I've been noticing lately, through my mindfulness and meditation practices, something omnipresent in my life: Anger. I've always been such a happy person, or at least felt expected to be cheerful and happy, that it took me a long time to recognize my anger for what it was. In my quest to understand my anger better, and to know why it was coming up so strongly after a life of smiling and laughing and people pleasing, I started reading. A lot. One fascinating article I found (and can't seem to re-find to link to, unfortunately) spoke of the moments in our day that give us a good read on our baseline mental state. It said that how you react when you burn the toast is a strong indicator of how we're genuinely feeling when all filters are removed. Think about it, you burn toast and it's no big deal. Just make more. But it can really make you flip your lid. And just reading that, I felt the anger bubble up fast, and red that I had experienced when I missed out on a parking spot the day before. Same concept, different no big deal. Deep down, I was angry. More or less all the time. Anger was my baseline mental state.

In our modern lives and these bizarre times, there are plenty of things to be angry about. Take politics, for example. I mean, that's enough. We can basically just stop right there. But life has so much more. Work, schedules, money, relationships.  However, for me, the biggest source of my anger all made sense when I received my New York Times Parenting email three days ago, containing a piece on 'Mother Rage,' a term I had never heard anyone else use, but had identified myself - and learned to keep to myself because, for shame!

On the select few occasions that I had said in confidence to someone, a couple times even another mother, that "you don't know true rage until you're a mother" it did not go over well. And it turns out that that sense of shame that accompanies mother rage is damaging all on its own, and ironically, serves to make our rage cycle, and get even worse as time goes on. In her essay entitled The Rage Mothers Don't Talk About, author Minna Dubin writes,

I start working with a life coach. He assigns me a section of Daniel Goleman’s book “Emotional Intelligence.” Goleman cites the work of University of Alabama psychologist Dolf Zillmann, who discovered that the physiological effects of rage can last for days, and that rage builds on rage. Repeated aggravations — “a sequence of provocations” — can dramatically increase anger, so that by the third or fourth rage trigger, the person is reacting on a level 10 in response to a misplaced key or a dropped spoon.

Amazingly, that is exactly the burnt toast analogy, explained for overwhelmed mothers, isn't it? I felt such a wave of relief reading Dubin's essay, because when you're in it, and feeling ashamed of it, mom rage feels like a deep and personal defect. I imagine all the other moms I know as being perfect - as if they're straight out of a Little Golden Book from the 1950's. One of my neighbors truly does seem like a perfect mom, and Coco has made it abundantly clear to me that she'd rather live at their house than at ours, but I'm smart enough to know that she is a mom, too, and Coco is never there for her mother rage. Sigh. Luckily, another neighbor mom has shared with me that she drinks more or less on the daily to keep from killing people, to which I said 'cheers!' and understood exactly what she meant. Note: If you don't understand exactly what she meant, that probably means that you do not have a husband, and two children and full-time job. ;)

I keep trying to find the secret sauce to motherhood. And I haven't found it yet. Being a full-time stay at home mom was delightful for me when Coco was a baby, but then it became increasingly isolating and difficult as she emerged into toddlerhood. Working full-time as a mom left me unbelievably overwhelmed and short-fused, but even still the reliability of the daily rhythm was a positive. Being a part-time working mom and part-time student mom is kind of insane, but I'm doing my very best to create a schedule that, as Dubin writes, "fills up my patience cup." She elaborates, "when I manage to exercise, make art and eat healthy food, I have a longer fuse," and it truly felt like she was speaking to my soul as I read that. However, I couldn't help but laugh when she concluded, "Unfortunately, as a working mom with a small child I am not swimming in spare time, and cooking, running and unpaid hobbies often fall to the bottom of the to-do list." Sigh. This is the mother's dilemma.

I know that I am more present and growl less when I am able to make my art - this blog and my podcast; and I know that cooking and exercise make me a better mom, too. So I'm determined to guard enough time in my schedule each week for these things. Not for myself, but for filling up my patience cup for them. Framing it as something I do more for my children than myself really highlights the validity of that self-care and what it really is after all. I highly recommend that you read Dubin's full essay here, and please share your thoughts and feelings about it in the comments below. I would love to hear what you think!

No, this is not about my birthday, which basically has been consumed by Coco's birthday for the rest of time. It's about hers! Coco was born two days after me, and two days before my mom, and coincidentally, two of her little besties have the same birthday as Coco. This makes it so hard to find a day for her party, and it also creates an internal dilemma for me every year - especially the last three years as her birthday has fallen on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, in other words, on good party days.

It feels really weird to invite a child to your own child's birthday party on their own birthday. But it would feel even weirder not to invite them! I really love that we have been able to have Coco's birthday on her actual birthday for the last few years (and not on mine, which is what happened for a couple years there!) but it is a weird reality that two of her close friends have the same birthday. Last year, one of them was able to make it and then we went to their party the very next day. In this particular case, the little girl's brother has his birthday the day before hers, so they always do a joint birthday party together. Another layer of complexity!

Planning is always a challenge, and there is rarely going to be a date and time that winds up working out for absolutely everyone, so I just make a plan and hope for the best. And here are some photos from Coco's party last year. All of the ideas, including cake design and candy kabobs for each guest, were her own. That girls knows how to throw a party!

Coco's chosen theme was donuts. She designed her cake (more below) and was then delighted to find a donut piñata that matched!

We took this drawing of Coco's cake design into the bakery and they worked their magic!

Coco picked out the table items. It all came together so well!

I loved that the bakery added the little donut rings around the outside! And that pink tassel decoration from Target has been the best. I keep it in the basement on our party shelf and get it out for all of Coco's parties.

Coco, ever the style maven, chose the black and white cake with raspberry filling inside!

The party started with backyard games, including ring toss and pin the horn on the unicorn. Then after cake and presents, it was piñata time. All in all a super fun time!

I think the scariest thoughts at 3 am. I never used to wake up at 3 am. Well, that’s not true. I did, but I was up to breastfeed and so it was lovely and sweet and cozy and I went right back to sleep with a snuggling babe in my arms. In those days, 3 am was an entirely different animal. But once Theo was old enough to not be partaking in the 3 am feed, I found myself waking up, unable to go back to sleep, and despite the sweet sleeping baby next to me breathing deeply and sleeping soundly, 3 am became a very terrifying space. For a few years there, I woke up at 3 am, more or less on the dot, and my mind, my soul, my very body were flooded with existential angst and regret and fear. Not fun stuff.

During one such middle of the night terror session, it occurred to me that my expat friends - the gorgeous women in the photo above - might forget about me before I have a chance to move back and get myself back into their orbit again. It made my heart ache in the spooky darkness while I stared, wide-eyed, at the patches of blue light that splashed into the room randomly through the curtains and blinds, illuminating swatches of the ceiling and walls of my bedroom. I felt an emptiness that overwhelmed me.

I grabbed my phone, which is normally a terrible idea at 3 am, but I knew I wasn’t going back to sleep anyway, so I started googling. Did you know that “I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends” is one of the top five regrets of the dying? As I read those words, I went from feeling totally defeated and fearful to resolute. I started texting my friends more. It’s so easy when you’re far, far away, to drift apart. It’s only normal that text exchanges become rote and shallow. “How are you doing?” gets back a “Busy! Kids are in soccer and ballet and life is good” and it ends there. Instead of doing that, I started texting my friends and sharing things I had been pondering - grey hair and wrinkles, loss of identity as a mother, the fleeting quality of time. It turns out a lot of them were thinking about the same things. I found myself having discussions, albeit over text for the most part, that were meaningful and allowed us to connect with each other and what we were experiencing beyond what’s obvious and on the surface.

It felt good to maintain those relationships, but also really confusing as I tried to make new friends here. And then, on top of that, came the confusion of knowing that deep down, I plan to leave again, but I never talk about it. That added another layer of complexity where my relationships feel false somehow because I’m concealing this huge piece of myself. And it really does feel like a piece of myself. The things we strive for are central to our identities. Isn’t the act of sharing our hopes and dreams the very stuff that builds connection and allows us to experience closeness with others? What if that is kept to oneself?

I don’t have all the answers yet, but what I’m learning as a repat, and also from reflecting back on my time as an expat, is that we have to be comfortable with ambivalence. We have to be able to simultaneously pursue two opposing ideals. I’m burrowing deep into my life here, making friends, joining a gym, building a community. And yet, I’m also focused on my goal of moving back to Zürich, building my new career, developing myself as an individual different from the person I am right now. In other words, as I burrow in, I’m also reaching out, striving for growth.

As we get older, finding truly close, intimate friendships becomes more and more difficult, less and less likely. It’s not enough to say, “that was my life then, this is my life now” and let them go. I think it’s important to stay in touch with our friends, as is evidenced by how if affects the dying. Are you staying in touch with people you care about? Why or why not? Does knowing that it’s a top regret of the dying make you want to change what you’re doing?

I love Volkswagens and have never bought another car in my life. They're so reliable and sophisticated and comfortable without being stuffy or over the top. Most of all, VWs have great style and design. Always. I have waxed poetic about my love for their ad campaigns before, but the latest ads for their new fleet of all-electric vehicles (set to hit roads in just a few years!) are truly swoon worthy.


Like this two-page spread to explain the "Lemonade" above. Are their advertising reps geniuses, or what?! I love how they pulled in so much history of the brand and their story in this campaign. Swoon.


And this is so gorgeous - with the side view, and the surfboard on top! Yes I want for J and I to haul our kids and dog (maybe) and yoga mat and surfboard around in this totally rad electric VW bus. YES! Swooning again. :)

And I nearly started crying whilst watching this ad. That song, the notion of pivoting and moving forward with hope in the face of uncertainty after a major setback. Wonderful. Volkswagen will always have my heart! And in a weird way, it feels relevant to my own personal expat-repat experiences that were unfolding in the years that VW were dealing with their emissions scandal. From 2015 until very recently, I have felt completely lost and unsure of what is next for me. I feel like I, too, have found the light in the darkness. Swoon forever!

Are you a Volkswagen fan? If you are, please swoon with me in the comments below, and if you're not, please do not share your thoughts or opinions with me at this time! I'm just too in love with these ads to bear it. :)

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