Home Away From Home

The Coulton Family at ‘Tandawanna North'. Photographer: Pip Williams

Bridget Coulton arrived at St George in western Queensland in the middle of the Millenial drought. She knew she was in for a cultural readjustment.

"It was hot, dry and pretty sparse," she recalls. "Lots of shopfronts were empty and I think even the mighty Balonne, the oasis of the town, was too low to water-ski on."

13 years ago, St George was the kind of town in which the only takeaway on a Sunday was hotbox food from the servo, and after years of drought, it was a desperate scene.

The then 23-year-old had come from Melbourne by way of a stint jillarooing in the Northern Territory, where she met Tom Coulton, a young farmer from Bungunya, population 75.

But there were no jobs at Bungunya, or nearby Goondiwindi for a young woman with a communications degree and a fair bit of ambition, so she found work as a paralegal in St George - an hour and a half's drive from her boyfriend.

"I would quite often get stopped in the street and asked, "Why on earth would a city girl like you move to a town in the middle of nowhere?" The locals certainly knew I wasn’t a local."

Small-town curiosity can either feel like an embrace or an intrusion - but to Bridget, it was the former. Friendliness in any form was welcome with her family so far away.

"Some holes never truly fill, but it's astounding how much we can adjust, adapt and create new ways of connection to fill old voids," she says. It's a lesson she'd learn again and again during each of the challenges her new life brought. 

Bridget's first job kicked off a legal career and after studying remotely, she earned a law degree and was admitted as a lawyer. She moved closer that boyfriend, who turned into a husband, and things started falling into place.

Home became Tandawanna North, a cotton, cropping and cattle property on the western floodplains of Goondiwindi, near the little town with the strange name, a school of 15 kids and an abandoned shop.

She nursed her newborn son on the gauze-covered back verandah of the 110-year-old homestead, looking through the garden to the tree line of the Weir River. She was making new memories in a house already steeped in so much history.

Slowly, she started to move with more ease in her community. "It took a lot of getting out of my comfort zone to meet new people and redefine who I was in this new environment," she says. 

Bridget had another baby, a daughter, but persistent bouts of mastitis left her feeling depleted and depressed. A return to law felt untenable - and her life in the country was slipping away, being replaced with something new again.

Bridget Coulton at ‘Tandawanna North. Photographer: Pip Williams

 "I was feeling really lost and lonely and I journaled a lot at that time," she says. "I'd write words down like horses, the bush, stories, art, food, travel, homes and style. I was starting to reconnect with some of my passions and I knew I had to pull them all together somehow."

In some strange alchemy, those vague but powerful notions started to take shape - and by the time Bridget had another baby boy - her purpose had formed. 

Bush Exchange is an online platform that shares culture and stories from across rural Australia, featuring profiles on artists, writers and photographers, and from spring, an online store. 

“One thing I have learned from living between Melbourne and Goondiwindi is that we all have a lot more in common than we think," Bridget reflects. "We all need to feel inspired, and we all need to feel connected."

While most Australians still live on the coastal fringe, there's an exodus underway of city dwellers moving to regional areas, primarily because of the pandemic. It's reignited an interest in the lives of those living in the bush, at a time when everyone feels the need to be closer to nature.

"I've learned a lot of valuable lessons living in the bush, from resilience to overcoming loneliness - but maybe the best one is not trying to control what you can't control," says Bridget.

"We’re all at the mercy of Mother Nature out here, and whether it’s the long droughts or the more recent floods, you’ve got to smile, have a laugh and get on with it. "

Bridget hopes her platform will cure misunderstandings she sees between city and rural cultures. “I want to forge an exchange between the two – and connect them through their mutual love and ties to the bush.”

"From one home out bush to homes all over the country – I don’t want to just forge a community, I want to create a movement – a bush revolution."

This story is from Vol.03 of Bush Journal.

Find out more at Bush Exchange.

‘Tandawanna North’. Image: Pip Williams.