Responsibilities

I grew up in a completely different environment to Pod boy. I am the eldest of four girls (he is the youngest, with one sister and two brothers). For most of my life I had responsibility drummed into my head, as the oldest I was also the one responsible for seeing that dinner was ready when my Mum got home from work and that all the odd jobs had been done too. I feel like I had a lot of responsibility from a very young age not just at home but also at school and in the community.

Me, second from the left, and my sisters

I was 9 when Mum went back to full time work - Dad worked from home but his office was about 300m away from the house so he wasn't really right there. I got my first job as a checkout chick when I was 14 and I began babysitting for neighbours and tutoring various neighbourhood children when I was 16. I was overly involved at school: I was on almost every committee, I was heavily involved in drama, music, debating, sport and I was editor of the school newspaper for 3 years. I also had various leadership roles in the school and tutored 3 students in English and Maths.

I went straight from high school to University and in my first year began to feel discontented with my life. I took a year off after my first Uni year to nanny for two little girls whose mother had died. I worked about 60-80 hours/week with them as their dad worked very long hours and I was basically live-in. It's no surprise, looking at this list (and remembering the other things I was also doing at the time), to me that when I turned 20 I totally rebelled against responsibility. I went back to Uni, but I was totally disinterested. I didn't have the drive to succeed like I always had, I wanted to have a life of simplicity.

From about 20-23 I dropped a lot of unnecessary stuff, I took more time for myself and I began saying "no" to some things that people asked of me. I was a lot more relaxed and tried to only do stuff that I wanted to do. I only did the bare minimum to pass my courses, and even though I was still getting great marks I wasn't actively trying for these. I had a couple of serious relationships, but there was always a part of myself that I held back. I was scared to let anyone too close to me, I was much happier being there for other people and not relying on anyone else.

When I was 23 I started my nursing course, I went into it excited and motivated (but unwilling to study endlessly or put more effort in than I needed to to pass). I'm lucky that I'm naturally bright, I can write assignments in hours that other people take weeks to write and I've used this skill endlessly during my course. I know this sounds scary, and you might be thinking "wow, I don't want someone that doesn't try to be nursing me" but don't worry, I'm good at what I do when I'm doing it, I just don't want it to be the focus of my life.

When Pod boy first talked about me living in the van full-time with him I was a little apprehensive. It was totally different than holidaying in the van with no other responsibilities. But then it hit me, vandwelling was the perfect situation for me right now. It feels right to be mobile, to be closer to the earth and more subject to nature. It feels right to walk away from the constrains of my childhood, it feels wonderfully appropriate that I'm back at Mum and Dad's so I'm going from my parents house to the pod: almost like I've come full circle. I feel like I'm only now beginning to live a life of simplicity.

Pod boy and I have an amazing romance, our story is actually pretty unbelievable, and for us vandwelling is both a completion and a beginning. Living together in the pod completes the work we have to do on ourselves and frees us up to focus on a new beginning. He and I might write a blog together when I'm over there and explore our relationship. It's so cathartic to write on here for me, I feel like I learn more and more stuff about myself.