PHOENIX RISING

SUFFERING THE LOSS OF HER HOME PROPELLED CHRIS FERGUSON FORWARD AND INTO A BETTER LIFE.

whir of my partner’s gyrocopter behind me, then the chop chop of the rotors as he comes in to land.

I am focused on fixing a gate, the warm sun shining on my bent back, hands in the red dust of this outback station that has been in my care for almost 20 years.

I imagine him walking into the house and filling the kettle while he looks out the kitchen window towards where I am working. He will empty the teapot out the back door and then take two large mugs off their hooks, gauging that I will be done soon and looking for breakfast.

I am anticipating that hot cup of tea when it hits me like a punch to the chest. The teapot, the mugs, the house — it’s all gone — burnt to the ground before my eyes more than three years ago.

I swear that I can feel it there at my back — our home. I can see the kid’s height marks on the door frame; I remember every detail of the schoolroom where my children received their less than perfect primary school education from School of the Air and me. I can see the door that my son ran into laughing and broke it, the front step where I would sit and watch the rain, the kitchen where I invented a myriad meals with dehydrated peas, potato and mutton in the long spaces between trips to town for supplies. Every minute detail is crystal clear in my mind.

It’s all gone, but I can still feel it right there behind me. Is this how it feels after the loss of a limb?

My house burnt down in an accident. It happened so quickly that my legs went from under me and I struggled to stand upright. I trembled and shook as though it was the earth that was shaking and not my heart.

My neighbours saw the smoke and came to help but there was nothing that could be done. They used their satellite phone to call the Rural Fire Service who quickly rallied and drove the 60 kilometres from the village of Wanaaring. They could do little but offer moral support, sitting with me as we watched my home smoulder away to nothing. Someone asked, “What’s that smell?” My gaze never left the fire as I answered, “My beautiful polished pine floorboards.”

I made my way through the time that followed like wading through thigh-deep mud. The days turned into weeks, then months and now years. The house has been replaced with a shipping container fitted out with all that is necessary and nothing that isn’t. It serves the purpose of shelter on my visits to the station, but it is far from the home that we lost.

A few days after the fire I took my camera to photograph the rubble in an attempt to record something through the numbness. As I was carefully framing the picture through the viewfinder, I noticed my shadow falling across the corrugated iron roof that now lay on the ground. I lowered the camera and enjoyed the golden afternoon light, smiling at the obvious; for my shadow to fall the sun had to be shining on me.

Standing before the remnants of my home, I had no idea then that the fire had burnt through the rope anchoring my heart to this place. The catastrophe that I believed I would never recover from turned out to be a catalyst that moved me into a bigger and better life.

Isn’t that often the way with catastrophes?

Chris Ferguson is a grazier and shares her experience of life in the outback at @lifeinthemulga on Instagram.