If I was feeling more emotional, I would have certainly cried walking through the reserve that leads down to the river, a ten minute walk from our new place. I've been too busy to allow feeling - there's far too much to do to get the new house ready for moving into, should (fingers crossed) the old house sell soon. I've been too busy to even walk, but I decided I'd take half an hour to see how long it actually took to walk to the river, which is itself only a five minute walk to the shops. Besides, I needed some cardio.

The reserve starts only two doors down from my house, so I don't even pass many houses before I'm in the bush. The Kuarka Dola reserve is actually a flat drainage line that connects the river with the inner streets of this part of town, but as unromantic as that sounds, it's home for birds, kangaroos, and fauna. It certainly beats the boring walk around the block at my old place.

Houses back onto this reserve, but in true Angelsea fashion, everything manmade is muted and hidden by trees. Nothing suburban feels imposing.

The wattles are out - everywhere. Spring is warm and bright and yellow. My heart lifts with the sight of their yellow fluffiness. There's actually tons of different species, and once you start looking, you really start to embrace the diversity of this plant. Mind you, we've just cut down heaps of them from the front yard as they do self seed like weeds and pop up unwanted.

As I walk down a man cycles by and tells me to watch out for the magpie - Spring means babies, and they're swooping protectively. They can really hurt - a magpie beak to the skull draws blood. I escpae unscathed.

I walk fast enough to reach the river in 9 minutes - we were told 20 minutes, but a brisk walk is fast! You can see the boatsheds here and the bridge where cars drive down the Great Ocean Road and back toward town with the coffee shops and supermarkets. It's a busy weekend, but it's so quiet where I live, and apart from the cyclist, I see no one else.

On the way back I see there's an alternative fork that leads to the same spot. I don't take that as I'm keen to get a proper time to tell Jamie, who's at home painting epoxy on the shed floor.

The walk also goes past an aged care centre - people joke that when I'm old they can just roll me down the hill. It's a lovely place, and where my granddad spent the last two years of his life. How funny life is that I end up living a street away from here. My best friend's Mum used to work here too. I already feel local.

I think about Dad, too. I get upset when I think that he never would know that we'd end up back on the coast. He'd be so happy for me. I think to myself it doesn't matter, and that I know how he'd feel about it, and he'd be happy for me. His presence is here of course. A five minute drive away is a few beaches I used to surf with him from when I was a kid right through to when he was too ill to get in the ocean anymore.

I feel so blessed to be home again. It does feel like my heartland. Okay now I'm emotional. Now I feel a little tightness in my chest, a little sob break free. I'm home, I'm home, I'm home.