Vacation and shoes and stuff...

Vacation, Southern Mediterrean country... it is equivalent to long and lazy mornings with breakfast eaten outside in comfortable calm. Birds twittering, happy children laughing, the odd chair scraping against the tiled floor.
Coffee, freshly made juice, toast, scrambled eggs and lots of sweet pepper, tomatoes and cucumbers. Maybe even a newspaper in old fashioned paper edition, in a language I can understand, just to top it off. Oh, joy! That is the kind of vacation I deep down inside feel I deserve.
It`s not quite like that, though.

This year we chose to rent an apartment in Spain, on Costa del Sol. I give them that: They are real careful not to lie in the commercials: The beach stretches for kilometres on kilometres, it is just simply gorgeous and packed with people sunbathing, but noone swims or plays in the ocean. Maybe not that strange considering the water holds about the same temperature as it does at home. The Atlantic Ocean is close by and it is cold.
The temperature of the water is not mentioned anywhere! Neither when mentioning the ocean, nor the waterparks... both heated by the sun alone, and cooled off by the wind. It never crossed my mind it would be an issue. We love to swim and play in the water, but I have to admit there have been moments when even I regret getting in.
We went on vacation to Costa del Sol, the sunny coast, and the enticing, cheerful sound of that alone, made every logical and sensible thought about actual temperatures on land or in sea just shortcut. And then the first day here we had rain, thunder and lightening. Honest! I was just stunned in disbelief when I woke up and went outside on the terrace to have a mug of coffee... it was like as if I moved on an autopilot, not noticing anything, untill I stood there, in the rain, getting wet.

I left my running shoes at home. One of these halfways consious desitions I sometimes make.
The only shoes I brought are my sandals, a pair of high heeled sandals (which happen to be my very best pair of shoes: beautiful on, excellent quality and wearing them is like walking on clouds), and a pair of ballerina shoes in case of a shoe emergency.
But my running shoes are at home. They are blooming in stark pink calm and quiet at home. Probably on the hallway floor. I call them running shoes, because that is what they were intended for, but people who know me know I never run.

Last year we went to Turkey on an all-inclusive trip to Side. It was really hot, so we had nothing to do all day other than play and swim in the pool and eat and drink. After only a little while by the pool, my husband began to act restless.

Now, most people (normal people that is) in warmer countries, who like to think they are fit, get up early before the sun really starts to burn, and do their workout in comfortable temperature.
Not my husband. My husband likes to sleep a few hours more than me, which is fine, really. Not many can cope with three hours sleep. He gets up when he feels he is rested.

In Turkey we soon established a routine: We had a late breakfast, calmed down, splashed about in the pool... and then my husband started getting really restless, before he just wandered off and left. He was gone for a good hour, and then came back; soaking wet, drinking coke and looking really smug and content: He had jogged around the estate.

This year it all started very innocent. When you are staying somewhere you should be oriented about your whereabouts and where to find what. We told the kids we'd be right back, and left... just to explore the nearby environment, I thought... yes, I am still that naive.

Since I aspire to the ambitions of calling myself a fit woman in my prime (I just love these obvious, beautiful lies), I started my endomondo just outside the door.

- Why the big deal with endomondo?
- I like to keep track of where I go, how far, when, if I walk faster next time... you know; just because...
- Who do you keep the records for then? I can hear the badly hidden skepticism in his voice. He has doubts if his wife has started publishing the tales of a happy ever after, perfect life in pure family idyll.
- No, it's just me; I like to see progress, if there's any. I really, really need motivation, and my endomondo sportstracker app is really and truly helping
The fact that online friends have found my account, and that I add pictures from the walks, is to me totally uninteresting knowledge for him.

The very first day we wandered off, and got back an hour later. We had then walked about 1.6 km uphill (oh yes, we found a road leading us uphill) and down. A total of 3.2 km.
A week later we are gone for a couple of hours, walking more than 9 km. Still uphill... before going downhill again.
I do not intend to ask him if he does it to make me lose weight unconsciously, or if he just enjoys my company. Either way we thrive on our walkes, even though I gasp for air and sulk over my hurting ancles. (Of course I never ask him if he loves our walks, away from our demanding kids, just as much as I do.)

I don't know much about slopes, other than the fact they are steep, but there was a sign saying 10%. I don't know what that is 10% of, but I know it is supposed to be steep. The cars driving pass us struggled with their gear, speed and acceleration, and those riding bikes (all two of them) came almost to a halt, no matter how frantically they paddled.

Since I didn't bring my running shoes, I walked in my sandals. Beautiful, soft, comfortable, real leather sandals. They look great, but noone in their right mind would even consider walking up a mountain in them. It turned into a thing for me, a gimmick, to walk the walk in them. Like a quiet protest against pro equipment for amateurs.
In pure sympathy my husband wandered next to me, on bad asphalt, in his sandals.

Back in the apartment we have a fruit salad, a cup of coffee, before he casually makes his exit: "Eh... I just go for a quick run." He ties on his running shoes, and runs the route we just walked.

Yesterday we went to Ronda. A lovely mountain town in the Andalucian mountains (no, we didn't walk, we drove the car there).
My husband got me a lovely pair of tracking sandals... today my husband both walked, then later on ran, in his running shoes.

Imperfect perfect life.

I work full time outside our home. Even though we have children, a fairly sized house in constant need of cleaning and garden there was never any doubt or discussion whether I should stay at home or not.

My husband got a full time job outside our home, but he`s on a rotation: two weeks away from home working offshore, and then four weeks at home... during those four weeks he does a bit of work for his employer, but he also does quite a bit of charity work, he jogs and he reads quite a bit. All these activities take about a full working day, every day. (A full working day in Norway is usually 8 hours, minus 1/2 hour lunchbreak. A full week is 37 1/2 hours.)

We are far from poor, but we need two incomes to make the wheels go round the way we want them to.

We have plans for how to help and spoil our boys, help them start their adult life and get a comfortable life. We have a number of donations we choose to keep up. And we live! In short: we have a good life.

We actually like working as well. It is fun, challenging and fullfilling to use your abilities to something else than clean and tidy up what will be unclean and scattered about within an hour.

It is lovely to see other adults. I so cherish the small breaks when I hear conversations about other things than what happens in the wonderful world of young boys. I don`t even have to participate! Just to hear somebody mention a world chrisis and give their opinion on fashion is like balm to my soul. It gives me the extra boost I need to both smile and be patient and listen to my little miracles.

We do a LOT of LAUNDRY. We spend a lot of time helping and listening to homework. We wash a lot of dishes. We clean the house and vacuum and take the garbage out. We explain and listen and say "no" so many times every day it is hard to remember how to say "yes". We attend partents` meetings and attend community voluntary work and buy groceries. The amount of milk and bread we bring into our house every week is unbelievable.

We try to leave the house tidy when we go to bed, and yet, in the morning, the house looks like a miniature tornado hit sometime during the night while I was asleep.

There is an awful lot to do in our house every day. Most of it noone will ever notice or even think must be a time consuming chore.

We cope, but it is an ongoing race against what people would say if they happen to drop by.

I think it`s fair to say we are happy, but our greatest fear is that some aunt, or other relative, should drop by. Someone likely to tell our mothers about the true state of our house.

Women`s liberation has been good to us women. Depending on your goals in life, Norway is probably one of the best countries in the world to live in.
But... having the opportunity to fullfill yourself has a price.
There is no possible way to be excellent and on the alert on everything.

I am me, an individual with independent views, opinions, feelings, needs and abilities. In addition I am a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister, a collegue, a careerwoman, a housewife, a friend, a pet owner, a wannabe writer and I do not wish to eliminate any of those roles. I want to hold them all; more than that: I need them to be and feel like a full person. If I had not known them all, they would not have already been a part of who I am, and I could be a full person without them... I don`t know, but I need to be everything I am.

Still I am fully aware that to have these demands to my life creates a big gap between what is desired and what is possible to achieve.
Leaving the house to do a full time job outside our home leaves a full time job at home open.
Many of my friends depend to a large extent on grandparents. I don`t have that luxury, but I understand that is a huge load off the heavy weight of being present.
Grandparents can be wonderful listeners and audience and guides to the many mysteries in life.

I try to do well on all arenas, but I know I don`t succeed much. My biggest worry is I will reach the point of regret some time in the future, of what I don`t know, but there is a good chance I will have them.
It is perhaps particularly hard to agree I can`t have a perfect home the way I want it to be perfect. There is no way I can do what my mother used to do when she was younger and an at home mom. I made a choice and got myself a career and a family. I just never thought getting it would make me feel like such a failure.

My comfort, though, is that we are perfectly happy there, even though it is far from perfect. Or perhaps living a happy life embracing all of our perfect imperfections (like the song says) is a far better way to put it.