NO TURNING BACK NOW…

It’s been a week since I signed my past away.

The contract was a massively bulky deal with diagrams and elaborate phrasing beyond my desire to understand. I’m a bottom line kind of girl – what does it all mean in the end.

“It mean your unit now belongs to them,” my solicitor smiled.

I’d bought the property four years ago for $79,000 and sold it for a health $150,000.

The unit was a small, dingy, two-bedroom affair that served the single career-driven me well. Something of a metaphor really – it was quite, unassuming and largely ignored. Buried at the back of a unit block its views were limited to an open yard of grass, two rusting clotheslines and a slowly rotting wooden fence with over-lapping palings.

Within its walls I was safely hidden away from the world. No one even knew I was there and I kept largely to myself. Occasionally, on my bolder days, I would make eye contact with my neighbours but otherwise I was convinced that if I had dropped dead within its walls no one would have noticed me missing.

I refinanced two years ago – put it up for rent – and decided it was time to put the old me to rest. I used the money to travel to Canada, to evolve and to redefine myself.

Without the small piece of property I would not have been able to do so.

With all the history wrapped into that tiny space it’s hard to let go but I’m doing so with an enthusiasm I couldn’t have predicted.

Over the last six months my past has gone silent on me. Chrissy is knee deep in work. Mick and Milo have simply disappeared, Sarah is wrapped in divorce blues and Trevor is out of reach. I have no doubt they’ll resurface in time but for now their absence is noticed and I’m worried about them.

Journalism is rearing its ugly head but on my terms and shaped into a new passion.

Other than that, my future is all bright and shiny.

We’re house hunting, talking about babies and making plans. The house we’re searching for will have three to four bedrooms, a yard, garage or twin carports. All the suburban trappings in a leafy location.

I have a new crew, or pod as it’s referred to. Simone, Peta, Leanne in the immediate vicinity. Nelly, Stella and Roma. All solid friends. All quality people. All ripe with potential.

Everything new and it’s getting less and less likely that I’ll ever go back to where I came from.