I was forced to live without the Internet on my holiday. And without the phone. No text messages. Nothing. It wasn’t planned. We just didn’t know that Vodafone coverage in regional Victoria was so bad. As in, non-existently bad.
I survived. Enforced dis-connectivity is, it turns out, quite good for you. I suspected that. I read a whole book. I knitted most of my Featherweight cardigan. I switched off from life and my concerns. Well, a little. I’d have to be comatose to achieve that totally. But the net effect was a bit of isolation, with Sean, and a sense that life was going on elsewhere.
I missed family and friends. I missed playing with Baby Alice. I missed the comfort that comes from a text or an email that says hey, I’m thinking of you. A couple of times we went for a drive and got a window of coverage and it was great to just feel connected even for a moment. I decided to feel ok about that need. It’s just who I am. I’d be in a right state if we’d gone away for longer than a week!
How good it is to be plugged in properly again. We’re not home yet but we’re in range and it’s sublime. I’ve made contact. Caught up on news. Slipped seamlessly back into emails and blogs and all the rest of it, all from the comfort of our hotel room.
I compulsivley tweeted what our dinner plans are because I could. Pizza, if you want to know. Fine dining, of which we have done a lot, is all well and good but the idea of making ourselves presentable for human interaction is not so appealing. But pizza and beer on a motel room couch most certainly is!
Tomorrow we’ll visit a couple of favourite wineries in the rutherglen region, an area we’ve not been to for some years. It’s strange to be back here. A few ghosts and strange memories reside here. But we’ll buy wine in the morning and enjoy the rest of the drive home. And maybe I’ll get the seemingly endless knitting of the Featherweight cardigan done.
Grey knitting and grey skies means I’m pretty keen to knit something colourful soon. More photos and holiday stories later.
