I mentioned a while
back that I did a guest post at
Bod-for-Tea. She's hosting such a cool series of guest posts on
Parenting Around the Planet - I highly recommend popping over to browse through them.
Anyhoo, as I've two sickly small girls on my hands and my bathroom is about to ripped up to (hopefully) find and repair a major water leak, I'm re-using that post here.
I think it sums up a lot of how I feel about where I live, and about what I'm doing right now!
My blog is about parenting and Cape Town, not so much
parenting
IN Cape Town, but parenting
AND Cape Town.
Reason being that I kind of feel the same about both: continual
dichotomy.
The Beauty.
Looking at my girls, hearing their belly laughs, seeing them
interact with each other, with their Dad, their family, feeling their small
bodies against mine, smelling their skin.
Staring at our mountain, hearing the hadeda birds, the call
to mosque, seeing the colour in our city, feeling the vibe of many cultures,
the grass underfoot, smelling the sea, the food, the salty fogs which roll in
at dawn.
The Fear.
Of nurturing two lives, forming two personalities, equipping
them with all that they’ll need to tackle the complexities of life in this
world.
Of living in a volatile society, forming the right opinions
and acting on them. The fear of seen and unseen threats, fear for the future.
The Freedom.
Of having so much time with my children. So many unscheduled
afternoons, so many moments free to play, to cuddle, to chat.
Of open spaces – beaches, forest, mountain. The proximity to
so many beautiful places, so many free and easy cultural experiences.
The Guilt.
Of being distracted when they want me all to themselves. Of burdening
them with my frustrations, or the by-products of those frustrations. The guilt of the privilege of having all this
time with them, and that not always being enough to make me happy.
Of being privileged. White. Middle-class. Belly full.
Supported. The guilt of that not always being enough to make me happy living
here.
The Humour.
Of raising two girls who laugh easily. Who don’t take
themselves too seriously and teach me not to do the same.
Of a city, a country, which has learned to laugh at itself,
at each other. Laugh with a fond recognition of our differences, our
challenges.
The Sadness.
Of my girls not having the freedom of movement I had as a
child. The naivety I had. That they are, too young I think, exposed to
homelessness, poverty, crime, desperation.
That the homeless, the poor, the victims, the desperate live
so close to all this beauty, yet feel so little of it in their lives. That
there is only so much we can do to help.
Living in Cape Town, a city, exposes me every day to the
dichotomies of life, the joys and the heartbreak.
One moment I’m buoyed by
morning light on the mountain, the good news story in our local paper, the
flower-seller singing as he rides his bike down our road.
The next I’m broken
by the news of an armed-mugging in our neighbourhood, by the small boys asking
for bread at the gate, by the next big corruption scandal hitting the
headlines.
Parenting, raising children, takes me on the same roller-coaster.
One moment my heart is singing watching my
eldest ‘read’ a story to her little sister, making a play-dough zoo, dancing in
the living room to the Black-Eyed Peas.
The next they’re both crying, hanging
on to my legs, they won’t eat the supper I’ve raced around to prepare, one’s
got a stinky nappy and the other a stinky attitude and I just want to die.
Who knew a happy medium would ever sound so attractive? And,
I guess, so boring.
