+ 0She noticed the girl in the red dress enter the theatre. She was on the second floor watching all the guests arriving and taking their seats just before the show. The girl in the red dress had some stylish man on her arm who didn’t look as excited to be there as she did. That didn’t stop her from waving her arms around wildly, trying to focus his attention on the space. Her hands darted from the…
all in a moment
Salty Poppy
+ 3As though a bull was towering over her exhaling, the air was hot and thick on the platform. Poppy fingered her bangs to rest back atop her over penciled brows and touched a drop of perspiration above her temple. Her eyes were fixed, she was staring over a woman’s shoulder at the blue ocean and sky. Beside the woman’s head were the words EUROPE’S FINEST BEACHES in bright pink.
Poppy recalled the…
Journal entry
+ 0This Monday I am hopeful.
More than usual.
Probably because I realize that when I expect greatness, greatness happens.
Yes, I did spend a hour in a government office line up that ended up directing me somewhere else.
Sure I walked for a half an hour when I thought I was 10 minutes away from the subway station.
And you wouldn’t be surprised to know that tomorrow my day will consist of much…
I’ve been showing my apartment all month, yet I have nothing to show for.
I’ve been showing my apartment all month, yet I have nothing to show for.
+ 1Blood gets the heart pumping. Gets the mind thinking. Gets the body moving.
My period is starting and I need to get writing. It’s become a science. Something I expect. Something I respect. It also saves money in Kleenex.
My mind is a jumble of lists and worries and plans and calls and schedules and reschedules. At times I feel it’s almost necessary to rip my hair out, but then I find my…
I had a lot of previous child care experience before Baby Xylo came along. Since I was 16-years-old I have been blessed with the opportunity to work with and learn from different families and their children. The ethnicities, sizes and ways of doing things ranged from family to family. I often saw and was taught things that strayed from what I was used to from my own family and culture. I would learn ways of how to handle things with one family that would sometimes not work with the next. I was able to pass on strategies and concepts that my own parents had taught me and somehow find a middle ground that everyone was happy with. Every family had different needs and circumstances but at the end of the day they had more things in common than I could visibly see.
Every Mom and Dad I’ve had the pleasure of working with has wanted the same basic things for their family at the end of the day. They want to be able to step out of the house, some for short periods at a time and others for long, very long hours of the day. They would take this time to go on with their careers, pursue their dreams, and/or have necessary personal time by themselves or together as a couple to stay mentally and physically healthy. But more importantly, they want to be able to do all of this while being assured that their children are in a safe and happy environment that allows them to learn and feel loved while they are away. In addition, they want to know their children are having fun and learning so that they themselves don’t feel bad for taking that hour to go get a coffee or for having a career that takes them away for long periods at a time. I’ve been the date-night baby sitter and I’ve been the live-in nanny.
This past week Baby Xylo turned 8-weeks-old and just like many of the Moms I’ve worked with, I went back to work. Now, the idea of going back to work is kind of different for me as a writer. Being a writer technically means you are never really not working. Writing about music, mental health and motherhood means that I have to daily stay on top of what is happening in the music industry and also be in tune with my own life for inspiration on what other mothers and families want to read and be informed about. To improve and practise my skill, I read and write daily whether it’s for commission or for my personal blog. I try my best to be as knowledgeable as I can be about the topics I write about. But going back to work now means I have to do this by obligation. I’ve made commitments with different publications that need to be executed. It’s exciting. However, it also means learning how to balance being a work at home mom (wahm) with being a stay at home mom (sham).
In my situation, I’ve had the past 8 weeks to really just focus on and bond with our baby girl. And because of my past child care experience, I really think I dodged most of the terror and drama a lot of new moms unfortunately face. The late nights, crying, and massive poops didn’t bring me any sort of shock because I had already been there and smelled that. On top of all of that Xylo is a sweet baby angel (so far) and her Nana has been helping us everyday since she was born one way or the other. But having nothing else to do but love this little butter ball also made it that much harder to leave her for the first time.
The day of my meeting Daddy was also away working. The plan was that Nana would be looking after Baby Xylo while I stepped out. I spent the morning racing around the house getting dressed and making sure Xylo would have enough to eat while I was gone. As I handed Baby Xylo over to her Nana I wanted to cry even though I knew she was in the hands of someone I trust my life with. The roles had changed. It was now me leaving the house for whatever reasons trying to assure that my baby would be in a happy and loving environment while we were away.
After I had finished what I needed to do I started to race home. On the way back I terrorized myself with the thought that I hadn’t left enough milk or that for some reason Xylo was non-stop crying. When I came home 6 hours later, I don’t think Baby Xylo had even noticed I was gone. She was comfortable in her chair swing probably dreaming about milk and kisses. I was relieved but I still wanted to cry. Leaving Xylo for the first time was necessary for more reasons than one. Xylo and Nana were able to expand their special bond and I was slapped with a sense of reality of what motherhood and providing for a family is really like.
Financially, we have no choice but to be leaving the house to generate income. There’s things in the list of our short term and long term goals that need to be accomplished and realized for our family to have a brighter, and better future. Coming to terms with all the things that need to be done for us to get there has not only made me work harder but it has also made me understand many of the things that my own parents and the ones that I have worked with have said and done. I now understand many of the looks I saw on their faces, and the tears in their eyes when their children didn’t understand or appreciate their hard work. I understand why some Moms, including my own, wake up even earlier than they have to just to schedule in some personal time for themselves so that the time they have with their children and/or partner during the day isn’t jeopardized.
Having worked with so many families with children of different ages. I’ve also been around for many firsts. My name was one baby’s first word. My hands were the ones one baby let go off when she took her first steps. It was with me another child saw his first caterpillar. And it was me another child first pondered and asked about God to. I often felt guilty when reporting the news to the parents of these children because I felt like I was robbing them of these special moments. Xylo just recently realized her hands belong to her so I know many of her firsts are waiting around the corner.
On a second occasion this week I had to leave Xylo under someone else’s care. I needed to do an interview over the phone. Once again I was running around the house before I needed to disappear just like many of the work at home moms I have helped in the past, even though I was only going to be a floor away from Baby Xylo. After two hours of getting some work done, I came back upstairs to see how Xylo was doing and my best friend Kahlil who had come over to help was celebrating the fact that Xylo had held on to her little giraffe rattle and shook it. This is the first time Xylo has ever done that. I was so jealous it hadn’t been with me. We got her to do it again and I was able to send Daddy a video of it. Seconds later he replied with “Can’t believe I missed that:(“. I have heard and read those words many times before from parents in the past.
My journey as a mom and partner has only just begun, but now more than ever I am grateful to Heavenly Father for my past experiences because they are helping me cope with and understand what I am currently going through and what I need to do to progress. I get sad when I think about Xylo being away from us while we work but I am comforted by all the special moments that were left in my heart by the children I was blessed to work with. I look forward to Xylo leaving those same special moments in my heart, her Daddy’s heart or whomever is around just the way those children did with me.
Touching <3
Get back in the race. She is gonna be so proud of you one day!
+ 7