It’s a choice, to live as if each day is the miracle it is. The stress of moving across the world has the benefits of finally arriving. Then there is new stress to encounter. Being in a new city, as a little family, without our normal family and social framework, homeschooling for 4 months (don’t ask!!), let alone still trying to work out the best place to buy our fruits and vegetables is challenging even on a good day. With only each other to depend on, it can at times bring a ‘lost at sea on a life raft‘ mentality, where we feel stuck with each other with no outs. Fleeting moments of claustrophobia come and go. We don’t have our foundations yet, nor do we even have all our belongings so it’s like living in a miniature monastery of minimalism. Very early this morning, I opened our beautiful glass bedroom doors to let the air in and Toofy suddenly lunged out onto a glass ceiling and made a dash for it, and I thought he was going to leap off the roof, a whole story high, all to bark at the neighbour’s dog. I had to tear out there after him in my underpants and a t-shirt, and when I finally captured him perched out there on the roof, I met our neighbours teenage son for the first time standing underneath me. In nude coloured smalls grappling a small fluffy dog going absolutely mental. My heart pounding as I attempted to say a normal hello and smile, clambered back up the roof holding a squirming Toofy and climbed through the doors. It took a minute to see the humour in it I will admit.
Within all this adjusting though, the little gritty bits, there is also unbridled sheer joy. There hasn’t been a second where I have thought ‘dear God what have we done‘. There is instead this incredible sense of peace and trust. Insane amounts of curiosity, happiness, togetherness, and love. Laughs unlike anything else. We sit of an evening having cooked a delicious dinner and eating it (off the only 3 plates we have until the shipping container arrives), overlooking the garden, with squirrels in the trees and roses blooming and the beautiful light filtering through, playing backgammon and cards, I can’t help but smile the whole time. We plan whole days of exploring together, researching the best burger joints for Marley near the gallery Arran and I want to go to. We walk our dogs through a neighbouring park as they build sets for the opera for the Summer coming, that we will be able to walk to whenever we want. Timber clad bookstores with books I’ve never even seen published lure us in. We walk 10km+ a day exploring, Arran and I often hold hands like we did when we just met. Marley and I go for ice creams in the middle of the day between her ‘classes’ and I get to write her ridiculous assignments that we both love working on. There is a library on our street, and I am forced to find quiet places to work away from each other so I can write you this very letter, with quaint library ladies and gentlemen reading the papers.
In and amongst the challenges there are constant little miracles. Moments of beauty, connection, and deep love. The little miracles of being alive call to us every day. We all have the choice as to how we see it all.
Sent with love,
Jac x