Monthly Archives: January 2014

New Year, Old life

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I like the idea of fresh starts. The new year, my birthday, a fresh season, heck, even a new month, these are all occasions that trigger expectations of new beginnings, renewed efforts, opportunities… but not this year. This year I don’t want to start out with resolutions, with hopeful plans of a new and improved me. This year I’ve decided to start out with more acceptance of the old me, the flawed, familiar me. I have a whole list of things I’d like to do, I’d like to finally completely eliminate processed foods and artificial products from my life, I’d like to exercise more, I want to get back in a dance studio, I want to be more patient, more fun, a better more engaging mother. I want to be a nicer wife, I want to have more sex, I want to lose lots and lots of weight, I want to be healthy, and less tired and less irritable… I could go on for pages…. But that’s exactly what I don’t want to do this year. I don’t want to start the year with a series of HAVE TOs.

In fact, I’m going to try to not make plans for “this year” at all. All I want is to be happy. Happy, right now, today. I don’t even want to worry about being happy tomorrow, or next month, or when spring arrives, I don’t want to worry at all, in fact.

I realize I’m not going to be able to eliminate worry from my life completely, I’m always going to worry about certain things, I just want to let go of some of the completely useless weight I’ve been carrying on my shoulders forever. I want my life to be lighter, both in weight and in intensity, I want it to be light as air, light as a bright sunny day, light as when you’re floating in the sea in the summer.

I’m a control freak, but I want to let go of some of the control. I’m tired of fighting to control the things I have no actual control over. I’m not saying I’m planning on becoming a completely laid back person. I’m not, I couldn’t, there’s not enough weed in the world for that… I’m always going to fight to get dinner on the table at 7 no matter what the circumstances are, but there are some fights I’m just not willing to fight anymore.

Being happy, happy with me, happy with life… it seems so simple and yet so daunting. So that’s my plan, that’s my goal, for right this minute and hopefully the next one and the next, but I’m not going to worry about them, I’m only thinking about right now for now.

 

So, friends, Happy New Year, may 2014 be whatever you want it to be, and may you always love yourself and be good to yourself… because, well, you’re with yourself a lot, aren’t you now…

Venice, eternally beautiful (or for however long it lasts)

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Birthdays are pretty important to me. My mom always made a big deal of our birthdays, it was probably the time of year when she made the biggest effort when it came to us kids, it was our special day. This is in sharp contrast to the Husband’s family that made a huge gigantic, twenty really awesome presents per kid on Christmas, but not much fanfare at all on birthdays. All this to say, I like to make a big deal of birthdays, I mean before kids I would have week-long celebrations for my own birthday (just to give you a frame of reference). But, for whatever reason, I never seem to manage to make a big deal, or even any deal at all, of the Husband’s birthday, this year I completely forgot to even wish him a Happy Birthday until he hemmed and hawed for a while… poor thing. And this year, of all years, I should have remembered… because this year his birthday present from me was a weekend in Venice. I mean, we woke up in a hotel in Venice and quite literally the only reason we were there was for his birthday, and still I forgot. Not sure what deeply rooted psychological issue is going on there…

Anyway… I had good intentions… His birthday is so close to Christmas, and I’m so crap at celebrating it, that this year I organized a family trip so he would have something special. I had just read one of those apocalyptic meme’s on facebook about the ten (or twenty or something like that) places to visit before they disappeared forever and Venice was on the list. It’s relatively close to us (compared to, say, the great barrier reef in Australia) and it’s off season there now so hotels do not require one to take out a loan to pay for them as they do in high season.  It was a wonderful trip.

We drove an hour to Turin and took the train there for Venice. It was the kids’ first train trip and the excitement was palpable. I’m sure all the other passengers were just as thrilled. Everything was cause for wonder, especially the bathroom, as evidenced by the frequent trips we took there.

The hotel was great, I would definitely suggest it if you’re ever in that neck of the woods, Hotel Moresco. It’s a small, very new hotel, the staff is very helpful, the prices are average for Venice, the position is quite good without being too touristy, and the rooms are large, clean, and modern (also wifi is free, which is not standard in Italy).

We arrived Friday evening, Saturday was freezing cold and foggy, perfect for a romantic gondola ride…

And Sunday and Monday morning were beautiful and sunny. Overall, we had a wonderful, if slightly more expensive than expected, time. Even though we forgot to wish the Husband a Happy Birthday.