The Basics #6

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Hello friends. I know I say it every week but thank you for stopping by The Back Fence. I’m really enjoying the routine of writing here each week. It feels very manageable along with being very fun. I’ve been playing with the idea of writing some other posts but so far they are just sitting in my drafts….I can feel the shift in season happening. Can you feel it too? Yes it’s still bloody cold & the rain is still falling & that is still making me feel pretty down TBH but I can see that the days are a little longer so that is something. There are jasmine buds forming on the front fence vines, I can’t wait for them to bloom. I’m pretty sure I’ve reached my soup limit so surely that’s a sign we are almost done with winter?! I optimistically bought some lettuce thinking I’d make a salad. The chooks loved the lettuce. I can feel myself craving the sun, smiling any time I see a patch of blue sky, willing myself to find some energy to get outside when I can or to just get up & do something productive inside. I tread this wobbly line around this time of the year. One part of me is totally fed up with the cold, wet, grey days. The other part is scared the rain will stop & we won’t see another drop until April next year. We have extra long summers here & the dry days take a lot of getting used. How do you feel about the seasons, do you feel their affect on your day-to-day life, your hobbies, the food you eat & your mood? What about your anxiety levels, where are they at? I’d say mine hover between a 5-6 with some brief moments of 8, which is pretty good don’t you think? Enough rabbiting on, let’s get on with the basics shall we?

COOK: I started cooking from my new cookbook Every. Night. Of. The. Week, the one I bought last week, & so far so good! Highly recommend it if you need a little boot up the cooking mojo. I also baked a chocolate self saucing pudding. Despite the fact I am looking more & more like a wobbly pudding, god I love a pudding! Total winter comfort food don’t you think?!

WATCH: last Friday night I binged the whole season of Cooking with Paris on Netflix. It’s so ridiculous & dumb but I laughed a lot. The montage of her shopping at the start of each episode was my favourite. I can never tell if Paris is actually the person she portrays to us or if it’s a persona she’s cultivated over the decades. I’ve also gotten back into Nashville (currently on Stan). I watched up to season 5 when it was first made & then lost interest. I wasn’t ready to commit to a whole new series while I’m waiting for The White Lotus to finish (are you watching? Who do you think the body is?!) so going back to something familiar & easy was the way to go. Winter is definitely my TV season.

READ: Pip’s new pop-up blog. Pip is someone I admire so much. I look at her as someone who is kind, wise & puts so much goodness into the world. Her new blog is a little burst of niceness in your day, which I love, & maybe you will too.

LISTEN: current fave song is Guilty Love by Ladyhawke & Broods. It’s such a vibe & I love it! Also highly recommend listening to a whole album instead of just playlists. Playlists are great, I have a heap on Spotify but sometimes I just want to immerse myself in a band or artist. This week I revisited my favourite Doors album, Morrison Hotel, after watching the Doors movie on Friday night. Val Kilmer knocks that part out of the park. The Doors played a HUGE part in my teenage years. I was the stoner, hippy girl who constantly bemoaned the fact I never got to be a teenager in 60’s & 70’s so Jim & the crew would transport there. It’s still a killer album. When was the last time you listened to a whole album the whole way through? What was it?

PONDER: I have been thinking a lot about who I want to be as I age. This is new for me because I have, since the age of 15, thought I would die at 43. That’s next year. Its been such a long, deeply held belief this will happen that I’ve never thought of myself beyond the age of 43 but lately I have been thinking of a much older Reannon & who I want her to be. I want her to be constantly learning new things, even if it’s just a new cake recipe. I want her to be involved in her community in a way the current me can’t be. I want my body to be healthy & be able to move freely. I want her surrounded by her family, intertwined in their lives as much as they’ll allow. I don’t fear ageing but I fear dying too early. It’s something I’ll soon be speaking to a therapist about but for now I like that my mind can even entertain the idea of a me beyond 43.

DO: Treat yourself like a little kid & when everything gets too much, add water. For me it was a shower. I’m a morning shower person but on Tuesday I’d woken up with a super twisty tummy. It was very painful but off to work I went. The weather had been foul- rain, gusty wind, small hail. By the time I got home I felt like I was on the verge of tears for no reason I could really pinpoint. The washing needed doing, dinner needed cooking & homework needed supervising but all I wanted to do was curl up in bed so that the day could be over. Instead I jumped in the shower & just stood there warming up. I got our, put on a face mask & some cosy clothes before getting on with the afternoon/evening palaver. I felt about 63% better. Sometimes we all need to wash away the day or have a little cry in the shower.

BUY: I haven’t bought anything this week, not even books! I bought take out for dinner last night does that count? Oh, I also got new reading glasses for the first time in 15 years!!!! I cannot explain how great it is to read things & see the words clearly!!! Here are some photos I took & sent to people because I was feeling myself in my new glasses 🙂 Cute right?

New glasses really magnify my eye luggage!

Same day I just put my hair up to see how I looked lol

BEAUTY: I know I’m at the age where retinol would be helpful in keeping my skin looking young but I don’t want to use it because you hear so many stories about how it can fuck up your skin for a while. Enter a natural retinol called bukuchiol! I bought this cream from Andalou & have been using it for just over a month. At first I didn’t like the feel of it on my skin, it felt tacky to the touch but when I switched from a gel to a cream hyaluronic acid it was better, not tacky. Surprisingly I have actually seen a difference in the fine lines around my eyes & on my forehead. I’m smart enough to know that nothing but injectables or surgery will totally erase them but I’m not going for the frozen super smooth look. I’m just going for the nicely hydrated & plump look which I think this cream has helped do. Don’t love the fragrance but it doesn’t stick around long. It’s worth a try.

GOOD: I have a mental health plan. It’s not a good thing that I need a mental health plan but it’s good that I have access to one & was able to see that I needed some help. I’m going to give therapy a good crack in the hope that it will help me with my anxiety, my feelings of self worth & maybe make my mind a little more of a relaxed place. If it’s not too personal I’d love to know if you have had, or a having, therapy & what’s been your biggest take away. Totally ok if you’d rather not share, I know not everyone is as happy to talk about this stuff to strangers like I am.

WORST: feeling physically not great all week. I’m unsure what’s causing the horrible, acidic, nauseous feeling in my stomach this week & I’m
wondering if I should do an elimination style thing to figure it out. Am I eating too much spicy food? Overeating in general? Consuming too much caffeine? Or have I reached my sugar limit & need to reign in the multiply sugary treats I eat every day? For the love of bread PLEASE don’t let it be gluten!!!! Maybe it’s stress? I don’t bloody know, maybe it’s everything combined with perimenopause (it was confirmed this week, along with other health related things, that I am in fact perimenopausal. I KNEW IT!!! Feels good to be right.) All I know is that it feels horrible to feel horrible every day & I hope it goes away soon.

Ive just re-read this post & it’s a bit of a downer. Sorry about that. Some weeks are just like that though aren’t they, we can’t be up all the time. I hope you’ve had more up than down times. Tell me all the things. Until next time xx