Growing, Adapting, Living...

Every day I wake up and tell myself that today is the day that I make time to look after myself a little bit better. I tell myself I will be having a long bath after the kids go to bed, I will finally get my eyebrows done, seeing as I have been talking about it for a year now (literally), or even I will just get an extra hour of sleep. But every evening I sit down on the couch and exhale, wondering how I will ever find the energy to do all of those things, ever.

I’ve never been what one would call high-maintenance. I would sometimes put a little eye make-up on. I had a love (still do) for pretty dresses coupled with biker boots or Docs. I would go to the hairdressers a couple of times a year, just to layer my hair enough so that it framed my face and wasn’t so heavy. But I always made sure that I practiced self-care – time outs as I would call them. A long, hot bath, a good book, a movie, time away from the outside world (and that included the phone). The world is a very stressful place, especially when you have to spend a lot of time interacting with people in it.

And then I had a child. A child who was so high needs I barely had time to sleep let alone think of taking an hour in the bath or running down to the nail place to get my eyebrows waxed. All of a sudden I felt frumpy – my clothes didn’t fit right anymore, and I couldn’t merge my new body with my personal style. Nothing felt right, I didn’t feel like me anymore, and I was too tired to figure anything out. I had to succeed in being a mother before anything else, even if in the meantime I forgot to be Jade. Who was Jade anyway? Was she the girl serving drinks behind the bar, dancing away to The Cure at 5am, while sweeping the floor of cigarette butts in the haunted building? Was she the girl who was stomping up and down Ludlow St, the life of the party? Was she the girl working 14 hour endless days in the office, working on cost estimates and languages and website launch timelines? Was she the shy girl walking into a kibbutz in Israel and staying there for months? Was she the woman walking around Bushwick in the early morning light, snapping pictures on one of her old Canon SLRs? Was she the rebellious teenager, intent on being herself, even though she didn’t really know who that really was?

As always, ever since I can remember, I wrote down my feelings. I wrote about childbirth and becoming a parent. I wrote about sleepless nights and baby products, about being sober and about how much I absolutely loved my child. I posted a lot of these things on my blog, but not everything. I also took a lot of the darker parts out of anything that I made public, as always afraid of offending others, or afraid of sounding like I was depressed. Or, as usual, afraid of worrying or bothering people. Of course there were dark days, days when I had literally slept 30 minutes, and was holding my screaming three week old, bawling my eyes out because I had no clue what I was doing wrong. But there were many more better days, when I pushed myself to believe in me, to go out into the world and show my child what I loved about it. I wasn’t depressed, I knew that, I was coming to terms with the new part of myself, Jade the mother, and working out how she could fit into all of the other pieces of me. I was still me, but with another role, one that I embraced, no matter how alien it felt. A caregiver, something that I had always yearned to really be. Nurturing.

These days I don’t censor myself as much. I’m a lot less worried about what people might think or say. Those who read my words and wonder who this person is never really knew me in the first place anyway; those who managed to knock down a few brick walls over the years have a special place in my heart and are probably not surprised at where life has lead me. I’m not surprised, even though I honestly never expected it. My first child is still very much high needs, already showing signs of that crippling anxiety I learnt to hide so well. My second is so strong and determined, and my third so calm: all three are these amazing little humans that Cesar and I are hoping to raise as best as we can. These days I have relaxed the brakes a little, I don’t feel as guilty when I get frustrated, I remember to eat when I’m hungry. I think about practicing self-care… I even read a book in less than a week recently.

But I still don’t make enough time to look after myself. I told myself 5 days ago that I would find a nail salon and get my eyebrows done, and I haven’t. Every evening I go to run a bath and use a Lush bath bomb I have had for months, and I stall in front of the mirror, change into pajamas and go back to the couch, reading newspaper articles on my phone. I look at my toe nails and think that a pedicure would be amazing, maybe metallic green nails for autumn, and have no idea when I will get the time to do that. But, at the same time, I am still writing enormous amounts, I am still working, the house is tidy, the kids are fed, dressed, and entertained, and I am still me. I am exhausted, but I am still happy.

Whether you become a parent or not life is a long series of adapting to new situations, of growing, expanding, learning, accepting, and also refusing. I ended up refusing to let motherhood engulf me, but let it become a natural part of my being. I am Jade: a mother, a writer, a girlfriend, a sister, a daughter, a bartender, an account manager, a photographer, a storyteller, a fan of The Cure, a lover of music, sarcastic, funny, silly, full of dreams, and full of ideals. I still love to dance all around my home, singing at the top of my voice, and I still love to cuddle my favorite teddy bear (when the kids haven’t taken him to cuddle), and I still dream of a utopian world. I’ve always found it impossible to be anyone else than me, no matter how many times I wished to be someone else. And in the end I am quite happy to be me, overgrown eyebrows and all. There will always be a darkness, but I know that it will always be surrounded by light, because as my beloved Leonard Cohen so aptly put it: “there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”.

Those Days, Those Weeks...

It’s not even 10am and the heat is pounding down on us, temperatures rising rapidly outside while the AC runs softly inside, 75 degrees on a 111 degree day. Another weekend with heat advisories, another weekend where we stay in because the sun outside is unrelenting. Always sensitive to my surroundings, I feel the tension in the air, electric, sizzling down the line, zapping my fingertips, painful behind my eyes. I close them and wish for a moment of pure silence so I can quieten all of the sounds crashing around in the thunderstorm that inhabits my skull right now. Silence. I breathe it in the same way I swallow my coffee, in huge, frantic gulps. Silence, just a few moments. And there it is, those few moments give me the peace of mind to continue and put this week behind me.

This past week has been a week of despondency, a week of wondering why we climb so well in order to stumble back hundreds of steps, clinging to whatever we can grab hold on to along the way. The rational side of my brain tells me that it’s normal, it’s life, we have our ups and downs, and that next week everything will look a lot brighter again. The more emotional side stands in the middle of the room, staring out into nowhere, hoping the tears won’t start falling again, just so I don’t have to explain something that I cannot voice. Emotions wax and wane, coastal tides often swept by high winds and riptides. Sometimes it feels good to cry, even if there is no specific reason for it. Sometimes I laugh through the waves of tears falling down my face, because the tears are just another release, and that throaty laugh is another emotion. It is possible to be overwhelmed and still happy, we are not one-sided but multi-faceted, a book with thousands of lines, hundreds of pages. Everything will be allright, but expressing feelings is normal. We shouldn’t feel the need to hide them, but we do.

We talk about tantrums and meltdowns, of terrible twos and threenagers, but our tantrums are not tantrums. They are earth-shattering moments of brain-melting screams, with punches, kicks, flying objects and finally headbutting the wall, until the inevitable sobs followed by “I love you so much Mummy”. The breathing lessons that we go through don’t always work and I stand there, helpless, waiting for the cloud to pass, and the sunshine to light her eyes again, our balance returning to ripples rather than waves. I am used to this, so used to this, but some weeks hit me harder than others, the lack of sleep, the day-to-day worries about bills and rent and food, the underlying guilt and fears that we messed up, somewhere. We haven’t, I know that, but I am driven by perfection, and embrace the imperfections a lot more than I used to, but cannot help kicking myself. Waking up in the middle of the night, cringing because I yelled too many times again… Yelling is not me, it never has been and never will be, but impatience creates a bubble in front of my eyes, I have to close them and wait for the moment to pass. I don’t understand the anger, I don’t want to feel the anger, I want to breathe through the anger. And then it passes. How can I help my daughter understand her emotions while still giving her the space to unleash them? How can I make sure that she never feels that she has to hide anything? I am slowly, only now, learning that it’s OK not to hide everything I feel. I want her to always know that I am her safe space. She will always know I am her safe space. All three of them will.

Breathe. Just breathe through it all.

I never understood why people complained about feeling “touched out”. Guarding my personal space was never a problem, I was used to pushing back, keeping my distance, surrounding myself with walls. Now I understand the concept, the needing a break from being touched constantly, little hands reaching out, pulling my top down, little hands stroking my cheek, little hands grabbing my hands, looking for guidance and warmth. I cannot build walls around myself any longer, and I cannot push the little hands away, as little hands soon grow into big hands that will no longer look to me for help, love, and a simple embrace. “Mummy I love you SO much”. Those words fill my heart with so many feelings; it grows and grows each day. But while our hearts grow and our arms continue to hold we are still allowed to say “space please, just a little space”. I step into the shower and let the water flow over my face, calming my senses, healing and sealing, relaxing. A daily shower, no matter how fast, is essential to my mental health, soothing, a moment to myself, even when little faces are watching me, talking to me.

It’s the simple things: the shower, the warm coffee with its perfect smell, the sunlight first thing in the morning, the silence late at night. The warmth of the baby in my arms, looking up at me with his big, brown eyes, and the soft sound of a toddler breathing next to me, dreaming of all the things that little children dream of, blown into the night time air by the BFG. It’s the knowledge that some days are better than others, and that no matter what, we will always be together. It’s the sound of my partner’s voice, his smile that I can hear, and always picture when he’s at work. The email that a friend sends at just the right time, making your heart sing, it’s the video of the ocean and the sun setting that your best friend sends you to calm your mind. And it’s the thoughts that these long days are only long for a very short time, and even over the space of a few weeks everything changes. Even the tantrums and the meltdowns deserve their place in the sun, making us both tougher and more empathetic, better humans in the long run.

Looking forward, this week will be one of positivity and hope. I do dislike the saying “count your blessings”, but I do, I always do. I am insanely blessed, and lucky. But it is OK to not be OK, even when those around us are even less than OK. And it is OK to be happy, so happy that our hearts burst towards the sky. As long as we continue to hold hands and reach out, always. Sometimes a smile hides a barrel of sadness, and tears cloud a hundred smiles.

And the Hidden (The Curse of the Strong Woman)

Have you ever been through something so heartbreakingly tough, awful, painful and/or depressing but not been able to talk about it? Or just thought that because you were so used to being the rock everyone counts on that you didn’t want to let anyone down? Going through life being strong, picking yourself up, facing every adversity full on as some kind of challenge, and embracing the potholes around you, knowing that if you manage to conquer the bad stuff, the good stuff will be all the better? I always feel like talking about hardships and problems with others makes them seem so insignificant, like I am moaning, and in the end it doesn’t really help the situation at hand. But trying to be strong all of the time can have some real downsides, and, as I have personally found, can be completely detrimental to one’s mental and physical health.

When I started writing about being surrounded by strong women in my life and doing my best to emulate this strength in my own journey, I also knew that I had to mention the other side of the coin, the one that is slightly tarnished and dark. In my heart it is the side of me that I don’t want people to see in case they catch a glimpse of my weaknesses or vulnerabilities. It’s often the side that I can easily keep away from those around me when I am sober, not so much when I drink. One of the many reasons, but not the most important, why I don’t drink anymore: there is something disconcerting about watching a person who seems to always have it together fall apart in public. Don’t get me wrong, I was mostly a fun drunk, until I wasn’t. In my head it all made sense, but how could it in anyone else’s when they had no idea what I was going through? There is some merit in asking for help sometimes. I often give this advice to others, and know full well that I should sometimes listen to my own little pearls of wisdom!

My other half tells me I’m so strong, my ability to put my mind to something and just follow through is something that inspires him. It’s just part of who I am, maybe a Taurean trait, seeing as a lot of it is really stubbornness or even bullheadedness. If I say I am going to do something, whether it is for myself or for someone else, you can count on me doing it. By saying something out loud I hold myself accountable and am terrified of being a disappointment. Well maybe not exactly terrified, my real fear is reserved for things that I cannot control and rather not think about, but it is a constant underlying worry. What if that article isn’t good enough? What if I annoy someone by bringing up a topic that they don’t agree with? What if no one buys my book because it’s just not interesting?? I don’t care if you like me as a person, I’m way beyond that now, but I do care about what I create and what I deliver. Perfection IS impossible, but I still continue to think that I HAVE to attain it. Even when I know deep down that I don’t.

You know those situations when someone asks how you are, and you know that they genuinely want to know the real answer, but you respond with “I’m good!”, or at least, “I’m OK!”. That’s me. And usually I AM OK. But sometimes I want to kick myself and say, no I’m not OK today. Or no I really just don’t feel like talking today. Or no, I feel like absolute shit and I want to dive into the sea and stay there for a while until everything is calmer in my head and I can deal with the world again. When Sylvia Plath described the bell jar effect, I totally understood what she was talking about. So much that when I was writing my MA thesis on her work I created my own bell jar. Not that you would have known because the only person I told was my journal. My closest friends guessed but didn’t know how to help, and did what they could in their own ways. It did help, and I figured my own way out, for the better. Every time I see the grey sky on the horizon I remember that time, and I remember how I found the blue sky and the ocean again, and it pulls me back into the rainbow rather than the abyss. I am acutely aware of the streaks of mental illness that run in my family, the depression, the anxiety, and I try to steer myself clear of all of that. Because I DO want to be consistently strong, and I DO want to be the positive person that I naturally am. And I DO want to always be there for everyone – it’s just sometimes I don’t have enough energy for it.

But who said we had to always have energy for everyone else? See I think here lies the crux of the problem: no one does. We tend to make ourselves so available, and then not know how to say no when it gets too much. And then we start to get angry and frustrated with the situation, ending up with a complete withdrawal or lashing out unnecessarily. I’ve had friendships that were all too one-sided to last, but last they did until I couldn’t give anymore. I’m sure those friends had no clue why I disappeared or “let them down”, but it was probably because I just didn’t have the energy anymore. Real friendship works both ways, and it’s taken me a long time to learn that it’s OK to say no (although I still forget to half the time…).

When I was in labour with my second child, I stoically told my partner to go back to sleep because it was OK, but in real life I was crying through contractions in the shower trying not to throw my guts up and wake and scare our firstborn, only 16 months old. It resulted in me making it to the hospital just in time to give birth and my partner missing it by 10 minutes because he was waiting for a friend to watch our other child. I was adamant I wouldn’t do the same for this last child of hours, but again, this time after many, many hours of labour, I found myself doing it again, and then yelling at him for not “helping” me (I don’t actually know how one can “help” someone go through back to back contractions at the end of active labour, but by that point I was a little delirious to say the least). I’m glad I yelled though, because it was the only way I could voice vulnerability at that point. It’s OK to not always do everything alone – especially something like this. And ultimately it ended in the situation where we were both able to be fully involved in the birth of our last child. Kind of magical.

I keep telling myself that asking for help isn’t a bad thing: we all need help sometimes. Doing everything alone isn’t always a merit, and while being strong in all situations means that I know there is always light at the end of the tunnel, sometimes it just feels better to get through things WITH others, instead of DESPITE others. At the time of writing this it’s been a tough couple of days, and while I have had an amazing recovery I need to remember that I am still recovering from 9 plus months of growing a child and 36 hours of getting him out safely. And that I also have two other children under four, one of whom has a lot of trouble adapting to change, and there have been a lot of changes recently. I just need to remember that strength also equals being kind with oneself and knowing when to ask for help, even if it’s just to take a nap. That will always be hard for me.

We Just Get It Done (The Blessing of the Strong Woman)

This is part one of a two part series that I have been playing around with in my head over the past few days. I have a tendency to balance thoughts out in my head, always looking for the grey rather than the black and white. We grow into ourselves over time, through experiences and through the influence of others around us, and I often think about all of the different people that have had some kind of positive or negative impact on my life over the years, playing a part in helping me become myself.

I was taking a long, hot shower yesterday (it sometimes happens, when the stars align right, maybe once a year) and suddenly an old friend and coworker popped into my head. Just before that I had been having a conversation with an aunt on strong women and the idea of just “getting on with it” despite everything, and for some reason Mary, amongst others, came up in my thoughts. I worked with Mary when I was in my late teens and early 20’s in a pub in Rutland, where I spent every summer. She was a tiny little Irish lady, with the physique of a bird and the mettle of steel. She was in her 70’s when we met, coming out of retirement because she couldn’t stand “doing nothing” at home anymore. Mary smoked Silk Cut after Silk Cut, told us stories of hardships and war, family and love, and doled out kindness after kindness, always making sure that everyone around her was happy.

I’ve been lucky in my life as I have often found myself surrounded by extremely strong women. Women who have or who had stories to tell for days, who accomplished the impossible despite everything, and who always get back on their feet again, no matter what. All of those summers spent in Rutland were also spent with my Nana whose legacy will live on forever. She became a mother so early in life, lived through divorce and husbands, more children, losing one child in the post-divorce post-war world, and one through death, reuniting with her firstborn 50 years later, saying goodbye to sisters, welcoming grandchildren and nurturing them as her own. And even after her knees gave out and her heart stopped working so well, she would still be found standing on the foot rest dusting the top of the fridge or vacuuming the stairs. Nana’s home always smelt of fresh linen, fresh air, and cleanliness. But a lived and loved in cleanliness. It always felt like home. She was the type of person to have a child one day and be standing in front of the stove cooking a full Sunday dinner the next, without even thinking that wasn’t normal. She was also the person who would tell you how her and her sisters would bike like maniacs down a hill in Kent when they were kids, flying over the handle bars when their brakes went out.

It’s not just the women born several generations before me, but I have always been surrounded by people who don’t complain and who just get it done. I remember coming home from school at the age of 9 to find my mother had given birth to our little (big) brother up there in that tiny bedroom, and just a few days later she was off back at work, taking the baby with her in a little bassinet so that she could continue to breastfeed on demand. A few months later she also took on another job at night so that we could make ends meet. My other half tells me stories of his mother, a single mother just like mine but across the world from each other, working three jobs around the clock to make ends meet. This is the norm for me, we remain strong because everything happens for a reason, and no one will save you except for yourself. And while there are certain downsides to this mentality, which I will explore later, I consider it a blessing. At the end of the day you will always be OK, because something will fall into place somewhere along the line.

I have no qualms about working any type of job. I may have been the first person in my general family to get a degree, it still doesn’t mean that I can’t get down on my hands and knees and scrub a floor. Actually, if I am really honest with myself I much prefer manual labour to working in an office. I was much happier bartending than I was ever working in a fast-paced NYC firm. I feel like a clown when I have to dress up in business clothes, a parody of myself, but put me in shorts and biker boots and I feel like a normal human being. My hands have been rubbed raw from scrubbing toilets with bleach in all types of different places, but I have better memories of those jobs than I do of sitting at a desk all day stressing out about clients and meeting deadlines and answering emails. Writing is my passion and also my job nowadays, but ask me to choose between working as a server or an account manager and I will always choose the former. But I digress. All that to say that I was brought up to believe that we can always figure things out, even when at rock bottom, and that going to work is a necessity and not one that you can skip out on when you are tired, hungover or bored. Years ago when I was 16 my aunt told me that I had a choice: either I went to school or worked, or I would end up relying on others for the rest of my life. I’m glad I chose the right way to go.

My mother did a computer programming course in the early 80’s, hoping that it would lead to better job prospects (as well as being really interested in it). She worked her backside off for years and years, taking us to different countries in order to raise our quality of life, and ended up making a real name for herself in the industry she helped build. And she’s still doing all that and touring the world shooting music festivals and concerts, spending time with her grandkids, helping her kids, and creating homes from scratch. Oh and did I mention working on our family tree, going back centuries through all of the branches? We haven’t done badly, coming from miners and farmers and ending up where we are. And I have a large conviction I come from a long line of strong women ancestors, and our family tree seems to show this. In any case, I get my work ethic from my mother and the other women in my family, and I hope to pass this along to my children. I hope that they will also learn how to be good, kind, gentle and strong, like their ancestors. The trait of strength seems to run straight line through the female lines on both sides of my family tree.

I think a lot of these thoughts on strength and life in general have all stemmed from the fact that I’ve been writing my last birth story, and it’s my toughest one to write to date. I somehow feel compelled to explain why I opted to go through another birth without anything to take the edge off; that even 34 hours in I still refused to ask for pain relief, even though there is nothing actually wrong with opting for a pain-free birth. While most of it comes from the fact that I know how much better I feel after birth when I do it unmedicated, another part also thinks that if my mother, my grandmothers, my great-grandmothers and so on did it there is no reason why I shouldn’t. And right at the very centre of it all is a place where everything is so primal, where your strength is tested over and over again, but where your heart is stripped bare and vulnerable – and that is the one moment I never wanted to miss. While, for all intents and purposes, I will never reach that moment again, it makes me happy that I did, and that I can tell the story. And anyway, I will continue to push the barriers of my strength from time to time, just to prove to myself that I am strong enough. It’s in my nature to do so.

I do feel like I am blessed with this trait to always stay strong despite everything, but all the same it can also be a curse, one that I am sure many women (and men) relate to. The next part will be more of a discussion on that side of the mirror.

Independence Child?

I'm hiding in the bathroom for a few minutes, overwhelmed by a sudden tidal wave of emotions, tears pouring down my face out of nowhere, wondering why I can't stop. I step into a warm, steaming shower, hoping that it will set my mind straight again, but the tub is moving, rocking earthquake-style, and I hear a baby crying over the sound of the water splashing on my skin and the old extractor pulling out the steam. There is no earthquake, no baby crying, no real emotional breakdown. As soon as it passes I feel drained and tired, ready for bed at 2pm, with demanding toddlers asking for lunch and loving other halves asking me where we can walk to to see the fireworks tonight.

This is when it suddenly dawns on me: emotions, and exhaustion, and backache and everything else mean baby is close. Baby will be on the way soon, may be tonight, maybe tomorrow. Will baby be born on July 4th? We always joked about that, with me being due on July 3rd, but I also have a history of late babies, coming closer to 41 or 42 weeks than 40. Wouldn't it be funny for us, immigrants, to have a US citizen child, born on the 4th of July? Cesar, born under independence fireworks, is on the fence about a 4th of July baby, I'm also not sure about it. It's a little funny, a little ironic, a little fun... My musings are most likely for nothing as baby is still comfortably moving around in my womb at 5pm on July 4th with no signs of making an entrance into our home just yet.

Only today have the worries about childbirth started again. I don't know how women say they don't remember the pain, and maybe it's because I had Aurora only 22 months ago that I still remember it so vividly, but I am currently trying to channel my inner Wonder Woman goddess person again, telling myself I only need to make it to transition and then it will be easy and fast. This pregnancy has been so active and easy, I keep thinking the birth will therefore be long and hard and painful. Cesar laughingly told me to "embrace the pain" today so I made him promise to embrace it too. Last time he was lucky enough to be shielded from it all, there is no way I'm letting that happen this time. No more Mrs Nice Lady, we are delivering this one together, just like we did with Luna.

And just as I want to hide away again, put headphones on and block out all the sounds around me and in my head I look over to see my girls dancing, twirling round and round to The Man Who Sold The World, and suddenly I know that all will be OK, because they are OK and we are OK, and whether little one comes on July 4th or July 10th it doesn't matter, because little one will be with us and our family will have grown yet again.

Baby Sprinkle Magic

Back in early 2014 my best friend organized a wonderful baby shower for me, for our first child, Luna. Knowing how I really don’t like being the centre of attention she made sure that I was, but discreetly, and also made sure some of my wonderful friends came and joined in on the fun. We didn’t have a shower or a sprinkle for Aurora, because she came so soon after Luna, and because while I loved my baby shower, I’m still not good at celebrating myself very well. It’s hard to explain, I come from a country where these type of celebrations didn’t exist before (they do now apparently), and I always feel a little self-conscious.

However, when we found out that I was pregnant again, being in California and not NYC, and because my sister wasn’t able to join us at my first one, I asked her if she would like to organize a little “sprinkle” for this baby, a little get together with friends from this side of the coast. So she got together with a few friends and organized a lovely party in the park, with food and games and balloons and a beautiful cake, and good friends… And water pistols that all the kids (and some adults) enjoyed immensely. Thank you to everyone who organized and participated – it was wonderful to see you all! (I mainly only added family photos to this blog post, but there are many more under the link a few paragraphs down).

My mother took some beautiful photos, just like she did at my first shower. It’s funny because this is the first time when I really cherish these images of me looking so pregnant and healthy and happy… I feel strong and beautiful, and at the same time a little wistful as this is the last time that I will look like this. This perfect little bump will soon be a perfect little baby, and while I cannot wait, at the same time I also would like time to tiptoe by rather than run.

If you are in the Sacramento area and would like maternity, newborn, family or baby shower pictures taken, you can check out my mother’s portfolio and website here. You can see the full gallery of the day here.

2016: A Little Retrospective

The last week of the year is going out like a lead balloon falling straight into the deepest part of the ocean. We have all been suffering from the most terrible cold and haven't set a foot outside of the house since Boxing Day. I find being ill very hard to deal with because I rarely am ever ill, neither are the children really. But I suppose being pregnant just makes it worse. So tonight will see me falling asleep by 9pm with a book on my chest, Cesar working late downtown, and hopefully a restful and peacefully healing night's sleep for our little ones!

Anyway, 2016 has been a strange, interesting, wonderful and terrible year altogether, better than some years in some senses, worse in others, but all in all full of changes, love, friendship and some sadness. Late last year we made the decision to leave our beloved NYC and move nearer my family in Northern California, a decision that still weighs heavy on us. While it's been wonderful to be close to my mum, sister and brother, living here isn't as easy as we had thought it would be, and both Cesar and I still miss NYC terribly. We also know that the move was the best thing for us as a family, so no regrets, just a little nostalgia, and a lot of thoughts towards the next few years and where we see ourselves then. So while the children are watching the Disney version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and we all cuddle in bed, coughing and sneezing up a storm, I will write my own little retrospective of the year, complete with my personal favorite blog posts...

This year two of my absolute favourite all-time artists passed away, amongst many other wonderful artists, some of which were a little expected due to age or illness, others whose death came as a sad surprise to us all. Losing David Bowie and Leonard Cohen sure felt like personal losses to me, and while I don’t blame 2016 for “killing” so many favourite icons I do believe that we were hit a little harder than other years, especially those of us who were kids in the early 80’s.

2016 was the year that our eldest turned two and finally started speaking. All of my worries in that department have disappeared as she now speaks as well as a three if not four year old. I shall have to write a follow up blog post to my previous speech-related one in the new year, especially now that our 16 month old has started talking and repeating everything we say. I started a high needs child series on the blog (Sleep is a Luxury, A Heart Warrior Mum's Account, Trust Your Instincts, Trust Your Child) that I hope to continue in 2017, because there are so many things that people don’t tell you when you are pregnant, and so many things that I feel women don’t talk about out of fear of being judged. While I still owe my blog a 15 month summary for my youngest, I’m pretty proud of the fact that I managed to continue her baby book/blog in the same way as I did her sister’s, because I will be taking all of the posts and photos and actually creating real books for them in the future. In other parenting news I blogged about tandem nursing, rambled about middle of the night and daytime thoughts, dreamt of the beach, discussed my vegetarianism, and talked about how we lead by example. And of course, not to forget, our newest news, that baby number three is on his or her way! And by the way, keeping with our tradition of not revealing the name until birth, this time around we will not be revealing the sex either.

One of my most proudest blog feats this year is gathering and publishing a collection of amazing immigration stories, and I hope to continue this series in the new year too (#IAmanImmigrant, The Ten Year Wait Part 1 & 2, Serial Immigrant, Henna from the Heart, In the Dead of the Night, They Are Coming For You, Female Janitors say Ya Basta). There were so many really awful things that happened in the world this year, civil wars spinning out of control with no end in sight, Brexit, US elections that made me want to leave and never come back (something that will happen once we get everything sorted, as we are a multi-nationality family that requires at least one person obtain a specific visa wherever we decide to move in the world), and horrific terrorist attacks leaving us all wondering if we will ever feel safe anywhere ever again. There were many, many other things that I wish I had taken the time to write about, but I’m spread so thin nowadays, between my work assignments, the girls and just trying to find quality time to do the things that I love that some things fall between the cracks. I did find time to continue my travel memoirs series though, and will continue to add stories over the next year (On Kibbutz Evron, One Night on a Felucca, Falling in Love with Barcelona, Working in the Kibbutz Dining Room, Memories of Poland, From Milan to Rome, via Venice and Florence).

When it comes to time, I feel like I haven’t taken the time to really work on my photography enough, and even the things I have worked on I am so behind on editing! So in the new year there will be collection of air show photos, some of Old Sacramento during the Gold Rush Days celebration, and quite a few autumn photos of the kids! In the meantime I have published quite a few albums, a retrospective of NYC street art that I shot and collected over the space of many years living there, the Western States Horse Expo, the California State Fair, the Chalk It Up festival, the Sacramento Mural Festival and the awesome Art Hotel 916, as well as a collection of photos taken in our local park during the summer months. All taken with Canon, FujuFilm and Nikon. I really want to work on more portraits as well as more horse show coverage this coming year, and possibly some sunrise/sunset photos on the delta too, but that will require some advance planning!

I’ve also had the opportunity over this past year to meet some wonderful, like-minded people via the internet, who have become my friends, and had the honour of having quite a few guest posts published. Ally on Life with my Little Duck published five (!) of my childhood stories, Jenny at Mamazou published my ramblings on tandem nursing, the words “fat” and “skinny”, and traditions, Vicki at The Honest Confessions of a NICU Mum published my story on raising a multi-ethnic family, a letter to my little girls on Pabarilife, and my story of unmedicated birth in a hospital appeared on Womb n Wellness.

I also had the opportunity to post some wonderful guest posts and interview some amazing people for From the Inside over the past year: Fear is Four Letter Word, So is Bomb by Simay Yildiz,  Raising a Heart Hero, and Raising CHD Awareness with Dara McBee, Ramblings with Charlie Romijn from Thought Forms, Interview with the Pechos Libros organization, Interview with Lynn Doak, Holistic Fertility Coach, A Chat with the Inspiring Jenny from Mamazou.

There were many other posts that have been published over the past 12 months, easily accessible via my Archive, and I aim to try to write more next year, at least until our third is born and then it will be a question of really finding the time! I have been blogging in some form or another since I created my LiveJournal account in 2003, and journaling and writing since I was 7 years old, and I love how far I have come in terms of finding my own voice, writing about things that are very important to me, and continuing to maintain my own little place on the web that will never be able to be categorized. I have some self-publishing plans for 2017, so hopefully they will work out and I can finally get some collections of poems, stories and essays out there! One step at a time.

I wish everyone near and far a very Happy New Year, much love, health and happiness in 2017, and to remember to feel blessed with what we have, and to reach out to those who need it, no matter where or who they are. I’m a little apprehensive about 2017, but at the same time very positive too. Come late June/early July we will have another little munchkin joining us, and while the world as it stands today is in complete turmoil, I hope that we can all stand up together to make some real changes. In the meantime, much love to everybody, and I hope that 2017 treats us all well.

Ramblings: Working in the Kibbutz Dining Room

When I got back from Israel in 2004 I spent a few months in California and managed to put many memories down on paper for future reference. I am so glad I did as reading through them brings me a lot of happiness amongst the waves of nostalgia. Here is the description of a typical day working on the kibbutz for me (slightly edited from the original that I jotted down over a decade ago). I kept the tense as it was when I wrote it because it immediately took me right back there. All of the Hebrew is transcribed as I understood it and all of the people mentioned are real. This is the second and definitely not the last piece on my stay in Israel (the first one, On Kibbutz Evron, can be found here).

There we are in front of the Dining Room, at 6am on the dot, on time as usual even after the few frustrating minutes of trying to round everyone up so we can go altogether (Nick’s “I still have to brush my teeth aye Kitkat, I’ll meet you up there” still resonates in my ears to this day).

“Boker tov!”

“Good morning, boker tov.” Vica, Vova, Doron, Sasha, Ofer, Ganit, Marina, Rami, Zoran, Motti… No Ronen yet because Ronen is always late.

First things first, a dash (I’m talking 6am after four hours of sleep dash) to the hot water machine for a polystyrene cup of strong, sugary tea. And into the kitchen I go with Isabel. For anyone who thinks a kitchen should be the warmest place anywhere, it isn’t in Evron. In the winter the water in “our” sink takes 10 minutes to heat up and cold air comes through all the top windows, but in the summer it becomes a lovely respite from the burning sun. Vova dumps the crates of vegetables to be cleaned next to the sink (although before Vova was promoted to manager I had to carry those crates by myself and my back hated me for it!).

One of us goes to get the plastic containers while the other starts on the vegetables; red peppers in halves or thirds, cleaned and placed on the tray; spring onions cut, cleaned, piled on the tray; white onions peeled, cleaned, halved and put on the tray (done with the obligatory latex gloves because I learnt my lesson the first few days- onion smell does NOT go away even after prolonged and multiple washes); tomatoes washed, checked, into containers; cucumbers the same procedure; parsley cut, cleaned and put out next to the lemons in the food area of the Dining Room.

Zivouv (“around”), my favourite job, going around the outside of the Dining Room, sweeping up cigarette butts and other miscellaneous garbage, changing the bins and cleaning the “station”. This has to be done before breakfast, so outside I trot while Isabel cleans and fills the napkin holders. It’s my favourite job because I get to sneak in a cigarette while working as well as take advantage of the gorgeous morning feeling that only a kibbutz by the sea can conjure up. Revi has come in (I love her; she is one of the people with whom I became good friends while working on the kibbutz).

7:25 (I always try to nab us an extra five minutes on our thirty minute break) and off we go to breakfast. Two slices of bread, one halva spread, a bowl of porridge and a “latte” from the machine (sometimes pancakes, sometimes French toast, on Thursdays an omelet). I love Israeli food, but I could only bring myself to eat vegetables in the morning during my last few months on the kibbutz. Although to this day I still don’t know how people can eat raw onions at 7am…

My breakfast goes down in less than 15 minutes, giving me the chance to do the most important: smoke 2 cigarettes with my coffee outside on the little wall.

8am: my turn to clean tables while Isabel finishes the vegetables for the next day. The Dining Room is full, all the volunteers except for Isabel, me and the two dishwashers (one being Michal, whose regular job was dishwashing) eating at “our” table, the factory workers at their usual tables, school kids, kibbutzniks, everyone chattering away, while I clean up table after table, giving the coffee and the dishwashing areas an occasional wipe, chatting to people here and there, taking a cigarette break by the dishwasher from time to time. At around 9:15 am the place starts to empty and I start to sweep excess crumbs up from around the tables, waiting for those last people to leave (and they are always the same people!). Then comes the best part of the morning: I grab a bucket of soap and splash it over “my” part of the floor, hose it down, scrub it with a brush, bring all of the water into the drain and “dry” it with a big cloth. And unless I want to hear Vova yelling at me in Russian, I had better not forget to clean the drain! There is something so cathartic about throwing buckets of water on the ground and scrubbing things clean.

Isabel is cleaning and filling the oils and then off we go on our break. It’s sunny today but not too warm. I run to the computer, check my mail then go to my room, make my bed and listen to Galgalats for a while.

10:40am- time to walk back up there, cigarette in mouth, fast stride right back up to the Dining Room. Cigarettes, lighter and keys are left on the shelf by the dishwasher and one of us goes to get a trolley from behind the kitchen while the other peers at the food on our “vegetarian” cart. The usual diet chicken and diet meatballs, most of which disappear directly into the Tupperware containers brought in by Esther for the Vaticon and by the kindergarden teachers; and then some sort of quiche, and (thank goodness no falafel or pizza today- it’s crazy when we have to serve either one of those!) and mushrooms covered in cream sauce. Isabel brings clean plates to put on the trolley, a bucket of clean water and some clothes. I peer over to see what Marina is serving on the meat counter- chicken legs, goulash stuff and other dishes. Then I go round the other trolleys, diet vegetables, rice, pasta, the same selection of salads as there is every single day, and some kind of jelly-like thing for dessert. Right. Rice and carrots again for me today.

We stand and serve the early people together. Vova is sitting behind us reading the paper, Doron is hovering, checking the salads, and Revi is occasionally smiling across the food area to me from her place at the computer. At 11:30am Isabel takes off for her lunch break (tomato salad) and I serve the high school kids, replace what needs replacing and clean the food trolleys when needed.

Serving hummus on the "vegetarian" cart

“Vova, I love this song, turn it up!”

“Beseder. But promise me…”

“What? Oh no, I get it. No!”

“Just one kiss!”

“No!” (laughing).

At noon Isabel replaces me, I grab a tray and my food, my coffee coin and I go to Revi. Mustn’t forget my receipt- must watch that food account! However will I be able to put my friends’ food on my account if I get to 300 shekels at the end of the month? It’s funny how the meat-eaters always end up going over their limit before the 25th, while the vegetarians never do… I eat at the volunteer table, but in 15 minutes I’m done, get my coffee and drink it outside while smoking.

12:30pm. Isabel goes off to clean tables while I finish serving on the vegetarian trolley.

“Ma ze?”

“Pashteda pitriottes”

Surprisingly enough mushroom quiche doesn’t seem to entice many people. Not much of a steady flow today, so I chat to Vova and Doron. At 1pm Vova helps me take the hot trays out of the trolley (“they’re too hot and heavy for me Vova!”) and I push it back against the wall. Out comes the hose and I spray the trolley down, scrub it, rinse it and wipe it down, then clean up the excess water. I sneak off for a cigarette break by the dishwasher before attacking the big plastic things in the kitchen. Ofer smiles at me, and without me even having to ask he goes to get a big trolley and empties the plastic containers of the leftover trays of food. Yet again I pull out a hose and hose the things down, after pulling them around the drain. They are scrubbed, rinsed and put back into place again, ready for tomorrow’s food in the morning.

The Dining Room in Evron

Time for another cigarette break and a latte from the machine. I can’t help it if I finish fast! I nip into the Kolbolit to get my daily supply of chocolate (those “4Plays” are delicious, both the regular and the white chocolate ones). I replace Revi on the meat counter for 5 minutes while she goes to the loo (i.e. cigarette break) and serve some of the later high school kids.

“Ma ze?”

“Ze of, ze bacar”

“Anni lo rotsa.’

“Bevakasha!”

Isabel joins me for a cigarette by the dishwasher and then I start refilling and cleaning the coffee area for tomorrow. We are out of Nescafe and hot chocolate so I go and collect some more from the big storage room. All the Dining Room workers, except for Revi and Tuti, are just finishing their lunch breaks, so I chat to Tuti for a few minutes, finish cleaning the soda/water dispenser, fill the hot water tank and sweep round the coffee, and as nearly everyone has left the Dining Room I grab the bin bags, the dustpan and the brush and head outside to do zivouv. It takes me about 15 minutes to change the five bins and collect the cigarette butts, leaves and other garbage all round the Dining Room. When I get back inside it’s 2:20pm and Isabel is just finishing the tables, Doron and Vova have started cleaning the floor. We clear up our stuff, tell Vova we’re finished and he sends us off home. We’re lucky, but only because we work hard, because we never finish after 2:30pm (all of the other volunteers finish around 3pm).

After collecting out stuff, shouting goodbye to everyone and getting our sweaters we set off down to the Volunteer House, going into the Volunteer Office to say hi to Ina before plonking ourselves on the couch, taking our shoes off, putting on music, smoking a cigarette and waiting for the guys to get back.

One example of a regular days work in the Dining Room. I worked there regularly because I asked and was asked to. Most volunteers were rotated around the different jobs, but I liked the fact that I had a regular job; I was given my own responsibilities and daily chores. The atmosphere in the Dining Room was mostly one of fun; we always managed to have a laugh… Gossiping with Revi, running away from Sasha, laughing with Vova, chatting with the guys in the kitchen, pulling faces at Rami, chatting with Ronen. The work was not intellectually challenging, but I really enjoyed it, and my Hebrew went from non-existent to a lot better because I really tried. One day I will learn properly! It’s difficult to describe communal living to someone who has never experienced it before, as there are so many things that are part of the whole experience. It is not for everyone, but it was very good for me. To this day it was one of my favourite jobs and I would do it all over again in a flash if I could.

I smoked a lot of Noblesse Lights during my time in Israel if you hadn’t noticed after reading this.

Photography: Summers Past and Present

It doesn’t take much to take me back there, a couple of years ago in the late summer, together on the beach. The Rockaways were still under a lot of construction post-Sandy, and there were no crowds on that Wednesday in September, just us and a few others, enjoying the sun and the warmer ocean. 11 or 12 weeks pregnant, thinking that it was so obvious, that I was huge, so many new dawns opening up ahead. A lot of unexpected dreams and hope and changes and a lot of wondering about what everything would look like the following September. Snapping photos on the beach, just a few of us knowing our secret, a happy in-between time in the sun, eating sandwiches and jumping over waves.

A few years later and out comes the Holga again, this time in Queens, walking around the park, visiting the zoo. Pregnant again, happy, in love with our family. Luna riding along on your shoulders, screaming in delight at the sight of colourful parrots and large, dangerous cats. More sunshine, one Spring child and now a Summer child on her way. Sisters, hopefully best friends. Edifices from past world fairs, an empty carousel taking Luna for her first gleeful ride and ice cream from the grumpy vendor. Soft serve with a twist and maybe some sprinkles. The Unisphere looming over us, beautiful in its starkness. Look there’s Mexico and there’s England and there is the US, all part of your heritage, Luna. And yours too little summer baby.

I took two rolls of film to a photo place on Roosevelt and Main, the nearest place I could find. I used to just drop film off at Walgreens and never had an issue, ever. I use black and white film that has been made to be processed in a color processing machine. It’s really, really hard to actually mess up the development of 35mm film. REALLY hard. Well these people actually managed to expose part of the colour film before development and develop the black and white BACKWARDS. I’m talking backwards like in a mirror. Luckily due to some mistake on their end I only paid $7 and I also only looked at the photos when I got home, otherwise I would have lost it. Now I am just telling myself that it just makes them a little unique and different. And I will never be going there again. I also know this camera very well and it wasn’t a case of me doing anything wrong, it’s a simple camera and pretty foolproof. Anyway, the pictures still make for good memories!

Ramblings: 10 Years Already...

4am is an excellent time to write beautiful sentences in one’s head, hoping that they will stay there until the morning so that you can jot them down. Of course they never do, and I never learn my lesson. But anyway, I had a whole post typed up in my head last night while nursing Luna back to sleep again around 4am, but it has all been lost to oblivion, or at least the back of my mind until next time. Maybe one day I will learn to keep a notepad under my pillow, or will type phrases into my phone… Maybe.

I have now officially lived in NYC for 10 years this month. I will always remember that day I landed here, came through Immigration with my temporary work visa, jumped in a cab with my 2 suitcases and 1 box and stared at the skyline as it came into view. And that feeling that I had finally arrived somewhere that I could call home again. During those first few weeks I discovered a place so special that it would steal my heart time and time again, even now after all these years. A place where you can find anything, where anything goes, and where you can really do anything that you put your mind to. Of course there have been many times that I have wanted to leave, run away, find a new place to call home, but I have never been able to actually do it. Even today, with another child on the way, still living in a 1 bedroom apartment because anything else is just too expensive, I find it hard to imagine living anywhere else but NYC.

We still make it work, we budget, live on less money, and we are still able to make it by, even at the moment when I am only freelancing. It has come to the point that we wonder when it’s not going to be worth it anymore, the hustle and the constant trying to make ends meet. I do dream of having a little house with a back yard that the kids can play in. A little area where I can drink my tea in the morning, plant some flowers, herbs and vegetables and have BBQs all year round. But at the same time neither of us want to have to drive anywhere, but I suppose that’s something we will have to get past once, if, we leave the city.

Because New York City is, and will always be, home to me. From the first night in that little apartment on Rivington and Clinton, via Spanish Harlem, the West Village, Bushwick and finally Flushing, I’ve always felt that  there will always be something for me here. In 10 years out of the 37 in my life there has been a lot of time to make many, many memories. So many friends, some who have become part of my family, others who have drifted away along the way, and some who have sadly left us too soon, hopefully jamming together in the stars, their souls shining away in the sky. There have been really bad times and really dark moments, and amazing periods where happiness prevails. There have been moments I would rather not remember and others that I will relive again and again.

The city changes rapidly, as any large and prosperous city tends to do, often to the distress of those living there. Rents go up every year, old buildings go down and new, uninteresting, structures take their place. People become tired of the hustle and move away for their sanity, their bank account, their health. Other people move in, everything continues to move, but it’s never the same as it was the year before or the year before that. We hold on to our memories of the “good times”, and hope that they won’t all be crushed by bulldozers and debris. But as long as the NYC we lived and live in stays active in our minds, thoughts and dreams it will never really disappear. Everyone moves here for a reason, and this city tends to give us hope that we can fulfill whatever hope and dream we had when we came. Or at least help us realize why we even ended up here in the first place.

When the winter finally disappears with those last cool, biting winds in April and spring shows its wonderful true colours, there is always an element of hope in my heart that I can make work through one more year, that I won’t have to leave just yet. One more summer on the beach, one more autumn watching the leaves turn all the colours of the harvest rainbow, maybe even one more blizzard… The idea of leaving this city breaks my heart, but the idea of staying seems more and more difficult.

I love walking through the streets with Luna, watching the trees bloom and the blossom start to fall to the ground, covering the sidewalks with pink and white for a while, leaves budding green, ready to open now that the frost, ice and snow has really gone for a while. The thermometer finally moves above 60 and windows are left open day and night to let the air in, air that will soon become muggy and humid and sweaty. I love how the city is in constant movement, never silent, always talking, whispering, shouting. But I also miss being woken up to the sounds of birds singing and nothing else. I think there will always be this dichotomy within me, the city and the countryside, always missing one or the other. But NYC has been the one place that stole my heart and will never return it. I’m not nostalgic for the NYC of 10 years ago, or that of 8 years ago, I have wonderful memories of those times and miss a lot of things about them, mainly friends and establishments and the silly antics I used to get up to in those days. I miss many things about the NYC of before, but this city is still NYC and will always be, and I have learnt to adapt to the changes while documenting them for myself, and keeping those parts that don’t exist anymore alive in my heart.

All I really want to say is that I still love this city, my home, and always will. One day we will leave, and as a family continue our lives elsewhere, and this is no longer a maybe, but a certainty, but there will always be part of my heart here in the city. Unless we can find an affordable house not far from the beach with a good school and not a 2 hour commute or car drive from the city… One can always dream, no? Here’s to 10 years and however many more there will be.

You are an extraordinary place NYC.

All photos were taken by me over the past 10 years. I have albums and albums of places and people on my Flickr HERE. Here are a few of my favourites:

LES

Coney Island 

Bushwick

Street Art