The Norwegian Experience

Last week the dream of every stay-at-home mother with no childcare and (almost) no real-life support network came true: I got to go on a trip alone.

I went to visit a dear friend who in Norway. Five days, four nights, no kids. No husband. Just me.

This may sound hyperbolic but it was a life-changing experience. An enlightening, life-changing experience.

The first thing I noticed as I went through the airport was that it's really *easy* to travel by yourself. Ridiculously easy. It was actually... fun.

The second thing I noticed was that no one noticed me. Without the stroller, the older kid, the bags and parcels I was just an anonymous woman walking through the airport, not worthy of a first glance, let alone a second one. That was truly disconcerting. I don't think I've ever felt so invisible in my life.

Then came the successive joys of ordering a hot coffee (and not trying to keep it from being dumped in my lap by a cranky kid). Reading the paper. Having uninterrupted thoughts in the middle of the day (the only time I am ever likely not to be interrupted is between 9-11pm, after bedtime and before Maz wakes up for the first of many wake-ups). When I was picked up at the airport by my friend, it was the joy of having a totally guilt-free uninterrupted conversation. (If I'm lucky enough to get an uninterrupted conversation in with someone, there's usually a nagging feeling at the back of my head that I should really be doing something else; helping my husband with the kids, for example). The joy of dining with adults, having adult conversation, only worrying about getting food into myself and not getting up from the table fifty times for water, milk, a clean fork, a new bib, paper towels, different food...

The joy of uninterrupted sleep.

We spent two days at my friend's cabin. A cabin on an island in a lake in the mountains. Did I mention it was my idea of heaven? No running water, no electricity, just silence. The sound of the little waves lapping against the rocks and the occasional sheep bell from the shore. No cars. No TV. No internet. I got to have coffee in bed. I repeat. I got to have coffee in bed.

It was also the experience of seeing how my friend moves through her life and adds joy and beauty to everything she does. She lights candles at every meal, just because. She uses pretty plates and cups, just because. Everything in her apartment has been chosen because she thinks it's beautiful. So many things I've jettisoned from my life because it's been so complicated-- with moves, with money (or lack thereof), with two little kids. Too hard to have a tablecloth between the baby and the cat, who prefers to vomit on cloth than on the floor. My friend's life was like a beacon. It was saying "Remember living like this? You can do it. You might have to make some different choices, but you can do it."

I came back with the certainty that things need to change. Childcare for Mazen. A job for me. Extra income for the family. I want to be a woman who has some self-esteem about who she is as a whole person, not just in her role as a mother to small children. I want to have the energy and the ability to bring beauty back into my daily life.

This trip, coming at the end of a particularly long, hard and stressful summer, has allowed me to see that my life is radically out of balance. I feel like I'm peripheral in my own life. It's time to make some changes, to move forward.

It's time to remember that if I choose to bring beauty into my life it doesn't need to be justified or explained. It's time to remember that I am an adult and I don't need to justify or explain myself to anyone. It's time to discover who I am now, having been living in a parallel world for the last five years.

Scary stuff.