The Town that Time Forgot

August 9, 2010November 22, 2013 Joanne4 Comments

Not far from my home, just over two hour’s drive north from here, is a sleepy little town, a town that time forgot.

The very first time I drove into Eumundi, which would have been over twelve years ago now, I felt right at home. The main street of the town is lined with wonderful old buildings, lovingly maintained throughout the years, preserving the rustic charm of a bygone era.

This is a town where I always feel good, no exceptions; a town with a calm energy pulsing through its tranquil, old world veins.

Despite the town’s population of a mere 500 estimated residents, Eumundi is actually a township familiar to many the world over, mostly due to the world renowned Eumundi Markets, held in the centre of the town, each and every Wednesday and Saturday morning.

Words alone cannot describe the attraction of the Eumundi Markets. Only a visit to the town in person could evoke a complete appreciation of the atmosphere, and the feelings of serenity, whilst wandering through the laneways of the colourful market stalls.

Nothing compares to leisurely strolling from stall to stall, whilst munching on a bag of freshly roasted macadamias (Australian bush nuts) and sipping on a cup of homemade ginger beer.

There’s so much detail in these two photos, so just click on them to enlarge.

I’m sure you can imagine my utter delight when Berkelouw Books opened up, right in the heart of Eumundi. The first time I walked into the new store, perhaps three or four years ago now, I can only liken the feeling to what I imagine it would be to have died and gone to book heaven!

The heavenly aspect of Berkelouw Books, however, is not just due to their stocking of latest addition books. Cramming the shelves of line after line of tall bookcases towards the back of the store, I discovered the biggest range of good quality second hand books that I have ever clapped eyes on in my entire life.

Now, I’ve been a browser of second hand book shops for many a year, but never before have I seen such an extensive range of pre-loved books as on display at Eumundi.

Time stood still for me as I pored over the multitude of books contained on the shelves. Upon leaving the store, I had become the proud owner of four books, written by one of my favourite authors, Daphne Du Maurier. Adding to the charm of my finds, each book had been neatly autographed by its original owner, dates included, going back to 1958. The same man had owned all four books.

The best frittata I have ever tasted came from a cafe in Eumundi. The name of the cafe escapes me now, although I could go back there today and find it in an instant. This cafe is right across the road from Berkelouw Books, on Memorial Drive.

How do I describe the magical quality of Eumundi, this sleepy town, held peacefully within the palms of a time-warp? How do I explain the feelings of euphoria I experience when visiting there?

To put it simply, I can’t explain why I feel this way, any more than I can understand whether it is a feeling unique to me, or whether others have also felt the magical touch of serenity within the timeless buildings and rolling green hills just outside of the main town centre.

Could I live in Eumundi? Yes, I could drop everything here, and move to Eumundi in an instant, even though its climate belies the four seasons I hold so dearly to my heart and constantly miss, due to living in a sub-tropical area.

The natural elation I experience during a visit to Eumundi is worth sacrificing cooler weather for… 🙂

basics · Changes · gratitude · happiness · knowledge · music · nostalgia

Do You Remember…?

July 21, 2010 Joanne3 Comments

Now I’m really feeling nostalgic! I received an email from a very dear friend this morning. He and his wife live in England and we often forward amusing emails to each other after we receive them.

Following my post yesterday, “Recycle, Reuse and Repair”, which found me lamenting to the tune of “whatever happened to the good old days when broken items could be repaired?” this email now has me thinking even more about “whatever happened to the time when…?”

Take a walk along memory lane yourself! Here is the email I received, along with a few interjections from me. 🙂

The email begins ~

“Someone asked the other day, “What was your favourite ‘fast food’ when you were growing up?”

“We didn’t have ‘fast food’ when I was growing up,” I informed him. “All the food was slow”.

“C’mon, seriously, where did you eat?”

“It was a place called ‘home’,” I explained. “Mum cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat together at the dining room table, and if I didn’t like what she put on my plate, I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.”

(Once every blue moon, my Mum would buy me a treat of hot chips, wrapped up in newspaper. But they weren’t fast; I waited forever for them to cook!)

“By this time, the lad was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn’t tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table.”

(I remember this very well; I had to ask, ‘please may I leave the table’, without interrupting any adult conversation!)

“But here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood if I’d figured his system could handle it:

Some parents never owned their own homes, wore jeans, set foot on a golf course, travelled out of the country or had a credit card.”

(Credit cards weren’t even invented! When you wanted to buy something, you saved up to pay for it!)

“My parents never drove me to school. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only one speed, (slow).

We didn’t have a television in our house until I was ten. It was, of course, black and white, and the station went off air at 10pm, after playing the national anthem and epilogue; it came back on air at about 6am. And there was usually a locally produced news and farm show on, featuring local people…”

(Oh yes, I remember the black and white TV days; my kids think it’s hilarious that TV’s weren’t in colour!)

“I never had a telephone in my room. The only phone was on a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen and make sure some people you didn’t know weren’t already using the line.”

(We didn’t have a phone in the house at all!)

“Pizzas were not delivered to our home…but milk was.”

(I had my first taste of pizza at age seventeen…boy oh boy, did I ever lead a sheltered life!)

“All newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys delivered newspapers…my brother delivered a newspaper, seven days a week. He had to get up at 6am every morning.

Film stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least, they did in the films. There were no movie ratings because all movies were responsibly produced for everyone to enjoy viewing, without profanity or violence or almost anything offensive.”

(Those were the days!)

“If you grew up in a generation before there was fast food, you may want to share some of these memories with your children or grandchildren. Just don’t blame me if they bust a gut laughing.

Growing up isn’t what it used to be, is it?”

The email continues, asking do you remember the following ~

Bottles with holes punched into the lids, for sprinkling water onto clothes before ironing them, because we didn’t have steam irons. (My Mum had one!)
Using hand signals for cars without turn indicators. (Yes!)
Sweet cigarettes. (Thinking he’s talking about lollies, and yes, I remember them).
Coffee shops with juke boxes. (They had one in the café next to where I worked at age 16!)
Home milk delivery in glass bottles. (The magpies (birds) liked to peck the silver foil lids off them, and the bottles were recycled!)
Newsreels before the movie. (Hmmm…Can’t say as I do).
TV test patterns that came on at night after the last show and were there until TV shows started again in the morning (there were only two channels, if you were fortunate). (Oh yes, this I do remember!).
Peashooters. (They were a boy thing…I remember boys having them confiscated at school!)
33rpm records. (Still have some!)
45 rpm records. (Yep, still have some 45’s too!)
78rpm records. (Yes! My parents had a few! Wonder whatever happened to them?)
Hi-fi. (My parents had one; lasted for years!)
Wash tub wringers. (Funny…Mum had one and always told me not to stand too close, in case my hair got caught in it!)

Yes, I know…now I’ve ‘dated’ myself something shocking, and you have probably done the same thing! But would you have it any other way? We lived in an age when the world was younger and much more innocent. Those days cannot, and will not, ever be replaced…and we were lucky enough to have lived them! 🙂

The technology in the world advanced suddenly and with such a great volume of speed that at times it left our heads in a spin. Our children missed out on our ‘good old days’.

I wonder what stories will be told by our own children, when they tell their grandchildren stories of their own ‘good old days”? 😉

Australia · Changes · father · gardening · Mum · nostalgia · pies

Recollections of Comfort and Security

July 11, 2010 Joanne2 Comments

“Ah! There’s nothing like staying home for real comfort” ~Jane Austen.

Once in a while, memories of my first childhood home re-emerge, usually brought about by a mention of the area I once live in, and every time it happens I am left with a feeling of melancholy.

The reminder this time was due to my stumbling upon a blog, discontinued in 2006, written by a lady living in Woodford in the Blue Mountains. In her blog she had spoken of her love for anything vintage ~ clothing, jewellery, books, recipes…actually, this woman and I have a lot in common.

My own early childhood home in the Blue Mountains was in the little township of Valley Heights. Today, the population of Valley Heights is estimated at 1,336, so you can imagine how tiny the town would have been back when I was a child!

Way back in the early days, in 1813, when Australia was still learning to walk, three explorers, Blaxland, Lawson and Wentworth, managed to find their way through the rugged, mountainous bushland of the Blue Mountains, opening New South Wales out to the western plains area.

Although the progression of time has brought about many changes, both to my old home and the area, my memory still holds images of the three bedroom house, mostly built by my father; the home where the true meaning of the words comfort and security originated in my existence, and still live today.

Recollections of red velvet curtains, a wood grain wall, a kerosene heater and grey carpet in the lounge room. Linoleum floors throughout the rest of the house, including my bedroom, with scatter rugs here and there.

My bedroom was painted pink, with my second hand furniture repainted in light blue. A low, built in cupboard ran along one wall, purpose built by my brother-in-law to hold my doll collection. At one count, I had collected around forty-something dolls.

The house was humble, to say the least, but in my mind I lived in a beautiful mansion, surrounded by lush gardens; a tall weeping willow tree down the back, not far from the swing my father had built for me and where I would spend hours of my time.

Out the back, we grew hydrangeas and fuchsias, which to this day still remain two of my favourite flowers, and we had mint growing and a passionfruit vine. Our garden backed onto a gully full of various species of gum trees and bottlebrush, but my favourite find in the bush was always the uniquely shaped branches of a plant we called “mountain devils”. I could walk with ease alone down the gully, to a point where there sat a huge bush rock. The rock was my limit, without my father’s help.

In the front garden my sister had planted poppies, roses, gardenias, violets and daphnes, along with as many other flowering plants as she could lay her hands on. She was married the day before my seventh birthday, but still spent time in the garden when she can home to visit us.

Nothing gave me more delight than walking to the end of our street with an empty bowl, returning home to my mother with the bowl full of wild growing blackberries, which she would turn into a pie. Wild flowers grew everywhere in the area as well, in the empty lots of land and along the sides of the roads.

Those were the days when we bought our milk, bread and vegetables from the back of one of the many vans, which travelled around the streets selling their produce. We lived on a gravel road and walked everywhere we needed to go. If the walk was too long, we took a bus.

Life was oh so simple back then. And the air was fresh and cool, not surprisingly, with an altitude of 375 meters (1,230 feet) above sea level. Winters were cold and summer days were rarely unbearably hot. It doesn’t snow at Valley Heights, although we would regularly visit the snow, when it made its appearance during the winter months, by travelling just a few kilometres further into the mountains.

When melancholy sets in, it is brought about not by the memories of a time long gone, but rather from knowing that my family prefers to live in a warmer climate, beside the sea.

I wonder if the blogger from Woodford still lives in the Blue Mountains, enjoying her vintage finds in the many antique stores and craft shops there? As far as I know, the cottage industry is still alive and well in the mountains and I feel certain that the antique stores and art galleries have multiplied, since my last visit there.

The melancholy will pass, I promise, and I will bounce back tomorrow, my usual chirpy self. 🙂

What about you ~ do you have a special location, held near and dear to you in your heart of hearts?

advice · Changes

Always a Second Chance

June 28, 2010 Joanne2 Comments

Time fascinates me. I also have a great love for clocks, although I don’t believe the two are connected in any way at all.

My ultimate dream clock, which I have yet to acquire, is a Grandfather Clock. They feel solid and comforting; in fact, totally timeless! I see Grandfather Clock’s as a most beautiful piece of furniture. On my mantelpiece, I have a wonderful, deep-chiming mantle clock; on the wall in my lounge room I have a cuckoo clock, and in my daughter’s bedroom, she has a musical clock (a gift from her mum, of course!)

The fact that clocks actually have a productive use, that being, they keep track of time, is totally secondary to my mind. I enjoy the various chimes they have, the rhythmic tick-tocking sound and the “feel” of them, that’s all.

Reading an article recently on the psychological reason a person has for a love of clocks, I was most dismayed to learn that the belief is that the clock lover has an obsession with time! Huh! Nothing could be more further from the truth, in my case.

For the day to day necessities, I have my own personal “inbuilt instinct” time tracker, much the same as animals have, glancing at the clock occasionally, to check that my “time sensor” is still on track. When I’m reading, cooking, gardening or talking with my children, I lose total track of time! So much for their theory of obsession!

In the very first article I published on my “Memoirs” blog, a post entitled, “It’s Just a Matter of Time”, I discussed the theory of time and my ideas on the subject, which you may like to read by clicking on this link.

I fail to understand the word “now”, in relation to immediate time, as no sooner is the word uttered, than “now” is gone, replaced by a new now, and a new now, and so on.

Now is far more successful as a broader ranged word, encompassing today, or this week, even this month or “for the duration”.

With the passing of what we know as “now” being instantaneous, we have the luxury of choice. If we judge our own actions in the “Now” to be pleasing, those actions become happy memories.

Alternately, if we are dissatisfied with our actions, feeling we have made mistakes, messed up in some way, or somehow find our choices displeasing, we are given a second chance! “Now” as we knew it is gone, replaced by another now. The old now is the past, the past is gone, and will be forgotten if we so choose it to be.

Life is full of second chances, of our own choosing. It is of no benefit to yourself, or anyone in your life for that matter, if you are hung-up on old mistakes; move on, create a new truth for yourself, and a whole assortment of new happy memories to look back on.

Always embrace every opportunity for, and make the most of, every second chance. 🙂

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