I was always told that when you plan to write something the first thing you need to decide is who are your readers. That will influence your style, content and so on. I think it makes sense and it is probably the reason why I could never keep a journal. Some people write their journal in the form of letters to an imaginary friend and I can see how that would make it easier.
This is a "secret" blog, meaning that I didn't tell any of my relatives or friends that I am writing it. That might come later, but for the moment only my husband knows about it. When I write, I know he is one of my readers, but that it not enough, because eventually I would like more diverse readers. So when I write I think of a few of my favorite bloggers and imagine that they might be reading, a bit like writing for an imaginary friend.
My top imaginary friend is Sciencewoman (who recently changed her pseudonym to SciWo). I started reading her blog more than three years ago when I was expecting my first child. She was a graduate student, like me, also expecting her first child but a bit further ahead in her pregnancy. Reading her stories was comforting and reassuring and even when I was too discouraged or depressed to read anything else, because it all seemed uninteresting and irrelevant, I still read her blog. You could say she is a role model for me and so it is probably natural that I write my blog as if she were reading it.
Today SciWo has announced that she will stop writing her blog and I feel quite sad, almost abandoned. It is very silly, but hopefully if she knew this she would be flattered rather than annoyed. Her last post gave me food for thought as well. Simplifying a lot, essentially she is saying that she is now perfectly happy with her life and her job. She is exactly where she wants to be and I can see that how this would be a good time for her to stop writing. I wish her and her smart and beautiful daughter a bright future.
Of course I now realize that I feel the need to write because I am not happy with how things are. I don't know if my career choice is right, or whether I will be able to pursue it without sacrificing other things that are important to me. Add to that the fact that the choices I make now can lead to profoundly different future lifestyle for me and my family in the future (For example will we end up living in India? If so will I be able to make it my home?). These uncertainties, with a bit of comic relief every now and then, are what I am going to write about and maybe in a few years I will be so satisfied with my life that I will have no impulse to write about it.
After
I just talked to my mom over the phone. She was coming back from the funeral. Apparently the priest did a lousy job in his oration, but it doesn't really matter because, for reasons I cannot explain now, the death of my father has not been made public yet, so most people who knew him were not present at his funeral.
What affected me the most from the phone call is what she said about seeing him in the coffin, yesterday. She says he looked more relaxed than she ever saw him in life, completely at peace. My mom is an atheist and so am I, so please don't read afterworld hopes into this. It just means that maybe he didn't suffer in his last moments? I so hope so. Or maybe it means that he always suffered - or better said, struggled - in his life and now it's over? I am not talking about physical suffering here, just psychological. He was constantly at war with the rest of the world, so it is indeed possible that we never saw him relaxed.
Ultimately, this just adds more weight to what I was already feeling, that I should have been there.
What affected me the most from the phone call is what she said about seeing him in the coffin, yesterday. She says he looked more relaxed than she ever saw him in life, completely at peace. My mom is an atheist and so am I, so please don't read afterworld hopes into this. It just means that maybe he didn't suffer in his last moments? I so hope so. Or maybe it means that he always suffered - or better said, struggled - in his life and now it's over? I am not talking about physical suffering here, just psychological. He was constantly at war with the rest of the world, so it is indeed possible that we never saw him relaxed.
Ultimately, this just adds more weight to what I was already feeling, that I should have been there.
Today
My father's funeral is today - in fact it is happening as I type this. I could have taken a flight two days ago, with my husband and children, and I could be there today to see him being buried. But I didn't, because going would have meant putting strain on the relationship with the only two relatives I have left, my mother and my sister. Why? It is so hard even for me to understand it, so I will not try and explain it here. They just preferred not to see me now, they would rather see me later in the year, when things are better. Let's leave it at that for now.
But it is not the first time that someone I am close to dies when I am not there and it is so hard to even believe it if you are not given the chance to take part in all the rituals that, in my mind, exist precisely for the purpose of giving some closure. I hope that writing about it, now and in the future, will help.
But it is not the first time that someone I am close to dies when I am not there and it is so hard to even believe it if you are not given the chance to take part in all the rituals that, in my mind, exist precisely for the purpose of giving some closure. I hope that writing about it, now and in the future, will help.
What I want now
So far December has not been kind with me. For the rest of the month, this is what I would like, in random order:
- By the and of the month, I would like to be free from my breathing problems and panic attacks. It seems a reasonable time for the anti-depressants to kick in, so I can be hopeful. (however, not in my control)
- I would like to reconnect with my older son, whom I have neglected a bit since my surgery two weeks ago. I want him to feel again secure as he used to feel earlier, a fearless little boy who can be bold because he has no doubts that his parents are just behind him. (partially in my control)
- I would like to start a scientific collaboration with my husband, as a way to get back into live research. As a start, I will just read some literature about a project he has in mind. (mostly in my control)
- I have mysteriously lost 3Kg in the last week. That's not a bad thing, it gives me hope I might eventually get back to my pre-two-babies self. I know I have lost this weight because of stress, illness and worry, but what is done is done and I would like to avoid getting it back, if at all possible without jeopardizing my health and sanity. (in my control?)
- On a related note, I really need to start doing some minimal abdominal training to help my wounded muscles regain their strength and stretch. (totally in my control)
- I would like to have a preliminary meeting with an adoption agency, just to see how things work, before leaving to visit my husband's relatives. That means it has to happen this week or early next week. (only partially in my control)
- I want to pick some Christmas gifts for my children and their little cousins. Not at all necessary, since people don't really do Christmas in this family, but why not? (totally in my control)
- I want to discuss the plan of a cottage that might be built in the mountains jointly by our family and some friends. Things have been dragging and I would like to help finalize the plan over the coming vacation - where the friends themselves will be present - so that the work can start in the new year. (partially in my control)
- It would be nice if my younger son could put out a couple of teeth and stop feeling miserable already. (not in my control)
- I would like the time spent with my husband's family to be relaxing and conflict-free. There are lots of nice things we could do, let's hope things go the way I imagine them for once. (half in my control)
- I would like to feel that I have some family left, even now that three people important to me have died in less than one year. However, things are complicated (not in my control)
I hate time zones
I have hated them with a passion since I left Europe in 2002. I really wish the Earth were flat.
Now I am here in India, it is 10:30 AM, I have a thousand thoughts going through my mind and nobody I might want to talk to will be up before at least another two or three hours.
Now I am here in India, it is 10:30 AM, I have a thousand thoughts going through my mind and nobody I might want to talk to will be up before at least another two or three hours.
I'm a wreck
I am having a rough month. My panic attacks are back and that is worse than it sounds, really. The constant feeling of not getting enough air and then, every now and then, the full fledged attack when you feel that your airways are closing.
But writing about it makes it worse, so I had decided not to blog about this stuff right now, even though it is what I think about every minute of my day. Which is not helping, I realized that. So I had decided to focus on trying out my new cookbooks, as a distraction, and I was going to blog about that, to take my mind off things and take deep breaths.
Then yesterday I was told that my father had been taken to the hospital and by night he was gone. I didn't even have the time to consider taking a flight back home. We knew he was sick, but not how much. In any case, my family dynamics are complicated, now more than ever, and it seems he had kept from us how serious the illness really was. And I haven't talked to him since I saw him in September.
I will surely write more about my dad at some point, but right now it is not helping. When I got the news I didn't cry but I had a massive panic attack and I was taken to the hospital for a check up just in case it was something more serious. Trust me to make it all about me... :) (sad smile)
But writing about it makes it worse, so I had decided not to blog about this stuff right now, even though it is what I think about every minute of my day. Which is not helping, I realized that. So I had decided to focus on trying out my new cookbooks, as a distraction, and I was going to blog about that, to take my mind off things and take deep breaths.
Then yesterday I was told that my father had been taken to the hospital and by night he was gone. I didn't even have the time to consider taking a flight back home. We knew he was sick, but not how much. In any case, my family dynamics are complicated, now more than ever, and it seems he had kept from us how serious the illness really was. And I haven't talked to him since I saw him in September.
I will surely write more about my dad at some point, but right now it is not helping. When I got the news I didn't cry but I had a massive panic attack and I was taken to the hospital for a check up just in case it was something more serious. Trust me to make it all about me... :) (sad smile)
Do we believe in Santa?
This year we are spending Christmas with my in-laws. We will be visiting them for two weeks and my husband's brothers will be there are well, at least for a few days. My older son will have fun with his cousin J, who is a couple of years older than him and therefore his personal hero.
I don't really mind spending Christmas away from my family. It's been a while since I spent the Holidays with them and to be honest people in my family are best kept away from each other, for their own good. What I miss a little bit is the whole atmosphere of Christmas: the lights, maybe the snow, people making plans and this sort of large scale countdown that always ends up affecting me a little bit even when I don't have much to count down to.
I think it is about the childhood memories. Back then Christmas was really something special and I would spend the fall months making gifts from my relatives, and thinking about what I would like to receive myself of course, but it really wasn't just about the gifts. I can't quite pin it down. Partly it was the fact that I knew that the celebration was really for us, the children. I would be allowed to arrange the decorations, attempt some culinary experiments, decide when the gifts should be opened and all that. I could start discussing such important matters with my relatives months in advance and I enjoyed waiting even more than the day itself.
Santa would come on Christmas Eve, after dessert and coffee. We would hear the bells of his sleigh and run to the balcony, but by then he would had left leaving behind two large black bags (garbage bags, in fact) with mine and my sister's initials on them, written with golden stars. Inside there were always lots of gifts, some that we had asked for and some not. I later learned by chance that all gifts given by family and friends were put in those bags so that we wouldn't know who had given what.
The family would gather again the next day for the Christmas luncheon, but my favorite day was the 26th, at my aunt's place. We would eat the leftovers, some of my aunt's friends would come by and I could get people to play with me and the new toys. Nothing like lots of attention for a Christmas gift!
I haven't celebrated Christmas recently, but as my son gets older I feel that I should revive some traditions for him. At the tropics with the Indian half of the family though, it is not the right place to start. And it hits me now that this is one of those things that my husband and I don't have in common, he has no childhood memories associated with Christmas. In many ways it is more fun like this, I like it when he tells me about his life as a child, it is like reading a novel because it is all so mysterious, and I think variety will be good for the children too, when they are old enough to listen.
We will eventually have our own family traditions, but if we end up living in India the magic of Christmas, the way I have experienced it in my childhood, will probably not be part of them. I shouldn't care because I am not raising my children as Christians and without that you could say it is just a commercial event, but that's not really the point. As an adult you can rationalize things like that, but as a child it is good to read books about the night before Christmas and decorate the tree and all that.
I haven't talked about this with my husband yet, so I don't know what our official position on Santa is going to be. I suspect we are going to go with the flow and do whatever people around us are doing, but I am going to be a bit sad not to have the chance to recreate the magic and suspense of Christmas for my little ones.
I don't really mind spending Christmas away from my family. It's been a while since I spent the Holidays with them and to be honest people in my family are best kept away from each other, for their own good. What I miss a little bit is the whole atmosphere of Christmas: the lights, maybe the snow, people making plans and this sort of large scale countdown that always ends up affecting me a little bit even when I don't have much to count down to.
I think it is about the childhood memories. Back then Christmas was really something special and I would spend the fall months making gifts from my relatives, and thinking about what I would like to receive myself of course, but it really wasn't just about the gifts. I can't quite pin it down. Partly it was the fact that I knew that the celebration was really for us, the children. I would be allowed to arrange the decorations, attempt some culinary experiments, decide when the gifts should be opened and all that. I could start discussing such important matters with my relatives months in advance and I enjoyed waiting even more than the day itself.
Santa would come on Christmas Eve, after dessert and coffee. We would hear the bells of his sleigh and run to the balcony, but by then he would had left leaving behind two large black bags (garbage bags, in fact) with mine and my sister's initials on them, written with golden stars. Inside there were always lots of gifts, some that we had asked for and some not. I later learned by chance that all gifts given by family and friends were put in those bags so that we wouldn't know who had given what.
The family would gather again the next day for the Christmas luncheon, but my favorite day was the 26th, at my aunt's place. We would eat the leftovers, some of my aunt's friends would come by and I could get people to play with me and the new toys. Nothing like lots of attention for a Christmas gift!
I haven't celebrated Christmas recently, but as my son gets older I feel that I should revive some traditions for him. At the tropics with the Indian half of the family though, it is not the right place to start. And it hits me now that this is one of those things that my husband and I don't have in common, he has no childhood memories associated with Christmas. In many ways it is more fun like this, I like it when he tells me about his life as a child, it is like reading a novel because it is all so mysterious, and I think variety will be good for the children too, when they are old enough to listen.
We will eventually have our own family traditions, but if we end up living in India the magic of Christmas, the way I have experienced it in my childhood, will probably not be part of them. I shouldn't care because I am not raising my children as Christians and without that you could say it is just a commercial event, but that's not really the point. As an adult you can rationalize things like that, but as a child it is good to read books about the night before Christmas and decorate the tree and all that.
I haven't talked about this with my husband yet, so I don't know what our official position on Santa is going to be. I suspect we are going to go with the flow and do whatever people around us are doing, but I am going to be a bit sad not to have the chance to recreate the magic and suspense of Christmas for my little ones.
