oops. i just accidentally looked back at my life. i just fell upon some photos from about 7 years ago when bryn was born and we lived in san francisco and zoe hadn't hit her perfect storm and jude was looking fine after a year of scary. it was a very sunny season. it was a very different season from now.
in these pictures, in these years, my kids dressed well- really well. their clothes matched and they were clean and their hair was cut. they wore shoes, even inside, cool shoes like vans and converse or little leather european shoes. zoe hadn't yet vocalized her sensory issues so she wore cute jeans and ponchos and pants with zippers. in these pictures we had nice things- pottery from our trip to barcelona, art painted by friends, things we'd collected. on the table in these pictures is good food, good cheeses and prosciutto and fresh figs and baguettes. out the window i can feel the cold wind and i can see the pacific ocean and the bay bridge.
our place was small for the five of us, but it worked. we even had a washing machine and a dryer, and a dishwasher. just down the street in the mornings we could buy fresh croissants and coffee and little meringue cookies in pistachio flavor. if we went in the evening we could drink cold wine and eat a croquet monsieur sandwich and hear live music. the ocean was near by with all it's sounds and smells and the feeling of sand between toes. there were trolley cars to get down town and strange interesting people riding on them.
on sundays we walked to church in the mission, and hiked in the marin headlands with our best friends in the afternoon. the world smelled like warm grass and fennel, and wet earth and the bodily scent of eucalyptus. things were good. they were good. we didn't even know how good.
but we talked often, in our tiny breakfast nook, about sustainability and how our life there wasn't. we talked about the cost of living and schools and daycare and buying a house? and we whispered words like what about family? and what about zoe? and what about africa? so we packed it up and moved. we flew out on a red-eye after eating sushi with my sister and her family, with three blonde pajama-ed kids and their blankies.
when we landed and sat in north carolina in my parents mountain house waiting for our moving truck to arrive and to sign our mortgage papers, i cried a lot and panicked and tried several times to push the escape button on this decision we'd made. we don't have to sign the papers.... we can turn that moving truck right around...i thought.
but we didn't. we moved into a lovely home in atlanta where we could still walk to get delicious treats, but they were bagels, and thin crust pizza. where the world smelled more like the familiar east coast that i'd grown up with, and seasons became real again. and we thought we'd arrived somewhere permanent or as far as we could imagine permanent.
four years later we moved to africa.
and now three years after that, i'm sitting in africa looking at pictures, and missing things- things like family and figs and live music and the smell of fennel. and i'm still whispering words like what about zoe? and what about africa?
and this is life i think, at least life for me. the asking. the looking back. the remembering and the dreaming ahead. this is life for me. sometimes when i look back i want to burst with the fullness of life and time and the seasons we have, and then i realize that my moments now will soon join those memories. that today will soon become pictures of what was and that i better savor it- all of it- the mismatched missionary clothes my kids run around in, their filthy red-dirt feet, my filthy red- dirt feet, their shaggy hair and lego litter, their kitchen concoctions and not yet perfect english.
that i need to love their constant snack asking, their failure to shut the door and the joy it brings of trying to capture the cat and put her back outside, their (painful) dinner time retelling of lord of the rings scenes, their hour long group car ride singing of every name they know to "banana-fanna- fo-food- me-my-mo-mude- jude".
it goes and it goes fast and it goes faster every year. so to try not just to live it- but love it, appreciate it, value it, own it, be in it, see it for the daily beauty that it is- sharing life together with whoever is in our life- it's worth it. so worth it.
we gather these things into us. these things that make us laugh and cry and need a nap, or a conversation or a glass of wine, or a run, or to write, these are the things that connect us and helps us ask the questions and find their answers- wherever we are, whoever we are, and whoever we are with. so love it, do it, savor it, hold it, let it go- live it well.
in these pictures, in these years, my kids dressed well- really well. their clothes matched and they were clean and their hair was cut. they wore shoes, even inside, cool shoes like vans and converse or little leather european shoes. zoe hadn't yet vocalized her sensory issues so she wore cute jeans and ponchos and pants with zippers. in these pictures we had nice things- pottery from our trip to barcelona, art painted by friends, things we'd collected. on the table in these pictures is good food, good cheeses and prosciutto and fresh figs and baguettes. out the window i can feel the cold wind and i can see the pacific ocean and the bay bridge.
our place was small for the five of us, but it worked. we even had a washing machine and a dryer, and a dishwasher. just down the street in the mornings we could buy fresh croissants and coffee and little meringue cookies in pistachio flavor. if we went in the evening we could drink cold wine and eat a croquet monsieur sandwich and hear live music. the ocean was near by with all it's sounds and smells and the feeling of sand between toes. there were trolley cars to get down town and strange interesting people riding on them.
on sundays we walked to church in the mission, and hiked in the marin headlands with our best friends in the afternoon. the world smelled like warm grass and fennel, and wet earth and the bodily scent of eucalyptus. things were good. they were good. we didn't even know how good.
but we talked often, in our tiny breakfast nook, about sustainability and how our life there wasn't. we talked about the cost of living and schools and daycare and buying a house? and we whispered words like what about family? and what about zoe? and what about africa? so we packed it up and moved. we flew out on a red-eye after eating sushi with my sister and her family, with three blonde pajama-ed kids and their blankies.
when we landed and sat in north carolina in my parents mountain house waiting for our moving truck to arrive and to sign our mortgage papers, i cried a lot and panicked and tried several times to push the escape button on this decision we'd made. we don't have to sign the papers.... we can turn that moving truck right around...i thought.
but we didn't. we moved into a lovely home in atlanta where we could still walk to get delicious treats, but they were bagels, and thin crust pizza. where the world smelled more like the familiar east coast that i'd grown up with, and seasons became real again. and we thought we'd arrived somewhere permanent or as far as we could imagine permanent.
four years later we moved to africa.
and now three years after that, i'm sitting in africa looking at pictures, and missing things- things like family and figs and live music and the smell of fennel. and i'm still whispering words like what about zoe? and what about africa?
and this is life i think, at least life for me. the asking. the looking back. the remembering and the dreaming ahead. this is life for me. sometimes when i look back i want to burst with the fullness of life and time and the seasons we have, and then i realize that my moments now will soon join those memories. that today will soon become pictures of what was and that i better savor it- all of it- the mismatched missionary clothes my kids run around in, their filthy red-dirt feet, my filthy red- dirt feet, their shaggy hair and lego litter, their kitchen concoctions and not yet perfect english.
that i need to love their constant snack asking, their failure to shut the door and the joy it brings of trying to capture the cat and put her back outside, their (painful) dinner time retelling of lord of the rings scenes, their hour long group car ride singing of every name they know to "banana-fanna- fo-food- me-my-mo-mude- jude".
it goes and it goes fast and it goes faster every year. so to try not just to live it- but love it, appreciate it, value it, own it, be in it, see it for the daily beauty that it is- sharing life together with whoever is in our life- it's worth it. so worth it.
we gather these things into us. these things that make us laugh and cry and need a nap, or a conversation or a glass of wine, or a run, or to write, these are the things that connect us and helps us ask the questions and find their answers- wherever we are, whoever we are, and whoever we are with. so love it, do it, savor it, hold it, let it go- live it well.
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