Somewhere slower part 2

Two years ago I only knew a few things for sure, and one of them was that I was not happy with our present way of life. Despite buying into the work hard enough and you will have all the things, a house, happy kids, a fulfilling job, and meals on your table every night. What I was finding was despite working 3 jobs, things like emergent healthcare and endless debt were drowning us. It was like putting out small fires in the middle of a house ablaze. All I wanted was some place slower. Space to breathe, see my kids, still work, but not over work. It wasn’t enough to look forward to a vacation with them every 2 or 3 years. While some seem able to find a balance with it all, we were not able to. Some of our kids have health needs that never seem to be covered by the uber expensive health insurance we were paying for not to mention the cost of breaking an arm or needing stitches. It felt like more than just that, it felt like there was never a space or a time to just be at peace. I was doing everything I could to try and slow things down, but I was still sad. Eventually you have to ask, “if it makes you happy, then why the hell are you so sad.”

I have a deep and lasting relationship with what I will call a little bit of chaos. I think it is the only way I survived high school and college without harming myself. It used to drive my oldest sister Melissa crazy, she couldn’t understand not taking the time to sit in peace or be quiet. In college she was forever asking me to slow down and find peace. Unaware that I was trying my hardest to out run my own depression. Like all coping skills, there are downsides and benefits. It made me industrious, I achieved things in the midst of depression that I couldn’t have done if I had taken the time to slow down. One could argue I would have achieved things more healthily if I had just found some help for my depression. However, in that space of time I didn’t know what I needed or how to find help figuring it out. I digress. What I am realizing here, is that I was right to seek out a place to live that values a slower pace. As I grew and healed, and found help the less I needed to be frantically busy, but the harder I found it to stop. I could make all the arguments of life with 4 kids is busy, and living in a city is busy. Which is true, but another truth is American culture values being rushed and busy. There is a push to worship your work, and sacrifice yourself on the altar of success. To be available and always in want of extra pay. Never taking time off and saving all your vacation days in case you need maternity leave or a kid gets sick. Then we came here, and there is peace in the rhythm of hanging our wash on the line and taking it in each day. There is this necessity to move more when you have to walk, bike, or bus anywhere you need to go. I never thought I would so relish a 5am bike ride as I do each morning when I ride to the bus stop on my way to work. When you live smaller (you should see how small our fridge is) you have to live slower. You have to make space for daily cleaning and laundry instead of getting everything done in a giant washer and dryer. Grabbing our groceries involves a bit of planning, biking, and re configuring to fit it all in the baskets to get home. I am happy in these daily rituals, happy to snatch my clothes from the line when the rain comes, happy to spend my day at work knowing no one will be calling me asking for extra time, extra hours, extra parts of me. I love being with my kids daily, riding bikes and watching movies. In this phase of our life here we have nothing to do, like literally nothing, and I had to talk myself off the ledge repeatedly because I kept feeling like we shouldn’t sleep in, we should be busy doing something when there really was nothing that needed to be done. It is taking time to wind down and settle in to this new slow life, but as we do, it is everything I hoped it would be.