I live in what I like to call 'Grandma-town', an established suburb of brick and weatherboard cottages with more than it's fair share of dogs, utes and sweet, old-school corner stores (you should see the sweets selection at the one down the road, completely takes me back to childhood!). Mind you, the demographic seems to be young families, but I like 'Grandma-town' as it has that charming old-world feel to it. Plus it's fun to say.
It is reminiscent to me of driving through the neighbourhood where my grandparents lived 30 years ago in Rockhampton. Lovely well-cared for homes where you see people walking the streets in safety, kids riding their bikes and plenty of parkland - we literally have a huge park less than a block away. I used to love visiting my grandparents and driving down the street to their little immaculate weatherboard home with its' large backyard and families everywhere watering their garden or playing cricket. Our family cricket games were legendary and as a little kid, those times will remain forever magical to me. Our neighbourhood has the same feel.
And on my drive to work I pass three schools all side-by-side and then cross a major urban intersection into...nothing. It seems like I'm driving down an old country road in the middle of nowhere, with only the odd stable, dilapidated shack or farm animal to break the greenery.
Then I turn a corner and...back to suburbia! Much more modern suburbia here, I'd doubt any house is over 10 years old. And then another corner and suddenly countryside again...
Our work has a small carpark but basically you gotta be in by about 6am (too early for this little black duck) to park in there. So the overflow go to the football club parking lot across the road which is a big gravel carpark backing onto the club, and right beside it is a windmill and water tower. On the horizon...countryside.
Mind you, it takes me 5 minutes to drive to work. Yes, 5 minutes! So in this small amount of time I've felt like I've driven the gamut of city, country and ultimate suburbia.
It's one of the strange contrasts about this town that I'm thoroughly enjoying. As the largest inland city in Australia, Toowoomba certainly isn't small and has all the facilities a big city has to offer (minus Gold Class cinemas, but let's not go there). But it the unique mix of small town and city that makes it special to me. Having come from Brisbane and worked smack in the middle of the concrete jungle for so many years, I'd have had to have driven about an hour to see any kind of windmill and probably a good half-hour to see a horse or any other type of non-domestic animal.
And Toowoomba city is less than 5 minutes from my house as well. The lovely part about driving through the centre of Toowoomba is instead of pulling down these majestic old buildings, they have been lovingly restored and repurposed into office buildings and restaurants. It's nice to see that whilst it's a thriving town due to the mining boom it hasn't lost any of its charm of yesteryear. I'm also just a few minutes from the top of the range which is one of the most magical sights you can see...a cliff face just dropping off and you can see for miles and miles.
As I rented my house sight-unseen, I didn't even know where the best place to live was, and in fact was looking in a completely different area of town to be closer to fellow blogger Willow. I'd found the perfect house and rang about it only to find it had been rented. I rang 'plan B' and it had also been rented. In desperation I went back onto realestate.com.au and found where I'm living today within about 2 minutes. 5 minutes later I was applying online. It wasn't in the area that I wanted, and I thought it must have been dodgy because it was so much cheaper than other houses with LESS modern comforts, but my gut told me to go for it and so I did! As you know, I spent a few nerve-wracking weeks fearing that I'd done something really stupid and that E and I would have to live with the consequences.
Looking back on it, I think my impetuousness was a sign! I LOVE my neighbourhood and it's proximity to pretty much everything. Shopping centres, movie theatres, even the university, all just a few minutes away. Yet we're tucked into this lovely charming little street that takes me back 30 years every time I come home and drive down the driveway to my cute little red-brick cottage.
And to see E riding his bike in the sunshine in safety will never lose it's charm.
It's a total kick.
xx
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