Dear Diary

Dear Diary is the theme of this week's Sunday Scribbling.

I have kept diaries of sorts since I was perhaps 15 years old. I threw out my first ever diary due to its shamefully embarrassing and juvenile content, but I kept my second one, which just so happened to be a school project we had to do as part of our year 12 English curriculum. I doubt any teacher actually had a read of its content; it was written by a dopey 16 year old after all, but had anyone chanced a bit of a skim through, they might have been surprised, for I never said a word in the majority of my classes at school, and the diary content, in hindsight, is both riotously hilarious (though not deliberate) and tragic (perhaps melodramatic is a better word...or angst-riddled maybe).

It did pass my mind to share one of the more laughable moments in that second diary, but I refrained from doing so, instead I thought I would share this little tid bit. In hindsight I think perhaps I might have suffered a little of the old post natal depression in the aftermath of having my babies. I was quite depressed and despairing for quite a while afterward... then we moved to Canada and the isolation, the loneliness, the lack of support was almost unbearable. To make matters worse, I then endured Vancouver's wettest winter ever; a winter that just would not let up. The darkness, the lack of vitamin D and my already questionable mental state saw me plunge into a deep dark hole, one that I could not see my way out of......until I travelled by myself to Australia to attend my friend's wedding. It was the break I needed; the beginning of my turn around. You'll be happy to know that I am in a much better place these days.

This is a diary entry of my landing in Sydney after my "great escape". It is a bit of an emotional rant - I hope you can follow it:

2nd March 2006 – Sydney Australia - 27 degrees Celsius

What a tumultuous thirty-six hours. Talk about stress and serenity; life and death; darkness and light; turmoil and peace; sanity and insanity; warm and cold.

What would a numerologist say of this state of being; highs and lows and opposing thoughts, feelings and experiences?

I love my family, but my soul has been dying and I have felt like one of those ships lost in the Bermuda triangle – having mysteriously disappeared without a trace, with no hope of ever being seen again –soul off the radar.

Actually the red light is still flashing on the navigation screen. It signals that all is well; all is registering. Life and the vessel are following the straight path to its destiny. Perhaps the vessel might encounter a storm or undue turbulence, perhaps the people on board are a bit bored themselves; they might feel a bit uncomfortable for a while, but they know it isn’t for long; they know that there is an end to their suffering – they can generally count down the hours on one or two hands. So for them, it is mostly…. well, bearable. I don't know where I am going or how long it is going to take. It is as though I boarded a ship without an itinerary and have unwittingly boarded one that has simply been set adrift.

My dreams have stagnated and rot due to a lack of reflection. They fade away like the colour of a bright red t-shirt left for weeks to dry on the clothes line during a heatwave. The brilliant red grows duller and duller; the garment stiffens and becomes unshapely with each rain and scorching it gets, hanging there neglected and forgotten.

I really did have dreams once, but I don’t remember what they are now….
Actually I do remember, but the fire of possibility has long been extinguished, the winds that fanned the flames – exhausted. What remains is the ashen remnants of an idea.

Everything starts with an idea – sure, but passion, desire, inspiration, hope and opportunity are needed for an idea to sprout forth. Nourishment enables the idea to gather strength and strive toward its greatest potential. We all need a little visual progress from time to time. Don’t you think?

I often find myself sympathising with the jailbirds – the prisoners. I can’t think of a more debilitating place in which to gather hope for a better life; of believing deep down that one is a worthy human being, with talents and gifts to offer the world, but are prevented from achieving this end. I often feel that my life is as restricted, lonely and confined as a prisoner – but at least I can get into my car and roam. It is not my physicality that is being held prisoner as much as my mind. I am a slow thinker – considered no more clever than an ass, when I were at school. In reality however, I really just needed the time and freedom to think.... I am not at school anymore. I am at home, but I still need that time to collect my thoughts and arrange them on the blank pages of my mind. But today I am not at home. I have managed to escape.

Alone I took a plane to Sydney Australia from Vancouver Canada. I think I spent most of the journey in a state of shock; my mind was numb, confused and unaccustomed to peace. I felt paralysed during that flight, not knowing what to do with myself and this yet unrealised freedom. My mind only seemed to switch back on as I exited my plane - like a child's forgotten toy that had suddenly been gifted a fresh battery.

I have been away from my family for 24 hours now, and I have barely spoken to a soul; customs guy at the airport; train ticket girl and the waiter here, in this glorious cafe that I now find myself.

For the first time in ages...years, my mind is observing its surroundings; it is reflecting, absorbing and watching the energy that is this peripheral life with all its activity. I am enjoying the silence, the stillness, the ability to just be...uninterrupted within myself.

I feel free.

It never fails....

Whenever I use the bathroom, it never fails that either one or both of my children will cause incident during the brief time I am in there. They will follow me and sit, stand or lay next to the door, and either quietly tap the door, thump it violently or yell at me through it, until I come out.

Should I manage the miraculous task of creeping away unseen, it never fails that one or both children will start screaming for me to "come here" and much to my urgings, they will not divulge the reasoning behind my immediate and urgent summonsing.

On the even rarer occurrence where I have managed to venture to the bathroom alone, without being followed; they knowing exactly where I am going, but are too engrossed in whatever it is they are playing to care, it never fails that some freakish mishap or bizarre turn of events should befall upon one or both children in my absence, causing one or both children to scream at blood curdling decibels, which leaves me panicked and helpless in my efforts to speed things along so I can attend to the broken limbs, broken teeth, gauged eyes and split open heads I am imagining I will find upon scrambling out of the bathroom...which, for your information, is never the case, despite the stuck pig-like squealing and squawking going on, or the terrorised tone of the non-injured party who is frantic for me to emerge "quiiiiiiiick"and call 911.

Why oh why oh WHY, can't I use the bathroom in peace...just once?

Mother's worst fear

I took the kids to gymnastics today. Afterwards I was in the change room layering the kids in the necessary winter garb, ready for the mad chilly dash to the car. I noticed a woman with two young boys, doing the same. She was dressing the youngest one, who was perhaps 2 and a half, while the older boy, perhaps 5, announced he was going off to the bathroom. Now I don't know what took place in the moments in between, but as I was walking out into the centre foyer, I happened to see the same woman, minus the youngest child, but now with a sheer look of terror on her face....she could not find her young boy. She asked everyone if they had seen her child, "blond hair, blue eyes, answers to the name Noah". But, no one had seen him.
She begins frantically calling his name, centre staff guard the door to prevent any motherless child or suspicious adult from leaving. Other parents joined in the search, we don't know this boy, but we can imagine or might even know that same feeling of dread when our own child has disappeared out of sight. They do not answer our bleating call. They do not rush back to sooth our panicked voice. They do not suddenly emerge into sight when a sea of people begin to disperse.
The mother, fearing the worst, runs outside into a cold gale which threatens snow, and begins calling her child's name with wild abandon...nothing.
We scour every toilet stall; the ice rink; the ice rink stands; the centre corridors; the stair wells and every inch of the gym. The mother is now out of her mind with worry; eyes darting, mind racing, disbelieving how this could have happened. We can almost hear her thoughts, "but I withdrew my eyes for only a second.... just a second. Forgive me for that one second of neglect. Please return my son to me".
It is cruel and unfair, but that can truly be all it takes for a mother's worst fear to be realised.
Having searched the entire premises, we start over again - he simply HAS to be here - we all want him found.
Finally a staff member, a gymnastics coach, finds the little boy. He was there all along, hiding from his heart sick mother behind the girls change room door. Mother and Son reunite. We watch the mother run to her boy, arms outstretched and then drawing her child tightly into the empty cavity in her chest...the only antidote for this kind of broken heart. We hear the mother lovingly scold the child, "what were you thinking, I was worried sick", before we leave them alone together...to breathe.
The little boy need take just one look at the agony written over his mothers face and glance into her misty eyes to know that he should never EVER try that again.... and I doubt he will.