CHAPTERS, plural noun: "a distinctive period in history or in a person's life."

A toast to country life, in chapters.

Leaving the, what’s now become the suburbia of the CBD, fringes of Mt Eden in 1998 was always on the cards. We wanted a country side life-style for the family, the key incentive to living in NZ over various European options we had when I moved here, to my wife’s home country, in 1994.

Mauku, Findlay Road, in all its grandeur welcomed us on Christmas Eve 1998 (a condition of sale from the buyer of our town house – a quick game’s a good game - we packed and moved in less than a week).

Two children, two years and two weeks and three months and 29 days old, an abandoned building site for a house, a garden so overgrown we did not see the orchard we had and the prospect of ‘ the mother in law’ to come and visit in two days was enough for my wife, a woman who is tougher than tough nails, to huddle in a corner, a child either side, and quietly let the tears flow, far away from the hustle and bustle four truck drivers and I created, piling up our household belongings in the garage and other areas of the building site we could reach without having to scramble over debris or broken floor boards.

Four months passed in a jiffy, a 0700-1700ish day job was complemented by some 2000-0100ish late-/moon-lighting: gutting, framing, tiling, gibbing, lining & plastering, naturally all under the watch-full eye/instruction of a certified master-builder, left us with a paint-job and a carpet to throw down (one that was so heavy it brought tears to the eyes of the installer). Et voilà, tout va bien, we felt we had, after some blood, plenty of sweat and the occasional tear drop(s) arrived and we were ready to embrace the country life-style in all its romanticised glory.

When you are a city-slicker turning country-bum, you start to value your peer-group relationships, in this case it was our city-friends, many with kids of similar ages to ours, who gladly accepted the invitations for weekend visits/stays, somewhat incentivised by the prospect of (plenty of) food and booze and ‘nix als Gegend’, a welcome distraction from the increasing in-fill housing developments all over Auckland.

We became pretty proficient hosts to medium to large crowds of visitors and our propensity of being house-proud and hospitable set a benchmark and reputation for years to come of being quite good hosts.

One of the lasting reminiscence of this period was the pitter-patter of (not so sure-footed yet) little feet scrambling over the kitchen floor through the hall to the front door and the dual screams of ‘DADDY’s HOME’, or something that meant the same, in an almost ritualistic manner Mo-Fri, when I made it back after a day’s work in the big smoke. Trying to outdo each other the two munchkins would wrap themselves around my legs, laughing, yelling and wriggling, often we just collapsed in a heap on the floor and, man, was I glad to be home.

Over time, these dynamics changed, as you’d expect, from ‘Hi Dad’ to a silent wave of the hand, a nod, a blank steer, a cool ignore to a snazzy ‘ZUP and eventually an articulate, “Hi, how are you, how was your day”, we passed the tykes to toddlers to pre-school to primary to intermediate to high school teens to Uni tweens stages, somewhat seamlessly, or so it seemed, maybe because the ‘point of entry’ remained the only constant throughout these times.      

Pre-school came and went, Jan re-entered the workforce, albeit part-time, and the kids, not just through school, started to further develop their own social lives. Football, Cricket and some individual sports created new avenues of social exposure and opportunities to put our hosting skills to the test of new demographics. Sleep-overs become the thème du jour, thanks to a 56m2 lounge, it was not uncommon to have the whole football team(s) or, depending on the time of the year, the cricket team sleep-over, catered for and well fed with our home-grown/home-made beef patties and saussies. These were the days where we used to run two BBQs side by side on a regular basis.

The sleep-overs, as you would have guessed, were that by name only, foolishly I introduced one of my favourite childhood games to the troops, called ‘Gespenst’, ghost, essentially, the rules were a little bit like hide and seek alas it was played in the dark, inside and outside the house, with torches and designed to scare the living bejesus out of anyone who could be scared.

Thankfully our boundary lines are generously away from the adjacent dwellings, privacy lived out loud, became a new quality in our lives.

Many a blurry-eyed Sunday morning was spent in front of the BBQ catering for the masses yet again, bacon, eggs, French toast & pancakes, all in a morning’s work, but the chitter-chatter, laughter and overwhelming carefree happiness surrounding us more than made up for the lack of sleep.

Two popular ways of making them work-off their two cooked meals in succession were me kicking footballs into the paddocks (I could kick, you know, quite passably) or hitting golf balls into the same, although many a golf ball never made it past the orchard, my kicks usually went further… and have the tangle of arms and legs go after them and in passing giving the cows and sheep a fright or two.

Then of course there was the trampoline and the swings…. Goodness gracious, just as well health and safety policies were still being written, our in-official record of occupants on the swing set at the same time stands at 27 bods, I think the number for the 16ft round tramp was only marginally below that and yes, some (little) people can actually bounce higher than the safety net, just sayin.

As is the case in local country side communities, we became very involved with the local primary school. Jan joined/supported the PTA and I ended up on the BOT for six and a half years before, for good measure, I spent another five years on the BOT of the local high school. Calf club days were an annual highlight, we had bobby calves, lambs, chickens, cats and a dog to show over the years and the lambs probably took the price for most needy ever calf-club pets there were… maybe our inexperience and naivety contributed to this but these lambs, they ‘ruled’ the property for, what felt like an eternity…

Fundraising, working bees and the opportunity to use the school pool outside school hours for a small fee were added benefits of what makes these small country schools so special, not only, in Aotearoa. The communal feeling, the pulling together, colours the sociological fabric of your children’s DNA, they develop a good social conscience early on, one that will never leave them and turn them into good, socially aware, responsible citizens.  

The beauty of country-side living is that you give little to no consideration to noise, or control thereof that is. We made a lot of it over the years. Piano, Keyboard, Guitar, E-guitar, Saxophone, Trumpet, Trombone & Tuba, complemented by a drum kit all contributed to our Hausmusik, the common trademark was that it was LOUD, always. Over the years both kids went on to be active in the various school bands, classical as well as big-band, jazz, and rock, we even went on stage at the NZ Modern School of Music annual judging, playing solo and four-handed pieces (yep- I was the one who chocked on stage, not the kids) for commendation and merit awards.         

Stillness, deafening or solacing, a tonic nevertheless to ears, body, mind, and soul; we had and enjoyed so much of it over the years. As an early riser I treasure the hours 0330-0530hrs as ‘my-time’ but the reality of our surrounds is that the majestic flapping of the wings of Te Kererū and the distinct whistle of the Tui paired with the ‘out of no-where’ appearance and steer-down of the Kōtare provide the daily and every hour of the day backdrop to the soul-soothing wideness of our scenic north-facing outlook.

We spent hours on end at the end of our busy days on the deck, entertained by the manifold variety of birds and the gentle changing of contours in the evening sky. I am known to enjoy my long walks on the beach(es) but these nights on the deck, in these surrounds, are a close, if not inseparable second and will forever hold fond in my memories. 

Busyness, the antipodal reality of (business) life away from home, can catch you, sometimes, unawares and I have seen many struggles and succumb to the self-imposed pressures of ‘keeping up with the Joneses’, strangely, this seems to be more prevalent with the city-slickers than it is with us country-bums…

We have worked hard, been incredibly busy over the years but never once have Jan and I ever discussed or overheard people in the community discussing the have or have nots of peers, neighbours or community members at large.

My personal belief is that the opportunity to reflect and detach on the drive home, once off the motorway, has helped me a lot over the years to be more at home, and ready to be at home, once home rather than still being entangled in the (business-) day-time busyness and the traits of envy and ‘what-ifs’ this can entail. In short, once at home, I am ‘in the moment’ and not lost in lingering ‘afterthoughts’.

The last 21 years have been busy, good busy, and we have had some challenges to deal with, as everyone does inevitably, however, our safe haven of peace has been our home, so much more than just ‘our castle’.

Times, however, they are a changing, kids have grown into responsible citizens, have moved/left the country or ‘gone bush’ and now we are finding that we can’t fulfill the basic needs of our home, to house and be there for a family. It is time to move on and look forward to our next chapter(s), whatever and however, that might look like.

The Moment is upon us now where it feels right to pass the baton of time and give another family the opportunity to have their next chapters play out in one of god-zone’s most wonderful playground, in the heart of Franklin.

Arohanui 197, it’s been a blast, kia kaha, be well – go strong!

';o)

https://www.trademe.co.nz/property/residential-property-for-sale/auction-2291984631.htm

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