Before I moved to Canberra, I hailed from the sunny beaches of the Sunshine Coast. I remember huddling in front of a slowly rotating, rusty old fan in the living room, battling with my two brothers to be right in front of it. The only good thing I remember about that fan was that it made your voice sound distorted and robotic when you spoke directly into it which to my 10-year-old self was only about twenty minutes worth of fun.

That’s why when we moved to Canberra, I remember my brothers and I jumping with excitement when the air conditioner van pulled into the driveway that very first summer. Unfortunately, the air con wasn’t working when we first arrived and my dad had to call for air conditioning services. Canberra in summer definitely had more long hot days than you would think.

Nine years later, I find myself clicking away at my computer, 20 years old and huddled in a hoodie and two blankets for warmth, feeling that same excitement as I make my first adult-feeling decision to book ducted heating repairs. Canberra thankfully has some really impressive air con repair companies that service my area. When I made the decision to move out on my own after starting university, my brain had pictured that my excitement would be coming from some very different experiences.

That’s the thing with life: it’s ever-changing. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to share this blog post. Nowadays I find myself constantly feeling that my experiences may not be ‘exciting’ enough or what I had in mind when I was younger.

I scolded myself as though my excitement was misplaced when I found myself happily booking in to repair my old heater today. But then I remembered that rusty old standing fan in Queensland, that first experience of the magic of air conditioning and the future mornings of once again feeling warm before my morning lecture, and I realise no excitement is misplaced. 

If there is any point to this post aside from an odd moment of reflective journaling, it’s this: enjoy the little things in life. Allow yourself to feel and relish in the creature comforts that make up every day. And that sometimes, it’s okay to get excited about the prospect of no longer freezing your toes off at 7am.