A young couple, Nurse/Midwife and Marine Ecologist, leave cold, rainy Scotland for the sunny climes of QLD Australia.
He likes adventure, change, excitement, she prefers calm, order, peace and quiet.
Their bond, an overdeveloped care factor for all living things
One small block of land and many animals later, how does it all work out? What could possibly go wrong?
Read on and see!
This will be the blurb if I ever write a book about our adventures! 😁
Two of my favourites books as a girl were “It Shouldn’t Happen To A Vet” and “ If Only They Could Talk” by James Herriot and I LOVED the TV spin off All Creatures Great And Small.
I dreamt of living at Skeldale House, driving to farms on the Yorkshire moors with James, watching him rescue stuck calves, treat horses with colic, cows with mastitis.
The other TV person I loved was Barbara from The Goodlife, could easily see myself in wellies and dungarees, looking glamorous surrounded by home grown veggies and back yard animal chaos. I just needed to find my Tom?
I was born in the grey rainy west of Scotland near Glasgow, in a town as far from Darrowby as you can imagine.
My first ever job was school holiday ‘kennel maid’ at a boarding kennels on a farm. Surrounded by horses, chickens, cats and litters of kittens, I was in heaven
Mornings I’d release the pack from doggie prison, pick up poop, hose runs , feed them mush from a bucket, then head off into the countryside on long, lead tangling walks
This was the 70’s, a chilled time, perfectly acceptable for a school girl to take off into the middle of nowhere with a pack of other peoples precious dogs🤷♀️
The horsey stuff was a learning curve, cleaning out stables , grooming, platting manes, putting on tack, and riding. Trotting round fields, doing jumps, falling off , getting dragged along “get back on!” (I was 13, I did!) going to gymkanas , my strongest memory not of competing but galloping up and down on the horse between events.
Can’t believe I EVER galloped up and down on a horse 😳😆 These days I love looking at them, patting them, watching other people ride but getting on one maself? Not a chance!
Zoom forward to my early 20’s when I finally met my own Tom Good.
The first time I clapped eyes on Rob was at a party, he was sitting at the top of the stairs snogging another lassie, I was 16, tipsy , dressed in red rara skirt , white tights and head band, channeling The Human League or was it Bananarama?
A few years later arriving at another party , he opened the door, we looked into each other’s eyes and I thought “ah, my Tom!” he thought “ah, this woman will put up with my animal owning shenanigans, might even move to the other side of the world with me!”
And so the adventures began.
Between us we’ve an overdeveloped care factor for all living things, me nurse/midwife , Rob marine ecologist fascinated by the natural world.
Spotting an African Gray parrot sitting on a perch in his family living room I should have known he wouldn’t be happy with the regular one dog, one cat owning scenario.
I also quickly learned that if I vaguely mentioned liking a particular animal, next thing , we’d own one
First pet Tommy the cat appeared thus “we can’t keep him” i said still living in a shared no- pets – allowed flat but he stayed, hidden away every time the rent collector came
Next in our first tiny home together, fierce little moggy Twiggy arrived, Tina the Italian Greyhound next and a tank full of tropical fish followed 🤦🏼♀️
Integrating parrot and Tommy into this mix a disaster, Twigs terrified the crap out of Tom and a talking parrot wasn’t exactly popular with the neighbours. Robs long suffering parents adopted them both
His dream of moving to the other side of the world was not in my plan, not at all so we tried settling in Scotland. Twiggy, Tommy and fish moved with us to to a bigger family home but a year in realised it was a mistake
The idea of being able to own a block of land and have a few farm animals (out of financial reach in Scotland) finally persuaded me to leave family behind ☹️and move all the way to QLD Australia
We arrived mid-summer Jan 1995, backpacks on, one suitcase each and within two weeks had rented a small western-facing unit “You’ll love the sun on the balcony of an afternoon” real estate blatantly taking advantage of our Scottish sun-deprived, naivety.
We first set eyes on our 1.25 acre block 26yrs ago on a random drive through the area, both loved and wanted it, penniless but with full time jobs the bank happily loaned us the grand sum of $75, 000 and just like that we were land owners!
My first priority was to remove all nasty weeds and lantana, Rob’s to build a vineyard 🤦🏼♀️
Rob likes abundance , stuff, more, excitement! I’m a minimalist preferring white walls, clean lines, peace and quiet.
I’m happiest creating order out of chaos , he’s happiest creating it!
See why we’re together?
Our first Australian pet was a random homeless duck found by Rob wandering near our flat , Rob walked in with this big white bird casually tucked under his arm, filled the bath and popped it in. It proceeded to shit everywhere, as ducks do 🤦♀️
Next day we did the huuuuge long drive (😆🙄) to our new place, built a shelter, settled duck in and enjoyed getting to know it over the coming weeks, then disaster. Duck found one morning strangled and half eaten by a resident carpet snake.
A right of passage for newbies moving to acreage in Australia, confronting the killing of pet livestock by snake or fox
The most shocking, waking one morning to feathers and body parts of every chicken we owned, spread across the lawn. Couldn’t believe what we were looking at, carnage caused by a passing fox.
So we got our act together, built shelters with wire dug deep into the ground, now all small animals free range during the day then head home to their shelters at dusk, when we lock em in safe from predators
So many “aha, THATS what we should have done” moments. Many more to tell … 😉