. He rushed in to ask if I was okay.

Why was everyone asking this? Was there something I didn't know? Didn’t we all love storms? Was this like the movies where I should have been under the house in a cellar or something? Because we didn’t have one of those and I just sat in the linoleum floored loungeroom and waited.

It must have been summer because despite it being dark and grey, it was not night out when he arrived to find me perfectly fine, in one piece and calm. 

As an adult, I know now that the storm was severe. I know it must have been an hour or two at least I was home alone. I know roads were closed because of fallen trees and flash floods. I know pets ran away. I know cows and horses were lost. 

But I was fine.

There is a video, well a few seconds of a video, that lives rent-free in my head. Margot Robbie, when asked what she misses about Australia when in America, without much hesitation or any context added or needed, and with nostalgia and almost heartache answers “The thunderstorms”.

I don’t know when I saw this video. Or why. Or what the rest of it talks about because I found that timestamp for you, lovely reader, and closed the tab. But I do know for the many years I lived abroad that was my answer, too. And when I saw that clip for the first time I knew I wasn’t alone.

I had a friend say to me recently, reflecting on her visit to Australia, “That’s the thing about Australia, right? When it rains, it rains!” and she said it like it was a bad thing. Is it? This same friend lives in Vancouver where the rain is so persistent and for months on end that I would creep into hibernation and depression and verge into suicidal ideation at times. Mostly I just wanted to sleep all of the months that were not summer and not do anything else. I suffered from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and the rain became the enemy.

So why does Australian rain, and the storms that sometimes accompany it, feel different? Feel hopeful? Feel exciting?

Is it childhood nostalgia? Is it the danger and excitement that is the spectacular show Mother Nature puts on? Is it the hail storms with ice the size of golf balls that made me think I was in the snow as a child and then once safe to do so would collect in an empty ice cream container? 

The storms here are special. They’re cleansing. They clean away — sometimes destructively but only temporarily — the old and make way for the new. (I hope this goes without saying that ongoing floods and loss of homes are not special.) But the Australian storms that happen in summer — the kind that it is warm enough to sit outside undercover and feel the spray of the rain and watch the world sweep by — they’re special. 

When I wake the day after an overnight storm I feel so well rested. I feel renewed and refreshed, and so does the world.

Lovely reader, head into the comments and tell me does where you live have thunderstorms and lightning shows? Do you love them? Do they frighten you? Is it both?

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here are three things i struggled with this week:

🙃 Recording this volume. It took me so many tries this week for some reason.

🌷 Impatience. I want it to be summer. I know it will be eventually. I need to stay present. I need to enjoy the whispers of spring’s arrival.

🐙 Letting it unfold. I might be wrong. I might be right. I am probably right. Let it happen anyway. Let it go. Let me be me.

here are three blessings from this week:

👖 Air dried clean clothes are such a blessing I will never not be thankful for.

⛪ Sundays exploring the city with no plan and a caffeinated body.

🍭 The candy bowl at the counter where you pay.

here are three goals for the coming week:

🦋 Be me.

👣 Less sitting at my desk, more walking. There is so much to see!

💗 Celebrate your life, from afar, over the live stream (I am thankful for the internet for this reason). Carry parts of you with me everywhere I go and in every smile I give.

pics or it didn’t happen:

when people ask where i live

I love you and I appreciate you reading my letters because I really enjoy writing them to you.

🧡, LD (lauren deborah | she/they)