Is our unschooling life rich enough? Can we live a seemingly conventional life and successfully unschool? Or do we need to travel the world or spend time seeing our country firsthand? Perhaps we need to live off-grid or live in an unusual place or home? These were questions that I was pondering quite a few years ago.
When we were offered an opportunity to move to a tumbledown cottage on a fish farm, we imagined living an exciting, wild and free life on 100 acres of beautiful Australian bush. So we set off in search of adventure. But we didn’t end up living a dream life. We had to endure drought, poor soil, rats, snakes, the stress of keeping our dog away from the gun of our neighbour. When we were told that our unborn baby had an ‘abnormality incompatible with life’, our dream came to an end. We headed back to town where we could be near the hospital and all the conveniences of life.
Sometimes we don’t have to go looking for rich learning experiences: they can arrive without warning. We learnt so much while struggling to cope with the death of a child. There were practical things: how to organise a funeral, order a headstone and choose the right words to put on it. But, more importantly, we also learnt about love.
It doesn’t matter where we live as long as our homes are full of unconditional love. That’s what our kids need more than anything else.
So, that’s the short version of my story. Maybe you’d like to hear the long one by watching my video.
Here are a few photos that I took on an old point-and-shoot film camera while we were living in the cottage on the fish farm surrounded by acres of bush.
These days, we live in a conventional house on an average-sized block in a village 20 minutes from the nearest town. We’re connected to the town water supply, and we buy our food from a supermarket. We often buy it online! And although our life may look rather ordinary, it’s not. It’s packed full of rich learning experiences. Most importantly, our home is a place which we try to fill with unconditional love. It’s where we unschool. It’s perfect for us.
How I love seeing those old photos! And all the happy kids! I`m sure they`ve had gorgeous time living there, despite all hard stuff that you as grown ups had to deal with, like water, dangerous animals and hard neighbors.
Sometimes I feel very “stiffed” living so close to many neighbors, I miss private sphere very much. When I think about a dream-place for our family, I imagine something like that – so much freedom and nature. But – yes, water would be very much needed. And good lovely neighbors also.
I think it is good that you had this experience living there, maybe it made it much easier later for you to appreciate “normal and ordinary” with all its boundaries.
What a hard hard time it must have been for you. Living in a hard place, already fighting impossible circumstances and then getting to know that your dear baby-in-your-belly is very very sick. I don`t remember – did your other children know about it during the pregnancy?
You must miss Thomas very much. Sending you a big hug!
I enjoy reading Angel stories slowly and savoring every page of that beautiful family. Imagine what a wonderful world we would have with tons of families like that! I can only dream.
Luana,
I’m so sorry I didn’t reply to your beautiful comment sooner.
You are so right: even though the experience of living on the fish farm was difficult, it wasn’t all bad. Callum once told me that he has happy memories of those days, and he’d like to live on a farm again. At the moment, he’s doing some farming work on his days off from his regular job. Also, we learnt a lot about the important things of life while struggling with the lack of water etc and later, then returning to town after we found out that Thomas was going to die. And we have lots of stories to share about those experiences!
My kids did know that Thomas would probably die after birth. They came to some of my prenatal checkups, and we tried to prepare them for the birth and probable funeral. It would have been impossible to keep everything a secret from them because I was so miserable during that time. We faced the situation together as a family. I do miss Thomas, but he’s still part of our family. I carry the grief deep inside me, but that’s okay. Things are as they should be.
I’m so glad you’re enjoying my Angel stories. Thank you for your encouraging words!
I hope all is well with you and your family. May God bless you!