A good parenting day
It has been nine months since the last time I went to the office and around the same time, we pulled our kid out of day care. The amount of pain, joy, disbelieve, relieved and anguish that I have experimented this year is not unique, yet it feels as if I have consolidated a decade of life in these months.
When I was at work, I was 100% on it. Part of my work implied to travel internationally. I absolutely love it. Since I was little, I dreamed of seeing the world, I dreamed of walking in silence absorbing accents, rhythms and flowing with the places. I have not traveled since February and sometimes, when I do dishes, I catch myself tracing my steps in the medina in Rabat, sitting in the Beco do Batman listening preta pretinha in Sao Paulo. My mind wonders and I sit on my computer and open google maps and I stare in the night of my kitchen at the image of the front door of my grandma’s house. I am used to pack my life in a bag and hit the road.
At the same time, when I was at home, I was 100%. I know how bad the distribution of care and home responsibilities is and Is made a purpose to give it all. Every night, from dining, to bathing to cleaning. I did the best I could, and I tried to remember that my child and my partner will not always remember the things I did, but they will always remember how they felt about it. This meant that sometimes, I traveled across the world and came back tired, jetlagged and tried to jump back at home rhythm as if moving from a train car to the next one. Many times, the speed of my own pace got me landing on my face as I tried to balance the things that have no way to be balanced.
Now there is no 100% of anything. In a good day, I can manage to work and feel like I am pulling my weight, make some food and find nuggets of joy in the life of a toddler, especially in his random expressions or questions. In a good day, I don’t have a migraine of a back pain or any pain. I can sit and read for 10 or 15 minutes. In a good day, I can catch myself crying for something moving, not painful. In a bad day, I am mostly in my head, dealing with everyone and everything, one zoom call at the time, one meal at the time, one task at the time, one diaper change at the time, one small tragedy at the time.
I am not sure when I will travel again. It might take another year, if things go well. As long as I am working, I will do it from home. I am privileged and I can do that. I walk around my house everyday trying to balance the misery of this situation and the absurdity of my privileges. I try and I fail, and I keep trying.
On the other hand, parenting has taken a different dimension. Now, there is no break. I know that the moment I am not doing what I am supposed to, my partner is picking up the slack. I have also learned that I thought I was 100% at home before but I was not. My partner picked up the pieces of figuring out things that seemed very straightforward to me, like winter clothing or food planning. We also perform tasks that imply more care and emotional labor for her and more logistics and cleaning for me. We did not plan it this way, but it works.
In a strange way, I have gotten used to this new constrained reality. Glued to a chair for endless zoom sessions. Cooking, eating, cleaning and going to bed. I feel like I am a song playing on repeat. Sometimes, I am rocking the tunes, other times, I need to turn it off and sit on the couch and eat as much chocolate as my middle age body can take.
But today was different, today I had a good parenting day. It was not a whole day; it was a good half a day of parenting. I was calm, I was clear, and I was able to connect with my kid and my life in a way that is rare in these demanding circumstances. We made a giraffe out of recycling materials and read books. No milk in the couch, no explosive pee, not tantrums or criticism. I did not get hit or pinched or mistakenly stepped on. It was just joy. Pure joy, like syrup coming from a maple tree.
This is Girafi
I am not sure when I will get another day like that or at least, half a day like that. I know that many, many of us are dealing with the extraordinary pressure of caring for us, for others and for each other. I know that many of you have lost someone and I am very sorry for that. I am sending you love, and solidarity and companionship. Just like unicorns, good parenting days do exist. They are rare, they seem mythical, but they are out there, waiting for you, in the midst of this shitshow. Keep looking for them and share them with us when you find them. This is the kind of thing that would help us make it together to the other end, whatever that is.