Growing up

My kids are growing up. This morning they ran into our room rather unexpectedly and announced we had to get dressed, close our eyes and follow them. Kat took my hand, Aidan took Davids and led us out to the breakfast table.

“Open your eyes” they shouted happily.

The table was set perfectly with a stack of freshly made toast a steaming bowl of scrambled eggs and two suprisingly good tasting long black coffees.

This is the part where I kick myself out of dreamland into the reality that my daughter is only 6 and my son is 4 and they had made us breakfast.

I was horrified.

I was amazed.

I was sure someone somewhere would criticise us for allowing our children to use dangerous things like hotplates and toasters and coffee machines and *gasp* breaking eggs.

In our defence, we didn’t know they were doing any of this and the more I think about it, I am less horrified.

You see, they know how to do all of this, not because we have trained them to make us breakfast but because they have watched us do it. They are learning machines! And while it might be worthwhile to teach them the alphabet or algebra, we know all of that comes in time. Right now, we teach them as we share space in the kitchen or in the backyard or as we play at the beach. We show them how we do things, how we try to be safe and they are learning all of the time, growing all of the time.

Still thinking about growth, I think today I realised that D and I have grown up considerably. Our first major purchase together was a lounge. It took weeks of debate and included no less than 4 massive arguments, 1 of which involved D storming out of a store and attempting to walk to his home in Turramurra out of complete frustration. We lacked a lot of the skills adults hone around negotiation, compromise and patience.

Fast forward ten years(?) and we have this mornings relatively big deal of a fridge dying and needing to be replaced asap. We calmly went out, visited a few stores, made a few decisions, narrowed our choices and within the morning had purchased and arranged delivery of a new fridge without blood pressure concerns and more importantly without anyone leaving in tears or storming out.

I am hoping, that as we grow towards being more even tempered as adults, our children will be watching and learning and maybe, like breakfast they’ll just know how to make it happen.

It is a pretty crazy hope though because I know deep inside I am just as childish and selfish and manic as I ever was, that part of me just lacks opportunities to escape. Tonight (at the end of a very mature kind of day) was one of those opportunities. I ran away to the movies by myself like I used to do when I was a kid. I sat in the back row with my feet on the seats and relished the dialogue, the soundtrack, the story and everything I could see all over the screen. And it didn’t matter what I watched, it was big and it was beautiful and it was just so much fun :)

Of course I signed up to the rewards program so I could get movies more cheaply, earn points to get freebies and get notifications of when special events are on. I am concluding that was a very grown up thing to do.

 

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

I watched this movie for the first time last night. I must in the mood for random. Anyway, I was so depressed after watching it, because it was so ordinary and so undisney. Nobody got what they needed to make a happily ever after, they just got what was going to happen to make an ever after. It bites because nobody is living a photograph. In a photograph, everyone smiles for a moment, or does something in a moment and it’s caught, but not sustained. Then we look away and move on and live the very inhale exhale of ordinary life. It is not sunshine and franjipani breezes and passionate kisses and laughter and triumphs. At least not all of the time and hardly ever most of the time either. The gaps that stretch between these moments are stuffed to bruising point with staring at nothing, thinking about everything, tending to routine and the gentle echo of experience. So much time wasted and yet only waste in contrast to what we are told to value.

I could identify with all three women in the movie and perhaps that is why the ending depressed me or maybe I can just blame Woody Allen for seeing life as it really is.

Something that moves and is still and is still moving

Quite knowingly I have let the Internet slip away from me over the last few weeks. When I login to this social network or that one, I don’t really want to get involved in the conversations, let alone generate any of my own. It is a real effort because it is so unreal to me these days. It seems like the more time I spend enjoying my life the less time I spend enjoying my livelihood. Does that make any sense?

What I fear now, is that I have gone too far and it will be too hard to get back into it and not just into it, but through the whitewash and backwash and undercurrents, out past the breakers and into the clear. Out there, when something new rises up, you can glide with it and see far beyond and back and then glide on to the next thing. Right now, I’m sitting on the beach and I really can’t see when or how I will make the effort to dive back in. I suspect when work heats up and makes me sweat enough to risk the great pummelling I’ll get when I hop back in the water.

In my favour hopefully – a new shiny toy to play with. Samsung Galaxy Nexus running infamous icecream sandwich. So far I’ve learnt that google voice search is pretty awesome, finding contacts and customising them is really hard and music is  a complete waste of time. It handles work email so much better than the iphone did and the camera has some nifty features but I’m not really happy with the noises it makes. It is also damn hot and guzzles juice like a dehydrated toddler on a summers day. I also find the browser a tad clunky and have now failed 7 times to answer a phone call.

All of these negatives are massively outweighed by its beautiful feel, its subtle notification system and its kick arse integration with the social web. I think I just need to spend a little bit more time playing with it on the beach before I take it into action as it certainly isn’t a lifejacket I’d want to rely on in an emergency.

 

 

Puffed

Must do some research. Have been thrilled to find that I can take my wedding ring off for the first time in 5 years or so, and have had less and less puffy fingers. So it has been a little shocking to find in the last 3 days the puffiness has returned. My water intake has remained the same, perhaps even a little more due to the heat – so what is going on? I suspect the increase in sugar over Christmas is the cause and I need more water to compensate, but that’s not based on anything. I hate the feeling so much now, the tightness that makes my hands hard to clench. Anyway research research and more water!

So much

So much has happened this year and yet not nearly enough. The battle goes on and while I count less black squares on the calendar, I know how hard won those white squares are.
The rest falls like the frangipani leaves and my summer is too short. When does the questioning end? When am I finally convinced and content?

And that’s the sound of a heart breaking…

It starts low, in a whisper, perhaps mistaken for a murmur. Then it tumbles out in laughter, strange empty laughter that somehow can still fill a room and that’s the sound of a heart breaking.

Finished and yet not

So today I finished #NaNoWrimo for 2011 and it felt just as good as when I did it in 2009 but I was much less careful this time around. It is still a story though and it is my proof that at least in this small task I am not a fluke artist. I worked on it every day and completed it.

I have sacrificed my morning walks because after home duties, exercise and nanowrimo of an evening I haven’t been in bed before 11pm and simply can not be out again at 5am and function effectively at work. I need to start these up again.

And in this month gone by such wonderful things have happened. All the chemistry appears to be balancing out and even though I am in agony because of everything, it is worth it. Like a special gift, I’ve been given a permanent role with IBM and this means finally the option to have another baby is something real.

I read back on my diaries last night and wondered how long I would’ve continued hating myself and making poor choices, if I’d been left alone? Just like my tastes have changed and I can no longer eat what I once did, so my mind has changed and I can’t jump on the next golden chariot heading out the door. I want to work at it, like I’ve worked at getting healthier, like I have worked on #nanowrimo.
I want to see what work, instead of fluke can deliver.

Discouraged

The strangest thing happened today – actually it has been happening over the last month. With every congratulations, with every bit of praise, with every recommendation and smiling opportunity, I have felt nothing but anxiety. Is this an actual problem, or simply the fragile suggestion that I am content right now.. and I don’t want the boat rocked by any handshake, backpat or a single dollar flipped into my lap?

NaNoWrimo 2011

I’m going to do it. I’m sick as a dog, have this massive weight loss project underway, must save money, must spend more time with my husband and kids, don’t know if my career is sinking or sailing and my hair has some serious issues.

But I’m going to do it anyway.

Here we go.

Day 1.

Progress & punishment

Slowly but surely or even unsurely. Last week I supplemented the incredible volume of advice and assistance I’ve been getting with a dedicated dietician. Lovely as she was, her angle was too obtuse which is funny given enough meaning. Anyway she wanted to treat the whole person instead of simply treating the overweight part. My issue with this approach was just that unless you have the eyes of a bird, a birds eye view can be a bit blurry. So I left her consulting room feeling more anxious, stressed & confused than when I went in. Must’ve been all that incorrectly applied pop psychology.
Forever fearful of confrontation and the ridicule awaiting my incomplete thinking on almost everything, I know I will continue to see this woman. But if she brings up meditation and tofu, I’m calling in Chuck Norris!