Me on top of Mt Oberon (Wilsons Promonotory) photo by DB.

I’d planned a different post, but life, and life altering experiences, have caught up with me.

In particular, I haven’t shaped or trimmed my fingernails for a while, and recently cut one of my fingers with the nail of another.

Of course, I slathered it with antiseptic and got on with what I was doing, but it still hurts. Especially when I type…

And not so very long ago, just a little thing like that was enough to kill you.

(On a related note, are your tetanus shots up to date? It’s a nasty way to die and there is still no cure. You should get vaccinated every decade).

A small cut on your finger is a very tiny thing, but it could change your life forever.

Many Life Altering Experiences come from bad experiences, but they don’t have to be.

They can be coincidental meetings. New people who become fast friends or future partners (of the romantic or business variety).

Or random YouTube videos turning up in your feed.

The strange (and difficult) thing about life altering experiences, is you don’t necessarily notice them unless you’re paying attention.

The photo attached to this post is one such life altering experience.

We’d just got back from England, and were taking a break before settling down into real life again. Reaquainting outselves with Australia while we figured out where we’d live.

The path up Mount Oberon circles the mountain, so every time you round a curve, you think you must surely have reached the top at last.

We circled and circled, pausing to sit and rest, then circling again and again. I complained a LOT.

And then we rounded the last corner, and all you could see was ocean and sky.

You become a tiny thing surrounded by vastness.

You realise that nothing you thought was important, actually is important.

Mind you, I’ve lived through a few bad ones too.

Diagnosis of kidney disease, the detection of breast cancer, and the stroke to name the biggies.

On the other side, the kidney transplant, this house (and its wildlife), my first book.

Not to mention all my Katies and Toselands.

And you.

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Photo of a windswept me sitting on the top of Mt Oberon in Wilsons Promonotory, Victoria Australia by A Hopkins