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After a seemingly long day spent with Virginie and Lily, home from school, I decided to take the girls for a swim in the pool. They were both so excited to show off their new tricks and a swim usually calms us all down enough to pass out pretty quickly at bedtime. There were a few downpours this afternoon so I feared the water would be chilly, but it was gorgeous. Calm and relaxing and the sun, by now preparing to recede on the horizon, was not too bright or intense. Lily got in first, wearing her floaty bathing suit with a few floaties removed. She didn't want to wear it, but it is too hard for me to keep my eye on them both in the pool and this was a safety net for Mommy really. Virginie and I followed and she immediately started her paddle, paddle, paddle, kick, kick, kick routine from swimming lessons.
As they practiced jumping in the pool and swimming to Mommy, I noticed a small audience forming on the roof of the guesthouse. My eagle eyes are trained for any sudden movements in the landscape and I homed in on them immediately. Monkeys. Seven of them. Two of them were tiny blue babies, but they were still watching us. They were all pretty curious as the girls screamed with delight jumping and swimming and floating on their swimming noodles. The mothers with babies were cautious, but realized that we were pretty far away and harmless.
This was a week of milestones. Lily swam underwater without her floaty swim suit. Finished her first year of school in Barbados. And graduated from Blossoms Nursery School. She will start primary school in September at St. Gabriel's School. I am so thrilled with her progress and excited about the prospects for her future.
When Lily was born, she was the best thing to ever happen to me in my life up to that point. I love her in ways that I didn't even know existed because I had never felt so loved. One wants to give one's children things they missed in their childhoods and often it seems that it is the material things that are most considered. But I want Lily to feel loved. Every day. And not because she does the things I want her to, but just because I love her. I want her to feel a sense of herself and her place in the scheme of things in life. And to believe that she is capable of anything. I know that it is my job to guide her in this discovery and it is here that I think I am failing her.
Seriously. This is not a plea for people to tell me what a good mother I am. I am a good mother. But I can see that my struggle is taking its toll on my little girl and that makes me feel horrible. As tough as this move has been for me, Lily has been with me the entire time, watching, waiting, hoping that I was going to be okay. I can see it in her big brown eyes. She wants me so badly to be the woman I was before we left New York for ports unknown. I want to be also.
I watched her singing at her graduation from Blossoms and she was so sweet and innocent and shy. She kept checking for me at the back of the room where I was rocking a diapered, but unclothed Virginie on one hip and taking photos with my free hand. I was waving at her, blowing kisses, smiling, welling up with tears. My baby was graduating from nursery school and I couldn't have loved her more. I hope she could see in my eyes how special she is to me and not the sad, mopey monster I have become as each day passes here.
Lily loves Barbados and the friends she has made here, many of whom will go on to St. Gabriel's with her. It is so sad to me that on this, we cannot see eye to eye. I know that going back home will return her to a small apartment or a house in the suburbs, yikes, outside the city. I know that going back home presents us with the financial challenge of providing her with a good primary education given the state of many US public schools and the cost of the private. I know that both she and Virginie will lose their private garden and their sense of freedom wandering around and discovering nature in their own backyard. But I also know, that my children shouldn't have to live with an emotionally and spiritually stunted mother. In the long run, they are better in a small corner loved completely than running around with ample space and feeling emptiness in their hearts. The worst gift I can leave them with as they graduate through life is a sense that they were not loved enough. That would break my heart and leave one more notch on the belt of Barbados for the destruction of my life and family.
My sister said to me last night, "When it's good, it's really good. But when it's bad, I know she hasn't taken her medication." She wasn't talking about me. But she very well could have been. I started this blog because I needed a way to sort out all I was feeling in this new country with all its issues and limitations, as well as its beauty and offer of escapism. It has been easy to share stories about the monkeys and the bugs and the creatures that freak me out. It has even been easy to talk about my marriage and my children and my hopes for all of us. It has made people smile and laugh and think about their own lives, I hope. My circumstances have been made more difficult by the post partum depression that wracked me and floored me for over a year. A feeling of loss and abandonment made more crippling by the fact that I truly was lost here in Barbados and did feel abandoned by everything I knew to be true in the world.
The girls and I arrived here in the dead of night on August 7th, 2009 and it was stifling hot. I was at least 15 pounds overweight, had endured endless nights of a colicky baby and demanding toddler who felt as confused as I was, and I was still not sure how we had come to the decision to relocate. Of course I knew, but I was tired and cranky and had just had a baby three months earlier! The monkeys, open floor plan of the house that let anything in, the heat, the sun, the lack of amenities that I had grown used to due to a life as a spoiled American girl just twisted my already tired brain.
Didier was gone for 10, 12, 14 hours at a time, trying to get a kitchen that had gone without a chef for 5 months together, and a hotel that had gone without true leadership for years. I sympathized. I sympathized with everyone really--my overworked husband, my tired, scared, mosquito-bitten children. There had been no time for myself. None. We knew no one, didn't know anything about this place and spent much of those first months in our own bubbles trying to breathe let alone communicate or share with each other. Then the craziness started.
I dared speak the word, but I knew what it was. I wept openly every day. Was scared to death of something happening to the girls in the garden. Had a terrorizing fear of driving the car. Only got out of bed so the girls would not think they had a crazy mother, which I believe they suspected already anyhow. My biggest fear was the girls living a childhood with a mother they could not connect to or trust, so I threw myself into their lives, giving them no chance to feel abandoned, ignored, unimportant. We read stories, drew pictures, went for walks, went swimming, had dance parties and tea parties, played in the paddling pool. I kissed them good night every night and told them I loved no one more than them. I answered every cry in the middle of the night and made silly faces when they seemed hurt or down.
I rubbed Didier's back and got pissed at the people at work who let him down. I talked with him about the troubles at work, made sure he got to visit the sea on his days off. Let him sleep later every morning and took the girls out of his hearing range so he truly could continue to sleep. I hoped for answers to his struggles here and tried to be supportive where I could.
So here we are now. Post partum has paved the way for a more amorphous type of depression. When it's good, it's really good...and I write about how much we love one another and how we are trying in the struggle to maintain. I see the beauty in the island and truly believe we can live this last year here happily. But when it's bad, you'd never know...because I keep smiling, but it's bad. More to come...
(c)copyright 2010. Citymominthejungle
Last year at this time, Didier had already left for Barbados and the girls and I were in New York getting ready for our relocation, first to Florida and then to Barbados to start this new journey. Virginie was two months old and on the verge of a colicky freak out that would last months and put me and my parents on the edge of sanity. Lily was confused and scared as our apartment slowly transformed itself into a storage unit of all of the things she recognized and held dear. We'd SKYPED with Didier early in the morning as it was, even then, our custom to get up at the crack of dawn, and chatted. It was our hope to keep things as normal as possible for Lily since her papa was gone and the life she knew and had finally gotten comfortable in was about to change.
Today, Father's Day began with a torrential downpour that rumbled through Barbados late in the evening and continued all morning. Because we are not tourists, we welcome the rain. It's great for the garden and offers a reprieve from the exhausting heat and humidity. Of course, once it stops raining, the heat will rise from the ground and we will all be drenched with sweat in our little bubble. The girls showered Didier with love at 6:55 AM, which was a break from the 5:45 wake up and I was able to sneak in a quick kiss and snuggle before the day went into overdrive.
While it continued to rain sporadically, Didier and Lily found a small window to get in the pool and play while I put Virginie down for her nap. Father's Day is different than Mother's Day in that we are trying to allow moments for the kiddies and Papa to be together and on Mother's Day, it's all about keeping Mommy free of kiddies! Still planning our menu for this evening while Lily and Papa fly paper airplanes and Lily floats paper boats on her imaginary stream. Didier is wearing his #1 Dad badge so proudly I think I might cry. You never know what kind of dad your lover is going to be when your lives are all about yourselves. And while he is not really into the domestic stuff, ie housework, tidying up, morning or middle of the night wake ups, Didier is surprisingly spectacular and comfortable in the imaginary world Lily has created for them. He is like a little French-accented guide into Playland who cooks and draws and paints and even dances when called upon. (This is a big deal as I have almost never seen this man move his butt!)
The kid in Didier, which is so available to those who know him well, but is often hidden in his professionalism and French politesse, is raging on Father's Day. I told Didier this morning that the plan is for Lily and Virginie to think he is the #1 Dad even when being number one in their lives becomes more challenging. When they find new distractions and interests and begin thinking for themselves. When it might seem easier to turn away and ignore what they are interested in than try to understand. He will be their first love forever and if he does it right, he gives them a better chance to not only believe in themselves, but to love themselves...and that would be the best Father's Day gift of all.
(c)copyright 2010. Citymominthejungle
Lily made me so proud. She greeted everyone who came to the table with her sweetest "Bon jour, which means good day in French," as she advised, and sat with her little napkin on her lap. She was thrilled to have been given a fork and knife which signified that she was now a big girl. Knives don't usually make it to her table setting at home. When her crepes arrived, she cut every single piece, even the ones she had no intentions of eating, into tiny little squares. Virginie, on the other hand, still new to the game, did a lot of screeching and wiggling and ended up in my arms while I tried to eat, rocking her from side to side on one hip.
I was sweating like a piglet. Honestly, I just seem to be sweating more than most here. Luckily I have given up all pretense of wearing make up or appointing myself properly. I am just one big, sweaty hot mess in a dress carting around children. At least my skin is hydrated.
We took a tour of the Gap in Holetown, a series of little restaurants and small hotels in a one block radius, to digest a little of our breakfast. It was quite a nice tour until the ominous black clouds of rain surged across the sky. Running back to the car, we made it just in time for a serious downpour! Rather than drive home and risk soaking ourselves to get inside, we drove north along the west coast and stopped at the Weston Fish Market when we saw beautiful red snapper and other fish we didn't recognize being sold. For $22 Barbados dollars ($11 US), we bought a gorgeous piece of fish that will surely get eaten by hungry Penn-Virots tonight.
Virginie passed out in the car and is still sleeping. Papa and Lily are swimming in the pool and Mommy is writing. A nice hot Saturday morning spent together.
(c)copyright 2010. Citymominthejungle
I went on a class trip with my daughter Lily to Farley Hill and the Barbados Wildlife Reserve today with the classes from Blossoms Nursery School. This was my first time as a class mother and I was so excited. I packed enough for a weekend trip--Six sandwiches, four frozen juice boxes, two frozen bottles of water, two sippy cups, brownie bites, Cheese Sticks, the Barbados equivalent to Cheetos, Tortillaz, Bajan Doritos, marshmallows, cantaloupe, grapes, apples, two extra changes of clothing, and Virginie. Well, we still don't have a proper sitter yet and I did not want to miss out on this trip with Lily, so her baby sister came along too. Lily and many of the other kids were just as excited about the ride on the blue bus as they were about our actual destinations. But I think Lily was relieved to get off the bus when we got to Farley Hill as she had clutched the seat bar in front of her the entire ride!
How I wish I had met some of these mothers when I first arrived in Barbados. I might have had a different impression of the island's people! I don't think anything is going to make we want to stay here longer than our contracted two years, but there were some women there that I would be happy to call friend.
Farley Hill National Park in the parish of St. Peter has very lush natural views and an historic mansion in ruins. While this appealed to my curiosity, Lily and her classmates were most interested in the playground! They ran wild for a few hours, stopping on occasion to snack and drink juice and water, as it was seriously humid and hot out there. Virginie was so thrilled with the raging three and four year olds that she refused a real nap of any kind until we went to the Wildlife Reserve.
The Wildlife Reserve tours are self-guided romps through the forest where one encounters turtles, deer, peacocks, and a feeding frenzy that includes them all plus the Barbados green monkeys in droves. An interesting prospect with two, three and four year olds and their moms and nannies. We were greeting at the gate by tortoises. Even though the literature at the park said there were very few on the rest of Barbados, there were hordes here in the Reserve. I could see why given their copulating at any given spot along the trail nearly non-stop. The kids had no idea, but all the chaperones were in fits of giggles. Other animals and birds roamed the forest and we stopped at each sight to Ooh and Ahh with the kids. The peacocks are always impressive, for me anyway. That blue is definitely a gift from God. I took about 65 pictures of the peacocks alone. Don't be fooled by the brown doves. They are pigeons.
There were warnings about sudden noises provoking the animals and all I could think was, we are a pack of sudden noises going into the wild. At the feeding time, nearly all the kiddies started howling and cooing and the monkeys went bonkers. They couldn't decided what was more interesting, the food or all these kids dressed in red, yellow, green and blue. At just the moment I thought I couldn't take it anymore, weighed down with Virginie in the Hip Hammock, the stroller long abandoned on the cobbled brick path, and a screeching Lily too tired to care about decorum any longer, Didier arrived to the rescue.
Nevermind that I had supported and fed and nursed and cared for the girls and their classmates all day. All anyone will remember is my knight arriving to pick us up just as we were to reembark the bus and return to school. As he whisked us to the car and onto our journey home, Lily passed out from sheer exhaustion and heat fatigue. Truthfully, it was a lot of fun and being with Lily on her journey of discovery was priceless. I will endure the wildlife of three and four year olds and wild animals for her any day, even on the days that she is pretty wild herself.
(c)copyright 2010. Citymominthejungle
I admit that I have it easier than most with a chef as a husband. And a chef as wonderful and creative as Didier Virot, even better. When I was pregnant with Virginie I gained 55 pounds and my OB/GYN with her big brown eyes would look at me and ask, "Stephanie, what did you eat this week? You know we have passed the recommended 25-30 lbs and you still have half way to go?" Yes, of course, thank you. I cannot blame Didier entirely, but we really did eat well all through both pregnancies.
Cooking in Barbados has been challenging, as has been finding interesting things to eat that will not cost your preschool tuition. Which is to say that while I know there are good restaurants in Barbados, one cannot eat at them everyday as it is cost prohibitive and just not that exciting. Sue me. I came here from New York.
Our troubles at home begin with the heat. It is hot. Every day. But more challenging is the heat that could be generated by the oven. I say could because we don't even bother. Before we arrived, Didier cooked using the oven and thought he might die of heat shock in the house, with no one to find him for days. If I ever need to blowdry my hair, and yes, I am a Black woman, so that time does come on occasion, I do it outside! That's how hot it is in here. We don't want to add any extra heat. That leaves us to the burners on the stove, the barbecue, and cold salads and dishes.
Now I know that many people, I was surely one of them, imagine that living on an island, one would find fresh fish, produce and vegetables to cook and eat and savor. But this couldn't be further from the truth here. Barbados imports nearly all of its food from other countries. There are many options from the States, Europe, and Canada but they are either frozen options or insanely expensive.
The girls, well the girls are another story. Lily eats pasta, noodles, or spaghetti nearly every day. While these things may all seem like the same thing to you, I dare you to say so to her. We make french fries, pizza, corn pancakes and gauffres from scratch for them and serve lots of fruit--apples, pears, grapes, oranges from Jamaica, and cantaloupe. There are brownies and cookies and juice boxes, the ubiquitous Goldfish and Cheerios. Yogurt. Ice cream that will break the bank--this stuff is like gold here, extraordinarily expensive. Recently, Lily has broken down and has begun eating a little chicken, some steaks, maybe turkey franks. An eater as finicky as that could nearly kill a chef. But not to worry, Virginie eats everything.
I was sad about our food options because I had become so spoiled in New York with the availability of everything. But I have found some places that have put a real smile on my face. I'll tell you about them soon.
(c)copyright 2010. Citymominthejungle
