The more we change, the more we stay the same

I met up with a friend that I haven't seen in 12 years. And before that, we had been friends for about 12 years too. Thinking about it, not counting family, she is probably someone who has known me longer than anybody else.

I felt a bit nervous meeting up with her. After all, 12 years: that's a lifetime! So much had happened in those years. So many things had changed. I am very different now to the person I was back then. And what about her? She would have changed so much too. She would be different too.

As I fretted about the impending visit, I reminisced about all I had been through with this person. We had been so close. We had spent every spare moment with one another. We had held midnight feasts in the top section of the closet. We learnt to plait our hair by practicing on one another. We roller-skated our way through primary school, writing love letters to one another and promising to be best friends forever. We grew. We got boobs together. We discovered boys together. Then we talked about them in a coded language that only we could understand. We laughed and played and giggled and lived and loved as we grew through childhood into adolescence. 

Then something happened to make us part ways slightly. I don't even remember what it was. And life continued the way it does, and we had grown up and moved on and married and worked and just were. And that slight offset of our paths, while it made little difference in highschool, in time, sent us to vastly different places. And as I prepared the meal we were to share, I imagined what the distance between us would be like when we reunited. Would it be like looking through a telescope across a large lake only to find that someone I once knew was standing on the distant shore looking back at me through a telescope and waving shyly...

When she arrived, I immediately knew that some things never change. I peered through my telescope at her, and she snatched it out my hand and threw her arms around me. There have been very few times in my life when I have actually leaped for joy, but this was one of those moments: nothing mattered except the excitement of reunion.

All of a sudden a dozen years melted away as two old friends looked into one another's eyes. We each recognised the soul sister looking back at us. We remarked at how the years had left laughter lines around our eyes, worry lines across our foreheads and a myriad of lines that cannot be seen in the creases of our memories.

All too soon, the evening was over. And even though I was sad to see her go, by reconnecting with this dear friend, one night became a bridge spanning hundreds of days. A kind of connectedness now rests somewhere deep inside of me. A fulfillment of sorts.

It's really encouraging to know that even though some things change, some things will always stay the same.

The Hardest Job in the World

When I was in high school, our teachers introduced a "Life Skills" programm into our curriculum. It was quite a novel and ground breaking idea at the time, and the selection of courses offered was very diverse. From Batique and Pottery to Ballroom Dancing and Jewellery Making. (Life skills? you ask. Hmmm. We asked too. But we didn't press it too hard because it did mean that our double Maths lesson had a welcome 40 minute interval.)

I opted for "Child care" because babies interested me and I didn't have to pay an extra fee to cover craft materials. All we had to do was bring a baby doll to school, pretend it was a live infant, and offer it the necessary care to keep it content throughout the day. We were led through the motions of nappy changing, baby CPR, babysitting essentials and the likes.

**Read anecdote below***

What "they" failed to touch on was 'Parenting', and I really think that this is a subject that all students need to be exposed to. Even if it is just a peep into the torrid world of parenting. Who knows, perhaps a dab of "Truths of Parenthood" would be a more effective contraception for teenagers than the threat of genital warts. 

Sometimes I think that if I had had any idea of what lay in store for me as a mother, I might have insisted extracting my womb and putting it into cold storage for, say, forever. Look, I love my children to bits. I could just gobble them up sometimes. And sometimes I wish that I had. Seriously though, I wouldn't have it any other way, really. Having kids has been the single most enlightening experience of my life. I have learnt more about myself in the last 5 1/2 years of mothering than in the 25 years preceeding that. And that's the problem really - Learning about me.

I have learnt some incredible truths about myself as a mother. I've learnt how strong I am, really. How patient I can be. How caring and completely sacrificial I can be. These are things I never knew about my self. But the incredible truths don't end there. I have also learnt the very worst things about me. I've been shown the monsters and skeletons that have lurked deep inside me all my life and were only awoken under the disturbance of parenting. I learnt that I can be mean. I can be selfish. Self-centered. Short-tempered. Things I hate to admit. But they are parts of me that cannot be excised, but serve to make me who I am.

Being a mother is truly the hardest thing I have ever done. Trying to lead by example. Aiming to mould another human. Trying to prune and nurture and grow to adulthood real live people! What pressure! After all, we're not talking sea monkeys here. Being The woman who as to answer for the health, safety, social value, moral fiber, life education, and final outcome of two clean unblemished canvasses is a suffocating responsibility. I am the mother. I cannot delegate this responsibility. It is mine. And with this duty comes the agony of knowing that I have conceived these perfect little people into a world that is far from perfect. There is an excruciating pain understanding how vulnerable these bright little stars are and how polluted their space to shine in is.

How desperately I want to succeed in launching these starlets into the social stratosphere. To secure them onto the intangible concrete of adulthood, headlamps polished and positioned for optimal illumination.

But the road is oh so dark. The maps and advice books apply to another time, another place, someone else's children. As we travel we make our own light, but usually it shines behind us, lighting up the path we have already travelled. Seldom do we see the solutions to the problems that we face day by day.

The last two weeks were nightmarish. My daughter and I butted heads. We argued. We battled. We shouted. We sulked. We howled and sobbed. And all the time, what was happening was that she was discovering that she had outgrown the boundaries that we had put in place to provide her with stability and security. Stubbornly I was squishing her back into that space and she was bursting the seams, unable to explain why her life suddenly felt so awkward and uncomfortable. On a number of occasions she actually said, "Mom, you're ruining my life!" I took it personally, of course, but in the light of retrospection she was feeling the pinch of the little kid box. I was suffocating her! Now, a heads-up on her need to expand herself  would have made it so much easier! Thanks Life Skills coach!

Sure it would have been a whole lot easier to just burn the box and call the whole parenting journey to an end, but we took another road. A harder one. It's steeper. But the view from the top is magnificent, I believe. We've given her a new box - with room to grow. And you know, she is completely fine with that. I have my little angel back. She's happy. I'm happy. 

And so we go.

***A friend and I undertook the job of educating our peers about the real threat of The Big Bad World. The year after we had experienced the Child Care course, we targeted the next group and managed to kidnap a baby for 2 weeks. We held the infant for ransom and the entire school was involved in the negotiation and return of child to mother.

On second thoughts, that sounds like an awful thing to let people know about.

We really only did it to prove a point.

And the doll was returned in good condition.

Ok.

Nevermind.

Commence the milk tooth migration!

This is a really big deal for me - the marking of the end of an era. Up until now the only signs of physical growth were measured according to outfits grown out of, shoes that became too tight. But this is personal - it's just so much closer. This is Nature talking. And when she talks, I, as the mother, sit up very straight and pay attention.

The first loose tooth!

Neither myself nor the mother of the year could bring ourselves to extract the wiggling little speck of enamel. He was completely queasy at the mention of a loose tooth, whereas I had a very important conference to attend to (it was about alleviating poverty and social decline in the lower reaches of upper Octravia - kind of crucial - and my contributions were very important. Ok?) So the job of pearly white retrieval was delegated to The Granny. One little tug and pop! my baby was one step closer to leaving the safety of our family nest. Eish!

She's getting bigger.

Sigh.

Next thing I know there'll be more wobbly bits in this household than any of us had ever signed up for. I can't bare to think about that...

Pulling out my Hair

I'm so embarrassed! Mortified, actually. I feel like I have failed a test of parental ability, or something like that. Me! Failed! It's unthinkable! But, there we have it!

The problem has been brewing for about a week, I guess. My little angel has been testing her boundaries. Exerting her independence. Determining the exact size and shape of her little place in the world. And, of course, this has lead to serious headbutting with her mother - me.

I have been exasperated in dealing with this little rebellion of hers. In fact, there have been days where I have felt that piercing my eye-lid with a knitting needle would be more fun than having the same arguments with my five-year old that have been coming up EVERY day. Oh. My. Hat.

It has become very clear to me that my little T-bird has taken an overdose of grumpy pills and is suffering a very negative side-effect. And, by 'negative', I do mean that anything that comes out of her mouth is in the negative: "No, I won't," "That's not mine," "You don't know," "I don't want to," "I can't do that", "I don't want to", "Not! Don't! No! Won't! Isn't!"

Aaaaaaaarrrrgh! Somebody book me a root-canal and a triple by-pass - it's bound to be more fun and easier than dealing with a five-year old on the verge of conquering the world.

I had actually even considered throwing in the rope. Holding the boundaries in place was just getting too hard to do. She's insisting she knows everything - so let her live her life without me trying to give it any structure. What. Ever. Isn't that what most people end up doing, anyway? Yeah, she was a nice kid. Once. Now she's a brat. Hello, real world.

My wake-up-and-smell-the-coffee alarm was tripped the other night, when she had ended up in bed with me (Dad was away on business), and at 2 o' clock in the morning, she started arguing with me over my pillow (her own had slipped off the bed). 

"Mom, you're on my pillow!" she insisted. 

"No, I'm not," I said, "Yours is right here," I slipped my arm down the side of the bed and pulled the pillow back up. 

"No," she whined, "you've got mine!" She tugged it from under my head. Fortunately for me, I'm stronger, and so I held onto it with a vice-like grip. 

"T," I said sternly, "I'm using this pillow." 

And then came the clincher. The words that made me realise that my daughter is clearly not in touch with reality. At 2 freaking AM her best argument was, "No, you're not!"

It took everything in me not to march her outside right then and there and duct-tape her to the front door for the rest of the night.

I decided I needed to put my foot down to this atrocious behaviour. We sat down and had a little heart-to-heart. And it went well, I thought. Things were going to be right as rain!

And then the unthinkable happened. I went to fetch my rehabilitated angel from school today and was met by a very serious-faced teacher who described my child's indiscretions of the day. My perfect little cherub had gotten into trouble at school! She had disobeyed a clear (and twice repeated) instruction from her teacher, and had ended up damaging school property. Woe is me. She was supposed to be exemplary! I have failed in my role as parent to raise an upstanding citizen. Is there any hope for me?

Oh, and just you wait till your dad hears about this, young lady!

Really good jobs

When somebody says they have a really good job, are they referring to what the job does for them in terms of self-improvement, or are they referring to how much they get paid? Or both, maybe?

The term "really good job" is usually used by the older generation when referring to their own children, isn't it? "We're so proud of John, he's got a really good job  (ie he can afford to live on his own and not sponge off on us anymore) and a really nice girlfriend (we're so glad he isn't psychotic) and is turning out pretty ok (when we were actually convinced he wouldn't get out of his teens without a criminal record!)"

In my mind, a really good job is one that helps to set you up for better and greater things (AND pays you handsomely as you go!)

I know several people who have really good jobs, in the sense that they provide the ideal environment for self growth, maturation, skills honing and overall experience,  (please note it's a really BIG comma), but they don't get the salary that would make their parents talk about their really good jobs!

And what about what I do? Pat me on the back and tell me I'm doing a really good job, but mothering is one of those uncategorised occupations, isn't it? Loads of work, plenty of experience, much opportunity for growth and skills honing (especially in the field of self-control), but no satisfying paycheck at the end of the month.

Look, before it comes back at me, let me just say I am not complaining - I chose this path freely, willingly (albeit slightly drugged) and with a complete understanding of what lay in store for me. My question is not really about the money thing (as there is so much reward to being a mother blah, blah, blah), but more about is mothering a really good job to have? Is it admirable? Enviable? Sort after? Exclusive? Great on the resume?

I'm just saying...

The problem with Angora Bunnies...

...is the angora. 

Oh. My. Life.

The super-soft hair on both our little hoppers has matted and knotted and made tight pouchey-things (especially collected around their arses). Help! Holly was sporting a fine matte of hair around her knee that was actually impeding her hop - 'strue, I swears. Jasmine was taking the teased updo approach, instead. I'm still working on how she got hold of all the hare-spray needed to keep the mass of hair in place.

This afternoon I spent a whole hour combing and brushing and cutting out wads of horribly tatted hair. And where did that get me, I ask with fluff in my eyes? Well, one painful bunny nip to the knee (that's definitely going to leave a bruise or get infected - I haven't decided which yet) and enough fluff to make a whole new bunny. Sure it doesn't have eyes and ears and a tail, but it feels just as soft and doesn't bite (discounted due to lack of appendages - any takers?)

I wonder whether the Weather will Work with me..

Dear Mother Nature

So, thanks for the grass and the trees and the fact that my newly planted herb garden is still growing. I really appreciate that - quite surprisingly it does a lot for my self esteem knowing that I can keep 15 plants alive.

The reason I'm writing has to do with the weather. I realise that someone is going to have to get your cold shoulder from time to time, and that this winter was our turn, and part of the complications of living in Cape Town is dealing with winter rainfall. (For the record, I personally, do not hold that gainst you in the slightest). 

You've given us a break now from the rainfall, and I can only assume your complaints department insisted that you dried things up a bit for the Western Cape, considering how much people have been moaning about the wetness. But I need to ask you to turn on the taps again, please.

At this point I can only imagine that you feel damned if you do, damned if you don't, and as a woman, and a mother myself, I extend a sympathetic arm of comfort.

Back to the reason for my correspondence:

My issue has nothing to do with you, mind you, but with some lousy homo stupid sapien who has taken it upon himself to relieve himself on my front lawn. I have recently become aware of a nasty urine smell lingering over the lavender when I return home from my errands, and am completely mortified that some sorry excuse for a human is pissing in my petunias (to coin a phrase). 

The problem, Mother Nature, is that I can't pin-point the exact bush that has been the recipient of this vulgar behaviour, and thus I'm asking for your help to rinse off this filthy poison like only you know how. Of course I'm aware that I could get the same results by putting on my sprinkler system and running it for half an hour, but I figure that if you do it, chances are the reprobate who has generously fertilised my flower beds will not take to leaking in my lavender in the pouring rain. A deterrent, if you will.

Please consider my request. Even if it's just for the sake of making another mother's life that little bit sunnier (metaphorically speaking, of course!).

Yours sincerely.

J

xxx

Therapy Thread

I visited the shrink-lady today.

I was so sure that she would be super-impressed with how far along I've come. I was on a high after a magical weekend away with the family in a secluded little fisherman's village, that I just knew she was going to send me home with a noddy badge and a pat on the back. I even considered calling her to cancel our appointment, but in the end decided I wanted to show off just how together I am, after all!

Well. The official tissue tally is 10 - which is a great improvement upon previous ratings. I only needed 3 aspirins to clear the cloud in my head. But the real kick in the crotch is that she made me stay in the clutches of her brain-picking company for close to two hours! Surely there's some medico-legal restriction on charging for that long a consultation, Number one, and Number Two, how the heck did we manage to dig up stuff to talk about for two whole hours when I had started off feeling like the fluffy little chest feathers of a bird in flight as the morning sun warms its beating breast?

The session got pretty involved, as you can imagine, (but not so much on the snot emission side of things), that the dear shrink lady actually offered me a cup of tea at the end of it - I must have made quite the impression... She has also suggested that a possible next step forward would be a dash of hypnotherapy. Um. Excuse me. I mean "excuse me" as in I need to leave now.

Look, I know that I'm not what you might call 'normal', but isn't hypnosis for REALLY crazy folks? And shouldn't I be scared to try it? Or should I see it as a little rebellion from the strict rules I have followed meticulously all my life, and just give it a go? Step out of my shell, so to speak.

I'd love to hear from anyone who's experienced hypnotherapy before...

PS. Being honest about one's mental health can lead to people looking at you like you've contracted some kind of rare tropical disease, and giving you the necessary wide berth to avoid any kind of possible transfer of crazy. Sigh.

You say Masseur, I say Masseuse

So here's the question: when booking a massage at a REPUTABLE establishment (before you go getting any weird ideas now), and the lady on the phone asks if you'd prefer a male or female therapist, what is the correct answer? Anyone?

I mean either way, you could be making a major social feux pas, right? Whether you're a man or a woman, is there actually an appropriate answer to this question?

I mean, as a woman, if I ask for a female therapist, does she think I want a bit of girly action?Does she compare or judge my wobbly bits during the massage? Is she thinking, "Thank Heavens my cellulite only covers my thighs - this chick's hardly got a patch of flat firmament." And would I prefer for a male or a female therapist to take note of all my bodily flaws, anyway?

Or if I asked for a male therapist, well, what would my husband say, right? And what if the therapist's quite nice? And what if it feels kind of weird having some other (quite nice) guy running his hands over otherwise spoken-for territory. Call me prudish, but it does pose a mild dilemma, in my book. And anyway, isn't a masseur more like a physiotherapist, anyway?

And if I was a (straight) man, would I really ask for a male therapist? Could I really, willingly request another man to rub the knots out of my back? And if I ask for a female, does she think, "Ag shame, poor guy needs to pay a woman to touch him"? And consider for a moment (but really, JUST a moment, please) that other little matter that may arise. For a man. You know which one I mean. Yes, that one. Does the female therapist get a kick out of that? A bit of an inside joke, if you will. And the male therapist? If I were a (straight) guy getting a massage from a male therapist and I had an unplanned uprising, well, just how would I deal with that? The masseur sure as heck isn't blind, or dumb. I mean, how do you go about explaining that? Or do you go into the whole experiencing thinking, "Me nan on the bog, me nan on the bog" (Thank you, Ali G), and get so focussed on preventing it from happening, that you actually can't relax?

And, what if the tables are turned? What if the masseur has a physically apparent reaction to the giving of the massage? Look, it's not likely going to happen in my case, but if I was a perky petite 20-something, or a strapping athlete-type, and I caught the therapist's eye, well, what if I lifted my head at just that moment, and came eye to, er, eye(?) with the therapist? Which would be worse? If I was a woman? Maybe that would be like one of those highlights of your week, where you know you've got the goods. But if I was a (straight) man? No matter how comfortable in my sexuality I was, it would be quite a testing circumstance, I think. Or does the male therapist go into the massage thinking, "Me nan on the bog, me nan on the bog, Pick up some milk, blitz and toilet paper on the way home"?

Ok, ok! I hear you! They're all so professional and there isn't anything 'funny' about their therapy, but come on! People are people, and people think things all the time - the massage therapist is not a brain-dead machine performing a pre-programmed service, right? And the customer also is not comatose (although, depending on how things turn out, they might wish to be).

Fortunately, this is not a problem I have to deal with often, but it has come up recently, and I am having trouble trying to make my mind up about it...

A mid-winter tanning Session

OK. So I don't have a photo to prove it, but it is true, I swear! I was on the beach this morning in a bikini! See, it wasn't all just lighthearted ramblings, when I said that I should spend more time on the beach in my bikini. I didn't think it would happen so soon, admittedly, being winter and all, but happen it did - brave me!

I found myself sitting on a rock in the sun. The girls, much to my disgust (and amusement), had stripped off their winter woolies and were frolicking in the freezing Atlantic waters lapping at the Paternoster beach. My body cried out for a double dose of Vitamin D. (Which, I guess would be vitamin DD - how appropriate!)

I succumbed. I had put my bikini top on as it was our last day and I had run out of clean underwear - a very convenient excuse, I know. I lay my less than perfect body out on that barnacle-covered rock and roasted at a moderate temperature for a full 20 minutes, turning occasionally. I admit that I did keep an eye out for any local fishermen who may have approached to try and sell off their illegal catch of crayfish. But, keeping their distance, kept me absorbing UVA.

And what a truly magnificent way to bring a long-weekend, mini-break to an end: Paternoster rocks! Now reality and the Durbanville chill are sinking in. Back to the grindstone, folks!

PS - I don't want any comments about the lack of photo to prove this event, thank you - I did it - take my word for it. And anyway, a photo would have rather ruined the memory...

Mindnumbing Ramblings

I sit drowning my sorrows in a BIG bag of salt and vinegar chips - yip! That ol' MSG craving has struck again!

Not that I have many sorrows today - mostly just thoughts and ideas and questions.

Things like:

* Will my frozen toosh ever have feeling again?

* How the heck did I emerge from yesterday's therapy session with a multiple personality?

* Will the drip in the braai room somehow magically dry up?

* Surely Simba chips should have their own level on the food pyramid? Especially those fresh Salt and Vinegar ones.

* How can I take a long-weekend trip when I have to care for two very soft and fluffy bunnies?

* Is that the Maldives I hear calling my name?  Yip. It must be. The sound of gentle lapping waves on the shore, a coconut falling off a branch, a gentle warm breeze rustling the leaves. Sounds Maldivesy to me!

* Is Wall-E really the best animated film ever, or is Barry Ronge, film critique extraordinaire, just exaggerating?

* If I had to choose between my daughter and my camera, I would have a really perplexing decision on my hands. Does that make me a bad mother? (I could have killed her for dropping it on Saturday - Aaargh!)

* Isn't it time to be more eco-conscious? I mean, I really feel strongly that green is the new black, and all, but I should be far more active in modelling healthy, eco-friendly behaviour for my children.

* How awkward I feel for defending the emotional side, and not the logical side, of last week's tragic suicide. Sure it was wrong, but she really believed that there was not another option for herself. She honestly thought that she would be making things better for her children and her husband. Logic did not play a role in her decision.

* It sort of messes things up in my head a bit when I feel like a good 'ol cuss will do the trick to capture the moment in one four-letter word, when, at the same I just can't bring myself to do it. Why is it so hard to overcome vulgarity for the satisfaction of spitting out those descriptive and colourful phrases? Surely a healthy bit of *&#$@ couldn't hurt?

* Has my honesty frightened off a couple of role players in the bigger picture? Drat!

* Are parabens really that harmful to my hormones? 

* Since when did the STUFF move back into the study? Sure, we had two birthdays, one hospital stay, and three weeks of holidays, but is this STUFF for real?

* Did breastfeeding my children for as long as I did leave an indelible stamp of confidence and security on their wee foundations? Please say yes, please say yes!

* Will I ever again be able to pull in my tummy so that my hip bones stick out? Currently, I can suck it up all I like, and that pot-belly doesn't shift an inch!

Hmm! The crisps are finished and it's time to collect the kids...

Therapy Thread

So, I visited the shrink lady again today. I hadn't been in a while, and I really thought I had my stuff together. I went in there thinking how impressed she would be with how well I've come along, and she would perhaps let me off for good behaviour, or something. (It does have to be mentioned that therapy is NOT fun. It hurts and it's uncomfortable, and it generally leaves me with a thick head and  a dull throbbing somewhere behind my eyeballs.)

 

I was going to blow her right out of the water with my cool calm collectiveness. She was going to wonder if I was even the same person. I wore make-up, I was feeling so together! I had even stored up a little post-birthday buzz to leak out in her office.

 

When it came to the crunch, I got pretty far, I'll admit. Not as far as I would have liked to have gotten, but at least 20 minutes in. I pulled out the birthday bliss thread and smiled confidently. She just looked at me and nodded knowingly. She didn't even congratulate me, come to think of it. What am I paying her for again?

 

Anyway, she fiddled around in the dirty bath-water and finally found the plug and pulled on it. And so the snot works began. Folks, we're onto session four here, and I put a lot of strain on the Kleenex scale. The tissue tally ended up at 18! I know! And that was in Time minus 20 minutes! Go figure, right?

 

And where has that got me to? Hmm, let's see. Well, for one, the make-up was just a bad idea. By the time we were done, I looked dreadful, and it was time to fetch the kids from school (on their first day back) which meant having to meet and greet people we haven't seen for 3 weeks by not really making eye contact and mumbling something quickly under my breath as I rushed past them.

 

The other thing, of course, is that elf who's going to be drilling and hammering in my forehead for the rest of the afternoon. Bugger! I may need to add aspirin-response to the tissue tally for truly accurate measurement by the Kleenex scale.

Bye-bye, Baby! Baby bye-bye!

My baby is all growed up!

Eeek - she's four! Where did the last 1460 days go?

See now how hard it is for me to leave the whole birthday blogging thing alone? Little Air-Bear celebrates her birthday one week after mine. (I find this rather convenient as I can leave the balloons up from my birthday and just shove over the Happy 30th cards for the Happy 4th ones! I don't go so far as to save cake, though...)

Fortunately for us, the next immediate family member's birthday is at the end of September, so we can take a break from the festivities for a little while.

But 4!

Four is the end of an era - especially when it's your last child and there really don't mean to be any more. Four is like the full stop on the Infancy sentence. Like this: INFANCY. or INFANCY four 

It means that the babies are departed. They have officially left the building. Enter the age of the terrorists (with whom I refuse to negotiate). And it's funny how that happens, isn't it? I mean the whole switchover from baby to big kid. It's so sudden. Abrupt, almost. One moment she's all cuddles and let-me-do-stuff-for-her, and the next it's all, "Mo-om!" (two syllables), "I'm not a baby, you know!"

Still, they will always be my babies, these girls of mine. I've warned them about that already. They know that one day when I'm old and incontinent and their own offspring are picking the azaeleas from my old-age home flower pots, they will still be my babies. And the funny thing is, that they're ok with that. At first it's all, "Arrrgh, Mom," but the resistance dies down and the next thing I know these beautiful mini people are obliging and approachable and completely pick-up-and-rock-them-to-sleep-able.

Lucky me.

Rainy Day Blues

So it's been raining, like, forever! PLUS it's school holidays.... which just equals "Aaaaaargh!!!"

The girls and I are completely chocolate-chip cookie-baked out. We're all Planet-Earthed out. We've painted, we've Play-Doed, we've Legoed, we've forted, we've mosaiced, we've danced, we've puzzled, we've Disney DVDed. And still the rain falls.

The washing basket is over-flowing. The earthworms are committing Hare-Kiri from out of the water-logged soil. The ants have moved inside. The water pours down the wall in the lounge. A film of mould is growing around the tumble drier as the condensation it emits has nowhere to evaporate to.  And still the rain falls.

The bath towels stay damp. The gas heater radiates its heat into an all-absorbing chill. We stay in our slippers throughout the day. We regard what's going on outside the confines of our protective walls with dubious skepticism. The sun makes a tease-appearance, casting a glimmer of gold upon the garden. Rain drops clinging to grass blades and leaves reflect brief sparks of light across the lawn. Then the clouds engulf the sun. And the rain falls.

I love my home. The roof over our heads. The protection from the elements. The well-watered garden. The recently planted herb-patch which I've been too chicken to check if it's been washed away or not. The unused turnstile washing line behind the house. The ample opportunity to scoop the girls up and chuck them into my bed where we can make up stories under the duvet while we keep each other warm and munch on rice-cakes. And still the rain falls.

The weather bureau promises a warmer weekend. I'll take that prediction with a pinch of salt, thanks. After all, this is Cape Town where the weather also listens to the meteorologists, and then does whatever the hell it feels like, and usually whatever is opposite to the most recent prediction. Just to spite the news team, I think.

I'm going to live to be 100

Ok, Ok, I know it's getting a bit tiring having me harp on and on about my birthday and turning 30 and getting older and all that, but, it has sort of been filling my mind lately, and I've had some really profound thoughts about ageing over the last week.

T-bird asked me how long people live for. I said 70, 80, 90, and maybe even 100!

She thought a bit about that and then said, "Do you think I will live to be 1000?" Er, it's unlikely.

But it got me thinking. So I hooked up with me old pal, Googs, and did a little research on old people. What fun reading, that was!

My newest hero is Madam Jeanne Louise Calment, who lived to the ripe old age of 122. What a character this girl was! She rode her bicycle until she was 100, and kept a fantastic sense of humor right to the end of her days. (Note to self: rethink bicycle riding...)

One of the comments she made (and which had me stitches for a whole evening) was, "Je n'ai jamai eu qu'une seule ride et je suis assise dessus." TRANSLATION FOR THE LESS THAN FRENCH: I've only got one wrinkle, and I'm sitting on it!

Another little anecdote linked to this fiery matriarch was that she sold her apartment to a man who promised he would pay her $500 a month until she died. He had paid twice the market value for the apartment before his own death 2 years before she passed away. Of this incident, Madam Calment is reported as saying, "In life, one sometimes makes bad deals!" - clearly!

One thing is clear through all the researching of the world's oldest people: they lived simple, happy lives. Madame Calment said, "I took pleasure when I could. I acted clearly and morally and without regret. I'm very lucky."

I'm lucky too.

Youth is wasted on the Young

So the big Three-Oh arrived. And I still have this strangely euphoric feeling all bubbly and jiggly inside me. It feels good to be 30. All growed up. No more silly issues. A switch has been flipped, and I am enjoying the electricity of the next decade.

Seriously.

I am even appreciating my earth suit with a new found admiration. I was told that the day you turn thirty, your body rebels, and everything drops, and your metabolism slows down and you become constipated and a number of other horrendous things happen to you. No wonder the lead-up to the day was slightly disturbing. Jeez! 

Nevertheless, the day came and went, and standing in front of the mirror taking stock of this body, I had me a little think. I thought back to when I was twenty, getting married, planning to go on holiday, and buying my first bikini ever. I remember how wearing that bikini made me feel so self conscious, and how I just didn't think I had the body for prancing along the beach front all scanty-like. Looking back now, I should have worn my bikini a whole lot more. 

Look, the package is still the same right? But, ten years and two kids later, some settling has taken place during transit, if you know what I'm saying? Still, not entirely unpresentable, mind you, just slightly more advanced.

And I reckon, that in ten years time, I'm going to think about the body I have today, and, compared to what it will be like then, I'm going to think that at thirty, I should have worn my bikini till it was threadbare! And so, in the light of living without regrets, I am going to (think about) wear(ing) my bikini a whole lot more, as of now.

Well, maybe not RIGHT now, seeing as it's torrentially down-pouring at the moment, but when the weather is a bit warmer, and the thought of soaking up some sunshine crosses my mind, I just might surprise myself in turning up in less than a t-shirt and pedal pushers... 

Taking Stock

Today I turned thirty, a good time to stop and measure up, I thought. Exercising the mathematical part of my brain, I set about quantifying my life.

Let's see...

Number of years on Earth:  30

... in days: 10,958 - wow, that's a lot!

Number of years married: 9 1/2

Number of years in Cape Town: 4 1/2

BMI: 30.8 = Obese

Feelings about last number: Never felt better about myself

Number of years it's taken for me to get to the point where I can say that, AND believe it: 30

Number of marriages: 1

Number of pregnancies: 2

Number of children I birthed: 2

Number of children in my house: 3

Number of times I was sure I was pregnant: 9

Number of those times this year alone: 4

Number of speeding fines: 1

... this year: 1

... worth: R200,00

Number of biological siblings: 3

Number of biological siblings who phoned me today: 3

Number of times THAT'S ever happened before: 0

Number of friends on FaceBook: 101

Number of friends overall: More than that

Number of friends with a face that can be read like a book: 2

Number of glasses of wine a week: 1 - 2

Number of glasses of wine tonight: 3

Distance to go to feed my tummy: 74,58cm

Distance to go to feed my heart: 7,458m

Distance to go to feed my soul: 7458km

Ok, the wine wins.

She'll be OK

When AirBear was in hospital, through a series of events outside of my control, we ended up with a pediatrician who really confirmed the suspicions I have had of him over the last few years. I found him rude and offensive to the point of insulting.

It took me a couple of days to work through the dialogue that had taken place between this man and myself. In so doing, my little T-bird picked up on the vibe and paid great attention to what I had to say, when I said it.

"Did that doctor make you cross, Mommy?" she asked one morning.

"Yes," I said.

"Why? What did he do?"

I proceeded to tell her what he had said. She didn't seem too perturbed by it, but was genuinely concerned for me. Placing her hand on my arm she said, "Mom, you shouldn't let it bother you. When people say things to you that make you angry or upset, you can just say, 'I don't have to listen to this!', and walk away."

All of five years and preaching self-confidence and assertiveness to her own mother!

I guess that she'll be fine, right? Fine: like go-out-and-rule-the-world-fine.

Sigh.