As I shopped and strolled through the CBD enjoying the atmosphere of the Queen Victoria Building (whose royal interiors were designed by a Bowral colleague, Prof Desmond Freeman), the competitive street theatre of Pitt Street Mall, the manic but controlled intersections of people a second from colliding with each other in George and Market Streets, I realised that I was ambling through all this with a smile on my face.

Somehow the ethos of the Highlands was telling me to go - slower.

I listened to the buskers, slipped a note to the beggar with a deplorable facial affliction but a singing voice like honey, smiled at doormen in thanks as they fed me into Prada and Vuitton, and picked up strains of conversations worthy of a Sydney version of Humans of New York as people rushed past me in the streets.

Everywhere there was vibrant mayhem, all that big city gorgeousness!

Both hands laden with boxes and bags (oh for a man to walk behind carrying parcels!)

I went ballistic in Dymocks though didn't actually buy anything (why buy books in the Big Smoke when you should get them here at our two excellent bookstores in Bowral?)

Lingering notes of Tenderly being played rather well on the David Jones Ground Floor baby grand tugged at my heart strings recalling the melodies that once flowed from my husband's piano in the Arcade, whilst the myriad exotic scents of France within the Perfumery section had me sighing with joy around the counters.

Though sheesh, couldn't buy any scent either, got to support the newly refurbished GLAM in Bong Bong Street.

And through all this ran a happy undercurrent - I am loving the big city, but I'm a visitor, my HOME is in the Highlands, where if we had doormen they'd smile right back at you for sure (doorman in pyjamas welcoming us into the new Peter Alexander store perhaps, what fun).

Later that day I attended a renewable energies forum in the Paddington Town Hall attended by hundreds of people in support of energy sources alternative to fossil fuels.

Several well placed speakers addressed the crowd, the keynote guest being the Highland's John Hewson who outlined recent plans towards a valid creation of renewable energy (Google 'Solastor').

Totally fired up with new vigour and resolve I picked up some I Love Solar posters on the way out (check out No 2 Park Rd Corner Shop window) and caught a cab to dine very happily with friends in Double Bay.

They too had once lived in the Highlands and talk went rather nostalgically 120km south west.

My home is in the Highlands I smiled, content to be going back the next morning.

And so, quite pleased with sniffing the concrete in the Big Smoke for a day or two, the next day the little car with the 'Southern Highlands - My Heart Lives Here' sticker stuck to its rump danced back up the slopes home to the bop of Berrima's Leo Sayer and positively racing like a horse to oats when it saw the Mittagong turnoff.

Yes, my heart lives in the Southern Highlands!

Alexandra Springett

Bowral