we can do hard things

 ...but jeez, we will generally go to huge lengths not to.

Well, I do at least. When I have a choice, I'm all about that path of least resistance, min effort for max gain, keeping it simple, keeping it fun, taking the shortest way round.  

But already in these first few weeks of 2022 I've done some hard things - and it's felt really good.

I've gone on two group motorbike rides with total strangers. 

The first just me with a bunch of cool kids, but on my small bike on a route that I know well. The second with Charl, but on my big bike, a totally unknown route and at least 25 other proficient riders. Shooweee, my nerves!

Motorbike riders are cool right? And ballsy, and mostly all they want to talk about are bikes. This crowd is quite a bit younger than me, with hipper gear and better stories and way more experience. But I kept my nerve and un-wedgied my big girl panties and tried earnestly to remember my bike's specs for the coffee chat and not fall too far behind on the ride and to not forget to put on my gloves before my helmet like a newbie.

So rad.

How cute is my bike though?

I've gone back to CrossFit.

Six weeks short of two years later, I walked back in to a CrossFit box. With my atrophied muscles and my pandemic weight gain and my complete lack of fitness I've signed up to a box where I know no one. That first class I was a bundle of nerves, but I walked (staggered) out of there feeling like a champ and have been back and have signed up for more. What. A. Vibe.

How cute are my shoes though?

And then just today, another hard thing.

How cute is this though?

From motor-biking to CrossFit to puzzles which require reading glasses - 2022 has had some challenges already. But I'll take these over drought, death and disease - some of the challenges of the last few years - any day.

My wish for this year is to have agency. To not just be reactive to the shit life throws at us, but proactive in doing things which make me feel stronger and better and more in control. 

We can do hard things, and not all hard things have to suck.

in the middle of the middle?

But when it comes to time, where is the middle?

My friends and I, as we have our second round of pandemic birthdays and are still, each year, amazed to discover that apparently we are 'grown-ups' now, have been pondering the particular complexities of reaching middle-age in the middle of a pandemic.

It stands to reason that every age will feel the effects of lockdown etc in relation to the age they are during this, and no one can really claim their experience to be worse than any other's (except maybe that poor 20-30 crew, I do really feel for those guys), but I think us of the middle-age are having a particularly interesting time of it for a couple of reasons.

Growing acceptance of one's own mortality and the inevitable death of your parents and loved ones?

BOOM - global flu pandemic to just really drive that home and place the risk of it literally around every corner.

Growing realisation that you might run out of time to visit all those far-flung destinations on your 'bucket list' (horrible term)?

BOOM - travel restrictions starting from your front gate to extending to most other parts of the world.

Growing unease at whether you've made enough provision for retirement / your children's future / the medical costs of growing older?

BOOM - total loss of career and all prospects of it ever picking up again PLUS flooding of the dwindling jobs market with thousands of younger and more relevant jobless candidates.

Growing independence from your children and freedom to plan around them and return to a bit of your own life?

BOOM - homeschooling, a thing you SWORE you'd never do, becomes your reality, school days shorten in the absence of extra-murals, kids are at home all the time.

Growing determination to get healthier and stronger and counteract the aging effects of weakening bones and muscle degeneration?

BOOM - all gyms and exercise classes close, or remain open and become cesspools of contamination.

So no, I'm not saying we're having it worse off than anyone else. I'm just saying we're not having it any easier. No one is having it easy.

It just feels like it would all be more manageable if we knew where we were in these things... are we in the middle? Of life? Of the pandemic?

Maybe the advantage of living through this in middle-age is the acceptance we've come to that we'll never know what's coming next. We've seen friends die unexpectedly, we've seen towers fall and countries burn, we've seen fax machines come and go... maybe we've got a better handle than some on the truly unpredictable nature of life.

Maybe we should know better than to overthink this.

sabbatical?

You think I'm referring to my long absence here hey?
Let's just not mention that and move on...

It seems I am finished work for the year.
I know right?
But it seems that I am.

This week I'm wrapping up my last contract for the year, with nary a sign in sight of more work and not one project lapping at my heels. This is a first in nearly 8 years and amazingly, I'm so okay with it.
I feel like I've reached the end of a piece of string, only to find it led to quite a nice place.

The last two years have been particularly full on work-wise. Everything-wise actually.
Months and weeks have run into each other in a blur of clients and events and kids and school and house and friends and pets and horrible tragedy and travel and family and wild fun and late nights and achingly boring adulting and mind-numbing stress and worry and tears and hysterical laughter and boundless joy and ... jeez, I'm tired.

But a moment has appeared, a break in the clouds - maybe the eye of the storm - in which this one enormous aspect of my life has stilled, and I feel a pause. It's deeply energising.

Can I call it a sabbatical? I asked a friend-colleague.
Sure, she said, but the thing with a sabbatical is you need to do something special with it - study, write, travel - set yourself a big goal you'd never have time or resources to achieve when you're working.

Hmmm...

How bout a sabbatical in which the goal is to be a more present parent. To support my big girl through end of year exams, my little through her current existential crises about getting older. How bout I be a more patient partner, a more engaged home-maker, a less haphazard Christmas gift-shopper, a more attentive daughter/aunt/friend.
How bout a sabbatical where I have more time to do the things which spark joy - work out more, organise my home office/studio, clear out the trenches of a big house and family, beautify my space, write my blog and frankly all of the things in the paragraph above.
How bout I find the time and head-space to create again - to make things with my hands which still and lighten my heart.
I feel like these are big goals of mine, special things to be able to do, things I don't have the time and resources to achieve when I'm working.
I feel like these are enough.

And as if the universe heard me, this week has been an onslaught of school plays and associated lifting and snack-bearing, of bake sale and school oral prep and personal admin and an afternoon lost to chasing a snake around our garden and trying to arrange its capture (and it's only Wednesday!).

But because this is all I've been doing, all I've been having to do - because there's been no additional email tyranny and meeting plans and calls with clients and deadlines and necessity to focus elsewhere - I've been flowing with it.
It feels like this is more than enough.

I know Murphy is probably listening and some huge and un-refusable job could be lurking around the corner, that would be okay too, but I'm hoping that the wolves remain at bay for a little longer. I'm hoping to have more time to just do this.
I love my work-work, but I love my life-work more, and I'd really like to spend a sabbatical building on that.

summer holidaze ...

On the last day of school I took a gang of 9 girls to the water-slides for the afternoon.
The last day of school, the first day of the long summer holidays, and the first day in absolute ages that I was just a mum.
Just a mum with a cooler fill of juice, towels, sunscreen, hot chips and my book. Just a mum in the shade taking pics and admiring tricks and enjoying watching her kids and their friends having a ball.

After months and months of desperately juggling work and parenting - trying never to let either job impact on the other, it was a gift to be just a mum, and a fun mum at that.

Then it was me time - my now annual retreat to Vortex. Last year it was everything I'd hoped it would be and more, this year just as great with more friends and the boud-car improved upon to attain peak comfort.

Favourite moment: A well meaning young thing remarked that it was 'so nice to see mature ladies at an outdoor party, how long have you been coming to Vortex for?' 

My friend deadpanned in response: 'Since 1997'

Old dog = old tricks.

On the way home from Vortex we stopped off for another little forest adventure - a picnic under the trees for a bestie's birthday on an old established wine farm on a hot afternoon.

And home in time for a shower and Christmas carols under the bridge. See? Fun mum.

The first of our 3 trips out to Onrus. This one highlighted by Jeremy Loops live at Stanford Hills!

The girls loved it so much - their first 'rock concert' of someone they really like - dancing and singing along like crazy. Such a jol.

Home for Christmas Eve - pool, food, pressies and family. Every year I'm more grateful for them.

With nearly half of my poor man's family gone in the last couple of years that side is all a bit disjointed now, scattered around and not really sure how to regroup. Christmas Day resonated with the loss of his Mum, none of us could face trying to muster Xmas cheer without her, so we headed straight back to Onrus, to spend it with his chosen fam.

And to CHILL. Just to bloody well stay still and chill for a minute.

The holidays are over, the girls back at school, work is picking up - but it's still summer, and the good times are far from over.
Hello 2019.

gatecrasherrrrrs

Much has been written about how women of a certain age gain an indisputable confidence and general whatever-fuck-you attitude.
Much has been written about whiteness, and how one of the undeniable privileges about being white is gaining access to all kinds of places without anyone questioning your validity for being there.
There's also been a few things written about Dutch courage, and the kind of bravado which can only be found in the bottom of a wine bottle.

This is a tale in which all of these collide ...

'Twas friend Y's birthday and three of us popped out to a nearby wine farm for a little fancy dinner of a rainy Wednesday evening.

En route we passed a mammoth big glass building - finally completed after months of building and traffic disruption - and noticed a little soiree happening inside.

'Is that my surprise birthday party?' quips friend Y.

We proceeded to dinner - a delightful selection of small dishes of fancy delicious things - and two very nice bottles of a wine which was not called 'Panties' despite my dinner mates continually referring to it as such. Lots of giggles, some silly selfies in the parking lot and we were on our way home thinking we'd had the most fun the evening had to offer ... until we passed back past the big glass building, and decided to just 'pop in'.

We swung in the gates and through the doors with all the self-assuredness of 40-something white ladies two bottles of wine down. And nobody stopped us.

Not one of the black-tie, ball-gowned, silver-heeled, well-oiled guests, nor any of the beefy, bull-necked, bruiser security-types even tried to stop us. Not even that slim black-clad blonde lady in the middle pic who turned out to be the gallery director and definitely gave us some quizzical glances dared actually approach us.

We were in sneakers for gods sake, but we were wearing them with a mighty confidence.

We were pigging out at the divinely decadent dessert table - the only people pigging out there I might add (I'm pretty sure the staff were on to us then) - and nobody even thought to engage us in conversation and find out who the heck we were.

We were taking photos and giggling at artworks and clearly misbehaving at the sponsors wall - but we got away with it.

Turns out it was the art event of the year. Turns out it was the patron's evening before the soft opening before the hard opening before the VIP opening of Cape Town's latest ra-ra gallery and art collection. Turns out it was quite a big deal.

Don't ever think old gals don't know how to have fun.

house of eels: july 2017*

It's officially a thing: our annual weekend away with this lot.

One of our party (not me, which is part of the treat) is ace at researching and finding out of the way yet fully lux and intriguing venues and, crucially, taking charge of rallying us all to find a free weekend, paying the deposit and getting us all to commit.
Another (again, not me!), takes on planning a menu, doing the shopping and packing and arriving with all the scrumptious supplies we'll need for 3 days of feasting and drinking like kings and queens.

Always dog and kiddie friendly, always comfy and a little decadent, always perfectly structured to accommodate our growing gang.
This year we had babies, one human and one furry ...

And this year, as with the last two, we had the best time - full of wine and friends and magnificent meals and adventures, and did I mention wine?

And hangover strategies ...

... and enough wholesome outdoor activities for us not to feel too bad about them.

*After my last post I've done a lot of thinking about all the wonderful moments 2017 gave us, and feeling amiss for not recording them here. I'm going to play catch-up a little, because 2017 wasn't all bad, and it'll do well to remember that.

right now

It's hard to blog when all the big things happening around me at present aren't my stories to tell.

Big things happening to people who are big in my life - filling me with sympathy, sadness, fear and fragile feelings of maternal tenderness.
There's a lot of them - people I love at whom life is throwing some big curve-balls.

WTF life??

The things I can write about are a mixed bag ...

... my Lego is failing fast. When the vet said 6 - 8 weeks, 6 weeks ago, I kind of scoffed. How could he be so sure when we've no idea how long she's had the cancer for? Turns out he knew (being a vet and all I guess). In 10 days time I go to Joburg for a week ...

... Joburg for a week to run logistics on a fab project. It'll be a week of hard work and hard play - my favourite kind. Johannesburg is interesting this time of year - icy cold nights (way colder than CT ever gets) and still, warm days. Good people, some of whom were with me in Durban last year, and interesting work. I'm looking forward to it, were it not for my ailing furbaby.

But in other news - we finished our bath renovation!

Well, besides for a small snag list ...

But it's lovely, very 'executive' as my brother called it (i.e. black and white and sleek), and now of course - totally different to the rest of our house.

It's been about 6 months in the making - the old bathroom was ripped out in November - and we've had the work done slowly as we've had the cash, or inspiration. We're 'hashtag blessed' to have had other loo's to use in this silly big house of ours. It's been fun, and we're hoping to keep up the momentum. We've been reminded that we love doing this, and I think we're quite good at it.
Photographing a bathroom is hard though - thank goodness for that massive reflective shower screen!

Life is hard, life is beautiful, life is relentless. What would we do without it?

easter happened

I was woken Easter Sunday morning by a small child shaking me.

'Pinkie-swear Mummy, pinkie-swear you're not the Easter Bunny.'

Hungover AF (we were in Hermanus, with friends, we'd celebrated a 50th the night before, there'd been a very excellent Taiwanese whiskey), I groped through my remaining brain cells.

'Pinkie-swear Mummy!' 

Little finger crooked in my face, big earnest eyes - this was serious.

I examined my conscious, and made a hasty decision. Actually yes, I could pinkie-swear I wasn't the Easter Bunny.

Was I fluffy? No. Did I zoom around the world planting chocolate eggs? No. Was I a fictional being? No. Although the whole experience did feel a little out of body tbh.

I wrapped my little finger around hers and shook it. 

'Pinkie-swear', I croaked.

The situation was nearly as awkward as a bell jar crammed with bunnies.

None-the-less, back home Easter happened in a far more adult and tasteful fashion.

thursday everyday

The eve of November seems a good time to say it sucks.

In November sometimes ...

November is like ...

In November it's easier to speak in meme's.

Because frankly we're too tired to string sentences. We're too busy to be coherent. We're running too low to be original.

It's been a long year. I hate Thursdays.

BUT. Tomorrow it is December.

And just today I tasted it in the air. Holidays.
Christmas and family time and lazing.
Swimming and small domestic jobs and food and lightness.
Beaches and friends and beer and seafood.

It's coming. But it's not here yet.

won't ever happen

We found a video clip on an old phone of Frieda, soft-faced and blonde curls, age 6, her voice so different, thicker - pre-tonsillectomy -  'I pinkie swear I'll never twerk.'

Stella, regularly, 'I'll never leave home, I'll live with you until I die Mummy. Or until you die, whichever happens first.' Her eyes become solemn.
She thinks a lot about death this one.

Overheard today: 'I will never, ever drink coffee.'

We've thought for months: 'Trump will never become president.'

the gift of time

We came back from Tankwa to a house of chaos and mountains of laundry. My office was a tip - my hasty departure for Durban evident - accumulated crap from a week away strewn about the place.
I spent the first day back trying to make sense of it all, trying to catch up to myself.

The next event, a 3 day conference in Pretoria, was looming large and I needed to pull myself together and get on it stat.

And then it got postponed.

Postponed as in, it has to contractually happen before the end of October but new dates have not been set and therefore I. am. free.
For a bit.

Free to stop for rainbows.
To hang with my girls.
To make decent suppers, and lemon curd.
To read.
To create.
To hang with my pets in the sun in the mornings when hours expand and move slow.
To sort out some cupboards and update some shit and get photo albums sorted and catch up on my blog.
To lift the girls to school and spend time with them afterwards.
To catch up with friends.
To breathe a bit.

This time is a gift. It's not scheduled free time - a statement in itself an oxymoron. It's not 'ermahgerd will I ever have work again time'. It's time which will end in a big job, time which could end in a phone call, an email, any day now.
Time which is precious until then, and there's virtually nothing I can do which isn't exactly the right thing to be doing at the time.

january chill

The holidays are over, the girls are back at school - and for the first time ever at the same school! They just had 3 days last week, this one is 5 - 5 days of being woken much earlier than they're used to, of concentrating and socialising and managing the radical heat we're currently experiencing.
It's an adjustment for us all.

I started work on the 6th and our wonderful beloved Nonki (She's back! We're thrilled!) came in to look after them. I felt some parental guilt, and suggested some outings, some activities - some fun holiday excitement for the last week of their summer break.

But were they interested? Nope.

There were a couple of trips to my brother's pool, but other than that there were days, endless long summer days of pyjamas and pets and books and games and drawing and dragon cataloging and audio stories and forts and Lego and lawn tumbling and snack eating and just ... being.

Just, as this article which conveniently cropped up on Facebook at the same time said, '... learning to be whoever they are when no one is watching.'

Alone time, pottering away, whiling away hours in seemingly unproductive but totally absorbing pursuits - preferably in pyjamas - is how I relax, recharge and reset myself. The girls have the same inclination. I couldn't be happier.
And grateful that something which has sometimes made me feel like a bit of a lazy slob, is actually a sound parenting ideal. How easy was that one?!

love has no labels

This kid has issues.

(So has my 1970's kitchen but let's just look past that for now - we've managed to for 3 years ...)

My small girl, who has spent much of her short life rejecting labels - she's a boygirl then a girlboy then a boyboy then a 'girliegirltoday' - also has a problem with the physical kind. This girl hates a label.

Too scratchy, too silky, too big, too small - ALL LABELS MUST GO.

To get her to try a thing on while keeping labels intact in case of a size change is a negotiation. I generally cut swing tags off regardless as most stores will accept returns without them attached, but actual care and brand labels have to stay on 'til we're sure we're keeping things, and that's never easy.

Pajamas her sister happily wore for years come out of the hand-me-down suitcase and must instantly be purged of all labels, hang tags, loose threads etc before worn.

Shoes must be practically turned inside out for that one sneaky 'made in sweatshop' tag which might be lurking in the instep.

A beanie with a cool surf badge must be unpicked and exorcised of any branding before worn.

I was casually telling some friends about this recently when one of them asked if I was taking her to occupational therapy for the issue.

OT? The issue? No I most certainly am not, and actually I'd never even thought of doing so.

Immediately of course the voice of parental questioning and doubt piped up: 'Why not? Shouldn't you be helping her fix this problem?'
And then my real voice promptly drowned that the hell out -

Just like we've given her perfect freedom to explore her gender labels in a safe and supportive environment, I'm just as happy to tolerate this little personal hangup too. So she doesn't like labels, so it's a pain in the ass - this is not an issue, this is not a debilitating handicap (are we allowed to use that word these days?) which will impact on how she operates in society. This is not a problem.
This is a personality quirk and by god those are for celebrating in this rapidly homogenising world we live in.

I will not add another weekly appointment to her life - one for which we will be perpetually late and she'll probably have to wear shoes (sans labels of course) and will cut in to her valuable 'playing with her cheetah family' time.
I will not make her conscious that she has something which needs 'fixing' or shine a negative light on a personal preference she has.
I will not spend time and money to make her just like everyone else.

We know someone, an adult, who will not eat RED food for god's sake. Let's save the valuable OT appointments for that level of quirk if we must!

Maybe I'm wrong, maybe as an adult she'll have wished we'd taken her label thing more seriously. Maybe she'll become a merciless serial label killer, maybe she'll be a seamless technology millionaire, maybe she'll become a nudist.
Maybe she'll just be an ordinary person with a few cute quirks/annoying habits.

Oh wait, she's that already.

You've all seen this video right?