So today I had to get up early. And by early I don’t mean like 5:30am, haha, oh no, I of course mean 7:30am (which is early enough). The reason, you may ask, as to why I needed to rise at such an ungodly hour when I only started work at 5pm? Well well well, this is it you see, every Friday and every Monday there’s what the mining community calls a shift change. It’s when the night shift guys finish nights, swap shift patterns, or are due to go home for a week…or something like that. So, on these days the pub will open at 6:30am until 8:30am, you know, to let those finishing nights come and have a couple of wind down bevvies before they go home. We could technically open every morning at this time, but who wants to get up at 5:30 every day when you’re only getting to bed at 1am? Yeah, not us.
I am rostered to work the Monday morning shifts and my adorable Danish counterpart the Friday morning ones, however, once the bar closes at 8:30, we have our daily cleaning to commence. So I arrived bright eyed and bushy tailed, Ajax in one hand, air freshener in the other and carried out an hour of cleaning which involved the usual, you know, toilets, hoovering and mopping, emptying ashtrays and general wiping down shizz. Nothing too strenuous. Plus, it’s not like I’m working in a shitty club where the beer taps leak, the post-mix has erupted, the floors are constantly sticky and there’s sick and shit and spunk up the toilet walls – it might be a mining pub full of blokes but they’re pretty clean and pretty respectful.
Following this I decided to go for a run and a bit of a wander. Not wanting to exert myself too much and not wanting to get completely lost in the bush to the point where I’d panic, worry if I was gonna get attacked by a rogue skippy (I’ve only seen dead ones so far so I think I’m good for the time being), think every limp looking branch was a snake, and have to send out an embarrassing SOS call, I chose the sensible option – run far but run in a straight line.
The sun was shining, the weather was sweet, it made me wanna move my dancing feet…haha, just kidding; the sun WAS shining though but it was still chilly, and my dancing would have to be saved for another time, maybe when I can afford gin. So I ran. And I ran and I ran and I ran. I felt a bit like Forrest Gump actually; the wind in my hair, the road stretched out before me, miles of land to marvel at (no pun intended). Forrest Gump ran across states though, I just ran 4km in one direction, turned round and ran 4km back. Hardly a super-marathon. Yet in a weird way, even though I had my headphones in and even though I hadn’t really gone that far, it was strangely liberating. Liberating in the sense that I had no idea what was ahead of me, and liberating because there was nothing to distract me – no people, no cars, no houses, no buildings, nothing – the road I took was a red dirt track lined with gum trees and charred grassy remains; it steeped in gradient from time to time and I could see fresh tyre tracks in the gravel but even after I stopped to turn back, the road looked like it would continue on forever…maybe it did…
I hope to take many more runs like this. And I hope to explore more of the area around me too (God knows I have time). Like I mentioned, the feeling of complete freedom was refreshing, the feeling of not knowing what was up ahead on that dirt track was kind of like a metaphor for my life; and the more I can soak up some of that liberation, the more I can keep going without worrying about what may lie around the next corner, or what may be over the next hill, the more my mind will ease and hopefully that wave of calm will wash over me, bringing with it some happiness, clarity and contentment.
Chasing Amy-Lou 