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My peaceful place, the beautiful Mt Nebo, QLD
I didn't want to leave Queensland. It's my happy place; my healing place.
I hadn't been there long enough to feel confident leaving yet.

I was moving through all this needless crap and shedding skin, growing peace in my heart and emanating happy vibes.

That's what I do in my healing place, surrounded by my beautiful and wise and funny cousins, and their amazing kids; I find peace in their madness

But the doctors down here in Cowra wanted to check up on me, and I am always excited about hearing the Wolf Cub's heart beat.

So I succumbed to mum's marching orders and spent my final night on the mountain reflecting on how amazing my transformation has been thus far. I fiddled around with the old camera phone, taking snaps of my Aunty's amazing organic mountain garden and experimenting (albeit unsuccessfully) with the glowing light of the warm open fire.

There is no television in my Aunty's living room. Some people apparently find that strange, or hard to understand. For me, it's a relief. I much prefer sitting in a big warm family room without the demand for submissive attention to a screen and the constant waves of invasive advertising distracting me from peace and reflection.

Of course, it's a lot nicer to sit in the quiet when you're high up on the mountain surrounded by green life and bird sounds and the night sky is a vast canopy of bright stars. I didn't feel like I was missing out on anything.

The next morning we said our farewells, teary for some, but just plain defiant for me, forever staunch in the idea that nothing is permanent and that Queensland is bound to fall under my feet again.

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Leyburn, QLD
As we made our slow descent down Mt Glorious, I received a text message from my Dad in Tasmania, telling me that my dear Grandma had passed away from pneumonia or heart failure...

It was not surprising, she had been sick with Parkinson's disease for years - ever since I could remember. But regardless of that, it was still sad to know that she had left us, before my little Wolf Cub had even ventured into the world.

I welled up a little and looked out at the view; valleys of beautiful Queensland forest, bell-birds chirping, creeks...just peaceful. A suitable place to reflect on a wonderful woman who spent the most part of her able-bodied life exploring the mountains of New Zealand, hiking and tramping through the wilderness for days, even weeks at a time, taking thousands of photos of whatever she saw in nature that so inspired her. What an awesome woman she was!!

We stopped to refresh, and reassert ourselves from the depressed lull we were falling into. Death does not have to be so sad, it's a beautiful and natural part of life, and its usually better to celebrate a life than mourn a death.

While we have it, life is a spectacular thing. Nothing is eternal

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Sunset at Moree, NSW
 
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Photo courtesy of National Geographic
I'M FREE!!!

Free from all the shit. Free to be myself.
Free to do what I want, to say what I want, to speak when I want.
I'm free to love, free to give, free to have.
I'm free to feel.
I'm free to go and I'm free to stay.
I am free to live!

I am free to be every inch of who I am and never let an opportunity pass me by.
I am free to learn and I am free to teach.
I am free to do my very best with what I have.

I am free to be wild and beautiful, to let the path unravel beneath my feet.
I am free to experience the magic of life and to roam to wherever it is I am supposed to be.

We are all free when we open our hearts to it.
Life is beautiful.