New Normal

The life update you didn't ask for

Life in Meco is going well, although the heat wave that has shaken Europe has been particularly cruel with Spain, already warm, with temperatures showing close to 40 degrees.

Sleeping has been difficult for the whole family because of it and because we don’t have a car I am doing a lot of steps a day, which I think should count as double in terms of sweat production. We are all tanned except Chris, who is red.

In general I find it amazing how easily things feel normal. New normal. Temporary normal.

When you go away you pack most of your stuff and bring it with you. Any anxiety that you use as home, your go-to coping mechanisms, all the things that annoy you all the things that make you annoying for the other family members. It is all still there. Some of it even more vibrant. But there is also a new lens, a new light and a change of scenery that invites you, somehow, to see it differently.

I have finally read Philippa Perry excellent parenting book and I have been surprisingly kind with myself for the things that I feel I could have done better at the time. Or now. Or realistically ever will. I have also felt confident about the things that I have done okay.

I have been trying to use some of her advice and basically using her philosophy as a verb. “I am going to Philippa Perry this incident.”

The kids now make fun of me and say things like “I understand your frustration” or “can you just fix it mum instead of therapying us?” when I come armed with my new tools of trying to speak mostly in first person (which is much harder than it sounds), or my willingness to validate their feelings regardless of how insane they sound.

I am also trying to stop blaming things on tiredness. Although Philippa, it is mostly tiredness.

Chris and I are doing a 30 days - 2 goals challenge. He is basically a guru who meditates and does lots of sports and I am working on my relationship with money and also had to chose sport because I know, I fucking know, that it is important. Mens sana in corpore sano and all that…

And even if I didn’t know, my sister does.

If you know Irene, you will be very unsurprised to hear that I am now doing boxing. She signed me up when she knew I was coming for seven weeks and I have been consistently attending.

Although I have cursed between gritted teeth all the past and future lineage of the teacher (who is lovely despite his psychopathic and sadistic tendencies during the warm up) I am happy to report that until today I haven’t fainted, cried or vomited in any of the classes. That is a stand alone success story.

One of the things I have noticed in boxing, as well as how difficult skipping actually is, is how present gender stereotypes are in the classroom.

I hate how much I apologise. All the time. For everything. In advance, during and after.(Not the warm up. During the warm up I am too busy swearing, just during the exercises we do in pairs). I say sorry if I miss one step in the choreography, if I hit too strong, not strong enough, if I am too fast, too slow. Sometimes I don’t fucking know why I am even apologising about.

I have been paired mostly with boys (One of them was 19, which I have never been since he was born). Some of them have been boxing as long as me, or maybe a couple of weeks more, and their technique is not amazing, which is normal.

What I find fascinating is that while I am apologising, God knows why, all of them have found it in themselves to correct me on something. Just a little something. “It is better if you twist like this.” “Start from a lower position.” And I have found it incredible. Not because I care about being corrected. I don’t. Not even because they weren’t right. They probably were. But because of that male confidence of being shit at something and yet having the urge to correct others.

I know a total of zero women who would have offered unrequested corrections to others while in the very early stages of learning something themselves.

So now, every time I go to boxing, as well as doing more squats than I want (which in fairness is always zero squats) I feel that I need to fight my socialised need to be excused for not being good at something. How dare I.

Apart from that, my kids are now going to a Catholic school because it was the only place semi-private kind enough to accept us for the six weeks we are here, and although I went to a semi private catholic school myself it is proving to be even more of a shock to the system than I thought it would be.

They pray three times a day. There is a pilgrim Virgin that goes from house to house so we can all enjoy her. Nora says they are learning Latin songs about God in science. And there is a palpable excitement about the imminent arrival of the Pope to Madrid. The kids were asked if their families were going to see the big visit at the weekend and Eric replied that his mum wants tickets to see Bad Bunny, which made me happy.

I am spending abundant time with my BFF. Something pleasant about the not having to pack all our latest news in a zoom call, or a wine (even a dinner) when I am here for shorter visits. The quiet knowledge that there will be more, and all the things we didn’t say will come up, or don’t… the luxury of talking about nothing at all, mixed with all the gritty things. Time together enough to “waste”.

I also saw a friend from my time in Deloitte, close to where we used to work, and it reminded me how different my life was and how different it could have been. The area and all the beautiful stylish rich people made me feel poor and fat. But we met to paint pottery with the kids and remembering that I do that weekly, as a treat to myself, made me feel rich and wholesome.

My friends from France reunited again with the excuse of me being here and we talked about everything and nothing. Plastic chairs in the shade is also richness, I thought. I was taken the piss out of for going to therapy every week. Middle class, we decided. That is how you know someone is middle class. If they can afford weekly therapy.

Speaking of which, I now do therapy in person because she is based here. She is taller than I think she is and keeps surprising me every week, maybe I will be fully settled when that no longer surprises me. In person therapy is a bit harder because it is more obvious that you are avoiding looking someone directly in the eye when being vulnerable. But they give you a bottle of water, so tit for tat.

I think that is mostly it. I miss Chris because the kids go to bed so late that we are all exhausted and we no longer have that extra hour to watch something, have a bath or talk about the day in more detail. We are also both prioritising sport and I am always unapologetically choosing spending time with my sister.

But when you read this we will be away celebrating our twelfth wedding anniversary in Madrid while my parents mind the kids. When you open this I will be alone with my husband in the city that once felt part of me and now feels like a cheeky meeting with “the one that got away”. I will flirt. I will briefly wonder “what if”.

But I will be with Chris. And as cheesy as it is, whether in Madrid or Meco or Northern Ireland, him and the kids are home. Old, temporarily or new. They are my normal.

PS: If you want to buy me an ice cream while I am here, consider becoming a paid subscriber, you will have access to all my previous posts!