New Year

I'm not really one for making New Year's Resolutions -- I do it sometimes because I feel it's expected, but I don't really go into it with any great fervour. It's not the way I work. I suppose I know what I should be doing -- I carry those things with me in my head and mull over them, but committing them to paper doesn't make me take them any more seriously.

The things that preoccupy me at the moment are all to do with getting my life under more control. I had a busy year at work last year -- a too-busy year, and in many ways a difficult year (and in some a rewarding year, so it wasn't all negative -- most of it, in fact, wasn't negative). Consequently, I let the reins of control slip, and did that horse ever get the bit between its teeth and bolt. So this year I have to focus on getting more balance. On having more fun -- because isn't that what it's all about. (Mind you, I do have fun in most of the things I do. Fun, I think, is a matter of attitude, a matter of having a smile upon your face and making do with whatever you have.)

My sleep patterns continue to get more and more out of whack, and that's perhaps the most pressing problem. It's so easy to stay up and enjoy the few hours of peace when everyone else is asleep -- if I'm lucky enough to get a few. Perhaps that's the problem -- the kids, jealous of my time, stay up later and later, and I struggle to find time away from them. And I am categorically not a morning person. I do not, under any circumstances, function well then. Anytime before 7, I cannot drive. Not safely. Well, unless I stay up all night and don't go to bed, but even that I'm wary of. (If I fell into that pattern, I'd probably dispense with sleep altogether, and what a disaster that would be.) Before 7, the brain is clogged, and the eyes sting. My body aches and longs to be horizontal. Before 7, I am best in bed, snoozing if not actually sleeping. Dreaming/day-dreaming a writer's dreams. It's important to allow time for that too.

There are other aspects that have also slipped and that I'm feeling keenly -- the state of disarray around me, exercise habits, writing habits, but these are all things I hope to address -- no, mean to address. And there's no time like the present. Today, I've taken control of my blogging, which I've been lackadaisical about lately at best. Gradually, I'll pull this control-beast in, and get myself to a better place.

She's back!

And then it was over! And for her it all now seems like a dream. I know what that's like. Sometimes it's hard to imagine that there are all these worlds out there, and us not a part of any of them, but every one just as real as the one we're existing in, whether it's the vast savannahs of Africa, the turquoise waters of the Greek isles baking in the sun, or the cluttered chaotic streets of Jerusalem.

It's over, and she's missed The Gadget Man's family Christmas -- which for the first time ever they moved from Boxing Day (to the day before she came back). How unfortunate -- especially as this was the one year where she would be bursting with things to tell them. I can't tell you about the maternal outrage this roused in me -- a most interesting thing in itself, as I'm not particularly given to maternal outrage.

But it is lovely to have her back: the excited girl who has been dying to tell us how she ate dog and snake's head, but who stood (sadly for me to witness) somewhat aloof from the other girls, not quite fitting in, as is usual for her. It leaves me to wonder how we managed to have two children who are both outside the box. I know this should be a good thing -- what's wrong with raising individuals, after all? But it is hard when you see all the other kids with invites and not your kid, and it happens again and again and again. Still, I was never the most popular in class either. I had a few friends who were intensely loyal, and that was enough.

She has the prospect of starting at a new school next year, but that must all be the stuff of another post. In the meantime, let me dwell for a moment on just how wonderful it's been to have her back. Let me have that moment, for no doubt in a few more, she'll be fighting with her brother again, and I'll be left wondering what happened to the peace of the last four weeks and longing for that peace again.

Lack of communication

Now the funny thing about travel in the modern world (compared to when I travelled some twenty-five years ago) is the availability of email. When I went away it was a few addresses on your itinerary where you would hopefully wait for mail (and get it if you were lucky), or otherwise a post restante address. I do remember searching the V to W box at The Walkabout Club in London on the hunt for mail, and missing opportunities because my Dutch aunt wrote my name in such a way that my post was filed under D rather than V, and I only found my letters accidentally several months later when looking for mail for a friend of mine.

I wouldn't necessarily have expected any communications between Princess Sleepyhead and home because she's not that computer savvy and hardly ever uses email at home. But when we did have a few communications and knew that whenever she was going to be in Hanoi (which they're using as a home base) that she would have access, I became more hopeful. Only they've been told not to communicate, not to tell us anything about what they're doing until they're back.

Now, I understand this directive. The world can, at times now, seem too small a place, and not having communications adds to that sense of isolation, that sense of distance, of being in the wilderness, if you will, of being independent. But someone I teach with also has a daughter on one of these expeditions, and her daughter has been told the same things, but is emailing regardless. Oh, if only mine were as rebellious. Not often I'm wishing that from her.

I ought to have known. A few years ago, we were in Sydney and running late for a lunch appointment, prior to seeing Fiddler on the roof. So, there was my brother, crossing a deserted road on a red light, and me and his wife following, and PS standing resolutely on the kerb, unwilling to budge from it until the little man turned green. Neither my brother's entreaties nor his threats could make her move, and he was pulling his hair out with frustration. I had to admit is was funny to see him lose his temper, but even funnier to see her unmoved by it.

I should be glad she is not easy to persuade to break rules -- after all, ADD kids have a high rate of unwanted teenage pregnancy, and for many years this was The Gadget Man's fear for her. Now I see she is too much cast in my mould: too reserved and risk-averse (though she hasn't been risk-averse in physical situations that may have benefitted her to have been risk-averse -- but so far she has been lucky). So I shouldn't be cranky about not hearing. I really shouldn't. But I am. Well, not so much cranky, as frustrated. Just like my brother, really. 

Astronomy

How cool is this? Tonight (yesterday as I write this) we had a sliver (crescent) moon and two planets in close proximity: Venus and Jupiter, giving the appearance of a smiley face in the sky. Here's some photos I took on my new camera -- without a tripod. I do have a very old and slightly wonky tripod somewhere, but I'm not sure where it was. Image stabilisation helped me handhold (with the help of a post) with a 1.6 second shutter speed. These aren't perfect shots by any means but for handheld, they're pretty amazing. So we have the regular shot showing the smiley face, the close up, where you can see the moon's disc (and a ghost of it -- some kind of interference), and then one with a reflection, though it's too dark to see the water.

Having heard . . .

Surprisingly, we've had a few emails from her -- she's arrived safely, she's lost her journal (what? I spent hours on that, gluing in her itinerary on separate days, writing little notes from home, writing out addresses etc), she's bought a lot of DVDs. Silly girl. I told her not to buy anything until she's back from her two treks. Now she'll have to carry them!

We're all missing her -- even Sir Talkalot, which is the greatest surprise. I knew I'd miss her. I expected it. The Gadget Man's been reduced to rumblings about where she is, and consulting her itinerary every five minutes. All right, all right, that's an exaggeration! But he looks at the map at least twice every day.

We had her Opa's birthday, and put out a photo of her to represent the missing one -- because that's the one thing she said she was sorry to be missing. My, the bond those two share -- it's touching, but will be scary the day something happens to him. She's so devoted to him -- always has been. I still remember when she did have that febrile convulsion, and woke from unconsciousness crying, not "Mum, Mum", but "Opa, Opa". Yes, that made me feel really good! Made him pretty happy though.

And so we go on with our relatively uneventful lives, which seem that little bit less chaotic than usual, but quieter, more melancholic, and not at all living vicariously through all that she is doing. (Only because we don't exactly know!)

Good morning, Vietnam!

She's gone. After all that planning and all that scrimping and saving to get the funds together, after the school's concern that she's not punctual enough, and all the medical clearances (because of her scoliosis, her ADD, her allergy to bandaids, the fact that she had a febrile convulsion at age two, and one other thing that I can't currently remember) we've had to get, she's finally gone.

She stood in the car park, loaded up with pack and daypack, and I don't know who was more nervous: her or me. But I didn't let her know that I had anything but the utmost faith in her going on this journey. My mother said that she wouldn't have let me go at PS's age. And she's not very mature for her age -- but then neither was I. I did a lot of growing up on my travels (but then I was 24!).

This expedition will try her, and there will be times when, no doubt, she will be lonely, homesick, and wishing she had never gone. But there will be times that will exhilarate her. Times that will challenge her and make her grow. Times when she has never felt more alive.

Am I nervous about her going? You bet -- and if anything goes wrong then I'll never forgive myself. But neither would I forgive myself if I held her back. Two days I gave her the most precious gift a mother can ever give: I gave her the world.

Our day in the mountains

Here's a typical day in our chaotic life:

(i) Drive Princess Sleepyhead to choir rehearsals for a concert she's not going to attend because she's going to be overseas. The drive is 3/4 hour each way, and we should, of course, for good measure take a wrong turn and not have the Melways with us!

(ii) Many hours later, pick PS up from the rehearsal and cajole her into going on a trek up in the mountains (even though it's late) as training for her real trek that's happening in far too short a time.

(iii) When we (all four of us) arrive at the mountain, have PS refuse to go on the walk.

(iv) Let The Gadget Man and Sir Talkalot go, but before driving to the top to meet them (because it is, by this time, very late), decide it is silly for us to sit in the car for an hour or so when the whole purpose of the exercise is for PS to do it.

(v) Send PS up after them to tell them to come back.

(vi) Find a car park (no mean feat) and sit at the bottom for half an hour, and realise that PS isn't coming back.

(vii) Presume she must've caught them up and been convinced to go on, so drive up to the top, and find the boys already there (even though The Gadget Man has said it's a 1 1/2 hr walk up).

(viii) Ask where PS is and realise, with horror, that they haven't seen her.

(ix) Find out there are two separate tracks up, so let the boys take one each down, and meanwhile drive back down to the bottom and find another car park.

(x) Find within five minutes of arriving that TGM, on the steep path, has run all the way down. No sign of PS.

(xi) Start worrying in earnest. But not panicking yet. She might still be on the main path. She must be, right?

(xii) Realise there is a third track going off sideways. Let TGM, who grew up in the area, take that.

(xiii) Wait. No PS. No Sir Talkalot.

(xiv) Finally, spot PS coming from behind me and find she'd gone up partway, couldn't find them so decided to come back. Then she couldn't see the car and was cross with me because I hadn't waited, but noticed a whole chain of car parks, so went off investigating those, in case I was in one.

(xv) Wait for the boys.

(xvi) See ST arrive, and then realise his hand is streaming blood. He'd been coming down with his hand on the railing, and there was a protruding twig that went through the webbing between his thumb and hand.

(xvii) Wait for TGM.

(xviii) When TGM finally arrives, call in briefly at his dad's and clean up ST's hand.

(xix) Drive an hour to our local hospital, so they can glue his hand up and tell him he's not to stretch it for a week. He has a piano exam next Saturday, which he isn't ready for, and the doctor absolutely forbids him from practising, so now I'll have to let the teacher know.

Just another typical day in the suburbs really.