#nofilter

What you are looking at on this blog is the real Huon Valley. It's the real deal. The photos are happy snaps normally taken with my phone. No Instagram-style filters. No rose-tinted glasses. What you see is what you will get if you visit or live here. The colours change with the seasons and are so beautiful, I don't see the need to enhance them. I'm no photographer, but seriously, it is hard to take a bad photo of the Huon River. It is stunning, just as it is.

I'm getting tired of filters that make the sky look bluer than blue and turn ordinary moments of family life into vintage perfection. Landscapes with added drama. Portraits with added softness. But last week a friend told me something I found quite horrifying.

Apparently, the good old school photo is now touched up, photoshopped or airbrushed - call it what you like. Now I'm sure many of us have school photos we would rather erase from history. Like the one where I had an allergy that gave me puffy bags under my eyes, during my 'chubby' phase to make it worse. Or that terrible zit at age 13. But what message are we sending kids about how they look if we have to 'correct' it? We're telling them they're not good enough. What might seem like a short-term self-esteem gain I think will turn into long-term body image problems. Celebrities look so alien in the airbrushed photos on magazine covers, with out-of-proportion body parts and plastic-looking skin. I'm hoping that pretty soon, Instagram filters will look passé. "So 2012," we'll say, and show the world in all it's natural glory, even the ugly bits.

Living a double life

Increasingly, I feel torn between two different lives. The 'corporate' life versus the 'rural' life. One day I'm in a meeting in the boardroom in Sydney in a suit and heels and then off to an industry dinner. The next day I'm cleaning out the chook shed in dirty jeans, gumboots and my Dad's old sweater. The 'corporate me' is on the phone to my team in Beijing, Tokyo or Mumbai, then 'rural me' goes to collect the mail from the post office box 5km down the dirt road and buy the local rag to catch up on what's been going on. The people I know in one life know little about the other life. Variety is good and I love both lives, but increasingly I feel like I don't belong in either. I'm not complaining, I'm very aware of how lucky I am to be able to live where I do and do what I do. And I know most people have a work life and a personal life that are not the same thing. I'm just trying to explain this uncomfortable feeling I have.

How to make enemies in a new town

Okay, so this is a tongue-in-cheek follow on from my previous post about how to make friends when you move to a new town, especially in 'the country'. Here are some quick ways to stuff it up:

Gossip. Especially in a small rural community, I am amazed that anyone would think it is okay to tell tales about others.

Rip people off. Not paying your suppliers in business, always asking favours but offering nothing in return, not showing up for appointments. In large cities you can get away with this behaviour to a greater extent (sadly) because the pool of potential customers, friends and employers is larger. Word of mouth is king.

Stay at home. Obviously.

Complain about everything. People won't offer you things or invite you places, if you're only going to be miserable about it.

Judge the local cider competition. I have found out the hard way that this is possibly one of the best ways to make enemies! Local competitions take one-upmanship to a whole new level in a rural community. Whether it's a trivia quiz, sailing, baking, art or cider making, it's very serious business indeed, let me tell you. And if you are one of the judges, then the end result is all your fault. It's a quick way to endear yourself to those who win and be forever complained about by those who don't.

How to make friends in a new town

A few years ago I met a lovely couple who had moved to the Huon Valley with their (almost) adult kids. We met when I popped in to collect a rooster advertised 'free to good home' on Gumtree. They mentioned how hard they had found it to make friends here. I was really surprised by the comment, because we've been amazed at just how easy it was to meet people and get involved in our local community. Your kids' school and the neighbour's kids can be a great starting point for making connections when you move into a new town. But we don't have kids, so we've found other ways. Here are just a few:

Step outside your comfort zone. Try things you might not otherwise do, even things you don't think you'll enjoy. I don't like old movies. No interest in film or film stars at all. Before I moved here, I had hardly seen any pre-70s movies. Since moving here, on the first Sunday of almost every month I have seen a classic movie at the local Palais Theatre. The bar is open, everyone takes a plate of food to share, we have a laugh at the overacting and dodgy plots, conversations are started and friendships formed, some folk even dress up in theme for the occasion. I've tried rowing, joined a local history group, gone to see  folk music... none of which I would have ever even considered doing in Sydney. But it's fun to try something new and it's a good way to meet people with common interests and values.

Social media. Follow people and businesses in your local area on Twitter or Facebook. Read and follow local bloggers. Then if you get the opportunity to meet them in real life and introduce yourself at a function, do it. In a wonderful yet sad example of this, David made friends with Bruce because he had mentioned on Twitter that he rode a Ducati motorbike. David went out on a limb and rode his bike over to say hi in person. No agenda, just to say hi. Bruce suddenly passed away 18 months ago now, but I know David will always treasure that friendship formed over good coffee and a joint interest in Ducatis.

Accept invitations. All of them. Sounds obvious, but if someone is kind enough to invite you...

Get out of the house. Anywhere. Apart from one neighbour who showed up on our doorstep with a whole salmon, and our friends who we met when they dropped in to look at our new ride-on lawnmower on the recommendation of the guy who sold it to us, no one has ever come to our door to meet us. We met our neighbours down at the local pub through that simple social question "where do you live?" Would we have spent Friday evenings in a pub in Sydney? Probably not, but it opened conversations and connections that have made living here a whole lot more special. There are of course healthier options like exercise classes, the local business group, choir or theatre group.

Get a dog. Kids may be the best way to meet other people (parents), but dogs must come very close. Lots of people approach us to pat our dogs when we take them out. We also joined a local dog walking group to socialise our dogs - and ourselves.

People tell me they would like to move to 'the country', but they're afraid of leaving their friends and worried they might not make new ones. It's a valid concern. Community connections are so important. I can imagine that it's harder to meet people and make friends in some towns than others.

If you meet a new arrival in your town, say hello, get their email address or mobile number so you can forward invitations to events, remember their name and introduce them to others. That's what the kind people of Franklin did for us when we arrived, and we're very very grateful for it.

The not-so-quiet life

We were under the impression that life outside the big city would be quieter, more peaceful, with plenty of spare time for simply sitting and admiring the view. The opposite has turned out to be true. Well, it's definitely quieter in terms of noise (I find it hard to sleep in Sydney hotels these days due to the traffic noise) but not in terms of things to do. In fact, we find ourselves doing much more here than we ever did in Sydney, partly because it is so much easier. It's easier, quicker and cheaper to drive into Hobart to see a movie or a show or eat out than it was to do so in Sydney. And then there is so much to do in our own local area, and even more as the weather warms up and festival season starts in Tasmania.

The most stressful period at work for me ended at the start of this month. I flew back to Tasmania on the Friday afternoon after a week working at a conference on the Gold Coast, a fantastic event that takes months of preparation from many people and creates a lot of pressure. It's the same every year, so I know what to expect, but that doesn't make it any better. That night we dressed up and went to a Halloween Ball in the Franklin Palais. Saturday morning there was unpacking, chores... on Saturday afternoon, American guitarist Richard Gilewitz and local musician Steve Gadd played at the Palais. Friends handed over a large bucket of herbs from their garden for our chooks. We had a lovely home meal. Sunday afternoon we spent at the

Longley International Hotel enjoying smooth ska and reggae from Hobart band Lively Up! (right) and on Sunday night we were back at the Palais for the monthly movie, this time a truly terrible French film called 'Breathless', enjoying a chat over shared plates of food at interval. The weekend was so full, I didn't have time to worry about the past week, what needed doing or what lay ahead. My left eye stopped twitching, the chest pains stopped and my right arm (the 'mouse arm') stopped aching. I felt brain dead, but happy.

We love the social aspect of life here, going to functions where you know half the room, trying and seeing new things that we might otherwise never have done in Sydney because it was all too hard. If you think moving to 'the country' means becoming a hermit, think again... unless that's what you want, of course.

A great sense of community

Intrepid walker and well-known Huon Valley identity Jan (pictured with walking 'tree' below) started the annual tradition of a Fathers Day walk to the top of Doodys Hill in Geeveston 18 years ago. Groups of people leave from different locations, aiming to meet on top of the hill at midday. Numbers vary each year depending on the weather and how much 'publicity' (all word of mouth) is generated. Yesterday we joined a small group of families and friends leaving from a local orchardist's place in Castle Forbes Bay. We took our dogs, who managed to make it all the way to the top and behave themselves, even when presented with curious new animals like peaocks.

The top of Doodys Hill is home to a TV tower and various communications antennae and provides wonderful views in every direction, of Port Huon with its fish farms, wharves and long-closed pulp mill, north to Mount Wellington and Sleeping Beauty and out to snow-capped peaks in the Hartz Mountains National Park. On the return journey there was a stock whip cracking contest and poetry readings on the top of a hill, followed by a barbecue at our walk leaders home. What a lovely community event.

On our return home, we found out that a friend and neighbour had been badly injured while sawing wood at home and rushed to Hobart for surgery. Everyone near and far jumped in with messages of support, love and offers of help. A horrible end to a lovely day, but it reinforced the great sense we have of being part of a community here. In Sydney we were lucky to have lovely neighbours - Darren and Lisa next door, Peter and Lise across the road, our dear friends Ingrid and Alan up the road and later Rick and Alex two doors up. And yet somehow what we have here is so different.

God I love it here

It's something I've said to myself many times during the last three years in Tasmania. It's generally due to the small things. When I say it, I am usually driving down the road in the truck and shaking my head in disbelief at how lucky I am to have showed up in a beautiful place like this and made a new life here. To provide specifics, here are a few things that made me say this recently:

• Minutes after a bush fire broke out in our town in February, friends and acquaintances from all around were calling, emailing or tweeting offering somewhere to stay (including our various animals) should we need to evacuate. Lucky for us it didn't get close.
• Going to local functions and realising we know almost everyone in the room
• The lady at the the petrol station who said I could have the fuel discount despite leaving the voucher at home because I am 'a regular' (I swear we've only met a couple of times)
• Walking down the driveway to lock the chook shed after 9pm at night in summer and it's still light
• Walking down the driveway to lock the chook shed at 5pm in winter and the birds are already asleep on their perch
• Getting up close with wildlife including the blind pademelon who comes out in the daylight to feed near our garage and the one who hides out in the chook shed if I don't close it early enough
• The dinners we ate where almost all of the ingredients came from our garden
• The friends who say they have too much silverbeet or too many raspberries, so just come over and help yourself
• Chats with shopkeepers. People take time here.
• The view. There's always the view. You'd have to look hard to find a bad one.

Moving to the country

Recently I wondered when the seed of country living was planted in my brain. When did I decide that I wanted to live in a rural area, with plenty of space, fresh air, wildlife and silence?

I can trace much of it to going to college in Bathurst, a country town about three hours drive west of Sydney. Most students rented old Federation houses that are probably worth a fortune now. We spent weekends playing pool at the Perthville pub. Oh and in the library of course! I loved the space and the relaxed pace and the friendly, interesting people I met. The whole experience as a student in a country town was brilliant and I'd recommend it to anyone.

Before going to uni I also lived in a country town of around 5,000 people in Germany for just over a year, but I don't think that was the source of it. Back then I was still a dressed-in-black city chick through and through. I liked seeing bands and drinking beer in dingy pubs. Going out dancing. Cafes. Just walking along city pavements and window shopping. I still like all those things. But if it means crowds, queues and traffic I'm not keen on doing them often. Once or twice a year will do. By my early thirties I was a tragic Country Style magazine subscriber and David and I went on many driving holidays in country NSW and Victoria with one eye on potential new places to live.

I blame the rest of it on Enid Blyton. I loved many of her books as a child but The Children of Cherry Tree Farm series and Shadow the Sheepdog were among my favourites. Possibly just beaten by the Faraway Tree books, but well ahead of the Famous Five and Malory Towers. Recently my mum confessed that she read Shadow the Sheepdog before giving it to me for Christmas and shed a tear or two, and I don't blame her at all, on both fronts. It's a lovely book. Johnny and his pup adore each other and have all sorts of adventures and misadventures.

The Children of Cherry Tree Farm escaped dreary London (where they were all pale and sickly) to stay with their aunt and uncle in the country for the holidays. They fed lambs, got chased by a bull, drank fresh creamy milk and went to market in the pony-trap. A strange old woodsman called Tammylan befriended them and taught them about the plants and animals.They saw squirrels, weasels, badgers, hedgehogs, deer, moles and foxes in the woods. Then, their dream came true: their parents decided to move to a farm of their own, and they became The Children of Willow Tree Farm. They churned butter, fed buttermilk to the piglets, gathered sheaves of corn, fed the hens and collected the eggs. I dreamed of doing the same.

Instead of those quaint-sounding British animals, here we have pademelons, possums, bettongs, wombats, quolls and echindas. There are screeching black cockatoos, tiny fairy wrens and soaring wedge-tailed eagles. We are definitely not farmers, but we're having little adventures of our own and love our new life. Just like those kids on Willow Tree Farm.

Small joys

Today was full of small things that made me happy.

• Positive feedback about my team at work.
• The new butcher (Ziggy's) that has just opened in Huonville sells 'continental smallgoods', including some of my favourite German style cold meats like Paprikawurst, Schinkenwurst and Lachsschinken. I couldn't help but buy some. It's all made at his premises in Moonah. He can count me as a regular customer, that's for sure.
• The hens laid two eggs for the second day in a row. One of them started laying an egg every few days in late June, but now production has expanded and soon we'll be eating quiches, cakes and eggs for breakfast again. Can't wait.
• I have made it though the first 10 days of Dry July.
• Cooked a delicious Massaman curry for dinner.
• Made some progress on the jigsaw puzzle.

As I said, small things. But nice ones.

Dry July

I have mentioned before how much I enjoy a nice Tassie cider, or pinot, or beer... so maybe I'm insane to sign up for Dry July, a month without alcohol. The goal of Dry July is to raise funds to help adults living with cancer (in my case, via the W.P. Holman Clinic at the Launceston General Hospital here in Tasmania) and also raise awareness of personal drinking habits and associated health issues.

After several weeks in Switzerland and Germany sampling the local brew in many different cities (sample below), my liver probably needs a break too. If you can support my effort through sponsorship, or fancy joining me, please do!





From blog to book

To keep a record of our first 12 months in Tasmania, and share it with a few family and friends who are more "offline" kinds of people, last year I turned my blog into a book using a service called Blog2Print. You can choose a cover, hard or soft, photos for the front and back, select which posts to include if you wish, a title and so on. After our second year here, I did the same thing with another year's worth of posts. A few weeks later, these glossy books showed up in the post. Easy!

Remote working

Whether you call it teleworking, work-from-home or remote working, that's what I've been doing for the past 18 months full-time. Before that, I used to work from home mostly two days a week and commute into the office on the other days. It took more than an hour on the bus in Sydney peak hour traffic, so including the walk/wait at each end, the trip took more than three hours a day. It was often stressful and a dreadful waste of time, except while I was studying, when the bus trip (provided I got a seat) was great for textbook reading.

I work as a regional director of PR for a US company in the technology industry. That means spending hours on the computer or phone, writing, talking with journalists, finding them information for their stories, arranging interviews with the company's spokespeople, promoting the company's expertise. I also manage a small team in Asia Pacific and Japan. I travel interstate to host journalists at the company's conferences and for leadership team meetings. This kind of work can be done from anywhere.

I consider myself very lucky to work for a company where this is normal. I have met colleagues who work from their home in the Arizona desert, on Vancouver Island in Canada, on Waiheke Island near Auckland, New Zealand, in Perth, Macau and on Scotland Island in Sydney. Everyone in the company has a notebook computer; there are no desktops. With the increase in fuel costs, traffic and natural and other disasters, I think this is a very smart move. In an emergency situation, almost the entire company can do their jobs from home. But even in a company with the technology set-up and culture and experience to support remote workers, being able to do so successfully is still dependent on having a supportive manager and management team, and I'm lucky in that regard too.

Personally, I like working from home. I can concentrate better on the task at hand, I'm in control of my own work environment (no beige cubicle for starters), I don't eavesdrop on everyone else's phone calls, I can stand up and wander around on the phone, the coffee is good (and cheaper), there's less wasted time. I can wear jeans every day. My desk has a nice view (see above). Sure, my social interaction mostly comes from Twitter, instant messenger and the dog, but that has its upsides to be honest!

However, there are things I need to do better:

• Get out more. Late yesterday afternoon I drove into Hobart for networking drinks organised by the Public Relations Institute of Australia. It was the first time I had met other PR people in Tasmania. Some of these people are in the same situation as me. One suggested catching up for coffee in the new year, so I'll be following up on that idea. I go to local business dinners with David, put on by the Huon Valley Business Enterprise Centre, but there may be other networks that are useful. Also it means I put on a suit! And as much as I dislike being away, I also need to travel to see people more. Relationships are worth investing in.
• Exercise. In Sydney I had regular appointments to train with the totally brilliant Wild Women on Top, and I always kept that commitment, rain, shine or headache. When working from home I walked the dog every afternoon. Here I have failed to keep any commitment made to myself to keep up the hiking training, and the dogs have a huge paddock to run around in. Sitting at a computer all day long is not doing me any good at all. To change this, I have to set a big hiking goal to train towards.
• Webinars. I used to attend these more when I was in Sydney, and in the absence of PR colleagues to discuss ideas with, I found them a time-efficient way of thinking outside the day-to-day.
• Weekly 'team' meeting. Or Friday drinks, like the office-dwellers do. David and I have a regular breakfast booked in at a local cafe, but I need to do a better job of actually using the time to discuss our work.
• Keep more regular desk hours. With most of my team between one and eight hours behind me (and worse in summer), a lot of the email and calls fall late in the day my time. That's hard because I'd prefer to work early and finish before I am brain dead and inefficient. I don't have a good answer for this one yet. To be honest it was no different in Sydney.

There's more, but with this post I just wanted to share a bit of what it's like working remotely, the good and the bad. I'd love to hear about your experiences if you work from home too.

All that glitters

I loved the following description of a certain type of blogger in a very funny recent post on chef Steve Cumper's blog:

My life is so dreamy and your isn’t
These bloggers are responsible for affluenza-like symptoms of envy in readers as they grow, harvest and cook in their desirable homes which resonate with overwhelming creativity and appreciation for the aesthetic life. A difficult life to emulate from one’s council flat.

I can see myself in several of the blogger types listed, but this one made me think. I have certainly felt envious after reading others' blogs. It's not that I feel jealous of their life - I like my own very much - but most definitely of their talents. The abundant vegetable gardens, creative photography, music, craft and DIY masterpieces, pretty pastel cupcakes and sumptuous dinner party menus... sigh. It's not just blogs of course. I have been an avid reader of Country Style magazine for many years while I dreamed of and plotted an escape from the suburbs, but I must say the pages full of creative people eating their own organic produce and raising delightful children on their stunning, historic rural properties mostly make me think: "how the hell can they afford it?!!" Are they all semi-retired investment bankers?

That comment on Steve's blog made me think about what we post and what we don't; what we are prepared to tell close friends versus complete strangers; what is the truth behind the photos on the blog. I guess tales of financial woes, health issues, battles with bureaucracy, family feuds, bouts of depression and stress at work are unlikely to make entertaining reading and best kept private. 'Be generous of spirit' is a wise guideline once given to me for online interaction, if you don't wish it to come back and bite you on the backside. Be positive. Glass half full and all that.

Looking at my blog this week, you'd think there I was enjoying the frosty mornings in the Huon Valley, looking out over our newly planted fruit trees and hiking in the great outdoors. But the truth is here I am in Sydney for work, sitting in a tiny fluorescent lit hotel room on my computer until late. Not exactly idyllic, but it most certainly means I have something to look forward to.