expectations will get you every time.

expectations- they are just there even when we don't consciously create them.  sometimes we don't even notice them until they are left unmet- and we're feeling disappointed and wondering why.  when we have that feeling and we can't  figure out where it's coming from.  deflated.  

i'm back in the city of san francisco with zoe.  this place which so much reminds me of her- of our lives together when she was tiny and very, very blonde and we were very busy going to and from schools and aftercare and appointments.  this is also our first trip together just she and i.  and not surprisingly, it's been good and it's been hard and i'm exhausted.  it's also rainy and 55 degree's and gray and all the shine and shimmer of this sexy city has peeled back and i'm left annoyed by the lack of green, the parking, and the smell mixture of muni, dirty sidewalks and incense.  but mostly my mood is because of the underlay of my unbeknownst expectations.

i think i'd imagined that there would be pedicures and window shopping and revisiting old places and remembering.  i think i'd imagined connection.  completion even.  resolve.  that coming back to the place where in some ways it all began, would be healing, unlocking, or....something.  that with out all the distractions of normal life and with out her brothers or mike, we'd be able to talk, to dissect it, to explore nostalgia.

instead, we've experienced regression, distraction, overwhelm, disconnect. not awful sticky thoughts, thank God, but landing 'in space'- clearly regrouping into her happy place- or at least her safe place. which is removed from me and who ever we were with. it's not been horribly, but certainly far from my, dare i admit it, expectations.

it's a lot for her to take in.  new things are hard, but old things that look new but are supposed to be recalled, are even harder. and for zoe, who just this year, has begun to experience the complex emotion of nostalgia, the tizita, it's extra hard.

so i'm left with managing twice.  managing my, in full disclosure, 'let down' and, helping her process.  today, i didn't do either well.  today i let myself down.  i was snappy and annoyed and desperate. i wanted her to just be that 11 year old daughter i'd dreamed up sometime.  i didn't want it to be difficult.  i didn't want her to pull back into her head and pull up the rope latter behind her.

we were out for a late 'brunch'. 
at zazi's.
i was hoping to get some meat into her- some protein- bacon and eggs.  (the gluten/ casein free thing is killer when traveling!)
we were eating and the coffee cake thing i ordered was completely different than what i'd remembered and i had to go back to the car to get her special muffins and when i came back she was just checked out.  i asked her what we should remember about yesterday for her scrapbook.

"well, i don't know.  can i listen to peter gabriel on your iphone?"
"no- let's think about yesterday, who we saw, what we did."
"i really just want to listen to your iphone."
"but we're at a restaurant.  can we please just have a conversation?  you seem so far away.  why are you so far away? i feel so disconnected from you."
"i know.  i'm sorry.  i just want to listen to your iphone."
"not now honey."
"mommy?  you know sometimes i just get like this, do you understand?"
"yes zoe, i do.  i mean, i don't really understand, but i know you do.  i get tired when i travel too."
"well, what parts of it do you not understand but know you know about me?"
"i know you do this when you're kind of overwhelmed. "
"yeah"
"do you want to go home?"
"no, i'm OK."

so there it was.  there it is.  i need to lower those _(*$&%*$* expectations!  i need to live in the reality of my life.  i need to see the progress, see the challenge, accept the differences.  not be angry at what i don't have.  instead be thrilled with what i do have.  embrace the life we're given- in it's beauty and it's yuck.  forgive the wandering off in the market, the baby-talk when we see the buffaloes at golden gate park, the hiding from her friend who she hasn't seen in 4 years, the arguing with the 2 year old we're staying with.  i need to stop saying "can't you at least act 7?" and give her a giant hug.  i need to remember that different wiring requires more patience and more forgiveness and at least as much love as i give to others.

tonight we're toning it down.  she's watching 'noggin' to chill out.  we're eating over lisa and yoyo's which is like home to her.  we will just 'be' in this down time.

tomorrow we'll go visit her old elementary school- the place she was teased for not doing the monkey bars, for being too slow in line,  and for not paying attention in class, but where she was loved and supported by a group of very committed teachers and specialists. 

and i will walk beside her with nothing but pride because she is the one who wants to go back, she is the one who needs to see it, she is a courageous soul.  she allows herself to experience it, even if she knows it will be hard, even if she's not able to verbally process it, even if she'll need to just veg and listen to 'i'm a lonely little petunia' on the iphone.  and i'll let go of pedicures and window shopping.  and i'll wait for the remembering.  i'll wait for the processing.  maybe the remembering will be of this trip- of our new memories- of our mommy-daughter time together, of this new san francisco experience.