#there are no cosy villages below snow-capped mountains to travel to in the winter either

[tleeaves]

homesickness never leaves you imo. i go to sydney and i miss bris and every day in brisbane i miss sydney, sometimes you never win

It has been a while since you sent this one in (and I apologise for not getting to your other one first, I wanted to answer it once I got around to actually listening to it (and then I have problems with listening/watching/reading any recs until my brain decides it's okay and it's a constant battle lemme tell you)) and so I've been thinking on it some more.

Homesickness never leaves. That's your view, and I've decided I feel the same about it. For so long, I was desperate to leave the farm in that country town, to ditch the place, the people, everything about it. There's not a lot of career opportunities out there either, unless you're going into farming, trade work, or something you can do remotely (given you don't have a willingness to commute by bus or train for hours each day like some folks I met).

I longed for Melbourne. It is a city with places I still recognise when I see a picture or background of it, but with so many unknowns and unexplored areas that makes me want to go back. Never leave a stone unturned and whatnot. Now, I don't even have that. There's just Brisbane. And I'm reluctant to get to know Brisbane on the principle that I know it's not Melbourne, if that makes sense.

And I know deep down that I crave the countryside again too. Not the kind you find in Queensland either. I need Victoria where it's cold, where frost laces the grass, there's soft carpets of clovers, prickly blackberry bushes spreading wherever it can take hold, the trees look a certain way, a fog fills the valley -- my valley -- in spring and early summer, the rain falls thin but showers for hours unending, I know the paddocks and highway and order of towns like the back of my hand, I know the map, I know the cemetery where I lived, the plot where my pappou is buried, I know the sounds of the particular birds, I know the music of the train and the regular bikers and I even know the turns wildfires make from my vantage on the hill I once was. I know where the puddles will form, the monstrous ones that we even named because of how long they stayed, and I know where it floods. There's four seasons in a day, so you always go out prepared, but you know to expect the unexpected, which made it reliable in a way. I sometimes miss when the power would go out, though we lived right near a power station (unhealthy air to be growing up on apparently, but country air was country air and it feels cleaner, crisper than anything I've breathed in Queensland), and we'd have to rely on buckets of water, generators, candles, and torches until some unknown time when the power would come back.

It's possible to know a place so intimately that it is a part of you. I think to grow up somewhere for so long is to make it part of you, to let it shape you, and I mourn it in a complicated way. I want to run away from the memories there as much as I want to go running back to familiar patterns and scenery. I miss the land, don't miss the people, but I miss what some of the people once meant to me and I miss that once upon a time I didn't care what sort of reputation I had with people and how they knew me. I run away from history but yearn for fields it was made on.

#idk I never get to talk to anyone about my homesickness #no one gets it because they don't know my hometown or much of the state at large #and I mean how do you articulate how deeply you miss a place without choking up if not through typing? #I'm still misty eyed but at least I'm not forced to try and vocalise these feelings #my family miss the ease of living but not the place like I do #being here is supposed to be some version of “moving up” both literally and figuratively #somewhere there's more opportunities #and closer to key infrastructure #near the seaside where it's meant to be good for your health #though the ocean is still a 15 min drive away #and it's warm all the time #who would miss the cold? (I do) #somehow I miss the cold even if it made bone pain hell #because my body still gives me hell here #and it was easier to be comfortable in cold than heat #winters here get chilly now #I've been here two years and I can feel the cold but it's not MY cold #it's too thick and too humid even when temperatures are low #there are no cosy villages below snow-capped mountains to travel to in the winter either #no frostbite to worry about #no firewood to worry about #no chimneys to clean and ash to constantly sweep up #no wild unowned sheep wandering from farm to farm and stray dogs and cats everywhere getting their fill from our doorstep every few weeks #no fox sightings or droppings no wombat burrows to steer clear of and other mysterious “likely snake-filled” holes in the ground #I can travel now and wander but I maybe what hurts most is knowing I can't go home #because home is not there anymore #there is nothing to return to except someone else's land now