Why I love Facebook

Blogging is great but there is nothing like Facebook in my opinion.  Why?  Because (yes and I know you are never meant to start a sentence with because but bugger it) I get to kept in touch with the most important people in our lives.

Me I don't have 1000 friends on Facebook, but what I have are the top people who have shared my life over many years and those people who are important to me every day, people who have inspired me, people I respect, people who somehow have shared a part of our lives and knowing what they are up to, knowing I am keeping in touch with them and keeping track with their lives is just the most fantastic thing.  I think back to the days, where you had to pen a letter -  boring and hoping and praying you might get one back.

Its great to connect with people you may have not seen forever but there they are on Facebook up front and personal and all of a sudden you share their life like you may have in years gone past.

You see their family, you understand their setbacks, their successes, their new friends without jealousy, but as a joy of all the people who also love them for the wonderful things they are.

Who knows who looks at my blog, but I do know the people who like my blogs from Facebook, I get to share my friends lives in so many ways via Facebook and to me it's underrated as a updating service especially in the older generations.

So lets look at my small but intimate group of Facebook friends by how long I have known these people - of course I will not mention everyone and I apolgise if I did not say your name personally it doesn't mean I don't love you it is just about you can't mention everyone.

Aleta Coroneo aka Aleta Jarrott - we met in January 1974 in High School - who would ever have thought we would become best friends and be some how linked for now over 40 years, that our lives would have been so entwined and that even now we would probably say we are best friends, even though we don't see each other much but we share so much of our lives with each other every day.  Leet I love you mate thank you for you friendship over these 40 years.  As we post old photos recently scanned we share so much and being bridesmaids at each others wedding I thank you for our on going friendship  and the memories that are probably in our hallways/life pics.  Thank you my dearest friend for every thing you have given me over the last 40 years!   

I have a friend who contacted me who is even known to me before Aleta and that is Lisa who lived up the road from me in the 60's early 70's.  Lisa is someone who found me through Facebook , and while we are not friends as such we are people who shared a part of life - here is what I remember of Lisa.  Her and her sister Noeleen lived 2 maybe 3 houses up from me  I remember when they move I was invited to their house at Beenleigh which seemed 100's of miles away at that time, but you know we had some terrific times and my memories of Guy Fax night, bon fires, etc are with me forever - so thank you Lisa for finding me and letting me share your life - something that would not have occurred prior to Facebook  - after all I think I may have 12 the last time Lisa and I shared anything and some 30 years before we did again.

Erica Bolam is someone else who seems to have shared so much of my life from D&B round 2 , ABR and the GlobalX, but more than just being work mates and people who shared a work environment we became friends and again Facebook lets me view Ericas and Karens life as it occurres.

Just a week or so ago some long time friend Terry and Glynnis started on Facebook and we immediately became friends, we have shared so much of our lives together - Glynnis and I first met at play group in early 1993 we both had 2 children and we were doing the appropriate Mummy thing, but from there we became friends and more than that I looked after her and Terrys children as a day care Mum a few years later. We were friends, we became extended family and over many many years shared our families lives and ensured we met up at least every school hols - of course this changed when we moved to the Gold Coast and the kids grew up thank you for letting us be a part of your lives and its great to see you and your lives again.  

That's the thing about Facebook, it doesn't matter if you are truly together - seeing, talking and sharing with those you know and love is connection and its instant.

Kerrie Mills - I only reconnected with Kerrie last year on our 25th wedding anniversary when I went who was at our wedding I am not connected with and Kerrie was in that group. Kerrie and I worked together, went to Hawaii together and had too many fantastic times together, but before Facebook and before just 12 months ago we had lost contact but now we share - again.  Its great to see you and your beautiful family again.

The Bells - a family I have know since I was 8, they were my second family and Elizabeth Bell was also a teacher of mine but the family in itself was my family - I felt Boney Joney was my 2nd Mum and Wayne, Andrew and Darryl were my brothers and some of my best memories of childhood contain this group of people.  Our kids interacted in an environment that was more than family, but Wayne and Derek as piers, Elizabeth and I as teacher - pupil and then piers, and of course Andrew and his boys just mates.  I do think without Facebook I wouldn't have that opportunity to know these people today as we had sort of lost contact as you do over time.

To all my other mates, Dereks other mates, family both long known (Derek and Pam, Stuart, my brother Jim, Gary and Helen and their family and of course our UK and US families of the Todds etc) and others such a Mandi, Shezza,  Favvy, Denny, Gab,  Kirsty, Ken and everyone else we have on Facebook as friends you know who you are and this wasn't about a list of friends or family members, it was about just saying hey you are all special to us in one way or other, and so many more of you thank you it is so wonderful to share your life experiences and be a part of those - I watch you grow as people, I watch you take on life and it is such a wonderful thing. There are also those people such as Maggie who have just inspired me and helped me to grow as an individual and many others. Our friends on Facebook are not 1000's but can be counted in the 30-60's but these are people we love, the people who have influenced our lives, these are the people who have made us who we are today and TO ALL OF YOU WE THANK YOU.  We  thank you for being a part of our lives some form decades, and some for just a short time, but we now get to share a part of your lives on a daily basis and see you, see your family and see what you do, how you do it and understand you better and this is fantastic.  It means when we catch up even after years of not seeing each other, we have heaps to talk about because you have been watching each others lives. Blogging doesn't provide that experience, neither does LinkedIn or a lot of other Social Media platforms, but Facebook allows us to connect with family and friends, it allows us to communicate when we are 1000's of miles away, it allows us to show what we are doing, it allows us to say how we feel -these are the the reasons why I LOVE FACEBOOK.

Moving On: The new journey

If you have been reading my blogs, you will know we have had the house on the market for a few months now, ready to downsize the property and up size the bank account - we had always said our home was our major contributor to our superannuation and over the years we have always thought of it not just as our home but as our super. After 2 weeks of being under contract we have today finally gone unconditional and the property is now SOLD!

We have loved our time here at our most beautiful home in a long list of homes and this home truly put life into perspective for us as well - with the kids being young adults it was our first home in over 20 years that wasn't about kids, but about adults and adult pursuits. This home taught us how to really live again and enjoy life past shopping, cleaning and raising kids, it gave us the ability to learn new and wonderful things like boating and going out (we had spent so long too far away from the mainstream on acreage or semi rural areas) we had forgotten how fantastic it is to live close to everything and where nothing is more than 20kms away, but more importantly most things are less than 5 minutes away including beaches etc.

In November we had signed up for a new community at Hope Island call Halcyon Vision which is a new over 50's community on the water http://www.lifebeginsathalcyon.com.au/halcyon-vision/ - it is perfect for us given we get to build yet another new home (yes I know another one but we love building our own home), it's still on the waterfront (although we have not chosen a waterfront property - but just behind waterfront), marina, boats we can use and everyone is an owner occupier and over 50. It was a no loose situation as we were able for a very small refundable deposit secure the block and home we wanted at the right price subject to sale of our property - so we could get in at a great price and great value and we had plenty of time up our sleeves to sell. Why is this important to us to be in a community like this you might well ask - well over the last 12-24 months we have been looking at heaps of wonderful waterfront units, villas etc but all of them seem to have a lot of renters and a lot of holiday rentals - we had decided we definitely didn't want to put our hard earned bucks into something rented by tattooed cashed up 21 year olds and putting up with the S&D they present. Also as I have put in other blogs sometimes we miss community, we miss having people to talk to - now don't get me wrong Derek and I can seem to talk all day every day to each other and still have something to say - but we love it when we are away to have others to share things with and this is probably one of the major things we have missed since being retired - camaraderie and being a part of something. We also get access to heaps of great facilities such as gyms, boats,pools, boat shed and marinas and its 5 mins from where we live now and area we absolutely love.

However there is a down side to this story - we sold our home lock stock and smoken barrel ie all furniture etc and our new home won't be ready until January/February next year - so what the hell do we do for the next 8 months - especially with nothing but some clothes, a few pieces of crockery and cooking utensils? Well you guessed it maybe -  we are off to be grey nomads for at least 5 months - we are buying a camper trailer and heading out west given the winter months are best for this - I have always wanted to go to Alice Springs and this provides us with the perfect opportunity to just head where the wind takes us. With no plans and no place to be at any particular time. I would like to be back by November and then we can do a short term furnished rental over the summer months until the new home is ready.

We started looking originally at Caravans, but like most things they get pretty expensive, and to be honest I want to be able from time to time stay in a motel or a resort when available so we went, lets just get a camper trailer and do half camping and half motelling ie: if the weather is great and the parks are great then we will stay in the camper, but if its raining or we want a bit of luxury etc then lets motel it - if we had a caravan you couldn't justify the cost of the van plus the cost of motels, but with a camper trailer you can - we will either love it or hate it - but remember this is what our retirement has been all about - trying new things and this is all a part of that journey.

So like all our adventures so far - we don't know what the future will hold, but we will have a beautiful new 25 sq home (our first home was 13 sq's) and we have done a full circle from 13sq's to 70sq's and back down to 50sq's and now 25sq's but it is  in a waterfront area, with heaps of facilities, good size block, lovely finishes, secure for when we go away and with people who are roughly in our age bracket (although most we have met are a little older but hey thats cool as most of our friends are older than we are), and heaps of good things for us to enjoy in an area we love.

Did we get want we wanted for our house? Well put it this way - we didn't loose $300,000 like most in the area who are doing fire sales, we held tight to what we believed and with the buyer also wanting all our furnishing, artworks etc well we were happy with what we sold for and we made a statement to the area - you don't have to give your property away if you believe in it, as we did.

So this weeks adventure was find the exact camper trailer we wanted and begin understanding a trip to who the hell knows where a bit better.

Here are some of images of our past 2 homes.  Cant wait for photos of our new home.  So keep watching this blog for some of our new camping outback adventures!