The work of being me

This piece appeared in Zadok Perspectives No. 110 (Autumn 2011).

***

At the end of last year I was constantly sick and felt run down, even exhausted. Yet other friends were juggling kids and paid employment; and here was I, a stay at home mum, so wrecked I fell asleep at nine o'clock every night. I finally had a big cry with my husband. I told him I felt like a complete failure: unlike so many other mums, I didn't even work, and yet I was so tired my bones ached.

He looked at me bewildered. He pointed out that I did at least a day's volunteer work every week. On top of that, I juggled three blogs and wrote more than a hundred posts for them in a year; I published ten articles in newspapers or journals; I drafted another half dozen articles that had been rejected and were sitting in the back of the filing cabinet; I gave a lecture, wrote a paper and tutored a subject at uni; and I was raising three kids, two of them pre-school. Put like that, I guess I did a bit of work. Perhaps it was okay to be tired.

Even so, at some level I felt like it wasn't. After all, it wasn't 'real' work. I enjoy fooling around with words; I enjoy reading with refugee kids; I enjoy preparing resources for churches; I enjoy tutoring uni students; and for the most part, I even enjoy my own children! And I've always loved doing the laundry. But when I enjoy it all so much, it's hard to feel that doing these things is anything more than a hausfrau fooling around.

Yet it is work that needs to be done. Someone has to do the washing, or we won't have anything to wear; someone has to raise our kids. Someone has to read with refugees, teach students and engage the church. Someone has to tell stories about this crazy sad and wonderful world. In a small way, I have been invited to be that someone.

When I put these activities together, however, they're not neatly encapsulated in a role like 'doctor' or 'lawyer' or even 'writer' or 'housewife'. Instead, they reflect a whole life, sparkling with love and play and work all mixed up together. This whole life is not a job; instead, it's no more and no less than just being me, responding to the invitations set before me: a process I might identify as following God's call. So although the things I do are clearly tiring, it is difficult to name them as work.

Sadly, too, just being me doesn't pay the bills. And so the other reason that all this industry doesn't feel like much is that it was, for the most part, unpaid. I earned a little from tutoring, a little from published articles, a little from click throughs from my blogs to an online bookseller – all up, about half a mortgage payment. Hardly enough to break out the champers, or feed and clothe three kids.

Living without making a significant financial contribution to the household is an ongoing exercise in trust, and at times I feel like a freeloader. Sure, my husband and I negotiated this position; it makes perfect sense for him to be in paid employment, and for me to run the household. But every now and then, I panic. I want to earn my own money, show him my worth, and stop being dependent. In our society, the money we earn is a quantifiable achievement, and the thing that so often honours our ability, training and hard work. I feel like I am missing out.

I find myself browsing blogs on how to make my own blogs pay; or thinking about articles that might sell for cash. When I'm really down, I even contemplate being a secretary again.

– and then I wake up to myself. I'm not going to put tummy slimming ads on my food blog, or gaudy advertisements next to a post on grief. That's far more humiliating than being financially dependent on someone who respects me for who I am, not what I earn.

There's a lesson in that. My husband knows my worth and values what I do; my friends and community don't judge me for the lack of a weekly pay packet – so why judge myself? While my activities may sometimes feel pointless for their lack of coherence or direction, they also feel right. Could I ignore the money, and think about the blessings of living out this call instead?

When I stop for a moment and reflect, I soon realise how great they are. After all, how privileged I am to be able to share books with young refugees. How fortunate I am to be able to tell stories, and to have found a medium to share them. How honoured I am to be asked to guide students in their studies. How fun it is to dream up activities and watch the church kids run with them. How delightful it is to cook for my family and friends. And how lucky I am to love doing laundry, and to have a family that generates so much of it!

A Thursday ritual

My husband is in charge on Thursday afternoons. He comes home early from work; collects the kids from school, always remembering a snack; takes them to the park of their choice for a long play; then brings them home and cooks dinner. Later, he reads them stories and puts them to bed.

Because I can't keep my mouth shut, can't stop myself from taking over the kids and the cooking and the shouting if I'm at home, I agree to be banished from the house. I head to a local bar, buy a glass of wine, and settle down at 'my' table to read or write. Later, perhaps, I might meet a friend and grab a bite to eat; then it's off to choir to sing my heart out and sit round gossiping with a group of mums. It's a highlight of my week, the evening I look forward to from sometime early Wednesday. Sure, most weeks sparkle with small good things; but this ritual feeds my soul. And what is good for my soul is good for my kids; without it, I have a tendency to become tyrannical.

What intrigues me is how easily I will jeopardize, even cancel, it. Last week, there was no choir; instead, our choir director held a concert of her piano students, which include my daughter. Meanwhile, my husband had not been able to be home for dinner yet that week. Because there was no choir and my husband hadn't been home, I thought I should stick around; even so, my husband urged me to go out, then meet us at the concert. But I decided that would be selfish; that we needed to eat as a family; and that I should stay.

When my husband and the kids surged in the door from school, at least one person looked disappointed that I had crashed their only weeknight together. I began to worry about dinner and what we would eat even as my husband heated pasta water. One kid shouted, another shrieked, I yelled, and my husband looked at me. 'Maybe,' I said, 'maybe, I really should go out? Would you mind?'.

'Go!' he urged me, 'please go!' and gave me a big hug. So finally, an hour later than usual, I pulled on my boots, packed my bag, and toddled off, wittering and apologising all the way – and feeling so selfish. Extraordinary, really, given that I had done the whole kiddie food – story – bed routine three nights in a row, and would do it again on Friday; Fridays are always a late night for him.

I have internalized so many ideas of what makes a good mother; one of them is about being present. A good mother doesn't go out for no reason; and she certainly doesn't squander money on wine in bars and a meal out! And yet, is this really true? Surely after seven years I have learned by now that without this sort of activity I become lonely, bored, ground down and angry; going out gives me the fillip I need to enjoy my children and to want to be with them most of the time.

My life revolves around laundry and floors, playgrounds and dishes; my Thursday ritual gives me a bit of structure, a bit of adult input. I get to walk at my speed, chat with adults or sit quietly. It's the only meal I eat in complete dignity, with no need to discipline anyone, no complaints about the food, and nobody's crusts ending up on my plate. Even without choir, just two hours alone out of the house far from the jobs that perpetually nag me is profoundly life-giving.

I may not be able to claim it for myself every week, but I give thanks for a husband who is wiser than me, who can gently nudge me towards the front door. 'Go!' he urges, 'Go!'. Obedient wife that I am, I nod my head, pull on my shoes and pack my bag; and dutifully I walk right out that door.

Photograph shows my middle daughter 'flying' to Mousehole in Cornwall - it's how I feel when I leave the house on Thursdays!

A linen package, sealed with wax

When's the last time you got a package from Dharamsala? I received one this week. It was stitched into a linen pouch and sealed with red wax. As I collected it from our veranda on a chilly autumn morning, I thought I heard the whisper of Tibetan horns sounding through the Himalayas.

I've gone through a few shirts lately, and also a couple of pairs of pants; I am one of those rare women who wears her clothes out. When you have as few clothes as me, losing a few things means a bi-weekly washing cycle and regular dressing crises. So I trawled through the op shops, but didn't find anything; in any case, second hand leggings are icky. My options were to go to the nearest mall and buy an armful of stuff made in sweatshops, or try a little harder. The mall is what most of us do most of the time; and sometimes, when I'm frantic, I do too.

However, I try not to. For one, buying clothes made by someone in desperate conditions is hardly ethical. That someone is probably not Western, nor well paid, nor looked after in their workplace. That someone is almost certainly poor. But because that someone is so far away, so abstract an entity, we pretend they don't exist. We pretend that the clothes have dropped out of the sky, untouched by human hand until they landed on this clothes rack, here in front of us. Supporting this system holds people in a system of entrenched poverty and powerlessness that they cannot easily escape, and it's not a system I want to uphold.

I wonder if we'd change how we shopped if every item of clothing was tagged with a photograph of the worker who made it, with a description of their wages, the cost of living, their working conditions and their family situation. Could we still buy a $12 t-shirt if, attached to the label, was a photograph of a 15 year old Guatemalan girl named Maria: lives in a concrete bunkroom, sleeps on the floor with a dozen co-workers, works 12 to 14 hours a day, and hopes to save enough money for a bus ticket home so she can visit her mother, who is dying from poverty-related causes? Sewn from cotton grown by Ravi, who is sprayed with toxic chemicals on a regular basis and whose village water supply has been contaminated by industrialised agriculture? If it was personal, if we could attach a real person to the production of this t-shirt, these trousers, perhaps we'd investigate organically grown fabrics, and clothing made under fair trade guidelines.

I hear suggestions that such workers need to unionise and get themselves out of this mess, and certainly many workers are beginning to do just that. But millions aren't there yet; and rather than hold them down, I would prefer to be part of the solution, helping to create a market for fair wages and good workplaces.

I'm also not convinced that the way out of poverty is through charity. I'm looking for a more permanent solution. And I think that when people are paid fair wages for their labour; when they work in safe conditions; when they farm in non-toxic ways; when they belong to collectives that ensure their children go to school and have access to some medical care, then we are all participating in a system that is dignified, merciful and fair.

After all, we are degraded when our consumption exploits others; and as charitable donors, we can easily slip into self-righteousness. But if we make good decisions when we buy the stuff we need, we can become no more, and no less, than ethical consumers. At the other end of the arrangement, producers don't have to live and work in terrible conditions, nor do they have to endure our charity. Instead, they can become no more, and no less, than ethical farmers and manufacturers. We are all dignified by fair trade.

So instead of going to the mall, a few weeks ago I spent half an hour online and ordered some things from a workshop in Dharamsala. People of Buddhist, Muslim and Hindu faiths, many of them refugees, work there. The workshop provides skills training and supplementary education, and all workers, both male and female, have access to sick leave and maternity leave. The workshop is certified by an external body, so I feel assured that the conditions are fair. On my desk, I have a printed catalogue; it includes a photograph of the workers. Their workplace is an exception to an industry that is renowned for its ruthless brutality – it is no wonder so many of them are smiling.

And in the parcel that arrived today? Soft leggings, two shirts, and a gorgeous red scarf the colour of His Holiness the Dalai Lama's habit. Perhaps that's why, when I opened the door, I could hear the echoes of Tibetan horns calling from across the world.

Chunks of this blog first appeared in the article 'Looking Good' in Zadok Perspectives No. 104. I am reproducing it here because a few people have asked me to post a list of where I buy fair trade stuff; the list is here, or find it under the 'pages' headings.

Great house, shame about the neighbours

 

What does it mean to love thy neighbour? I'm confronted by this question every day, because I don't.

On one side is a disgruntled older woman who loathes us because we, to her, represent gentrification. We know this not because she talks with us – she won't even acknowledge our greetings – but because, having refused to meet with us regarding our renovation, in a surprise move she took us to the building tribunal to complain. When we appeared before the panel, her issues turned out to have nothing to do with the building; instead, she and her adult sons ranted about the yuppies who were changing the suburb, and told everyone how hard their lives had been in the post-war migration period fifty years earlier. Notwithstanding that they now drive a large late-model Mercedes, they are, apparently, life's victims and we are the privileged ones they love to hate. It's been five years since our renovation, and they still haven't forgiven us; and I am beginning to realise they never will.

Yesterday, I discovered a sturdy five-foot-long wooden bench in the hard rubbish. As I carried it home, my two year old tripped over and skinned her palms. She began to wail, so I put down the bench, sat on it, and gave her a big cuddle. I had a vague thought that we may have presented an amusing picture, even charming – mother and daughter having a moment on a green bench in the middle of the footpath – but clearly not. My neighbour bustled around the side of her house to see what the commotion was; but when she saw us, she ignored my cheerful greeting, hissed through her teeth, and turned her back on us. Again.

A few doors up in the other direction is a couple who moved in perhaps four years ago, then had a son. I've greeted them every single time I've seen them in the street or bumped into them at the local shops, and the mother is yet to do anything other than stare straight through me.

There's another guy who doesn't acknowledge my greetings; the invisible people who scurry from their back doors to their carports and so out via the lane; and the family across the street which, although I have dropped in with gifts of quinces and cake, still do no more than wave if they're caught directly in my line of sight, and I wave first.

For a few years I thought that perhaps we hadn't been here long enough, and that if I kept smiling and greeting and waving, then we'd settle into the street. But lately I've realised we've been here almost ten years; before I know it, one of us will be carted out in a pine box and our neighbours will barely register.

When I was a kid, we were in and out of the neighbours' houses. Kids flowed between four or five houses in the street; neighbours stopped to say hello and swap lemons and figs; there was always someone around when we needed an emergency babysitter. Our street was choked with traffic, but we'd climb the tree in the front, hang over the footpath and give pedestrians a start; we'd share rides and walks to school; we'd hang out after school and play. Here, this is unimaginable.

It's not that I want my neighbours to be my best friends. But I'd like a cheerful greeting, a bit of 'how's the weather', or a cup of tea in someone's kitchen from time to time. I could use a safe house to drop my kids in an emergency; and I'd love to have a neighbour's kid come by for a play. For that matter, I'd even appreciate the simple courtesy of people returning my greetings. Yet with the exception of a busy older couple who live across the street, I have no indication that anyone else wants any form of interaction at all.

And at some level, why should they? They, like me, must have dozens of friends and companions and fellow-travellers; why add the connections of neighbours? Who really needs to know anyone else?

And yet, why not? Why pretend we're all islands? We overlap at the shops, at the library, at school; our cars jostle for the limited parking out front of our houses; the cats explore each other's yards. Could it be possible that a little interaction might make our stay here a little more enjoyable, a little easier, perhaps even a little bit fun?

A couple of years ago, I wrote about some of my efforts to connect with my street. Sad to say, beyond calling 'hello' left right and centre, we haven't kept it up. We've hardly been encouraged; and in any case, there are times when it feels like whenever we go out front someone across the road is screaming abuse at someone, or our most dotty neighbour is shuffling past, shrieking. For a while, my kids wouldn't go out the front without me.

But they're older now; and we have a new bench. Yesterday's find is on the veranda beside the front door. It's exactly the right height for me to dump my groceries while I fumble for the key; but even better, it's perfect for a kid to sprawl on. The wood has been rendered soft by decades of other people's bottoms; this is one comfortable wooden bench. So comfortable, in fact, that last night, for the first time, my kids asked to go out the front and wait for dad to come home. They turned on the outside light and took books; he found them curled up in a pool of light, on the bench, the oldest reading aloud to the youngest.

It made me wonder whether it's time to dig out the chalk again and let them loose on the footpath while I sit out there shelling almonds. Maybe we can find a way to be present on the street again; maybe someone will smile at the kids; maybe someday someone will return my greeting.

And if not, then at least I will know we have tried.

Report Card: 36

When do I get to be entirely comfortable in my own skin? I've just turned 36, and I've been awkward my whole life. In many older women I see a confidence that I long for, and I've always hoped that by the time I'm forty I might, like these women, have grown into myself. But from where I'm standing now it feels a long way off, certainly further than four years.

Like so many women, I don't love my body. I don't hate it, and don't want another. Yet somehow I always feel the wrong size. If I were thinner, my clothes would fit better and I wouldn't have this muffin top peeking out my jeans; if I were fatter I'd be more beautifully rounded. My skinny friends are always stylish; my large friends just gorgeous; but somehow my thin bits are scrawny and my big bits are lumpy and I never, ever feel just right.

The only time I've loved my body was when I was pregnant. That's when I began to swim, my enormous balloon of a belly wafting below me as I meandered up and down the lap lanes. Once I had the babies I stopped swimming, however; I can't stand being seen in bathers. I love the feeling of being suspended in water, but every time I look at the swim bag I feel sick. I've tried sidestepping this with tank tops and big shorts, but I hate wearing them more than regular bathers; they just make me more obvious.

Yet the discomfort doesn't seem to have much to do with my body, per se. I can't imagine I'd feel different if I were glamorously thin with perfect olive skin. I would still hate being looked at, or feeling scrutinised by strangers. Really, the discomfort is about being noticed; and the physical side is only one aspect. At times this aversion has dominated how I've felt in public. I never used to sing, or laugh; I'd get highly anxious in shops or on public transport; I'd become flustered and stammer in coffee shops when the waiter came to take my order. I've only danced under the influence of exactly the right dose of alcohol, and usually not even then. Much of the time, I hate being observed; and I struggle with this.

I long to grow out of this discomfort, this desire to be invisible which has, at times, crippled me; I get so frustrated that I haven't managed it yet. But I'm beginning to realise it's a thing to keep working it, a gradually dawning state that will come with effort and patience, for when I look back over the years, I see change.

Although I never sang for many many years, now I sing every day. A few years back, having spent several years at a small church where singing was paramount, I realised it was time to get over my fear. I stayed at the church, joined a community singing group, and began singing to my kids. I've learned to listen, and to modulate my timing and tone; my singing voice has shifted from a whisper to a bray to something moderately tuneful. Not only that, but where once I stood stiff as a board, these days I find myself swaying, sufficiently lost in the act of singing to be able to move with the sound.

I used to get wildly flustered in shops, and at times I still get anxious. But gone are the days when I avoided them altogether; now I enjoy the hustle and bustle of the city streets. I used to get so panicky on public transport that I'd disembark early to avoid missing my stop; now, I stay seated til journey's end. For years I wore only black; but now I wear colour – lots of muted blues and greys, yes, but also pinks, reds and greens, impossible a decade ago. My black boots have been replaced by burgundy; my black Mary Janes by clogs sprinkled with flowers. Small things, perhaps, but indicators of change – though what slow change it is! At kindergarten, I smothered my pictures with thick black paint so no one would comment on their strangeness; they showed perspective and depth. At school, I found it easier to draw like everybody else, formulaic flowers and little girls in pink. Thirty years later, I am gradually unlearning the drawing, peeling back the paint, and depicting the world as I see it. I use words now instead of a brush, but it's the same game; and I'm finally doing it in public.

So at 36, looking back, I find things are progressing. Healing may be possible. It's taking a long time, quite literally decades, but I'm well on the way. No longer stuck in the desolate years of my teens, or that awful black hole of my early twenties, I feel like I've found good earth and am sinking down roots; I'm sending out new green shoots. And the more I unfurl in spirit, the more I unfold in public.

One day in my forties, perhaps I will blossom. I will put on a pretty dress without wincing; I will wear my bathers casually. I will write something long, and become one of those women I adore, big and bold and confidently present. When that day comes you will probably know; for not only will I be singing aloud, but you'll probably find me dancing.

Blame and Grief

Last week we were minding a baby, and from time to time she cried a little. It didn't bother me, except on Wednesday. On Wednesday, I felt angry; and when she cried, I wanted to blame somebody. I couldn't blame her; she's too little. So I blamed other things. For a while I blamed my own kids. If only they wouldn't play with the baby and make her so tired; if only they were a little more willing to walk another block or four while we settled her in the pram; if only they would just for five little minutes shut the hell up.

Then I blamed myself. Perhaps I took her out for too long; or held her upright when she wanted to lie flat; or lay her down when she wanted to sit up; or put her in the cot when she wanted a cuddle; or put her in the sling when she wanted to kick her legs on the floor. I blamed my floppy old body that is tired from hauling babies and toddlers around and resented carrying her in the sling all day. The previous day I had hauled her and a two year old and two backpacks for a mile; and on Wednesday I felt it, and I blamed my eco-pride that meant we walked not drove.

Meanwhile it's school holidays so my older two are home; and after a week of four kids at my side and a toddler with the runs and the baby in the house and cooking with my arms outstretched as she nestles in the sling, I also blamed my streak of perfectionism that drives me to make something nice for dinner and which makes caring for four children so difficult at times.

But late in the day, after all this angry blaming, I finally recognised my sadness.

Wednesday was my mother's birthday and because she died so long ago, nobody remembered. Tired or not, I waded through the day holding onto the baby like a life preserver. She cried for only a little while, but I was in such a hole that I played the blame game for hours; and still I held her close. As I breathed in her scent, hour after hour, slowly I realised I wasn't really angry. I just felt utterly bereft.

My mother and I fought constantly. We never really got along; even as a little girl I lived in opposition. Yet other children loved her. As I grew into adolescence and adulthood, I watched kids flock to her. They would crowd around her and tell her their secrets; they would nestle in and listen to stories; they would kneel beside her wheelchair, bumping against the footplates, and play with her shoelaces.

She died years before I had children of my own. She never met her grandchildren, and she never saw me become the adult I am now. A decade later, I find myself beginning to realise we are no longer in opposition, and I am no longer defined against her. I may not be her, but somehow I too have become one of those women children tell stories to, the sort of person who spends a party showing a four year old guest how the kitchen scales work, how to use the oven timer, how to make the apple machine spin. I know when a baby needs a feed or a sleep; and choose to spend days rocking a friend's little one who needs to snooze in this draughty old house that is not her own.

When this baby cried on Wednesday, instead of finding someone to blame perhaps instead I could admit the long-reaching tentacles of loss, and name them as the source of my anger. The baby, my kids, my own self: they didn't really bother me at all.

Instead, it was grief, pure and simple: my missing my mother's floppy grey cowl-necked jumpers and her tiny spotted hands; my remembering the way she used to run her fingers through her short thick hair; my yearning for her long-gone fisherman's smock, the pockets stuffed with crumpled tissues, the stub of a pencil and the little battered notebook in which she recorded the birds she saw; my recalling so many birthdays so long ago, and wondering which of her apple cakes she would have liked me to cook; and my slow realisation that perhaps the best present I could give her is this: to hold a friend's baby, to pat the baby's bottom, to pace the hall up and down, up and down, and to sing as she settles into sleep.

Babymoon

I'm enjoying a babymoon, dreamily in love with a little one. I'm drinking in the smell of the back of her neck, the sound of her trilling, the softness of her thighs. It's not my own, alas. But this fortnight, a friend is recovering from radioactive iodine treatment, which means she cannot spend time with her little one; and while her partner is at work I am caring for their girl. What a gift!

Every morning she is dropped off and has a cuddle in my arms. We go for a walk, and she sleeps in the pram; she wakes and chugs down her bottle, smiling all the while. Tummy full, she lies on her back and grabs her feet; she examines her toes, or chews something interesting. Later, I strap her into the sling and we hang out the washing, dust the house, or pick beans and figs from the garden.

This little one chuckles at every tickle and blurt. Lying in a pram under a shady tree, she stretches her arms to the dancing leaves and sings with happiness. In the sling, her body nestles into mine and my heart skips a beat in sheer delight.

I watch her and remember how much I have learned.

I struggled to love and make time for my first. I was the first of my friends to have children; I hadn't held a baby until I my own. I didn't understand that she needed to be near all day; she couldn't be left for hours while I did Important Things. Worse, I had no emotional capacity to offer what she needed; I was so drained that the very idea of holding her often made me cry.

But she taught me well. Slowly, I learned to hold her; slowly I learned to stay in eyesight and wait until she slept before hanging out the washing. With my second and third, I learned these lessons more perfectly; and my capacity for love grew vastly.

Paradoxically, it is only now I have three kids of my own that I have the time and energy to add a fourth. When I heard that friends were struggling to find a carer for their child, I offered at once. There is plenty of room in our lives for a little one – and the rewards are so abundant, as I knew they would be, that I feel almost selfish in offering.

So I want to say thank you, my sweet sparrows, for teaching me so well, and for showering me with gifts:-

The gift of baby time: I have learned that there is always time enough. We can watch a baby kick her legs, we can sit for hours and croon and sing. We are surrounded by great oceans of time, and all that needs to be done will be done; there is no need to rush. My children taught me to slow down and fall into the infinite universe of a baby's eyes; they taught me to savour it.

The gift of generosity: I have learned that love breeds love. Not one of my girls has uttered a word against this baby who has borrowed their mother's attention; instead, they have adored her and speak of her as their sister. Again and again they show me that love is expansive, generous, infectious; love generates love.

The gift of cuddles: I have learned to love with my body as well as my words; now I'll hold a baby close against me for hours at a time. For the most part, this is love enough for a little one; and their loving body close against mine feeds me no end.

The other morning, a friend and I took a walk with the baby. He held her up to little trees and ran her fingers through soft leaves; he paused under dappled light and talked about shadows. We stopped for coffee, and other patrons dropped by to admire and make eyes at the little one; she is neither of ours, but we took full credit and glowed with pride.

These two weeks have become a joyful holiday, a delightful break from the norm. And once again I find myself taking lessons from a baby, who reminds me that we have time in abundance; that love abounds; that everything is fascinating; and that babies need nothing but the world.

PS Years ago I read Annie Dillard's stunning autobiography, An American Childhood, in which she wrote that her mother referred to her children as 'my sweet sparrows'. The phrase must have stuck somewhere deep, because lately, perhaps a decade later, I find myself blurting it out at groups of children; it so perfectly describes a group of little people hopping around my ankles, cheeping frantically, and stealing the crumbs from my plate.