Lighthouse Beach Port Macquarie Photo by Simon Williams

When you are young new beginnings are full of hope and promise.  Your life is flexible, you believe that changes can bring rewards. As you accumulate the baggage of life new beginnings require much more thought, negotiation and planning.  Where once you only had to consult with yourself, now you must consider the needs, wishes and wants of a group of individuals who may not always be as keen on beginning anew.

The great sea-change experience for our family was difficult. Children had to be bribed with promises of daily trips to the beach, husband was guaranteed as many fishing trips as his heart desired. A house needed to be renovated and sold. A new home created. Jobs found.

In the early days, when I needed a map to find the local shops, and the children worried they would never find new friends, I wondered if my choice had been right.

Things didn’t get any easier when my husband suffered a major heart problem and I suddenly found myself commuting between Sydney and Port Macquarie, “Why didn’t this happen in Brisbane?” I queried where I could be at the hospital during the day and home with the kids at night. Instead we rely on my mother to take care of the children, I kick my friend’s son out of his bedroom and  become a long-staying house guest, the finances become a major juggle when we are absent from our casual jobs that offer no holiday or sick pay.

Husband recovers and we begin owner-building our new home, yet another exercise in stress-laden decisions, good and bad judgements and more monetary nightmares.

Do they give Nobel Prizes for persistence? For keeping on going in the path of overwhelming odds? Surely we are worthy of a nomination.

New beginnings take courage and stamina. They need a faith that all will come good even when, on the face of it, disaster seems the only possible outcome.

The days are getting longer now as we move into our fifth summer.  Soon there will be bbq’s on the beach and family dinners on the back deck. The children are hardly ever home, their social schedule is overflowing. They have spent hours getting to know their Nana. The new beginning has finally begun to bring rewards.