a fifo wife {fifo life: me: want to have coffee and possibly be slightly dissappointed?}

I was sitting on the bus waiting for it to take me back to Potts Point in Sydney and I had a vacant seat beside me despite the bus filling up fast with other bloggers or writers whatever they prefer to call themselves. Given that I was an outer towner who new nobody I assumed the seat wouldn’t fill and so made myself a little comfy. I threw my goodie bag on the vacant seat and my handbag at my feet and just as I did my phone went off. Wanting and excuse to look busy as you do when you are aware that you are the only one with a vacant seat I scrambled to find it head down.

As I picked it up someone said to me ‘can I sit here?’ completely surprised someone wanted to sit next to me (truth is their were no other seats- duh so it wasn’t so much as a want as a need) I said sure grabbing my goodie bag and then quickly taking a second look at this beautiful blonde ..Oh my goodness I said as my heart literally skipped a beat…it was Katrina Chambers…the block girl…the writer/ blogger girl…the blogger I had been following since her days of little la la’s. For a moment I had a little celebrity check like the time I met Val Kilmer, Eddie Maguire, Natalie Bassingthwaighte , that Lucas chick, David Raine, Katrina Rowntree and the guy off channel seven weather (the benefit of a five star property and yes I’m name dropping because well I can and we so didn’t go any further than your room is 521 if you need anything just call) my heart skipped a beat as I realised who she was and that she was more beautiful in person and she was in fact just that a real person.

Now she could have chatted with her bestie the Redcliff style chick across the aisle but she didnt she instead chatted to me. We chatted about her boys, why she named her boy Tex and how nervous she was of giving her that speech that night. When I asked her why she said normally she didn’t care but this time she was meeting people that followed her blog and she didn’t want them to be disappointed. That they make think she isn’t the same person that comes across on her blog…at the time I said don’t be silly…your lovely… and my friends I will tell you she is lovelier in person that on her blog slightly thinner and more pretty than should be allowed but we can’t all be blessed with the plain Jane gene like me. The bus stopped and pulled up outside the Holiday Inn she got off to leave and I wished her well for the speech and then instead of saying you will smash that speech I said either way Katrina you will be memorable…it didn’t come out as it did in my head..F*ck is what I said in my head and see ya is what came out of my mouth as she replied of what I assumed was a unsure how do I take that thanks. So thrown was by failure at humour that I got off at the wrong stop and had an extra half an hour walk back to the hotel reliving the comment over and over in my head. Crap it.

Move ahead six months later and I’m on my walk this morning thinking about the people I write for, have made friends with friends with and I thought as I stumbled over my feet I would really like to meet them- you for coffee you know while I’m on my adventure. Then I remembered Katrina and what she said…what if you they, those that met me for coffee were disappointed. I pondered as I tripped again over the rocks so obviously sticking out of the earth… I don’t think I’m any different… how can that happen if I’m writing about myself, my life,  and what I know as my truth? I wasn’t disappointed when I met Katrina she is as she appears but then I remembered another ‘blogger’ I had met at the Village Voices conference. I had followed her for a while so when I saw a table at the back of the room with spare seats I was relived because whilst I didn’t know her I knew her- makes sense? It’s a comfort thing for someone as shy as me…seeing her also took the focus of my need to vomit away and a relief that I knew someone sort of…long story short..She is not the person I had come to know from her blog.  She did to her credit initiate conversation which was lovely she made some small talk lovelier I then went to continue the conversation but apparently it was over as she turned…her..back…on me at a rounded table for the next three hours…neh is all I thought…needless to say I have since stopped reading her…much to my disappointment…but then I thought of Katrina and I wasn’t disappointed when I met her and I came to know Clare from Check and Spots who is as cool in real life as she is in person, I met Jo Whitton from Quirky Cook -awesome just like her blog and Emily from the Daily Smudge so sweet I wanted to kiss her..I also met some other amazing ladies just as their blogs describe them as and decided this other blogger was a one off…

So my sweets if you would like to have coffee with me (when I put the shout out via facebook when we stop somewhere for longer than a toliet break- I am driving with my husband after all) and perhaps are prepared to maybe or maybe not be slightly disappointed…I am I can reassure you as shy, neurotic and nervous as my hopefully my blog describes me as so give me the thrill of more than a one sided conversation. Let me get to know you..listen to your stories..learn about you.. one of my favourite things to do..

So let’s have coffee…let me know…I will be the one hyperventilating in the corner waiting…

Xx Deb