Friday, September 07, 2012

Weekend Reading: The Perfectly Described Edition

Well, we've all survived the first week of Kindergarten. I will undoubtedly have more to say about the transition to Kindergarten soon. I may even decide to post an update to my logistics detail post. But we are still settling into our new routine. It is too soon to write about it. And besides, I'm fairly drained from this week- the transition went well (really well, even), but transitions are hard and a little bit stressful. So, I'll give you this week's links, instead. They are all posts that I think perfectly capture some experience or emotion.

First up, Antropologa has an awesome post on being an expat and expressing yourself in a foreign language. I've never lived for long in a country in which English is not the native language, but I have spent enough time for this post to really resonate.

Next, Julie at A Little Pregnant perfectly captures the desperation and despair of having a low sleep needs kid. My kids aren't as low sleep needs as her Charlie, but I have felt what she describes.

Staying on motherhood topics, AskMoxie had a beautiful post about how motherhood is a relationship not a job- and how you can be great at the relationship even if you don't love all the jobs. Or even if you don't do all the jobs.

The next post captures another aspect of parenthood- or peoplehood, really: the realization of how important health insurance is. I don't often get political here, and by linking to this post I'm not saying that I think the Obama administration's health reform was the only way to approach this problem, or even the best way. But I am saying that I think this problem needed to be tackled. It really, really did- both because having something as random as a bug bite have the power to wipe out a family's savings is just wrong, and because the fear of this is keeping a lot of people I know from striking out on their own and trying to create their own businesses, and that strikes me as wrong, too.

Finally, I came across a post that took me back to my college years, being a young woman riding public transit and just wanting to be left alone... but not getting that. And the calculations you make in your mind as you try to figure out the best, safest response to a situation, and how heartily tired you get of it, and how angry you get, but how you know that expressing that anger is NOT the best, safest response. Honestly, the fact that this sort of crap almost never happens to me now is one of the consolations of aging.

And on that sort of sour note... happy weekend! Leave me any good links you've found in the comments.

3 comments:

  1. Yeah, that last public transit post. There's a reason why I choose my seats very carefully and the moment there looks to be some weird interest, I start scoping out other seats or move. I won't make eye contact or if I do, it's with a very practiced, extremely closed off expression and angry mouth that works on most people who don't seem relatively harmless.

    There's absolutely no safety to be found in crowds other than using them as cover to get away when something erupts.

    I don't get the attempts at conversations that I used to when I didn't do that. And I am pretty sure it helps that I never "dress up" for work in what I consider vulnerable clothing - I would never wear clothes I didn't feel comfortable defending myself in when taking train or subway. Because this crap is always on my mind. So I'm less of a target for this than the girls who are considered pretty by comparison. And that's pretty crap for them too.

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  2. I love both the Moxie post and the health insurance one, which puts a human face behind the problem. I always found it ironic that a country which is so proud of independence and entreprenuerial spirit doesn't have any support for those who become their own boss. As for the Moxie post, so true!

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