Seventeen days ago, Australians voted in a federal election. Normally we have a result the same day but this time neither major party had a majority and we had a hung parliament. So we’ve been playing the waiting game to see who would be head of the government. It was all hinged upon preference choices of a few non-major party members of parliament. There’s probably an easier way to phrase that but I can’t think of anything at this hour. After more than two weeks, the last three have finally made their choices and the Labor government will remain for the next three years. We breathed a huge sigh of relief at our house once we knew the result. While we aren’t too happy with the state of this government, it’s far preferable to the opposition. And because the government doesn’t have a majority, balance of power will fall to the Greens party. So it will be interesting to see how Australian politics fares over the next three years. This whole chapter of Australian politics should be seen as quite historic. This is also the first time a woman has been elected as prime minister. And it’s also the first time a known atheist has been elected prime minister.

On a more personal note of history, today was the anniversary of the end of my second pregnancy which ended with a fetal demise thirteen years ago. It’s interesting that I’ve been more aware this year than I’ve been for the past couple of years. I no longer feel a sense of loss for the child that might have been but I do have a strong memory of the feeling of going through the experience all those years ago.