This slip of the tongue has stuck with me since it was misspoken at the start of a webinar some months back, another life.

In early April, booking accommodations and scrutinising ferry schedules, Norway felt much more imminent than it did two days ago.

Work deadlines, life events, upcoming holidays, a moment to sit on the couch. Everything was happening in these parallel layers of time which felt unquestionably persistent.

The present was constantly becoming the past, so was the future. Memories of old houses, old exercises (side planks!), old injuries, old feelings. All mixing in with the new.

I haven't had a smoothie for months. I used to drink ten a week. I've been eating almonds almost daily, after forsaking them based on a blood test in 2023. I'm nothing but living echoes. My house is no longer mine. Driving around my old neighbourhood and GI tract I see new shops and changed roads. You move on, but time persists.

In My Ridleyton Era.
In my covid era.
In my mulberry tree era.
My cycling era. My air-fryer era.
My upper limb surgery era.
My no mortgage lifestyle era.
My friends all having kids era.
My fresh baguette from the shops that morning era.
My savvy and not so savvy investing era.
In my meat puffs era. My New Holland Honeyeater era.
My watching Nash grow old era.
My integration architecture era.
In my working and working out from home era.
My local cafe knows me and my dog's order era.
In my noticing how bad the cold is in winter era.
In my driving twenty minutes to the beach nearly every second summer evening era.
Out of my Ridleyton era.

I feel like, in Nash's head, she is on an eleven year winning streak. Until tonight. This is what happens when the Dentastix slides underneath the couch as you leave the house.

She did not get it out.

I am not going to detail how I mounted the fan in the new gym, but in the second hour of the job I did use a hammer.

For five years the tree was a centrepiece of my life. When I woke up in the morning and poured a glass of water, tree was there through the window. Working from home, standing up during a call, I'd look out my study window and see the top of trees.

Lunch time, I'd prepare a salad or heat leftovers or make a sandwich and eat it out the back looking at the tree (or my phone). Evenings. BBQ. Peripheral tree. Bedtime, take the dog out to toilet, she would do it beneath the tree.

Why did I like tree so much? The main difference between the house and the previous house was the location. But the main difference between the houses was the tree. And what a difference a tree makes. Especially when COVID shutdowns demand that you spend all day in your house. Sometimes on hot days I would go and stand in the shade of the tree just for something to break up the day.

In spring you could eat mulberries off the tree and in summer you could be sheltered and in late winter you could see the first buds of green on the spindly branches to give you optimism and cheer.

In autumn you could pick up lots and lots and lots of leaves. Which was good in a manner; an unavoidable reason to reconnect with nature and touch grass.

Maybe I liked tree because I knew that as long as it was upright it was adding like $50k to the value of my house... That's why I felt beholden to prune it, water it, fertiliser it, to keep it green. Maybe that's why we grew close.

Tree is not at my new house. In the mornings I drink water looking at the pool. Nash shits on a small strip of grass by the fence. When I look out my window from the study, I do see tree. Some previous genius planted a couple of lilly pillies directly in front of the western facing windows and they block out the harsh afternoon sun quite nicely. Lorikeets like eating half the fruits and dropping the other half.

Those trees aren't tree though. It was windy yesterday, autumn skies. I had the shutters pulled aside because I needed to catch a delivery van pulling into the driveway without leaving my computer. I heard knocking, but it wasn't at the door. It was on my window. The lilly pilly branch was swaying and tapping on the glass. "Let me in, Brad", it seemed to be saying.

No, I won't let them in. They are not tree. Goodbye tree. Hopefully soon I'll receive that $50K in my bank account. I'll put it towards pool maintenance. I hope the tree brings the next owners as much joy and centring as it did me.

On January 25th on our traditional morning walk to the markets my ankle swelled up so badly I could barely limp back home. It recovered a little with ice and rest, enough that I could get in a legless workout before going to an open house. We decided to make an offer for the house. The next morning I woke up at 4:40am for a road trip to Merrijig.

Every day since then has felt like a hurtling drive with stops only for coffee (it's okay Alex) and every night feels like I woke at 4:40am that morning.

We bought a new house, and then decided to sell our old one. I've dedicated days to spreadsheets, cleaning, furniture, finances, work and inopportune holiday plans. My ankle has been pretty sore most of that time. I thought I had gout so I gave up beer. Then when that didn't help I gave up beer and dairy. I spent over a week without a proper smoothie, coffee, thing of yoghurt. What a terrible way to live. Anyway when the MRI came back as ligament damage and arthritis at least I could drink a beer again.

I also spent a week living without carpet. I also was the one who ripped up our old carpets. I just put on Triple M's greatest hits, and lucky I was back on dairy because I also had an ice coffee, and I just cut into it and pulled it up. I had a new knife, plus gloves and a dust mask from big box hardware. One of many trips to there this month.

Carpet is such a fragile thing. It's in your life in your house and you never once think about what's under it and then a few slices of the knife and you roll it up into a roll and gaff it together and it's gone. Houses in general are stupid things. I've felt this way for so long. All you really want is shelter from the sun and if rain exists, the rain, and warmth, and high speed internet. Why do we need cornices and grout and matching coloured cabinets. I've spent so many hours cleaning things since Merrijig that I didn't shave for a week because I couldn't get my hand clean enough to touch my face.

And the dryness is relentless. Now we don't even have upstairs curtains. Heat, clean, work, sleep, repeat. I also haven't been to the gym for nearly two weeks. Although our storage unit is on the second floor of the storage building, so I have done many rounds of storage cardio. I've lost 3 kilograms since January. Maybe from storage cardio, maybe from abstaining from beer and dairy.

Tonight, finally, the house was ready for photos. The new carpet was laid. The terrible paint job was concealed. All the new furniture was arranged and Vanessa had them styled with cushions and books. The floors were mopped, windows wiped, the back courtyard pressure washed, the garden pruned, the front door washed, the new rug vacuumed, the bed sheets ironed, the shower screens scrubbed, the cardboard boxes cut up, the crevices dusted. The photographer admired the pizza oven, took the sunset shot, and it was done. Finally, tomorrow can be a day to breathe. The last thing I cleaned was myself. And I shaved.

Pretty much the opposite amount of enjoyment compared to Venetian holidays.

This weekend has confirmed it. We're selling the house. I did consider keeping it. I did a big spreadsheet to work out the value of that, but there was none. And that didn't even require my annual $10K of mental costs to tip the ledger.

I don't want to be a property baron. When it was a possibility, I was thinking about all the jobs I'd need to do around the house to make it tenantable, one of which would have been getting rid of the spider that's lived in the corner of my kitchen window for the past year. It made me sad to think I'd have to evict that poor spider. I think that's when I knew that being a landlord was not for me.