Last night I arrived home from my kids' Spring Piano Recital around nine pm. It occurred to me that I have a ticket to board a plane today and I hadn't done a thing to prepare for the trip. Out came the suitcase, and the grabbing of clothes from drawers, and the yelling at children to just bring me the flip-flops already. Once I made a chaotic mess of the bed and floor, the dog pads into the room and stares up at me.

I look at him and I remember.

I remember I have a fourth, furry, four-legged child. I email and then call the kennel. I pray I remembered to book him in for this weekend. I look for evidence in my email. There is none. I pray harder and I think of ways I can explain this to my husband, because clearly my marriage will be over when he finds out I forgot about the dog. Again.

I ask God to grant me this one itty-bitty marriage saving favor, and I email two friends who might take pity on me and don't want to see me divorced and destitute. Both say yes, they will take the dog if the kennel doesn't work out. One promises to make her husband sleep on the sofa because last time the dog came to stay he jumped into their bed and growled at the strange man trying to join him there. The other says she'll try to work him in around their newly adopted cat. God loves me. He gives me good friends who recognize I might be borderline insane, and who still like me. They might like me a little bit less after last night, but they like me.

I decide to use the friend with the sofa sleeping husband as my back up. I plan to use my lack of linguistic skills to my advantage, and show up at the kennel in the morning anyway. The worst they can do is send me away in a flurry of words and stupid American insults I can't understand anyway. I decide not to tell my husband until much later. Last time things didn't work out with the dog, it involved the police, a locksmith, some swearing, a pair of scissors, and a mangled cardboard box.

I drive to the kennel first thing this morning. I take my eight year old boy with me for moral support and translation services. We arrive at the gate, I take a deep breath and I shove the dog into the arms of the girl who greets us. She looks at me, hugs the dog, and asks when I will be back to pick him up.

Panic recedes. My son translates dates and times. My marriage is safe. I realize calling myself borderline insane is probably an understatement. I leave and call my friend to tell her she can sleep in the same bed as her husband this weekend. Fortunately, so can I.

I have a bunch of stuff rattling around in my head, but jet lag isn't conducive towards putting ideas together in anything other than bullet points. So, here you go:

My littlest can remember important details like what her sister wore for a party three years ago, or the color of my friend's favorite earrings. She calls it her 'ReMemory', which is so adorable it makes it impossible for me to stay angry when her 'rememory' doesn't work to my advantage. She does have an exceptional memory for detail, a trait which I have long known I do not possess.



I know she comes by it genetically, as my husband can still remember his childhood best friend's phone number. You can imagine how difficult it is to win an argument with such a person. Fortunately, he doesn't have as much recall for emotional outbursts as he does for numbers, but it is still a challenge when he's able to remember exactly how much I spent on a visit to JCrew.

My memory is very poor, which is decidedly unhelpful during arguments, when writing about past experiences, and in situations under which I feel intense scrutiny. One such situation is the ubiquitous 'class coffee morning'. This week I had three to attend, and as I have an extreme aversion to small talk and experience hot flashes in uncomfortable social situations, I find them to be of the devil. I kid. Sort of.

At my third, and thankfully final coffee this week, we were asked to give a short bio of ourselves and how we found our way to Switzerland. Easy, as I do remember my name, my children and my husband's employer. What I did not account for was a question and answer period, in which a woman who is now referred to by my friend as 'The Interrogator', would tell me that her husband works for the same company. Not a problem, until she proceeded to question and then correct me on the exact location of their office, which as memory serves me, my husband is never at. She wanted to know where he travels, and how often. She then could not understand how he travels for work and for graduate school. Frankly, neither can I.

Then she wanted to know his precise, and I do mean precise, title. I got three quarters of the way through it (it's long) and drew a blank. I drew a blank on my husband's title in front of a co-worker's wife and thirteen other people.

I could not remember and it was horrible. Cue the hot flash. There I was sweating and my mind was reeling and fourteen people were staring at me, and she says 'Oh come on. You can do better than that.'

Well, no. No, I can't.

The Interrogator then comments upon leaving 'how embarrassing that must have been for me'.

Well, yes. Yes, it was.

That is one coffee that I would like to wipe completely from my ReMemory. Comments are now open for any and all embarrassing moments you would like to share. Thank you.

Kimberly

On my back deck sits a lone polka dot flip flop. I put it there a few days ago because it has dog poo on the sole, so I placed it there, sole to the sky, in the hopes that it would rain soon. I thought it was a brilliant idea except that it hasn't rained this week. The flip flop has been sitting, sun baked, patiently waiting for the dog to stop by and sniff it every time he goes out. I know I should bring it in and wash it myself, make it usable again, but I don't like to get my hands dirty.

There are a great many things in life that need cleaning up. Beginning with my attitudes, my head, my heart. Sometimes I think if I ignore them, place them out of sight somewhere, they will come clean without me having to do the dirty work. I hate to say it, but life is about doing the dirty work. I have a poop smeared shoe and a lot of emotional baggage to prove it. We all do. That's the beautiful thing about this life. We're all a bit of a mess in need of work, but there's always the grace to complete it.

It's no use waiting on the rain.

Kimberly

It's been ages hasn't it?

We've been busy settling back into life in der Schweiz. There has been laundry, groceries, and lots of gardening to catch up on. Cold, rainy weather has led to some rather interesting dynamics among my little people, namely who can be the most annoying without getting caught and who can make their sibling the first to cry on any given day. There have also been rousing games of who can make the biggest mess and not clean it up, and who can complain the most about the bad weather/soggy garden clean-up/general obnoxiousness of their family members.

I may or may not have won that last round.

Summer as an expat is a tricky time. Most families head back to their home country for the better part of the summer months, so playmates are scarce. Add in some exceptionally bad weather, and you are looking at a lot of empty hours to fill. We'll be filling them soon with a villa in Italy. Until then, I will be silently begging God to accept that I have enough patience and I no longer require the aforementioned situations in order to produce it.



What are you doing to fill your empty summer hours?

Kimberly

The return to Zurich is weighing heavy on my mind. It will involve three little people, five suitcases, some carry-ons, and only one responsible adult who does not bear up well under pressure or a lack of sleep. Our last trip ended with my son's (possibly accurate) observation that I wasn't 'setting a very good example'. You might agree if you believe yelling at one's kids and generally acting like a crazy person is considered a bad example.



Our time here in the US has been all kinds of wonderful. Being with friends and family who know my true self, and still like me in spite of it, fills up the fissures and cracks that have appeared over the last year of living away. Having said that, I am excited about this next year in Switzerland. It is likely that we will return to the US next summer, so there is a lifetime of travel to be squeezed into a very short twelve months. There are new friends to make and expat friends to keep. Mountain views to be enjoyed and forest paths to run. Kids to raise and laundry to complain about.



It's going to be a good year. A very good year.



Do you have big plans for this next school year? And by big, I mean anything from the care and keeping of your family to trying a new hair color.

Kimberly

Michael has been steadily trying to convince me that I should go to the apple store in Zurich today in order to queue for the release of the ipad2.

Please.

He can not be serious.

Tomorrow is my last very long run (22mi.) before the marathon in 4weeks. I am dreading it enough as it is, and to attempt to do it on legs that have been waiting for hours on end for an ipad? I think not.

He suggested I bring a lawn chair.

I suggested he run 22 miles.

He suggested that maybe I don't actually run on Saturdays, but instead head off for a coffee at Starbucks for three hours then splash myself with water to appear sweaty.

I suggested (under my breath) something that does not bear repeating here.

Aaaahhh, the final weeks of training. They do require a mental fortitude that I'm not sure I possess.

In other news, E has been away on a three day snowboarding trip to Davos. He arrives home this evening, and I can't wait to get my arms around that boy's neck.

Happy weekending!

Kimberly

Spring is nearly here. The world seems to be falling apart bit by bit, and still forsythia blooms and my children wake up to sturdy, sunbathed walls.

All's quiet here for the moment.  It won't last long. We are now officially on half-term break, or Ski Week as the Swiss like to call it.  Fortunately for us, my complete and utter lack in planning an appropriate ski holiday has worked in our favor, as the weather is positively spring like.  We have various day trips planned, which should generate a few new photos for those of you who enjoy the views here.  I really can't do the beauty of this country justice, either with words or with photographs, but I will try.

In other news, I am busy reading, reading, reading.  Taking a Jane Austen course is one of my best ideas to date.  I have the perfect excuse for burying my nose in some of my favorite novels.  Of course, this then means that I must watch every film adaptation of the books.  To get the full picture, mind you.

I'm also pushing forward with the running.  Good runs, bad runs, they're all important in the process as I'm training my mind just as much as I'm training my body, regardless of the pain, mental or otherwise:).

Wishing you a pain free weekend, filled with your favorite things....

Kimberly




 

Unfortunately, the title of this post indicates that something exciting has taken place.  It has not.  However all three of these things have made an appearance in my day today, and sometimes it's worth noticing the details, mundane as they may be.  It's all fuel for the art, my friends.


I'm usually motivated to notice beauty... in my kids, my situation, my life.  But, life isn't about limiting our view only to the lovely.  It's seeing the strange, the tragic, the complex or the downright weird.  And if that includes watching a family on a walk with their dog and three goats, or attending a show with festively dressed turtles, then I hope I'm there to notice it.

Kimberly

Sometimes I can't believe myself.  I really can't.  Today I got a taste of the medicine that I usually dole out to my husband.  I returned home from my twenty mile run, sweaty, tired, hurting in places I didn't think possible.  First order of business was to get a drink of water, so while standing in the kitchen I turned my attention to the running schedule posted on the wall. As I looked at it, I realized that something about the dates didn't add up. Something like the fact that I didn't account for a week, meaning I have another week of training.  Meaning that I ran twenty miles too early in the schedule.  Meaning I have another really long run to complete.  Meaning that I wanted to collapse in the corner and cry like a baby.

I have attention to detail issues and usually I reserve this minor character flaw for situations that involve trips to Home Depot, placing Michael's chinese food order, or having the correct shirt clean on the right day.  This means that I am frequently doing or not doing something that will land me in some sort of trouble with Michael. What it should not mean is that I have to run an extra twenty miles due to an accounting error.

Good grief.

Kimberly

I'm having a hard time wrangling my thoughts these days. I apologize for the lack of posting, but there's simply nothing noteworthy happening at the moment.

My neighbor almost ran me over a few days ago.  That was interesting.

My daughter has been giving me the third degree over how many chocolate chip muffins I plan on eating for breakfast.  She wants to be sure there's enough for her.  I really feel like I'm past the age where my food consumption needs to be monitored.

And I'm having aches and pains in places I did not think it possible, thanks to the commencement of the most intense training weeks before the race in November.  I'm not sure my neighbor running me over would have been a bad alternative.

We're hitting the six month mark here in Zurich.  I also like to refer to it as "Buyer's Remorse" month.  Six months is always the hardest.  It's when the shine starts to wear off the new toy, and you realize you've still got a long way to go before you can shop at Target and no longer endure a fridge/freezer that seems more appropriately sized for Barbie's dream house.

I miss home, toes that don't bleed,  neighbors who don't attempt to kill me and eating as much as I want without having to report to a miniature person.  In spite of all that, life is good.  We're off on an adventure this weekend and I'm running my first 20 miler of the season.  Yes, life is good.

Kimberly  
 

I was cleaning up a few bits and bobs yesterday, and I came across various collections of articles, book lists, recipes, and ripped out magazine pages that I've put aside for one reason or another. It's a sickness. I am compelled to save these things.  Apparently, I was also compelled to save a package of Shrinky Dinks, because I love to save things that will lead to irrational arguing between my children.

The book list(s) in particular caught my eye.  I have, in the last year, written down over fifteen books that I would like to read, and that doesn't include any of the books that I actually have read.  I think I was being a bit ambitious considering I've only read one book in the last month.

I think I made one recipe from the food pile, purchased two products from the cosmetics pile, and tried out exactly zero routines from the fitness stack (which was the largest).  Consequently, I've got some really cute lipstick, a kick A cottage pie recipe, and less than perfect abs.  I'm willing to live with these choices.

The question is, what can I recommend to you from this wealth of information I've accumulated?

This book. If you're a runner, get it, read it, google each character because this book is more outrageous than fiction.  It sounds a bit dry, but I tell you it's one of the best books I've read in some time.

This lippy.  All natural, minty goodness with the softest hint of color.

This recipe.  Thanks, Martha.  Finally, a recipe that doesn't require a few hours, a sous chef, and obscure kitchen implements.

Do you have any books/recipes/cosmetics you'd like to recommend?  I'd even be willing to accept fitness routines, but I'm not making any promises on follow through.

Kimberly

Life is clickety clacking along at a steady pace here.  We are now three weeks into the new school year and five months into our Swiss adventure.  Apparently time flies when you're busy trying to understand what the heck is going on around you, and spending the better part of your time in the ridiculously overpriced grocery store.  I may have mentioned that one or twenty times.

It snowed on the mountains yesterday, and although it's still warm here near the lake, talk has turned to skiing and lessons and other ways to spend ungodly sums of money this winter.  I'd like to make it to autumn before we start talking snow, people.  I'd be quite happy to burrow down under a blanket near the fire and stay there until April, but in an effort to embrace the full experience I will be strapping on my snowboard and heading for the Alps.  Sometime in February.  Maybe.



We've packed Rachel up for her first three day school trip to Heidiland (yes, there is such a place), where her days will be filled with hiking, climbing and a viewing of the movie Heidi.  Sweet, no?  Later in the year both she and Ethan will have week long skiing trips with their respective schools, and then another week long trip to England.  I'm so pleased that if nothing else, my kids will walk away from this experience having really tasted a bit of the world.  The flaw in this plan is that if they've inherited any of their Mama's wanderlust, it will come back to bite me when they're grown.  When I play the movie in my mind, I imagine them far flung across the globe as adults, to the soundtrack of weeping and gnashing of teeth.  And that's just their father;)

Kimberly

I'd like to post more, I really would.  Life has taken me for a bit of a ride lately, and while back to school season is welcome, I'm finding it hard to think of a way to describe it, that doesn't include bullet points.

Ten things I did on my first day home alone that a) did not include a harrowing trip to Ikea and b) did not include my hubs staying home to "keep me company".