10Aug

The Cowardly Lion Learns Success

I’ve known for months that once I moved to a new country and had the daily shopping responsibilities all to myself, I would quickly need to become a Brave Woman. Now that I’m here, I feel instantly disqualified for two reasons:
1. Brave Women do not lie in bed in the morning wondering if they can push the snooze button just 599 more times.
2. Brave Women are not afraid of the grocery store.

I feel like I ordered a side order of change, but when I wasn’t looking, someone added a combo meal with extra fries and super-sized the whole shebang. Now, I’m enveloped by a newness that I expected only in a fuzzy, theoretical kind of way.

It’s harder than anything to be patient with myself, a life-long perfectionist thrust into surroundings where trial-and-error is the only option. However, I’m slowly learning the vital lesson of how to appreciate each day by its small successes:
Drying three loads of laundry on a clothesline…
Ordering lunch meat at the deli next door…
Lighting a gas stove without horrendously burning myself, passing out from the fumes, or destroying more than two matches…
Chatting for five minutes with another mom at the park…
Recognizing our bus stop…
Learning how to say “Don’t throw the gravel!” like a good Italian mamma…

I wish I could write more about the whole experience, but time seems to be slipping away in erratic bursts. These first days have managed to be ridiculously short and impossibly long at the same time, leaving me with twenty-four misshapen hours to navigate each time. Plus, the combination of jet lag and internet withdrawal has me in a very woozy state of being.

Now, to get Natalie out of bed (where she put herself, by the way… What mother has to forbid her two-year-old from napping before lunch?) and to sweep up the inch of high-quality Italian dust that magically appears on our floor every hour, on the hour. Another [completely, utterly, and exhaustively] new day is underway!

6Aug

The TSA Should Be Banned

Navigating airport security with a toddler:

1) Grit teeth.
2) Take shoes off two-year-old.
3) Explain to distraught two-year-old that she will get her shoes back, provided that they don’t turn out to be flowery size-6T bombs.
4) Go through security gate to wait for our unsecured valuables.
5) Watch helplessly as husband–shoeless, beltless, and holding toddler–is instructed to take stroller to the farthest outskirts of civilization for special processing.
6) Observe x-ray technician letting our carry-ons through without even glancing at the screen.
7) Suppress the urge to put the carry-ons back through security just so someone will notice my excellent Ziploc-bagging skills.
8) Attempt to re-pack liquids and/or gels, laptops, teddy bears, and boarding passes while putting on shoes, belt, and four backpacks before next person in line manages to clear security gate. (Keep in mind that husband and child are still trekking back from the nether regions of Stroller Security Land.) Hope that next person in line will require a strip search.
9) Feel guilty.
10) Reunite with husband, daughter, and–eventually–stroller, once it has been deemed innocent of international terrorism. What a relief.

(We have, in fact, arrived in Italia. More updates once I snap out of the hazy world of Jet Lag.)

1Aug

The Growing Lack of Anticipation

I’ve been living inside of a to-do list the last several days. The result: far greater productivity and far less giddiness than I’d hoped. I miss the agonizing buzz of joy that used to haunt me for weeks leading up to kid’s camp. The wriggling, sleepless nights… the obsessive daydreams… the hilarity exploding like a string of grenades in my mind… I’d like it all back now, please.

30Jul

Starting Young

Natalie sat down at the breakfast table this morning, put her head in her hands, and sighed, “Mommy, I want a beer.”

My daughter, taking underage drinking to a whole new decade…

29Jul

Perfect Moment

A storm hit last night, the kind with rhythmic bass notes, strobe light effects and raindrops like overzealous bouncers. Being the hard-core ravers we are, Dan, Natalie, and I made sure to run through the worst of the rain. (Three times, in fact; we weren’t quite drenched enough after the first two.) As we collapsed inside, I discovered a Perfect Moment right there with my little family, thoroughly soaked and laughing out loud.

::Smile::

27Jul

Countdown Begins

After 7 months of being told “your papers will come any day now…”
After 960 unanswered phone calls to The Godfather…
After 2 summer moves to homes that aren’t actually ours…
After 6 excursions to the Italian Consulate…
After 38 emotional upheavals in the last week alone…
…the real countdown begins:

6 days until we leave for Italy.

Naturally, my brain has been replaced by a kaleidoscope. Cheerful orange elation clashes with deep purple worry, which keeps running headlong into clean green practicality, which occasionally shifts into an absurd yellow panic. And then there are the sudden revelations speckling across my vision like a TV gone haywire:
We won’t get Mac ‘n’ Cheese in Italy! (How will we ever survive?)
I’m going to be delivering this baby in a foreign country! (Do they know about C-sections over there?)
Italians speak Italian! (Why, oh why didn’t I put more effort into becoming fluent?)
We’re leaving behind some of the best friends we’ve ever had! (How have I never realized how much I’ll miss them?)

But then my less-placenta-brained husband reminds me of that day three years ago in Venice when we talked about throwing away our return tickets. And then I remember early morning bike rides and noontime strolls through the open markets and lazy afternoon drinks in the piazzas, sunset walks through the parks and hilarious late night gatherings in the pizzerias. I remember how effortlessly the Italians talk, their whole bodies animated with the joy of carrying on conversations. I remember the lovely winding roads and the rolling hills lined with grapevines. I remember the pizza and the pasta and the coffee and the wine and the chocolate.

And then all the pesky, swarming details seem less than important because, hey — we’re moving to Italy!

25Jul

Brain Cell Exodus

Yes, I know, too long without writing. Inexcusable. (Except that it’s very, very excusable.)

While I’ve been itching for a quiet hour or four with my laptop, the world has been spinning a little too fast… cartwheeling too, and back-flipping, and careening through all known variations of insanity. If I survive it with enough brain cells to count past 4, this summer will end up on a “Top 5” list (most likely Top 5 Reasons I Can No Longer Count Past 4).

Natalie tends to say things best these days:
“Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, I love you, Mommy, I want to go home now.”

Me too, kiddo.

(Stay tuned for exciting news!)*

*As soon as I figure out what it is…

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