The smoke from our campfire rises gently. It twirls between a jigsaw of caravans and tents before making its escape northwards. The fiery afternoon sun seeps through the eucalyptus trees, suspending smoke in diagonal threads, like spider webs, across the campsite. It is a beautiful sight and I am, if only for a moment, completely mesmerised.
It’s the last day of our camping trip to Jetty Beach, on the Southern tip of Bruny Island. Our children are scattered throughout the campsite, playing games with the ‘caravan children’, who are on a twelve-month road trip around Australia. Their faces are black with dirt and full of excitement as they run through the bushes after one another. Here they are free to be just as that are – children with imaginations and spirts as wild as the great Southern Ocean around the corner. Little Sylvia is searching for the wallaby – the ‘wal-wal-bee’ – that darts in and out of the bushes behind me. A neverending game of hide and seek.
A gentle sea breeze blows through the camp, taking the smoke from our fire with it. And the unhinged, easy days of the summer holidays. Tomorrow we return home, to work, school and the tedium of routine and responsibilities.
I sigh at the thought of the lunchbox preparations that await next week, a daily onslaught. The frenzied mornings and afternoons, that leave me having to count to ten on more than one occasion, and the long evenings washing up dishes in the kitchen. But perhaps, if I am honest, I am also a little excited about the return to school. This year three out of four kids will attend. It marks the end of many years at home with a ‘team of toddlers’ and a baby on my hip. Quieter days and new opportunities await.
After eight years at home as a full-time mother, I wonder where this next chapter will take me. Life is full of possibility. As Mary Oliver so beautifully wrote, ‘Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?’ And I can’t wait to find out.
A little hand tugs at my skirt. “Mummy”, Sylvia pleads. Reluctantly I join her on a wallaby hunt, my eyes also searching for the three older children. I hear crying coming from our tent. It’s Arthur, he has lost his bush treasure and the other children have disappeared. I pull him into my chest and give a reassuring hug. But my patience for feuding children is fading as fast as the afternoon light. “It must be time for dinner”, I whisper to Arthur. A full belly fixes most things.
Anders cooks abalone and cockle shells on the fire. And just like clockwork, the children drift in, settling into their camp chairs around the fire for dinner. They smile and laugh, admiring their sea-salty ‘catch of the day’. Then with smoke in our eyes we suck the juicy meat out of the shells, crunchy crabs and all. An honest and humble goodbye to the summer holidays.
