It’s so early in the winter, and yet we are so over it already. The below freezing temperatures started over a month ago, and just now the holidays are over. A long icy road lies ahead.
We sense an interspersion of beauty and hardship.
It’s only fitting. I get a sense that this is how parenting is. During winter we mostly take pictures of the beauty of the season, the lights, the celebration, the white snow covering trees, roads, mountains, the holiday adventure. But in between there is a lot of shivering, of dirt, of tiredness.
When I moved to California I had missed so much the hardship of winter, as it gave me a darker context, a place to emerge from into Spring.
These days I have been running on low battery mode. By her nap time I was done. She has been with me full time, because it worked out this way. I took her swimming a lot, and to Bunica and Bunicu to play with her cousin, I took her to the playground to play with her little friends.
I dream of a day home alone. To read, to clean, to watch a movie. Or to just stare out the widow in silence. [this wish was granted the very next day]
Winter is like parenting. It is mighty beautiful and mighty hard. We seem to pour into a bottomless bucket, and being intentional in our parenting is exhausting. But we wouldn’t have it any other way. The early hardship is better than later larger drama.
Next week we go to inquire about short program kindergarten, if there is room and if they would accept her midway. At first we will start with a couple of hours at a time. But she loves kids. And the more I observe her patterns of development, her needs, her desires, I believe she would thrive at kindergarten. That will be a huge milestone.