la vie immédiate

Today was one of those scrambling, overwhelming days, parenting-wise. Everything went at such a fast pace, starting right after breakfast at 7:30. Playing with water, massive clean up, they slip in the water, crying kid, bad-parent-guilt, bath-time, get kids warm and dressed, bath clean-up, snack-time, snack clean up, cuddling, storybook reading, comforting inexplicably whiny while from EA, set A up with an art project, get EA to sleep, break, long enough to realize I was feeling overwhelmed and scattered, have a blissfully quiet hour drinking coffee and reading and writing, and…make lunch, clean up, dress them for outside, etc etc.

Even just wtiting this list is exhuasting. Some days I like the pace and rhythm of doing and moving and energy. And some days some kind of rhythm and pacing exists. Today just floored me though with it’s busyness and constantness.

The exception was our hour outside playing in the snow. We all slowed down and I forgot everything, all my shoulds and coulds and wishes, and just played.

Came across this recipe for banana coconut milk pancakes I scrawled dwon this summer, and lo and behold I had both coconut milk and bananas in the house. So I tried ‘em, and they were deelish.

And I made a few important calls on my cell phone over lunch.

Also, propelled by Axel’s desperate boredom, (being tired of all his toys and all his climbing/wrecking-shit-up stations in the house), I went outside and filled up a storage bin with snow. Oh the success! It was smashing. He could hardly believe his luck, and just looked at me, disbelieving for a minute, before happily toddling off to get more shovels and cups.

Don’t want to forget this combo, it totally worked: cheddar and raw spinach rolled in a Swedish pancake (kind of like a crepe) topped with honey and served with bosc pear.

It’s snowing. Everyone is asleep. I’m leaving the dishes for tomorrow. It feels so different when it snows in late winter than when it snows before Christmas. Then there’s this buffer, you feel like it’s making everything cosy and picturesque. This feels more ominous somehow. No it doesn’t. It feels more peaceful. Or what is it? Neither, it feels like it’s pointing out to me that I am less comfortable. More questioning. I mean, no. That’s not it. I am perfectly comfortable but it’s like some reminder. Or there is something shaking me off balance. No, I wasn’t particularily in balance. Not shaking me off balance but reminding me that time is passing. Reminding me that I don’t have control. Do I want control? Reminding me not to stay too comfortable. Shaking me awake? Isn’t it spring that does that? What is this unease? It’s just snowing, it’s just a fact. Why complicate it?

I don’t know, I mean, I just went back and had another look and it looks good. Picturesque, and people are out walking their dogs in it and stuff. I’m over it. I like it. Not cosy, but not without magic.

In Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones I read about a study on how women add qualifiers to their statements. For example “‘I like this, don’t you?” Or “This is terrible, isn’t it?” The study showed that in their sentence structure women were often looking for reinforcement for their feelings and opinions. They didn’t just make statements and stand behind them- “This is beautiful.” “This is terrible.”

The other thing was that women often used words when speaking such as maybe, somehow, perhaps.

I’m thinking about this. Wondering if I do this. And noticing that I often do. It’s interesting to become aware of it, and to think about how my use of words changes when I take away those qualifiers. I can see how in some cases, speaking in definite statements could be clarifying, even empowering.

Of course there are times when I need to say Maybe I do, I don’t know, or I somehow became this or that, but there are times when weeding out my “I guesses” and my “Don’t you thinks?” could be useful.

I guessed a bear, but no, it is a groundhog. (One who sees with his body and his paws as well as his eyes, apparently. )

And this page painted black that I almost threw away, but then didn’t after I asked what it was?

His shadow, of course.

Country for a couple days. Got to slow down and got to be outside a lot and got to get muddy. It was good. Went to a secret spot, climbed up to it sliding on the mud, ducking under branches.

And this was up there: green itself.

And these dark red and light straw colours were restful.

Even in winter there was plenty of play food around to collect. And when you play that your house is under a tree without realizing the time it gives you a sense of relief.

I wandered around for awhile looking at woodpiles and old buoys.

There’s no wind, the air is damp, and suddenly birds are in your world again. It’s like pressing Reset. It’s like pressing Esc.

A. found a pile of Valentine’s themed scraps and fabrics lying around my desk. I’d pulled them together thinking I’d make a Valentine collage but didn’t get around to it. So I let her use the stuff and she came up with these two beauties. (In the first one I made lines for her to get started with.)

Inspired by hers, I made a quick one today before putting all the scraps away:

The charm and crookedness of hers can’t be beat though.

There’s been so little snow that when we get a bit we literally drop everything and run out to play before it gets rained away again.

This snow was so wet we were all soaked pretty much right away. But children, they do not care about such trivial matters.

Made asparagus quiche for my mother’s 60th birthday party dinner.

The “Puzzle Machine”. (And the Puzzle Wrecking Machine?)

A few hours without kids. Their toys laying around in quiet sunlight were nice.

Out on a walk I saw these straight, bare branches. I love looking at bare branches in spring, ready to burst but so contained and stark.

And this is my aunt’s clothesline. I love clotheslines and they’re awesome in winter.

-EA saying “hej då” (goodbye) to Per and waving
- buying asparagus
- EA and A sitting in the grocery cart looking all blasé instead of the more usual whiny meltdown mode
-coffee oh blessed coffee
-time to write for the hell of it
-clementines
-EA eating, so happily and satisfied
-A’s awesome collages she made while talking to herself in Swedish as if she was running a kids crafts how-to show
-big snowflakes fallin’
-watching, in a sort of tired, amused-annoyed way, EA and A roll around on the rug like crazy puppies, mashing pizza crusts into it, laughing maniacally
-wine
-blankets
-so February

notes: rebel against self more
do things you don’t expect yourself to do
find ways to make everyday-ish days more interesting less thought more action/motion

There’s definitely something in the way kids play.

There’s something in their urgency. Build! Get in! Have the party! Tear it down! Build a different one! What’s next? What’s next? Don’t stop to analyse. (What does analyse even mean?)

There’s something in making spaces for yourself to crawl into and be whoever you want.

There’s something in that constant motion.

Just keep moving and you’ll figure it out.

I like watching things rise in the oven. An odd form of relaxation. You’re done, now all you have to do is wait.

I got out and it was so windy and cold my fingers were immediately frozen and I could barely see or breathe but I just wanted to see, for myself, and not just from the car windows.

I only stood there on the boardwalk for maybe five minutes, but it was long enough to shake away my cobwebs and remind me that the Wild exists. This was exactly the kind of wild ocean I used to picture and miss when I lived in Stockholm. Way beyond my control, big enough to give everything perspective, and with that wind tearing past that shakes away everything fake, everything flimsy, everything unnecessary.

You catch a toddler doing this and they look at you like, What, lady? I’m just doin’ my job! It’s part of my job description, already!