WanderMama

Everything is coming up roses for us here.  Moving to a great place, paychecks, cute car, new furniture, dream school for WBoy, grandparents willing to watch WGirl twice a week…. Roses.

But when people say, “You must be so excited” (and I hear this often), I think “Happy, grateful, absolutely.  Excited? Hmmm.”  I am so grateful for our good luck and I know that we will be happy here.  We can slow down, admire our wonderful kids, eat great ethnic foods, just appreciate all we have.

But looking at pics from last fall in Thailand I can’t help but envy that girl with the stars in her eyes.  The one that thought, “Yeah we’ll do China for a couple years.”  She believed that ‘being abroad’ was the answer.

Truth is: there is good and bad about everywhere you live.  You truly can’t find happiness in a location.  Yup, I’m gonna say it: I’m pretty sure that it’s inside that you find it.

It’d be a helluva lot easier if a new city or village provided instant happiness.  It offers excitement for sure.  But you’ll always find things that are not to your liking anywhere you go.  It’s all about how you look at it. Half empty or half full.

Travel remains as important to me as ever.  Hopefully, I’ll be just a bit wiser about my life when I’m not travelling.  Everyday, every place is important.  This time is amazing — not in 3 months or 2 years when I am away again.  I can still plan my next adventure but not at the expense of today’s adventures.

Excited?  No.  On the path to real happiness? Sure hope so.

Since we decided to leave Bangok, I’ve been concerned about WBoy’s school. CT law says that he is Kindergarten-ready.  But we’d like to give him another year, given that he is boy, a September birthday and didn’t have a full year of pre-school last year.  Plus, the public school in our neighborhood, New Haven’s best, has been full since May registration.

So, I sought alternatives –  even calling Catholic schools  from Bangkok.  I decided to let it go until our return and started up again 3 weeks ago.  My first choice was a pre-school/Kindergarten called Leila Day but I also loved St. Rita’s in Hamden.

He got into Leila the other day, which is amazing.  So he’ll do the less intense K there and then will be able to register for the homework-in-Kindergarten public school.

Private school is not cheap but it was the only choice.   Watching my boy talking baby talk with his sister and drinking out of what is essentially souped-up sippy cup, I think we’ve made the right choice.  He is smart as hell but socially a little more time in a younger environment will be good for him.  And for his mom:)

After much research and contemplation about buying a stroller that could accommodate a nearly 5 year old, I bought the Peg Perego Pliko 3 stroller.  It is perfect for a 2 year old and 4-5 year old.

Since we plan to walk alot around New Haven, I wanted a stroller that WBoy, almost 5, could stand on if he got tired walking.  But I didn’t want to be saddled with a 2-er or Sit n Stand for the 80% of the time I am alone with WGirl.

Nor did I want to have a step thing hanging off the back of a stroller.  Two reasons for that:

• Cost: Those things cost $65-80. Add that to even a used stroller and you are looking at $150+
• Comfort: They are a pain to take on and off so I would be hampered by it when out with just WGirl.

Then I stumbled upon Peg Perego’s Pliko P3.  It has the step for WBoy built into a great, light, well-thought out stroller for WGirl.  It collapses easily,  handles smoothly, has adjustable handles for taller people and a HUGE sunshade.  It feels much sturdier than other umbrella type strollers I have tried.  Very European.

WBoy loves the ride-on feature and hasn’t asked to sit.  WGirl too seems to like her new wheels.  I think, it would be great for travel or for city living with slightly older kids.

Tip:  I got the 2008 from Albee Baby in Mocha for $209.00.  The new 2010 ones range from $329-379.  Not sure about new features but I can’t think of anything missing on this one.

Can you reinvent yourself …again…in 3.5 weeks?  Hell yeah.  Here’s the short version:

1. WPapa got a great job.  Smart people, interesting work, regular hours, and excellent compensation.  His title:  E-Commerce Architect.  So 21st century.  Thank God he choose Computer Science as an undergrad because it’s worth his Engineering MS, Oxford MBA and my Yale MA put together.

2.  We rented an apartment in my favorite American city: New Haven, CT.  With its walk-ability, great restaurants and cheap/free culture compliments of Yale, it really is my fav (cue fellow-Yale grad pal Nicci’s headshake of disbelief).  And it’s thirty minutes from my free babsitt…I mean parents.

3.  WBoy is enrolled in a GREAT school.  Getting him in at this late date was harder than WP’s job search.  He will be a Kindergartener at Leila Day School in New Haven.  We can walk there in 5 minutes from the apartment and a chef prepares breakfast, lunch and snack.  Enough said.

4.  We bought a new Honda Fit for me:) My mom laughed when I said it’s my dream car but it is.  38 miles per gallon and so cute!  We’ll be the owners of a used Honda Civic by week’s end.

5. We have a pediatrician at long last.  And health insurance, life insurance, disability etc…  Ah the benefits of working for a large corporation.

6.  I have gotten to spend a lot of time with my very best friends.  I missed them so much and seeing them, and our now legion offspring, playing and fighting over toys is great fun.

Those are the major things.  Of course there are moving related things (truck, painting, buying and shleping furniture), school prep (endless forms, long pants/sleeves to buy), trips to the DMV, etc… But mostly we are done.

Soon I’ll even be able to think about my plans/work again.

The grandparents said yesterday that I painted WGirl as extra bratty in my posts from the road.  Just to set the record straight: she is not.  She is 2 and that comes with a dose of tantrums and whiny-ness.  But she is also full of joy, loves to explore on her own and has the cutest, most expressive face I have ever seen.

She, as well as WBoy, are settling in nicely here.  She was speaking exclusively Russian after her near-month with my in-laws but English is leaking in.  I am trying my best to enforce with WBoy a family Russian policy.  A struggle for me but it will be so great if they continue to develop their fluency.

I don’t want to know about this, but I have learned from a friend about all the chemicals that they put into mattresses to make them flame retardant.  Apparently, the amount of mandated anti-fire chemicals in mattresses has been upped and now people are taking notice.  I watched this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt20q-WezOc from an ABC News Chicago report and of course read blogs/website rants.

So yeah, broke but need to buy an organic mattress … or three…I guess.  It was alot easier and cheaper to replace the sippy cups for BPA-free ones.

I found several sites that have organic beds but this one looks to be the most affordable so far: www.nontoxicbeds.com.  The flame retardant junk is sprayed onto a mattress cover that you can zip off.  The site claims that your chances of dying in a bed fire are more than a million to one vs. sucking in chemical crap nightly.

Since we have to buy mattresses anyways and now that I know this, I cannot really ignore it.  But it’s pricey and frankly annoying that there are all these chemicals everywhere that we don’t know about.

It’s kind of hard to write during this transition time.  Everything is so temporary.  I am planning scenarios based on living in New Haven and Cambridge.  I have checked out schools in both places for WBoy, who is kindergarten aged in CT and not yet in MA.  We are so late for getting him into school but I have found 2 possible places in New Haven so I am going to let that ride.

Everything, as always, hinges on WPapa’s job.  He has applied to 15-20 or so CT-based jobs and has interviewed with 3 in person and a few more on the phone.  Great considering he started searching just over a week ago.

I badly want resolution but I know that this time is precious: WP is around, WBoy isn’t yet in school.  We are free for a little while longer.  Isn’t that always the way with job searches? You piss the time away wishing for a job and then poof you have one and life settles into TGIFing.

So I’m trying to live for the moment and enjoy the summer.  I’m so lucky that my three best friends have come often to hang out.  It’s been so great to catch up and see our kids — many of whom are the same age — playing together.

So life is good, if temporary, here in Westbrook, CT.

So its been a week since I reunited with my wanderers.  After a layover to see my gorgeous, sweet niece (and her parents:) in LA, I took the red-eye to Hartford.  BTW my flights from Bangkok to LA and LA to Hartford were amazing.  I slept 9 hours and 4 hours respectively.  Wonderful!

In Hartford my dad predictably got choked up but recovered quickly — after all the worst is over for the grandparents. Forty minutes later, I walked though the door, dropped  my bag, hugged my mom and was back out the door bound for JFK.

Traffic was light and I was about 3 hours early.  I found a playground near the airport, ate Subway and mused on my initial impressions of America.  In a nutshell: everything seemed the same one year later.  Not a bad thing but strange as I feel very different… or just odd being back where I started — after only a year when I expected to be gone much longer.  Sitting there in the bright Jule sunshine, on a bench near a baseball field,  I began to confront the reality that that particular dream is over.

But lucky me I had the part of my dream that I get to keep to retrieve at the airport.

After an hour delay and a great phone conversation with one of my best friends, I was itching to hold those little kids.  I was hanging over the rail, watching the door like a hawk.  Panicking that my husband was really a Russian spy as my ex-boss jokingly predicted years ago and that he kidnapped the kids.  What can I say I was exhausted.  But then the doors swung open and 23! days after I’d last seen them, they were running into my arms yelling “Mama”.  Nothing better.  Dream shmeam I got my kids back.

WanderBoy konked out the moment we got on the highway, despite the girl bawling for 45 minutes.  Then she too succumbed and WPapa and I whispered our happiness at being back together.   WBoy didn’t awake until the next morning around 4; WGirl played with the one they call Grammy (no memory) and then slept.  We woke before 4 for a couple of days but now seem back on track.

More later on impressions and plans…

OMG.

That’s it… that is my whole post.

Thank God I’m alone.

See you on the flip-side.

So wow…last night.  It’s been such an amazing year.  So much learning.  I cannot even process it all.

These last three weeks being alone have given me some time to reflect but mostly I have just had more learning experiences: the children’s hospital and the massage school.  I feel a bit full up on the learning to tell the truth.  I think it’s time to slow down and stop making so many new things happen.

I remember my first trip to Russia (and 2nd, 3rd, 4th, ….) how hard it was to be in such a foreign place and how happy I was to return home. Returning was simpler then.

While I’m so excited to see my kids, family and friends, this return is more complicated.  Jobs to be found, a place to live, schools and childcare.  We just did all that in Bangkok 6 months ago and now we’ll do it again.

The experience of this year has been worth any setbacks or disappointments. And that is why, although I’m exhausted and missing my family,  research has begun for a February trip.  It is on the road that I feel most alive, that I really experience the world, and that I live each day to its fullest.

But for now I am ready to go back.  I look forward to the ease of life.  To being understood when I speak.  To clean air and green parks.  To being around people who know and love me.

I’ll be in LA the next time I post.  Then the stateside wandering will begin.