Now that it's over
I will allow myself to post one election-related link. I stayed away from any political commentary on purpose, as the internet is already full of passionate opinions and things got quite heated and ugly at times. The following is an article by Joe Klein from the current Time magazine issue. I've always enjoyed his writing, he tends to be spot-on without dramatic fluff - of the negative nor positive kind. He didn't disappoint this time either. He brings up all the relevant points without sarcasm and without making Obama into a messiah.
Obama's Victory Usheres In a New America
Posted at 09:34 AM on November 08, 2008 | Comments (0)Domestic Monastery
In the morning I get up first. It's always too early in my mind, but actually I'm always about 15 minutes behind. I turn on the computer to soothe me into the day with emails and news. I never feel soothed. After I take my shower I feel better but I'm still not really ready. I wake the reluctant kids and suddenly it's mayhem and everything moves too fast. My level of crankiness soars as I'm trying to get the kids dressed and ready to go downstairs to have breakfast. The bus pick-up is always looming. The more I try to be patient and sunny the closer I feel to a meltdown. Veronika is always in her own world, needs to be told everything twice. I usually end up dressing her, because the alternative is to start yelling. I don't want to yell. I guess she will just need a maid when she's in college. Ivan is more present but he is two: I want dis shuh-wt, not dis pants, no dis socks... etc. Only the baby doesn't complain about getting dressed. Once we are downstairs and they are sitting down and eating I relax a little. Fifteen minutes later I start another round of herding to get Veronika (and Ivan, he has to come along) dressed to go to the bus stop. By the time I'm back I'm beat. It's been almost two hours.
I turn on the TV for Ivan and put the baby down. I go upstairs to make a list. This is my favorite time of the day. It's relatively quiet. It's short. It's the only time of the day where I feel somewhat in control and am firmly anchored in the illusion that everything will go well. After that the onslaught of physical labor, organizational demands (bills! phone calls! appointments!), conflict resolution (but I had it first!) and oh-how-much-do-I-hate-it meal preparation reduces me to a mere survivor at the end of the day.
This is not news, I know. It's just what I do, what tons of people do. It looks like nothing much. It's a lot of work but it doesn't look all that significant. It doesn't even feel significant to me, because it's so repetitive, whatever is done is undone the next day. True, what you have to show for at the end are your grown children, hopefully good people, hopefully successful etc, and it may seem that that would make a difference in the infinite string of tiny repetitive moments... but not really. It is the ultimate goal of course, but its effect and shine dissipate when you find yourself at the beginning of yet another day, facing these little people who expect everything from you, seeing all the tasks in front of you, knowing that most likely you will not talk to any other adults while you do them and knowing that nobody will have seen what you did and how much self-control it took.
I think the loneliness is the worst. We depend so much on who we are to someone else. While it's wonderful to be a mother, I can't turn into this role permanently. But it's so hard when 99% of your day it is who you have to be. At the end of the day it messes with my head. I shrivel up mentally. I am cranky, dissatisfied, drained. In those moments when I feel I can't do this... I can't empty the dishwasher anymore. I can't clean up these crayons. I can't go and find out who hit who... I summon up all my strength, all my awareness. This is today and this is me and these are my children and all I have is now and I will give up this minute and do what has to be done out of love, which I don't feel right now, at all. Sometimes this doesn't involve much doing, but just surrendering. This process ends up being my big daily drama, my inner fight, my scrambling to stay the course, to remind myself what I believe life is about and that in the end God will not ask me what I did but how much I loved.
So I know that it's the "how" that makes the difference, not the "what", but I always feel like I'm just now realizing it and only just attempting to put it into practice. This is not the kind of job that makes you feel accomplished on a daily or even yearly basis. It's not a job, where you check off a list or which you could summarize to give to a potential employer... "Made about 300 dinners a year, improved taste by 34.5% over the course of 8 years, accomplished keeping everyone alive and not hungry in the process; Implemented new disciplinary measures, made children unhappy short term, long term results are as of yet unknown, will provide update in 13-15 years..." Most of what I do is invisible, it is not quantifiable, it can't be measured. Only I know what it took. I can't even really describe it or "tell" someone. This loneliness is the hardest. It's not just not having someone around, it's the nature of the job: seemingly simple tasks on the outside, incredible spiritual demands on the inside. And I fail so spectacularly at both. Those are the moments where I wish I could just run away. I can't turn myself into a cleaning and nurturing machine (one solution) nor am I capable of turning washing dishes into loving joyful worship like a monk (other solution). Instead I send angry emails to my husband and eat chocolate.
My biggest accomplishments are not big finished projects, but more things that need to be described in clunky sentences like: "Today I did not yell at Ivan when he spilled his juice twice." "I took the kids to the park on foot, which was good exercise (also for the dog) and saved gas and also I didn't really want to go, but I did it anyway." or "I went to sleep on time because I didn't read my Time magazine even though I wanted to, but it made a difference because I wasn't as cranky and it made the kids be in a better mood." These things are a big deal. They are also not really explainable. This is the enormous challenge of my daily life, making myself available, making conscious choices, fighting my anger and frustration. On the outside it just looks like a bunch of housework and babysitting. But in reality it's my shot at making a difference in the world and creating a meaningful life for myself. And sometimes when I'm having feelings of futility and invisibility I think of my friends, of the other mothers who do the same things and feel just the same and I make myself one with them for a moment, because I do see them and I know it's not for nothing.
Posted at 09:30 PM on October 27, 2008 | Comments (10)Universal
"With all that he never succumbs to dispair. Every so often he'll snap out of a doze, gaze around at whoever happens to be hanging around his chair, and sigh in his New England accent, "Ahn't I fohtunate, having you all home like this." Having never been exactly what you'd call a demonstrative family, we bask in this reflected warmth, emboldened to let out all the stops. We have always depended on him, but now he is gripping our hands, grabbing our shoulders accepting our help. The effect is transformative. We, who tend to communicate by ridicule, blurting out, "I love you, Dad" - right in front of everyone. We, who have always prided ourselves on our sarcasm, are reporting back to each other on his every word and move, in voices hushed with reverence. When we look at each other, tears flow so spontaneously it's like breathing: after a while, we don't even bother to wipe them anymore."
Posted at 04:47 PM on October 26, 2008 | Comments (1)Mount Desert Island, Maine
(Click on the photo to view album)
Ten days ago we came back from our best family vacation so far. It would've been easily done since it's probably our second (not counting visiting relatives), but it was so spectacular in terms of experience and relaxation and lack of problems that it will be hard to top in the future. We had rented a cabin in Maine, close to Bar Harbor deciding to go in fall mostly because of the off-season rates, but I must say it was probably the best time to go regardless.
I feel completely inept to write about it besides relentlessly repeating myself... "It was really really GREAT. SO GREAT. No, you must understand, it was GREAT!" I will spare you, but you are invited to look at a selection of photos which was narrowed down to 49 from uhm, 400. I wrote commentary to most of them, because it was the easiest way to remember it all. If you view it with the slideshow the photos are more impressive, but you won't see the writing, so basically you have to watch them twice. Cheating is ok as long as you comment enthusiastically.
Posted at 02:26 PM on October 22, 2008 | Comments (4)Heaven and Earth
I have never been through this before, I never had anyone die who I was close to. I find myself going through a million of emotions and thoughts. Every day ends in massive exhaustion. Grief is strange... it's a different kind of sadness. It overcomes you at moments, holds you in a grip physically and mentally and then it lets go but continues to hover over you even when you are feeling peaceful about it all and go about your day doing the things you always do. Regardless of your feelings it seems to have to run its course, like a virus... nothing to be done, you just need let it do its thing and try to rest when you can.
I haven't found my faith in eternal life tested at all. I'm grateful for that. I know my father is not gone on the same level of awareness as my knowledge that God exists. Both have little to do with human knowledge or emotion or rational thought. They are a gift and reside in the realm of mystery. The place you can't convey, but can show itself through yourself and other people. But I am still human and alive and the fact that my father is not reachable is confusing. All I know is "alive", I don't know "dead". I have no concept of what that means for me.
I keep having these conversations with him in my head... "- So, what do you mean, you're not here? Weren't you going to come visit in November? You haven't seen Nikola yet. I didn't even get to tell you I was hoping you could take the kids on the new boat this summer. I know you always wanted that... finally there would've been an opportunity... I don't understand." And I would see him looking at me regretfully and shrug... "- Umro sam, Dinkica, evo, kaj mogu? Jednostavno sam umro! (- I died, my dear Dinka, what can I do? I just, simply died!) Then I'd laugh a little, because of the complete lack of logic in all of this.
At the same time I feel that right now my dad is who he was, but in a "new and improved" version if you will. It feels as if his soul left that sick, old and exhausted burden of a body, which in its broken organs trapped all the bitterness, the fear and the guilt, all the limitations he had put on himself and us, all the heaviness of waking up to the same old same old every day. He is free at last and what is left will be buried in all its harmless and useless irrelevance. What is it like to be fully who you were meant to be, in the right place with full understanding? I literally can't imagine but there is a certainty that it's exactly where we're all headed.
I'm tempted to shrug all of this off as grief-induced incoherent ramblings. And maybe that's what it is in part. At the same time it's a relief to experience something that surpasses what is explainable and could be processed rationally and emotionally... because I come to rely on faith, which curiously makes everything feel just right. I still can't make it sound logical, but it makes perfect sense.
Posted at 09:25 AM on September 27, 2008 | Comments (5)