Life altering event

Nearly 6 years ago a long-term boyfriend broke up with me. Now, I wasn't devastated or anything like that, I had known something wasn't right for a while. Anyway, that's not the point.

I had been wanting to go to the UK before I even met The Ex, and when he broke up... Well, what was stopping me?

It took a few months, but I finally decided to actually do something about it instead of just thinking about it. So I handed in my resignation at my job at the bakery (which I didn't like anyway), and I got a part-time job substituting at a nursery. As a substitute I wouldn't need to give any notice before leaving, so I thought it would be perfect for when I could finally go to the UK.

At first I was looking at "normal"jobs and flats online, but it's very hard to do it that way when you can't go for a viewing or an interview and I know nothing of the areas or anything, so I decided I'd take a different route and I started looking at au pairing jobs.

Less than a year after The Ex had broke up with me I was sitting on a plane over to England. I had gotten a job as an au pair in a place called Chesterfield, and as it turned out I stayed in Chesterfield for over 3 years before I decided I wanted to see even more of the world.

The crooked spire of Chesterfield.

I don't think I realized how life-changing the break-up was at the time, how could I? But I'm sure happy it did happen. As far as I'm concerned my life changed to the much better. If someone offered me a chance to go back in time to the time around the break-up I would not take it. I don't want to change a thing.

What about you? Tell me about an even or incident, big or small, that has changed your life in some way. Did you realize it was life-changing at the time? Did it change your life for the better or worse? Would you go back in time and handle things differently if you could?

I keep changing my mind!

I have had today off, so I've been looking at what specified jobs there are in regional Australia, for when I finish as an au pair in January. Most of the jobs either require me to have a licence or they want me to start straight away. Or they want male workers...

But then after I had been looking at what kinds of jobs there were for a while (not a lot of jobs anyway really), I just thought that since most of them want workers to start immediately anyway I might as well wait until I finish this job before I look.

And then I started thinking that I don't really want to do specified work, which is mainly fruit picking anyway. It's going to be hard work and I'll melt outside in the heat. I would like to do it for a bit, because I think it's part of the experience on a working holiday visa in Australia, but I don't really want to tie myself down to one place for 3 months (or more).

The whole point on me coming to Australia is to see the country, travel. And I've already "wasted" 6 months as an au pair. Don't get me wrong, the family is really nice and it's nice to know I've got a place to stay for free so I can save up money, and that I've got a job and I'm earning money, but it's hard to travel when I can only do it on the weekends. I also get kind of "settled" and just want to stay at home and relax when I've finally got some time off. Whereas if I didn't have a job I'd feel like I'd have to do something and I'd travel more. Hopefully.

So, at the moment I am looking at just travelling for a bit. Hostels have got notice board with jobs posted on them so that when I want to make some money I can have a look at them (or online), but I'm not going to stress it too much. I am also thinking that if I don't do 3 months worth of specified work, and I don't qualify for a second Working Holiday Visa, then if I choose to come back to Australia it will be a kick up the bum to figure out what I want to study as I would probably have to get a student visa.

I have found a greyhound bus pass from Brisbane to Melbourne, it's a hop-on hop-off one, so I'll get to see more of Australia, so I might buy that one for when I finish here in January.

(source)

I am also thinking about flying over to Tasmania when I get to Melbourne and going on a 6 day tour down there, to see that part of Australia as well. I think it's very easy to miss out on Tasmania when you're backpacking because most people tend to just stick to the mainland. After that? We'll see.... Apparently all of Tasmania is on the list of regional areas, so maybe I'll just get a one-way ticket down there and then do a few weeks work there if they have any?

But I might change my mind again before January, so who knows what'll happen?

What about The Paramedic I might hear you ask? Well, I still have no idea what's going on there and even if things do work out between us I'm still going to travel. Who knows, maybe he'll even come with me some places. If not it will just have to be a long distance thing for a while.

Look at this!

I have written another guest post at my friend Nicky's blog.

Easier said than done...

If you want to read my first guest post for Nicky, here it is:

I travel alone, for better or worse...

Guest post: What becomes of the broken hearted?

What becomes of the broken hearted?

 

By Nicky Curtis

Web author of Little Miss Dreamer

www.thelittlemissdreamer.blogspot.com

There are two certainties in life:

1. You are born, and then at some stage you die. There’s no point trying to run away from this happy little fact, you can’t beat the grim reaper, so deal with it.
2. You will have your heart broken into tiny smithereens somewhere along the way, whether you try to avoid it or not.

It’s a cheerful old life isn’t it?

There’s not a lot you can do about the first one, this is the deal you make when you enter into this world. You might not remember agreeing to this trade off, I don’t, at the time I was more concerned about the bright lights and screaming, but it really is the inevitable. So we’ll waste no more time arguing the pros and cons of that, because unless you make a deal with the devil, which I wouldn’t advise, then really you’re stuck with it.

Certainty number two however, is an event you could try to avoid, but sooner or later it will catch up with you, and if a person doesn’t do the breaking, then the loneliness will do it for you. Whichever way you spin it, basically you’re screwed.

So as Robson and Jerome sang, or whoever they stole the song from, what becomes of the broken hearted? This is a question I’m particularly keen to know the answer to, because right now my own beating heart is struggling to heal itself and any help would be greatly received.

I don’t regret the events that led to my heat being trampled on until it screamed, I opened myself up to a person I believed to be worthy of my love. He seems to be unworthy right now, although I am ever hopeful and believe that one day he’ll come good. Regardless of that, I am hurt, I am broken, and in need of fixing. The overwhelming feeling, other than ouch, is confusion. Why? I don’t understand how someone’s feeling can go from 10 and then back down to zero, mine certainly haven’t. His decisions and moods give me whiplash and deep down I know I deserve better. But can we choose who we fall in love with? I really don’t think so.

I guess that is where the problem lies.

I, like a lot of girls, am a sucker for a bad boy. Good boys don’t interest me. I like the drama, I like the excitement, I like the flattery. Yes, with that comes an element of risk, but there’s always the hope that maybe he’ll fall in love, maybe you’ll be the one to make him change.

I’ve never been a girl that thinks they’ll change, once a bad boy, always a bad boy really, but I do believe there’s some good in everyone. And that, ladies and gentleman, right there, that is why I get hurt. Because I am naive, I am stupid and I think the best of people. Not all people are good. Not all people are capable of love. Not all people are trustworthy. And not all people can be trusted with your heart.

I clearly don’t know the difference between the two species.

If you’ve ever been in this situation, you’ll know that around the time this life-altering event happens to you, everyone else in the vicinity seems to undergo some sort of positive change in their relationship/find a new love/get married etc, and you are left wondering what the hell you did to deserve it. I’m beginning to wonder whether I did something really terrible in a previous life and karma is now making me pay. The result of this sudden out-pouring of love to other people and the cup seriously running dry in your direction, is loneliness. And loneliness approximately one month prior to Christmas is not a good thing.

It will be lonely this Christmas indeed. It would have been if things were going well, considering he lives in Turkey and I live in England, but at least I would have felt something back. Right now, I feel like he’s slammed a door in my face, and I wonder if I will ever recover.

I’m assured that things will get better. I have many arguments to the contrary and unless my emotions undergo some sort of major overhaul akin to a DIY SOS transformation, then I think next year will be as difficult as this one.

What am I dreading most? Seeing him again, with someone else. Going to the place I met him, where I always go, and feeling his presence even though he’s not stood in front of me. Missing him forever more and never getting over it. Never meeting anyone else who makes me feel the way he did. I think that’s the worst one. He gave me a taste of happiness and whipped it away.

So what does become of the broken hearted?

Well, I guess look around, every person you see will either be suffering from one, recovering from one, had one, or be about to have one. I guess at the end of the day, we’re all in the same boat.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Well, they say love makes the world go around. Maybe we have to risk heartbreak to find true love.

See, I told you it was a cheerful old life ….

Like what you read?

Visit my blog: www.thelittlemissdreamer.blogspot.com

(It’s usually much more cheerful, I promise!)

It will hopefully be better now...

Sorry about being so quiet lately.

It's been a busy couple of weeks, and to top it off my laptop was throwing a wobbly, so I decided to only use it for short periods of time to check my e-mails and FB just in case it decided to die on me.

I had a look at getting my laptop fixed, it seemed like there was just a loose component or something as the picture would go all weird, but everything still worked. And also I figured that I shouldn't waste my money on a new one now that I'm travelling anyway. I went and talked to someone about it and they said it would probably be around $200 to fix it.

The laptop was a shitty cheap one that only cost maybe twice that, the keyboard wasn't working properly and neither was the mouse-pad buttons. So in the end I decided to just go and buy a new laptop (also because I'm a tech-nerd). I got some money for my birthday the other week and it would be enough to get a new one, hopefully not as crappy as the last one.

So yesterday I was running around Chermside shopping centre (NOT fun this close to Christmas, too many people! I'm glad I'm done with all my Christmas shopping!) trying to find a new one. I finally found one, well I found two, but one didn't have a DVD drive so I went with the other one. It was even less than what I was planning to spend and the shop assistant said it was a good laptop as well. I asked if they had it in stock, he said yes, one brand new one left, went into the store room to get it, only to realize it was on lay-by for someone.

When I've decided on something, especially electronic stuff, I have decided, I will rarely settle for something different. The shop-assistant said that I could order it online, it would take 5-7 working days to arrive, but at least I would get the laptop I wanted. So I thanked him and went home. I wasn't too happy about having to wait so long, but at least I had saved my files from my old laptop just in case it totally died on me.

When I got online it turned out that they don't do home deliveries on the laptop I wanted.... Typical. But they did have it in stock at another shopping centre nearby. I politely asked The Mother if she could take me to that shopping centre, which luckily she would, I booked the laptop online before we went (just in case) and it was there waiting for me when we got to the shop. YAY!!

So I am now the owner of my first Acer laptop. So far it seems good. It's a lot quicker than my old one, but that might be because I've not installed a thousand and ten things on it yet. It's strange having to get used to a new keyboard and mouse pad, but I'll get there.

I had to name my laptop when I set it up. Seeing as Kaby's Bob died, I had to give the name a second chance.

Please don't die on me Bob!!

City Sights!

Not long after I came to Brisbane I found out that the council has a bus tour called CitySights, and I have been wanting to do the tour for a while now, as I think it sounded like a good way of seeing more of Brisbane. I would not have been happy with myself if I hadn't done the tour while I was in Brisbane.

I didn't really want to do anything other than lie in bed and read some books today, but as that's all I did yesterday I thought I should probably move out of my bedroom today. So I decided since the weather was nice, and I would just keep putting it off if I didn't do it now, I might as well do that tour.

It does quite a few stops, and you can hop on and off at any of them.

The first place I hopped of was at Mt Coot-Tha. Stunning view of the city from there. I would love to go there early one morning and watch the sunrise!

The next stop I got off at was actually the one after Mt Coot-Tha; Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Mt. Coot-Tha. There Was loads of beautiful flowers there, I especially liked the Japanese Garden. I would love to go back one day as they don't do the free guided tours on Sundays.

The last place I hopped off was Chinatown. I had some lovely Chinese food at one of the restaurants for my lunch, house fried rice without prawns, yummy! I can't remember what the restaurant was called, sorry.

As I finished eating just as one of the CitySights buses had gone, and it was 45 minutes until the next one, I decided I would walk along the river back to the train station. I then also got some nice shots of Story Bridge, which was on my list of things see while I was in Brisbane.

I had a nice day, so I'm really glad I didn't just stay in bed.

But now my laptop is starting to act up, so I'm getting a bit nervous... I just hope I have time to get a memory stick and transfer my pictures to it before it decides to die!! Please don't die laptop, I've only had you for 2 years!

Serendipity

Book number 39 in the 100+ Reading Challenge

Serendipity
by Melanie La'Brooy

Outer back cover: Hero Hathaway likes her life ordered, neat. Perfect. So how does she end up in a Manhattan bar, downing cocktails and masquerading as fearless trapeze artist Lola? Not to mention flirting with the charmingly unpredictable bartender, Oscar Martin. Sparks fly, but when Hero panics and runs away, it's the end of the affair - until she bumps into Oscar in Sydney, two years later...

I liked this much better than The Wish List. It was more believable, in some ways anyway. I sat down and read the whole book today in a few hours. The book takes place over a fairly short amount of time, it jumps from Hero and Oscar meeting in Manhattan to two years later, but the feel of the book isn't rushed because of it or anything.

The way both Hero and Oscar act can seem very over the top, but it kind of gets explained in a way that makes it justified. I wouldn't mind if someone would send an Oscar my way actually! Haha.