History inspires gratitude

Or that we mow our lawns because the grass is getting too long, but then turn around and pop the sprinkler straight on them to make it grow again?

I’m forever grateful we have a home to call our own, but there’s no denying the upkeep is relentlessly challenging.

If I had no hobbies, or if I actually enjoyed house and yard work enough to pass them off as hobbies, then it might be different.

But as anyone who reads this column regularly would know, I get my excitement from things other than cleaning the lint out of a clothes dryer.

Many things have changed in our family routine recently and if I ever thought I was time-poor before, I’ve become a time-pauper.

And quite frankly, I’m exhausted by it.

With kids to rush from school to work, learner driving hours to accumulate and my own new job with longer hours to settle in to, there’s bound to be a bit of burnout in there from time to time.

We can, sadly, go an entire week without even walking the dog once now.

And finding time to get away for even just a day trip on a weekend is one thing; having the energy to simply leave the house is another.

I had great intentions in the lead-up, but it arrived and I just really wanted to catch up on some things at home, get some rest and make it through the seventh and final episode of a Netflix series I’ve been trying to finish for a month.

These are the times we try to look at the place we live through a visitor’s eyes and become tourists in our own town, so we can still do something exciting, but not spend a large chunk of time or dough.

Where’s somewhere we haven’t been before? A restaurant we haven’t eaten at? A travelling exhibition that won’t be here for ever? Is there an event on we haven’t heard about yet because we don’t follow a page on socials that might have alerted us to it already?

We found ourselves at the Shepparton Heritage Museum.

Though all of us had visited during our primary school years, it’s well known that a few years on your life can add a significantly different perspective to anything.

I mean, I went on a Contiki tour when I was 21 and had my one-litre bottle of duty-free vodka confiscated by a bar owner in Germany as I danced on a table in his venue with my new-found friends.

He told me I could have it back in the morning when the bus was leaving and, with no shame, I actually fronted up there to ask for it, only for him to hand it back to me sans lid while he smirked unapologetically.

If that were now, I’d have better spent my time exploring castles and sitting at that table, instead of dancing on it.

And I sure as hell would have let that bottle of duty-free go rather than show my face there again the morning after.

I digress.

My point is, the things I found interesting at the Shepp museum more than three decades ago are different from those I do now.

The things my kids found interesting — even though it’s not even been one decade since their last visits — were also different.

To most of us Shepp folk who’ve lived here for a long time, or all our lives, the heritage centre might look like a little beaten building we drive past on our daily commutes.

You might not even notice it because it’s such a fixture in the Welsford St landscape.

But as underwhelming as it looks on the outside, did you know it was built around Shepparton’s oldest surviving building: The Public Hall of 1873?

And as for the ‘little’ part, it’s really not that small.

Once you step inside, you’ll be surprised at how far the building extends back from the entrance.

There are a whopping 7000 historical items inside four galleries, an archive storage bay and a replica colonial cottage.

And even if you’ve seen it before, there are different exhibitions and display changes to make it worth revisiting regularly.

When I visit these places, I am always fascinated by the design, function and quality of old artefacts that have stood the test of time.

On the flipside, they always make me so very grateful for modern technology.

For instance, the writer in me loves old typewriters, but I imagine if I’d had to bang out this column on the keys of that heavy metal apparatus weekly, my fingers would be quite muscular.

Or maybe twisted with arthritis?

Modern things aren’t as visually appealing as antiques, but that might just be because they’re not antiques yet.

Maybe in another few decades I’ll be awash with nostalgia, reflecting on my days as a newspaper journo, when I see a flimsy plastic keyboard in a museum.

I have my doubts.

Anyway, must be off, my modern washing machine just sang at me, signalling it has washed my laundry after I programmed it to do so using wi-fi and the touch of a button on a phone app.

So, I guess, as much as I begrudge housework, I can be thankful I don’t have to wash our clothes in one of those laborious contraptions I saw at the museum.

Thank you, history, for always showing me another perspective.

Bree Harding is a News reporter and single parent to three teenage sons. She loves music, adventure and creating.