One thing I’ve been asked a lot over the years mainly in social situations and even recently I’ve been asked, so what do you do all day? It’s always asked with a certain tone, as they may know loosely my background and are almost saying ‘well you don’t have a job or kids, so what do you do all day?‘
I always struggle and slightly squirm inside when I’m asked as I never know how to answer. ‘Oh I just potter around’ I answer very unconfidently and pray and hope someone, aka my husband, will swoop in and change the subject or move the conversation on.
I find because our life hasn’t been and isn’t the conventional 2.4 children and me not ‘working’ really since my flying days, that people do seem to judge our life sometimes.
I think our life is pretty simple, in a good way don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love our life and what Mark and I have built and are building together (basically a life we don’t need to escape from) is pretty cool. I’m finally not ashamed to say it, as we’ve sacrificed and saved a lot over the years to get in the position we are in.
I do find though because I don’t ‘work’ some people just can’t seem to get their heads around how I keep myself busy and I get comments like ‘oh I would have to do something’. Which in the past and still a little bit now has made me feel less of a women somehow or slightly inadequate to them because I don’t’ have a traditional family to look after, a million hobbies or a job to go to.
I do wonder sometimes what people think I do do all day. Do they think I sit there staring at the wall waiting for my husband to come home?!
So a little bit of background to how I came about not ‘working’. When Mark and I got together I was Cabin Crew and Mark was an Aircraft Engineer. Both of us working shifts and we were like passing ships in the night. We worked for the same airline and that airline started to offer various options of early redundancies, unpaid leave and sabbaticals.
With Mark being able to get work pretty much anywhere in the world as a contract Engineer we took the opportunity of unpaid leave. Mark got a contract in Malaysia, we rented our house out and off we went on a little adventure. Well that was it, a 6 month contract turned into the last fourteen years us being away and living in various different places around the world and building our future dream in Spain.
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So, what do you do all day I hear you ask! Well for one thing I’m never bored and always manage to fill my days! So in a nutshell – We have a multi-cat household which I know sounds crazy, but looking after my fur-babies really does keep me busy and does take a big chunk out of my day. I wouldn’t change it though. Along with looking after the cats I guess I do fall into a bit of a ‘housewife’ role, which I do love. I keep on top of the housework, all household chores, I’m constantly tiding and sorting and cleaning inside and out. I love to garden and our garden is a big work-in-progress with a constant stream of jobs to do out there. I’m getting back into blogging so I’m trying to put time aside to work on weekly posts. My husband works away during the week so the weekends I keep free so we can spend that time together, so really I only have 5 days to do all my ‘houswifey’ jobs.
Then of course I have the time to see my mum every week, go shopping at my leisure, have walks along the beach and just generally enjoy having our home in Spain.
I know that still might not sound much to some, but it works for us and we’re happy. It’s also nice to be able to travel at the drop of a hat, to go to the UK to see Mark or if Mark has to travel somewhere for work I can go with him.
Life is about living, enjoying yourself and being happy. You have to make your life work for you and if that’s being a stay at home cat-mum like me then fab or if you’re a high flying girl-boss then that’s pretty cool too. We’re all different and have different goals and aspirations in life so no-one should ever judge someone for how they live their life or make them feel less of a person just because their life is running in a different direction to another persons life.
♥ Heather
Heather Townsend 