Tag: life

Tossing things aside

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I played a few games of cornhole at a work event this week. I am usually pretty terrible at any casual games like bowling or mini-golf, mostly because I never practise them outside work events. So imagine my surprise when I won a game. Then another one. A lovely American from work then saw it as a challenge and eventually obliterated me but it was fine, I was mostly surprised I did so well to begin with.

Then I realised why – a few years back I was trying to get Riley to play something active and somehow we ended up throwing a little ball into a laundry basket. At the beginning of the game we stood right next to the basket and whenever one of us got the ball into the basket, we would move further away. A super casual game that requires zero prep. We still play it from time to time, except now the twins participate too. I never really cared about winning or getting better at the game, mostly about keeping the kids happy and engaged. We play it every few months max. And yet, somehow it helped to train my throw enough that I can win an unanticipated game of cornhole.

That’s a huge contrast to my usual approach to things: I tend to dive into things. At some point I was sailing 3-4 times a week, offshore racing, reading books about trimming sails. When I started strength training, I was learning the basics with a coach then started reading books about it and advice online; with time I added mobility exercises and some skill work. Even though I often struggle to find time to exercise I definitely give it a lot of headspace: always looking how to improve, to do everything better. And then there are things I really care about, like work and children and their education. And sometimes I wonder if giving all of those things so much consideration and space in my thoughts helps – or just makes me exhausted. Maybe if I just cared a little less or at least let things go when I am not actively involved in doing them, I would be less tired.

There are caveats of course – tossing a bag or a ball requires far less skill or consideration than helping a child get better at writing. And yet it’s such an enticing idea that we can sometimes get better at things just by casually doing them every now and again, without thinking about it at all. In the world that keeps telling us that the most important thing to achieve things in life is discipline it’s pretty counterintuitive to just… do things occasionally, for fun, without planning. I’d like to think of a more lighthearted, more fun version of myself.

Approaching life that way would require lowering the stakes though. Can I care about work less when it’s not just about my ego and to a certain extent my identity but also about paying off a mortgage and taking care of my family? Can I care less about my children’s emotional health and their education? It doesn’t seem possible – so I don’t seem to be able to toss them out of my head the way I forget about a game of cornhole. And yet, when I do have a little time, I will try to remind myself then I can also let go of some things and tread lightly, with no obligation to achieve any results whatsoever. Now how do I not overthink this whole not-overthinking thing…

Numbness and being alive

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What do you do when you struggle to find enjoyment in anything? When every day feels like a never ending stream of chores to be followed by another day of chores, with responsibilities and other people’s expectations shaping up your every day?

I tend to numb myself when not working: listening to audiobooks, cleaning, ticking off other chores, staring at social media, not allowing myself to pause to avoid being overwhelmed by wondering why is this life that I built for myself – in fact worked very hard to build – can feel so miserable, like there is no space for myself in it. But that numbness only makes it worse, I feel like I disappear into nothing and lose all sense of myself as a person, my inner light completely lost as I retreat, dull eyed, after a moment of joy with one of the girls. I sleep dreaming of being abandoned over and over or being stuck in a place I cannot leave – that’s my brain’s revenge for not giving it any breathing space to chew on that question.

This happens to me from time to time, especially when the weather is miserable and I don’t have enough sleep. I remember a couple of years ago I took a single day off work to revel in reading, having a slow, lazy lunch and walking along the beach. Three hours into it I got a call that one of the twins was sick and that I had to go home and look after her. That feeling of utter defeat – I don’t know how you avoid it. No matter how many times you tell yourself to be grateful (and I am truly grateful for so many things in my life), not having any control of your life for even one day can be soul crushing.

I do eventually snap out of that feeling of being completely depleted. One morning I wake up and feel warmth in myself; I don’t rush to look at my phone, I suddenly feel enjoyment in my cup of tea, my comfortable seat on the couch. I start writing again. Suddenly, I don’t just notice the cuteness of my girls in an abstract, remote way, I notice how they react to me as I tickle them and breathe in their smells. I see warmth in my husband’s eyes. I return to myself and wonder how I can treasure my little humans so much but never seem to apply the same love and acceptance to myself. But I can never arrive at that moment by sheer willpower. You can understand certain things intellectually and yet it does not help you to feel better at all.

Where does that numbness, that grim feeling of overwhelm comes from to begin with? It’s tempting to blame it all on the stress of modern lives, with ridiculous property prices and expectations of being able to work as if we don’t have kids and parent as if we don’t have jobs. I know for me it’s much more than that, it’s the perpetual feeling of being unseen when I lose connection with the outside world and myself.

I am fortunate enough to have friends who I connect with on a deeper level, despite all of us having hectic, overwhelming lives. We might not see each other often but being able to be completely open with each other is priceless. I remember talking to a friend while eating chilli crab in Singapore. We hadn’t seen each other for several years, she moved countries, we both had more children and many other changes and some setbacks in life – and yet we felt so close in that conversation, no need to guard ourselves from being misinterpreted and misunderstood.

That’s not going to happen with every single person in our lives, I understand it intellectually; yet I try sometimes and then that openness makes me vulnerable. Being open turns into exposing weakness to someone who will not reciprocate. I cringe at how uncool it is to try to be friends who is always guarded against you.

Yet the best things in my life came from risk – risk of leaping into unknown and risk of opening up instead of keeping up appearances. I shudder to think what my life would be like if I contorted myself into a cooler version of myself who pretends to always be in control, who isolates different parts of her life completely. That version would be much less me – and I want to be more me and stop losing the sense of myself when I am overwhelmed and doubt everything. Eventually I find my own way back to myself – that’s when enjoyment creeps slowly back into my life, even when there is still way too much to do.

The Road Not Taken

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I was watching surfers last night. We had epic surf on Good Friday to the point there was practically no beach left at Avoca where we are spending the long weekend. It settled a bit on Saturday, waves came in clear sets and there was an occasional gleam of green in contrast to the day before when the wave tops were immediately blown off to churn white all the way to the beach. Surfers were everywhere. They get so close to the rocks it seems way too dangerous. Then one of them pops up on a wave and takes off, down the wave then up and no matter how many times I see it, I never get tired of it and it never stops being, well, magic. Witchery.

I grew up in Siberia and apart from doing ballet as a 6 year old, cross country skiing in the forest across the road from our apartment block and mandatory PE in school, I was not an athletic child. I wore glasses and I always had a book to read, long before it was known that distracting yourself from the world around you is unhealthy (but I was doing it with books not devices so I guess it was ok). And yet when I first got access to satellite TV I was mesmerised by the channel that was showing skateboarding and surfing. The persistence and skill required to do those things seemed way cooler than anything that I could do (a sad poem, anyone?). If I could transport my conscience into someone else’s body for an hour I’d choose an experienced surfer on a good surfing day, for the experience of that high of mastery over your own body and the ocean that can so easily kill you.

I did try surfing after I moved to Australia. It was way before I got into sailing and I took many lessons with a community college and got to know a few people, mostly surfing instructors. I lacked the upper body strength but my balance was fine. I had tremendous fun even in white water and I did manage to catch a few waves, mostly with the instructor’s help. It was pretty clear though that I’d have to basically live on the beach and practice every day, not once a week if I wanted to get serious about it. I would also need to either keep paying an instructor or somehow find someone who’d be ok to at least go surfing with me which seemed impossible with all the other things happening in my life.

I haven’t surfed in ages.

It’s interesting to think what could have been though if I made different choices in life and surfing is one of them. And if I was born in Australia to someone who sent me to nippers, would I be a completely different person, ripping down and up the waves, would that be something so natural and easy for me that I’d take it for granted? What would that life feel like? Somehow I am convinced I’d still find a way to be anxious and questioning my choices. There would be different worries (my friend circle? Source of income? A very vague feeling that I could’ve learned to write better? Maybe they wouldn’t be all that different after all) but I doubt I’d escape unscathed. It is a fun exercise to indulge in right before your birthday though, considering all the lives you could’ve had.

Life with three kids can be intense and sometimes James and I joke about what our lives could be like if we remained childfree (lots of spare cash, probably a seaside apartment instead of a house, much travel and delicious food and should I mention loads of uninterrupted sleep) but ultimately we both agree that it would’ve come with a sense of loss even if we didn’t exactly know what that loss was about. I’m sure there are people who don’t long for children but I struggle to imagine being one of them. It’s one of those choices in life I can’t imagine not making and it seems inevitable, just like moving from my hometown to St Petersburg and then to Australia, maybe because I imagine the kind of regret I’d have had very clearly.

And then there are choices in life that seem a bit less clear cut. Choosing one job over another (I nearly went to Ireland instead of Australia). Choosing sailing over surfing. Ending or continuing a friendship. While some of them seem more important than the other, do we really know which ones are true bifurcation points?

I am still fairly sure I’d arrive at some version of me that might be physically slightly different but fundamentally the same. Somehow I cannot imagine a version of me who doesn’t overthink or who is more confident than sensitive. I’d probably be tortured by different things. I might fight joy in different things, too. Yet it appears to me that through any circumstances my own self would inevitably crystallise and if all those versions of me ever met they would all enjoy a conversation about what it means to be me, just like I’m enjoying writing this post right now.

Then again, it wouldn’t be me if I didn’t add that I could be completely wrong about all of it.

Tan Lines

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A few years ago when I was sailing a lot, sometimes up to 4 harbour races a week and offshore ones when possible, I used to get very specific tan lines on my hands. My hands looked white apart from the tips of my thumbs, perfectly matching my sailing gloves. We called it the Mickey Mouse tan.

The other day I looked at my hands and I realised there was a tan pattern on them now, too, a totally different one: fingers white up to the second phalanges then tanned evenly. It took me a moment to realise that the tan lines are caused by my pushing a pram every day, sometimes more than once a day. What a great metaphor of how my life changed, I thought. I used to be a very involved sailor and now I am a mother.

Some people, including my own mother, expressed astonishment at the fact that I am now a mother of three (granted, I was as surprised as anyone when we discovered that instead of leaping from one to two we skipped a step and jumped straight to three; nobody plans for twins). Some thought I was too interested in other, non maternal things like my career (or sailing), others no doubt remembered how much I struggled adjusting to having just one child. Yet the astonishment stings a bit too, as I probably invested more in being a great mother to my first than in anything else in my life and I never had any doubt I’d do my best with more than one, too.

Having three has been chaos. The twins are two months old and have already copped a few daycare colds brought home by Riley. A congested newborn is not a happy baby. I’ve listened to my oldest child cry for me in the middle of the night as I was pinned down by a feeding pillow with two newborns on it; my child who was never left to cry, used to reliably being comforted by me, was scared in the middle of the night in her own bed alone in her room and I wasn’t able to help. Sometimes all three cry at the same time. Sometimes I join in the crying, too.

I feel like I need to write about the upside of having multiple kids at this point of my blog post. How blessed we are to have three healthy kids (despite the copious amounts of snot in every single nose in this house right now), how sweet the babies are and how cute and funny Riley is. How James turned into a great father who is confidently taking all three kids out by himself while I try to catch up on at least some sleep. Mostly though we are surviving. We keep reminding ourselves not to wish time away and maybe one day I will miss this season when I am so desperately needed by all my children but right now I just keep saying to myself that the hardest days will pass and we’ll have the reward of children who learn how to play and share with others (I am sure I will regret these words in the future), who will always have each other even when they are adults. I’m reminding myself that our Christmas will be far more magical for having multiple kids, that I will be able to watch each of them grow into their own person which is my favourite part of parenting. And then I catch myself awash with the same astonishment I find so hurtful in others: how could it be that I am a mother of three?

Some people climb mountains, going all the way to the top where they are oxygen starved, freezing and in constant danger of dying where nobody will be able to retrieve their bodies. Some do long offshore races, soaked to the bone, fighting off nausea and tethered to the sides of the boat trying not to fall out. By far more people have multiple children and while some seem to breeze through that experience, a lot of us struggle with round the clock care duties, sleep deprivation and the constant terror of doing something wrong and scarring a person fully dependent on us for life. It’s not considered special by society because it’s so common yet as a way to find meaning bringing up kids can be more relentless than an offshore sailing race, more intimidating than climbing a mountain peak. We can’t turn back and so we continue on our way, clutching on to every tiny pleasure along the way. With time the relentlessness of it somewhat eases, our kids need us a bit less until they seemingly don’t need us at all – and then we’ll have to reinvent ourselves again. Who knows what my tan line is going to be then.

I can’t say I ever fully planned my life and so far what worked for me was doing my best with what I’ve got and letting things happen. And as I look into two brand new little faces all I can do is hope everything will turn out great for them, too.