Trisanah's Place

Cannington, Beckenham, Glendalough, Padbury, Doubleview, Rockingham, Stirling, Pithara, Karrinyup, Huntingdale, South Hedland, Dixon’s Caravan Park, Bunbury, one of the “yup”s down south, Rivervale, Tuart Hill, West Perth, City Beach….Seattle.

I love moving. I hate moving.

I have moved getting close to twenty times in my life. It is certainly getting up there.

Early years I don’t remember so much, going from south to north Western Australia. I lived in a caravan park in a chalet for awhile. That was the coolest thing. As a twelve year old, it was super fun to be in this little community of long term residents. My mum was a manager at the service station there. We got to “order” our lunch for school everyday. (Unfortunately, at 6am, for some reason I only ever wanted a cheese sandwich…)

I’ve lived in a place with a pool (awesome!), a place with a hot tub, a place with upstairs and downstairs…a duplex, a couple of apartments, a bunch of share houses and even in a renovated garage. In Perth I have lived North, South, East and West of the River. There was a point where over the course of five years, I didn’t stay anywhere more then roughly six months! I can’t recommend that, moving isn’t cheap and it is nice to spend a bit longer in different places.

After I met W, we moved in together into a once-in-lifetime kind of rental deal. It was a beach house in City Beach, Perth. It was old, leaky and overgrown. It was also stuffed to the gills with the former resident’s gear still! It was great though. Like really great. You could see the ocean from the back room. You could fall asleep to the sound of waves crashing. It had old wooden doors out the front that looked like something straight out of Labyrinth.

We also lived in a cute duplex half in West Perth, also old, also quirky. It was located close to the city and a lovely array of local eateries. It still managed to be on a quiet street. My cat had half the local walking population trained to stroll past and give her pats. We were there just over two years. At that point, that was the longest I had stayed anywhere for ages.

Then came the chance to go to Seattle, USA.

You know, I never thought not going was a real option. I thought it was such a cool opportunity. I definitely did not expect to as homesick as I have been. I didn’t realize how, even with all the moves… I had really settled into Perth. I was really getting to know the city and and all the little nooks and crannies. I was really comfortable.

That being said, Seattle is great. I am starting to get comfy here too. There are some great people in and about the place. The neighborhoods are all really interesting. I don’t think we will ever run out of new places to eat. (Eating is incredibly important!) Very close by there are MOUNTAINS and NATURE…islands and all sorts…We will get out there more.

We lived in Capital Hill the first few weeks we were here, then Queen Anne up until this point. It was kind of in-between upper and lower Queen Anne. The apartment had pros and cons. It was stupidly close to the city – us being without wheels meant that was super important! It had great views of the city and Rainier when she was out. Lake Union slowly became more visible as winter came and the leaves dropped. It was an apartment though and we’ve had some heavy footed neighbors upstairs. (Also, ask W about the thumb story).

Just in the last week we have moved again! To a house! And it’s ours! Or the debt is ours anyway. We looked and drove around with our agent for months and months. We got outbid several times. We ended up giving a short sale place a shot. It went mostly smoothly, with some interesting bumps. But we got it and we moved in with some help from some awesome people… it’s really great 🙂

It is located in Ravenna or Roosevelt technically. It is a 1920’s house with some interesting leaks and a very large list of things that need to be fixed! It has a couple of bedrooms up top and some that need some work downstairs. It has a dining nook with a booth in the kitchen. This is really cool and lovely. Please come have a cup of tea with me in it sometime and I will show you 😉 Our house is the Sideways House – so called due to a fabulous technical filming area. We looked at at LEAST 60 or 70 properties…the contenders for the day would usually get a video. For some reason, this house I buggered it up… 9 minutes of Sideways glory!

In the last year. I have struggled with some other kinds of moving. I’ve slowed down so much I almost stopped. Then things have spun out of control so quickly I’ve come to and not been able to remember big chunks of time. I’ve also done things that I’ve called sideways moves. I wasn’t letting myself see things for the value they had. But moving sideways is just moving forward in a different direction. So that is OK.

Life is just this.
It’s living.

So, I’ve decided to finish this A – Z… obviously it will be several months late…

But whatever – I do what I want!

I’ve been busy living. This is part of the reason I’ve not written for awhile. I’ve certainly thought about it a lot. I’m not sure they have been anything but extended brain farts though.

After some thought, I’ve decided I want to accept and be ok with what I am now – which is a lot of different things. I want to be ok with the fact that I can’t be everything I’ve expected I will be. Don’t get me wrong, most of the time I am fine with the path I’ve taken… but sometimes doubts creep into a mind. It is all right to have these doubts, but I don’t want those doubts (read:fears?) to stop me doing the things I want to do with my family here in America. I certainly don’t want to give myself flack for not achieving every expectation, goal..etc.  I want other things too, involving houses, jobs and all that stuff… but this is the main thing.  At this moment though, this paragraph is giving me the shits. I am trying to articulate something specific in a general way and it isn’t working. Oh well.

Moving on to other musings.

In a lot of ways, moving across the world frees up a lot of expectations that get placed on a person. They still filter through across the waves of the internet. But in day to day life, things have evolved. I’ve been wondering about how I’ve changed since I moved here and trying to account for what has caused some of these changes. What does the person who never moved and never went through the last year and a half look like? It doesn’t matter really though, this is me now.  I’ve got to stop saying what I might have done had I stayed in Australia and focus on what I am doing here in America.

I’ve met some really cool and interesting people here in Seattle. This is a city filled with some mighty passionate nerds. It is pretty fantastic. I still keenly miss those that we left in Aus. But I am awake enough now to put energy into new things and better energy into the current things. So very much of this last year has been hunkered down inside myself.

W and I both have some substantial memory loss around the earlier parts of this year.  But there have been days. Days where it snowed. Days where we tasted something new. Days where we have seen some amazing nature. And then beside ourselves – laughter, smiles and love. It is all still there inside of us. Sometimes these things bubble up and then grief settles in right alongside for the ride. Sometimes they just are. And so it is. Am I sad that on beautiful days filled with sunshine, that I have to wipe tears away from my beloved’s face? Of course. But we can hold our hands together and love him.

I think that even though it has been hard, having friends and family to talk to has helped. New ones to make and get to know, has been so lovely as well. Talking to each other. Listening. Our annoying cats. Making the choice to live and move into the day. (Very difficult sometimes). Recognizing when we can’t. (Important). There is no solution to this, or a way to fix it. You just have to keep living.

So, we live.

And we take joy in what we can.

Kale is a cabbage like vegetable that has become pretty popular on the heath food circuit in the last few years. It has been around forever and yet, only now is it getting back into everyday diets. I have to admit, until a friend far healthier then I pointed it out, I had never heard of it or knew what to do with it in the kitchen.

Here is the good part though, it is super tasty and not hard to prepare. You can put it in all sorts of things! Right now we usually use it in stir-fries and as part of any Mexican feast…or as a side just cooked through.  I know that you CAN put it in to soups, salads and smoothies…but we haven’t got there yet! It lasts well in the fridge too.

It also contains stuff that is good for you, beta-carotene, anti-oxidants, calcium, protein and all that jazz…but for me the very best part is that my partner likes it 🙂 I mean, he possibly likes it MORE then me. It is hard for him though, as he refers to kale as “hippie” food, but thoroughly enjoys it. Living in Seattle, which is a very health conscious kind of place to be…there a lot of “kale munchers” out there and we are sort of part of that group.

I would encourage you to give it a go!

And not the stuff you don’t think you are ready for either…

Jelly gives me the fear.

It is gross, wobbly and… well it irks me out ok! I have never liked the stuff. It makes me the weird kid that refuses to eat trifle…

I have an old memory of a well meaning relative trying to force feed me jelly and custard, while using that “here comes the aeroplane” stick. I think that might be where it all started. Either way, the utter dislike and revulsion of the wibbly wobbly gunk has stayed with me.

It sort of extends to other gelatinous foods like bubble tea. The very idea of drinking that stuff gives me an increased pulse! My friends have been known to sneak jelly onto my plate at restaurants – just to see my crazy dial wind up a little bit.

It doesn’t even taste good. Sugary gross goo! I haven’t got what you would call a legit fear…more of just a super weird dislike/revulsion I guess. I can handle it better when it is contained in a cup or whatever. But when it is out on a plate, wibbling ever so slightly from side to side..eek!

I could go on..but I prefer not to. Jelly sucks ok!

A – to Z lag out!

I will be back in action in a day or two after my test at school!

In the meantime – any suggestions would be super awesome!

What the bleep is that you say?

It is a muscle…well actually it is TWO! It is the term applied to describe the Illiacus and Psoas Major.

Why do you care?

Well it (they) are pretty darn important! (all muscles are though right?)…

It is a hip flexor and also helps out a bit with lateral rotation. So you know, standing, walking, running… and can also help to pop out your hip to do some fabulous dance moves.

If you check out my super crummy drawing here, you can see the Psoas muscle attaches (originates) from the TVP’s of Thoracic 12 and Lumbar 1-5 (the longer skinny bit stretching up to the spine) and the illiacus muscle attaches to the anterior (front) illiac fossa (fossa means, pit, groove or depression).  The anterior illiac fossa is basically like, the inside groove of the upper pelvis. Both stretch down to finish (or insert) at the lesser trochanter on the femur. (the lesser trochanter is a little nobbly bit of bone on your inside and upper thigh).

Here is what I talked about  just before, but in tech talk for school. I have to REMEMBER all of this!