Dan is still in Bangalore, but returns on Saturday. Each day he calls at 5 am his time, 7 pm our time to say goodnight to Mia and Evie and to read ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’ to Masan for 15 minutes for her nightly reading log. Even though he is physically and mentally exhausted, he has never missed a reading. While in Bangalore, he gets up very early each morning to life manage before he goes into the office where he works until 8 pm. Contrary to what his first phone calls lead me to believe, he has been able to get a ton of things accomplished: He opened a bank account (almost $8,000 is required to open one), took care of his visa stuff, purchased mattresses for the house, bought white bedding, plates, bowls and mugs, and turned on the water, electricity, and gas for the villa.

Today at 10 pm Bangalore time, noon our time, Dan called me from the hotel. He told me the following anecdote, which I think sums up my dedicated, selfless husband and his experiences in Bangalore thus far: He took an Uber from his office to a FabIndia (home goods) store, which was an hour’s drive, so to translate, that’s equivalent to a half mile away since the traffic really is that horrendous, to pick up some remaining mugs that the store hadn’t had in stock when he went the day before. On the way there his phone ran out of juice. Once he got to the store, the Uber driver told him that he couldn’t take him back to the hotel because it was too far. So now Dan is stuck an hour way from where he needs to be without a phone or a way to get back. And he begins to feel a bit of panic. So he bribes the driver, “I will give you a thousand rupees to take me back.” “No problem, Sir.” 1,000 rupees is a bit less than $15, but an exorbitant amount to pay for a ride, even an hour away.

Dan makes it safely back to the hotel and the front desk person takes one look at him and walks around the desk to give him a hug, and tells him that he looks exhausted and should get some rest. The porter comes to help him with his box of mugs and proceeds to drop it. Several mugs crack as the box hits the marble floor, but Dan tells the guy that it’s no problem.

Husband Dan is in Bangalore for 10 days. While he misses his girls, he seems to be adjusting really well. I hope he doesn’t mind, but I would like to share some of the things I have heard from him over the phone since he arrived in Bengaluru on Saturday. This is his second trip to the city where his goals are to start working and to get the villa set up for when we arrive in 4 weeks.

First phone call from Bengaluru to Brooklyn:

“It’s 4am here and I am walking around. The weather is great, and it’s really calm. There are monkeys climbing in the trees. Oh wow, that guy just dropped his pants and is going to the bathroom on the side of the road.”

Frantic phone call to me 6:00 am my time on Sunday:

“There are so many people in this city!” and “I have been trying to get basic stuff for the house for 2 entire days and have literally not gotten one thing yet. They don’t have anything plain in this country! I cannot find plain white dishes or plain sheets and there are salespeople following me all over the store. They are following me right now.” Dan, they are there to help. Ask them for help. “I ask them for plain white sheets and they instead show me 50 different kinds of purple with Mickey Mouse.”

Dan on starting work, which he is really enjoying:

“Working here is pretty much the same as working in my office in NYC, expect that every 5 minutes one of the construction workers uses the wall outside of my window as a place to urinate.”

Other conversations:

“Today I went to pick up the key for the villa which I thought would take the usual 5 minutes. It took 4 hours. Guess how many people were there? I took a picture! There were 20 people—the owner, the relocation coordinator, the broker, the caretaker of the house, some other people—I don’t know who they were—the cleaning person and her mother. We went through and recorded every scratch on every surface, every mark on the walls. Afterwards the broker offered me a ride to my office. When I went outside to look for the car, there was a moped instead. He wanted me to ride on the back.”

“I’m going to be sick.” Do you have any pepto or antibiotics on you? “No, I’m meeting someone for dinner, and there’s nothing around here. I need to go back to the hotel, but it’s so far. I thought it would be helpful to talk on the phone, but it’s making it worse—I need to go. Love you, bye!”

Okay, good luck, Dan!

Lately I have been thinking this blog should be called Brooklyn Mama’s Pre-Move to Bangalore Angst. As is disappointingly clear by this point to anyone that came to check out this blog for information about Bangalore or for practical advice about living in Bangalore as an expat mom, this blog is instead free therapy for me. (Move, already, dammit!). I could be moving to Idaho and the blog would be essentially the same. But I do promise that there will be more India specific content in the coming weeks as the plane tickets have been bought and we fly out June 10th at 3:00pm. There will be lots of posts about snakes and saris because what else am I going to do when I have a driver, housekeeper, and cook (ummm, yes, it’s true, but don’t hate me yet. I will process and express my guilt and white privilege in posts to come)? But right now, with the move 4 short (or long, depending on the day) weeks away, I’ve been thinking a lot about friendship. Not as flashy as venomous snakes, I know.

I posted this to fb not too long ago, but I have been reading this book lately called ‘A Little Life: A Novel,’ by H. Yanagihara. As one main character so eloquently describes to a currently friendless tween, “…the only trick of friendship, I think, is to find people who are better than you are-not smarter, not cooler, but kinder, and more generous, and more forgiving-and then to appreciate them for what they can teach you, and to try to listen to them when they tell you something about yourself, no matter how bad-or good-it might be, and to trust them, which is the hardest thing of all. But the best, as well.”

In life what I have found is that what friendship is based on changes dramatically depending on life stage. In high school and college it’s based on mutually agreeable bands, clothes, interests, art, etc. And if there’s a bit more, and they show you that you can trust them to carefully hold your vulnerabilities without dropping them, the ones that you can even bring yourself to share (you’re hesitant because emotional pain hasn’t been handled well growing up, and you are afraid of burdening anyone or having your pain brushed aside), and this thing you have going isn’t just about a ride to the Black Cat, this can become a long and cherished friendship, one that started with, “I like your skirt” on a Catholic school dress down day, involved many trips to thrift stores to buy way-too-short, discarded Brownie uniforms and purple embroidered sweaters, AKA “dead people clothes” per your mother, and evolved into a 24 year friendship. And if the friendship is just based on mutual interests, and one person moves away, the friendship may not travel well. And it’s sad, but it’s okay.

When I first moved to NYC in the late summer of 1998, I didn’t know anyone. I left friends, family, and an on and off-again boyfriend in VA for grad school. I remember being so excited to be in NYC, the noisy Amsterdam Avenue right outside my dorm window. But it was so incredibly hard for me to make friends. I was so homesick and lonely that I was literally sick to my stomach and couldn’t eat. So that I didn’t starve, my mom wisely suggested eating peanut butter out of the jar to get calories, which I lived on. I wasn’t able to connect with my quiet, Korean PhD Music Education suite-mates or the commuter students in my Counseling Psychology program who ran out right after classes to get back to their real lives. I had one really good friend. She was from CA, so like me, out of state, and living on campus. Having her around helped me survive that first year of grad school. But her program was only one year, and mine was 2, and once her program was over and she left, I was again so incredibly lonely. I hung out with fellow dorm dwellers who I didn’t really have anything in common with or connect with, just because I didn’t want to be alone. It was frankly miserable. My friendships were based on proximity and my neediness.

But I stuck it out. For whatever reason, as hard as it was, I knew that I was supposed to live in NYC. And it took time, but I made friends. And now that I’m a mom, I’m a friend-making fiend. Having kids makes it so much easier for me to start a conversation with someone new, it gives us an easy commonality. And I can finally say that I have really great friends. Whom I love, although I may not be as demonstrative as I could be with them for fear of rejection, but hopefully they know how I feel. Each one of them meets a different need, and I hope in turn that I meet some need of theirs. I have spontaneous, ‘up for anything’ friends who are always good for a last minute playground meet-up who I have learned to say, “for sure” way too many times from, I have friends to have incredible and festive joint birthday parties with, I have friends with whom I can quietly process feelings and emotions with, I have friends who bring me soup when my kids are sick, I have friends who help me think about things in a practical and logical manner when I start my emotional spiral, I have friends who educate me about working out and who are there for every kids’ birthday party and awkward Thanksgiving dinner, I have movie friends and drink friends, and everything in-between friends. Each of these beautiful people is so much better, kinder and more generous than I am. They possess traits that I hope to one day have, but probably won’t. They teach me about inhibition, organization, party planning, spontaneity, moving past emotional childhood baggage, dedication to your craft, patience in parenthood, savoring the small moment, making the mundane feel special, among millions and trillions of other lessons. And now we are 4 weeks away from testing the friendships with distance. If they are based on more than having kids and being neighbors, then they will travel with us to Bangalore, and if they are not, then it’s okay. And I am so grateful.

Please note that if you are reading this you are obviously a friend since no one else would indulge me, and if you are not in the photos above it is not because I don’t love you, it’s for lack of an easily accessible photo of you. XO

I have been a planner for the last 20 or so years out of anxiety and life management necessity, although I have always appreciated a good, organic, ‘go with it’, ‘let’s see what happens,’ ‘live in the moment’ kinda perspective. My appreciation for both ways of being is probably why I plan things with friends and then cancel at the last moment. On Wednesday it seems like drinks on Friday evening with friends is an amazingly fun idea, but now that it’s Friday and I have barely gotten through the week with my sanity intact, getting out of my sweatpants, putting on make up, brushing my hair to get together with adults to have adult conversations and drink wine seems like a mountain too high to climb. Or we have our weekly playgroup meet up after school at Jenni’s house, but Masan’s friend from school drops by, so we bail on playgroup instead of kicking out the drop-in friend. This last minute change of plans probably also stems from my family of origin’s way of doing things. Gram often tried to get out of hosting us for visit at the last moment to assuage her anxiety about having guests (although she was an amazing hostess). My mom would more often than not question or change plans at the last moment depending on what new information came up or how her mood struck her. Visits were sometimes cancelled or changed because of rain or cold weather. So despite my knowledge of all this, it’s a pattern that I often repeat, although I hate that I do it.

I married a fantastic, loving, kind man who, although very successful at work and in life, is not a planner. And this poor, logic-driven decision-making guy has to live with this sometimes flakey, often Type A planner who makes decisions based on how to ward off anxiety. Dan is a put-out-fires kind of guy. I don’t think he realizes that at least some of those fires are preventable with a smidgeon of planning, but regardless, his strategy works for him. However, his way often involves meltdowns (his, mine and sometimes the children’s) and copious amounts of the f-word when time has run out and what is now front and center hasn’t gotten done. Because we are married, we often have to co-mange projects—like the daily lives of our kids or how to get ready for an overseas move. Our opposite strategies for handling life—I did my high school projects the day they were assigned, and he did them in the bathroom right before class on the day they were due—often cause conflict.

For example, when I bring up one of my move checklist items, like needing to get at least 8 new suitcases for the move, to Dan and it’s not a priority for him, he doesn’t give it any attention and makes me feel as though it’s not important, and because he often knows the most logical way to do something I defer to him, and skip that checklist item believing that it’s not important. If I go ahead and take care of the checklist item myself, and he thinks I haven’t done it the way that he thinks it should have been done (like I spend too much money on the aforementioned suitcases), we usually get in an argument. So to prevent fights and promote harmony, I have tried to be very Type B about this whole move and managing the kids lives these days. I am letting him take the lead. And this strategy has worked fairly well—until now. Last week I barely worked on the move unless something came up that Dan asked me to do. Instead, I did work for clients, took yoga and cardio classes at the Y with Mia in child watch where she only screamed for mama for 10 minutes this time, and on Friday worked for 8 hours on graphics for posters for Evie’s birthday party (reliving my higher ed workshop flier-making days). And yesterday we all went to Sesame Place for the whole day with friends during which time I didn’t even think about all the stuff we still have to do for the move.

But this morning, s–t hit the fan. The baby had been up all night screaming from possible Elmo-withdrawal, but definitely a cold. All night. Dan, the saint he is, handled the baby. Then this morning when we woke up for the day at 9:15 am (the big girls had been playing their iPads for at least 3 hours in their room by this point. Masan, the one who aims to please, woke us up about 4 times to tell us they were playing their iPads so that they didn’t wake us up) Dan immediately started freaking out because he just that second realized that Masan is supposed to be in a procession at church before her CCD class. And church starts in 40 minutes. And everyone is in pi’s, and it’s a 20 minute walk to church—we can’t drive because Court Street is blocked off to traffic for some sort of street fair. Although the kitchen calendar has been hung up for the sole purpose of keeping us all on the same page when it comes to what’s going on in the life of the family, this is the first I am hearing about this procession (Dan is in charge of CCD stuff). Last week we showed up for class when class wasn’t happening because of public school spring break. We would have known this if we had had the CCD calendar, but again, Dan is in charge of CCD and he is not a planner (I do love my husband so much!). So now he is walking around in circles, panicking, upset about how Masan is going to feel about missing the procession (which is really sweet, but she is oblivious to it because he never mentioned it to her either), tearing through drawers looking for the CCD calendar so that we can find out if we have class today, and not able to process anything logically. So now I become the logical one who cleans up the mess by getting in touch with the teacher, talking to Masan, and helping Dan  manage his panic. But now that we are in a heightened state of stress, and my poor husband hasn’t gotten any REM sleep, more and more things we need to get done in the next 4 weeks come up, and it snowballs from here. He has to get to the office RIGHT THIS MINUTE to print out the visa applications he was given on Friday for our appointment on Monday morning. And there are 5 applications—one for each of us. And each one is 80 pages. And we need to inventory everything we are taking on the plane, storing in Brooklyn, and air shipping to India for our move. And we need to buy 8 suitcases and decide what may have to be sea shipped. And at this moment we realize that Masan doesn’t have her backpack to do her homework because she left it at the school playground on Friday, and I forgot to remind her because the baby had been knocked over by a kid and was bleeding from her mouth. And we just now realized that she didn’t have her backpack because I was trying to not be so controlling and let her do her homework when she decided she wanted to do it. (It’s come up that I am making her anxious by the focus I put on homework). I love my husband, but I think that it’s time Type A Sharon stepped back in.

P.S. As I write this Dan calls to tell me that the visa application coordinator never sent his visa application to him with the rest of the applications for the family. And it’s the middle of the night in India, where she is located, and he needs it today for us to print out, get notarized and taken to the consulate tomorrow morning. AHHHHHHH!

The three of you who read this blog (thank you, I love you) have mentioned to me that I didn’t write a housing update. This will be short and sweet. We did find housing. It was that last house that our lovely relocation coordinator worked tirelessly to find for us that I wrote about in the Nail biter & Our Superhero post. We were flying back to Brooklyn the next morning at some ungodly hour, so it was this cute, last minute place or a gorgeous villa very far away from Dan’s office, which would have meant an hour and a half commute each way to work.

The home we chose is on the smaller side (Brooklyn friends, don’t be mad, I know this is beyond large in our warped world)—over 2500 square feet vs. the 5000, 5 floor almost-palaces we saw. We are actually under our housing budget—I can’t say that I am often under budget for anything, so this was a big win. The villa is very simple and bright, with a big kitchen, in an expat neighborhood with an amazing community center (a pool for the kids, a room with a climbing gym for them like the Chuck E. Cheese’s at the Atlantic Center used to have, but cleaner), 4 bathrooms and an extra bedroom for all of our American guests (right? please?). Most of the expats in this community are of Indian decent. I did see one white woman in the neighborhood, but I think there are going to be a lot less people that look like us than I thought when I heard the word “expat,” which is great because the last thing I want to do is take my children out of a diverse school to put them in a bubble with other people who are just like them.

It took from the end of February until about a week ago to get the lease signed. Much, much longer process than in Brooklyn. And in India you can request certain things. So we requested a dryer to go with the washer that’s already there, and 2 TVs! How insane is that?!? In Brooklyn you you feel so lucky to get a lease that you suck it up and are happy if there’s a new coat of paint on the walls.

Oh, and although I didn’t post a photo, there is a small backyard, but simple enough that there aren’t any good hiding places for snakes, which was a must for us since there are 4 kinds of venomous snakes that live in Bangalore. And they like backyards, apparently. More on that next time!

After school ice cream break

Toddler Masan at The Chocolate Room after her first movie

Sweet, curious baby Evie

Sweet Mia at Carroll Park last spring

I LOVE my children. Yes, this is the sort of thing people say before they say something scathing about them. (And yeah, it’s veering somewhat in that direction, but hang tight because it’s not bad, promise). I do love my kids more than anything. It took 9 long years to have 3 kids through pretty much every means available. It took 9 years of prayer; loads of painful, annoying, marriage-testing medical intervention; gut- and heart-wrenching, tiptoe through the mine-fields, emotional free-fall open adoption; and the good old fashioned, pain in the ass of 9 (which is really more like 10) months of the morning sickness, bloating, and depression otherwise known as pregnancy.

So they are hard won, these kids. And they are my life and world. Being a mom was the only thing that I really knew that I wanted in this life. I was lonely before they came along—something big was missing. Once Masan got here I could breathe again. However, and here comes the scathing part—the chores necessary with raising small children SUCK! No one told me I was going to be Cinderella without the mice to help me or talk to, stuck in my farthest-thing-from-a-castle apartment in Brooklyn, washing dishes, making beds, folding laundry, dealing with the trash and recycling (which we can only take out to the curb twice a week and takes up valuable square footage in my already teeny kitchen), cleaning up spills and crumbs, making meals, packing lunches, picking up and refolding all the clothes that the youngest has emptied out of all the drawers in her room, etc. OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN for seemingly all eternity. This must be a circle of hell.

Everyone knows the deal and gets the picture—I don’t need to go on and on. I’m not talking about the school field trips to MOMA or the birthday party planning or the playdates—those things are really fun, well….except when the playdate fun ravages your apartment just in time for dinner prep, homework, bath time, and the whole night-time routine. The other kids head home and you are left with your 3 kids inevitably on a sugar-high because you served fresh-baked cookies (from a mix, of course) because you love your kids’  friends and so that you could seemingly be the really great hostess and cool mom—“oh, it’s totally fine that your kid peed all over the floor in the bathroom and my 18 month old walked through it and tracked it all over the carpet,” having to clean up the toys strewn all over, the crumbs mashed into the rug in every room, the sticky juice spilled on the floor, all while trying to get homework done, shove something healthy into your kids for dinner, bathe them, read to them, tuck them in, say prayers when the only thing that you want to do is have a glass of wine, sit on the couch and not move one muscle while binge watching ‘House of Cards’ on Netflix for the next 3 hours before you sleep walk over to the bed and collapse, ready to be up at 6 am when your kids jump on you and start arguing over who can lay closest to you (which is so sweet, but really annoying at such an early hour). And sometimes your husband comes home in the evening just in time to help you handle this nighttime chaos after his chaotic day, but most of the time, you are on your own to help keep this ship afloat. (Sorry, the venting dam has opened and I just can’t stop the flow!) And pretty much every morning the kids are up at 6 am, the husband has already left for work, and you have to get the kids out the door without any help while the baby hits you over and over in the face, obsessed about eating the Trident gum tucked away in your night side table, and homes in on it like her life depends on eating it, and throws herself on the floor when she is denied. Somehow you strap her to your chest, get the other 2 out the door, in appropriate uniforms and wearing backpacks, with even a French braid done for one of them, and by 9 am you are ready to collapse, but you really should take a shower and brush your hair. Or even better, have a moment to write a blog post about it because when you tell your husband all of this stuff, he tells you that you complain too much.

Okay, where was I? My point was that the fun things about parenthood are amazing, but I am slowly turning into a middle-aged, no time to work-out or take care of me, version of Cinderella. So basically, Cinderella with grey hair peeking out of her handkerchief and no babysitter for the ball.

Dan keeps telling me that in 6 more weeks everything will turn into roses and sunshine because we will be in India. He seems to think that because we are going to hire some help that much of what is dragging me down will be done for me. It all sounds too good to be true. Is hiring someone to help me battle the constant air pollution that invades all homes in India going to help me escape my prison of never-ending housework? I am doubtful. I want to be able to see India, to explore with my kids, to make new friends, to experience all that this scary, interesting, foreign-to-me country has to offer. My biggest fear is that I will be trapped inside my “villa” with more bedrooms and bathrooms, but doing the mundane things that I do everyday in Brooklyn.

The walls of the block-long Met Supermarket kitty corner to our block on Smith are now completely gone. There is a giant hole that goes at least 2 stories down, crumbling brick, dust, and debris where we used to get our milk, $10 Polly-O string cheese, suspect organic produce, and whatever other necessities we needed with the Trader Joe’s 5 blocks away was just too far to walk to. The Met will probably be resurrected as a shiny chain, like the Michaels on Atlantic or the Mac store 2 blocks down (both of which I will probably sheepishly shop at).

When I lived on Bergen and 4th Avenue 15 years or so ago in an apartment share with 4 other roommates, someone’s boyfriend and his hermit crabs, my cat Fiona—who ate one of the hermit crabs, and one bathroom (on the block where a taxi yard lives/used to live (?) and an entire 4 story apartment building once collapsed, that still hasn’t given way to the change that’s swept Brooklyn in the past how many years), I would walk from my place to Smith Street down State or Bergen Street–whichever felt safer at that time of day, and once I reached the Met, I knew that I was probably fine. If I had any issues I could run into the store and feel safe. It was like a single-gal-in-the-city-beacon—the familiar bulletin board outside the blackened, dusty automatic doors overrun with old fliers, the smell of kitty litter inexplicably permeating the air of the supermarket, and the two owners taking turns yelling at the check-out gals as they chewed their gum, rolled their eyes and tapped their press-ons on the conveyer belts in boredom.

I had more than a moment of sadness as I passed the hole that used to be the Met on the way to the playground the girls and I named ‘Met Park’ 5 years ago when we moved to Smith. The sadness was exacerbated by the Met going the way of anything old and unprotected in this city, but had begun during a conversation earlier that morning about what New Yorkers love to talk about more than anything else in the world—the rising cost of real estate. My wonderful friend was talking about looking at 2 bedroom apartments in this area with a price tag of $2 million. One bathroom. $2 million. Although I know how outrageously expensive this neighborhood has become, this really pissed me off in a significant way. How dare this city?!? How dare this place change and become unrecognizable and unaffordable to any “normal” (whatever that means?!?) people.

I dug a bit deeper and realized that what I was actually so angry about is not all the wealthy folks who are the only people who can afford to live in MY neighborhood, but the fact that I am leaving and might not be able to afford to live in MY neighborhood when I return. My kids might not get to go to THEIR diverse, free, challenging and lovely school when we get back from India.

As I pushed Mia on the swing at Met Park, with one eye glued to Evie as she ran around in her uniform with her school buddies, I expressed my fear of the return to Brooklyn and the changing neighborhood to a friend of mine who was also pushing her youngest on the swing. And she said simply, “It’s irrelevant.” What? Huh? Wait, stop. Huh? Let’s pause here. It’s irrelevant.

She went on to say that travel changes us in profound ways that we can’t even imagine. She asked me if I had ever gone back-packing for 2 weeks. Uh, not even overnight. Okay, so what’s the longest you have traveled? Maybe 2 weeks when I was in LA after grad school or the 10 days I thatched roofs in the Dominican Republic in high school. Ohhhhh, okay, well, you will see. (Please note that I am paraphrasing this conversation because I am more of a forest person and less of an each individual tree person, so I understand the big picture while not being able to repeat verbatim each piece of the puzzle).

Anyway, that simple gem of wisdom from my wise woman friend has given me such a sense of peace and freedom that I just hadn’t had before. I was trying to keep one foot here while being open to what’s in front of us. And I can’t do that. I have no idea who I will be once I leave India. Everything might change. I’m so excited.

I write this entry as Mia bangs her head against my desk and slaps my leg with her little hand because I won’t let her eat the small metal pieces that attach to a picture frame. The older gals never banged their heads in frustration so this is a first for me (I hope this phase is short-lived, poor Lovie), but I can see where she’s coming from. I can see why this might be a choice when words won’t come and the emotion is overwhelming.

Today I feel like banging my head against my desk also. Instead, I have basically been walking around the apartment in circles wearing my pajamas, trying to figure out where to start with the newest sorting project—what to keep, what to store, and what to ship to India. I have been purging slowly, very slowly as to not startle myself, for weeks (and it’s surprisingly much easier to let go of things than I thought it would be. Some things are easy to give up—we really don’t need that huge bag of candles from IKEA for that garden party we are going to have in that future Brooklyn apartment with a yard. Time to give up that dream. And other things that I thought would be hard to give up aren’t really— having 2 copies of the book we made in 2011 to send out to prospective birth moms isn’t really necessary). But now I need to step up the pace (since we leave in 8 short weeks), and decide what gets stored in long-term storage and what gets shipped to India. Some of the time I want the girls to pick 20 toys each, pack them up, and be done with it. And other times (they like these times better) I want them to take most of their toys so that they will feel familiar surroundings in an unfamiliar place. As I have been told by my dear husband, I can’t make a decision to save my life. He’s right. And I know where this indecisiveness comes from, but I just don’t know how to overcome it right now. I want to make a good, logical decision that makes this move easier and my kids happy.

But since I can’t decide what the strategy for sorting should be, I follow Mia around the apartment as she drops her banana and chewed apple here and there, wiping up the sticky as she goes. And I read a chapter of a book, but can’t concentrate because the thoughts swirl and the guilt encompasses–too much to do to relax. I even watch a bit of Elmo with Mia. Then I decide to take a nap. At least this way the thoughts turn off. When I wake up I feel guilty for not doing anything. So I get up and sort one living room shelf of stuff into give away, storage and bring to India. One small task done and it took ALL DAY LONG.

So what’s the deal with this lack of motivation? Is it denial of the impending move? Resistance? Is it that I had too much to drink last night at the preschool auction and am just feeling sluggish? Probably all of the above, but mostly resistance to the big move.

We had a great time with good Brooklyn friends last night. It was just comfortable and easy and fun. And it’s here, not over there in Bengaluru. Who knows if or when we will make friends. Even if we do, I can’t imagine it’ll be as easy and familiar as it is with these friends. In stark contrast to last night, I had an enlightening experience this past weekend where I was an outsider at an event, and try as hard as I did to small talk, no one was interested in talking to me. It’s one of those situations that takes me right back to the first day of a new high school when the cliques were already formed, the hair had been recently permed (yes, Mom, you did try to dissuade me), the body was that of a 12 year old boy, and I had to eat lunch alone. At this event last weekend, I wasn’t dressed the way that everyone else was, I didn’t talk the way they did, and I didn’t know them. I was an outsider, and couldn’t break in. Of course this brought up fear of my future life in Bengaluru.

One huge thing I have going for me in this move is that unlike high school and the event last weekend, I don’t have to do it alone. I have a husband and 3 kids going with me. And the 3 kids do wonders for breaking ice with new people. The reason that I know so many wonderful people in Brooklyn is because my kids made it easy for me to connect with strangers. Is it terrible that I am relying on my children, especially Masan, to make friends for me? If I could only get them to sort stuff and pack for me.

This isn’t a post beautifully written (even if I could…) about the lessons I have learned from preparing for a move around the world. Not about patience, about acceptance, about calm in the midst of chaos, lemons out of lemonade. It’s about none of that. It’s about the mess. The huge emotional, physical and psychological mess I find myself in. It’s about getting the blah out. Pure and simple processing on the page. WARNING: So if you are a cup is half-full kinda guy or gal or someone who hates complaining of any kind, you might want to stop reading now (and for all 3 of you who read this blog, thank you for humoring me!). If you want to continue, I apologize now for dragging you into the mess.

I’m just going to lay it out there—I HATE mess. My friends and family know that I hate dirt, dust, grime, clutter and mess of any kind. Every Christmas I ask for a vacuum, dust buster or steamer, I am embarrassed to write. I am literally afraid of whatever is on the sidewalks and on the subway floors, seats and poles of NYC. I do whatever is in my power to keep all of that at bay or get rid of it: We don’t wear shoes in the house, I steam clean our apartment all the time, the girls take a bath EVERY SINGLE NIGHT of their lives, we don’t even wear the same uniform more than one day in a row before it gets washed. (And I don’t have a washing machine in our apartment). In a small space such as ours, if things aren’t put away and cleaned up, the household falls apart or seems to in my mind. It’s the broken window theory. Remember from Sociology 101 or the Giuliani administration? According to Wikipedia, “the theory states that maintaining and monitoring urban environments to prevent small crimes such as vandalism, public drinking, and toll-jumping helps to create an atmosphere of order and lawfulness, thereby preventing more serious crimes from happening.” If the kitchen table is littered with dishes, homework, princess paints, magnetic blocks, etc. Dan will inevitably come home and put his tie, jacket, and other work related stuff on top of that pile of stuff. If the table is clear of debris, his stuff will most likely get put away.

Friends, you won’t believe me, but I HATE cleaning. It really annoys me. I am COMPELLED to be so thorough and start at the beginning when all I want to do is curl up with a coffee (or wine, depending on the time of day) and read to my kids sitting on a pile of MESS, but it’s almost impossible. If you came over right now you would see my unmade bed, my kids’ unmade beds, laundry bags full of freshly cleaned laundry on the floor, breakfast dishes on the counter and in the sink, and Mia’s toy trains and blueberries from breakfast all over the floor. And you may think, “totally normal for a household with young kids.” What you may not know is that last night every single thing was cleaned, put away and organized. And within 5 minutes of my kids being awake this morning, it’s now in it’s current state. It’s an exercise in futility to clean up after young kids ALL DAY LONG, and to do it to the extent I am compelled to. As Einstein said, “Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Yup. I am so tired.

To be able to write this blog or run my business in a house that is in a constant state of entropy isn’t easy and requires letting go. I long to be one of those people (like my eldest daughter and husband) who literally can’t see the mess. Oblivion! How I long for you! But I am not and never have been that kind of gal (I used to have to clean and organize my entire bedroom growing up before I could start my homework) so I have to put the housework that I hate doing out of my head to get done what I want or need to get done. Let it go and know that the mess will be there in a half hour for me to clean up. (Anyone else spend 2 hours a morning just getting their space into functional form so that the day can go smoothly? I know tons of you do. Isn’t it tiring?) And if apple juice is spilled at breakfast onto a phone and homework, and the sports bottle leaks all over the lunchbox, and kids in tights step in it on their way out the door, well, it just might take a bit longer than 2 hours. The good news is that I am able to let some of this go because the house was thoroughly cleaned yesterday and while it’s messy, it’s not dirty.

I was never OCD before NYC. My theory is that anxiety comes up as a result of the chaos and uncertainty of the city around me and just good ‘ol life in general—and I’m not completely clueless about the psychological factors in my own life that lead me to want to control my immediate environment—years of infertility, job uncertainty/loss, insane bosses, elementary school kids labeled “Emotionally Disturbed” with a million issues that I could do nothing to ameliorate other than putting a bandaid on the current wound. All of that lead me to my need to clean it all up in my own space. Keep it all contained so that my little family has an oasis in this hectic place. And so that I can breathe. So that we can go out and dance, sing and play in the dirt-storm (I want to say S–T STORM, but this is a PG blog for my mom and dad), and come back in, shower it off, and get cozy (and clean).

So what the heck do I do when that cozy, clean haven is moving to INDIA?!? A place that isn’t Singapore—you definitely won’t be arrested for throwing your gum on the ground, let’s be honest. A friend mentioned to me that the pics on this blog make India look like Florida. I definitely didn’t mean to give the impression that things with this move are easy or that the place resembles a vacation destination. (Perhaps I was unconsciously trying to present the best because I have been accused of complaining too much. I can go to the negative way too quickly—and it’s because the problems are a more interesting story than the positives. Seeing life as half-full and not complaining as much have been my New Years resolution like 5 years in a row. Or perhaps it’s because that’s the thing about India—there is beauty all over the place. Right next to the mess). Okay, so truth—the air is polluted, the water is undrinkable for those new to the scene, and there are piles of trash on the side of the roads in communities with and without money. I am not trying to be in any way insensitive, so please forgive the bluntness if it comes across as such. But what do I do to keep the chaos (and anxiety) at bay? I do what I always do, start at the beginning, turn over those bath toys and scrub the mold, pull up that carpet and vacuum those crumbs.

With the move to India, it has become all about setting up our environment—and now that we have secured that (hopefully), it’s about setting up that environment. So stuff. Moving stuff from here has become the biggest concern. What to bring, what to leave, donate, sell, store. And how does the move work? Ship, fly? When will we meet with the moving company to figure it all out? I need to know for my own peace of mind, which caused a big blow up today with Dan. Bad. Screaming, tears, anger, hang ups. Yes, I hung up the phone. (See the warning above about this not being a pretty post). Which prompted writing this post. To get the feelings and mess out. And maybe to try to explain them. And maybe, although it wasn’t my intention at the start, try to understand and order them. Because that’s how I handle the mess…”Life’s messy, clean it up.” Bissell’s words to live by.

Wednesday:

Writing this in the Etihad Business Class Lounge (not feeling guilty any longer about the amenities after our experience on the Jet Airlines connecting flight. I’m taking my luxury where I can get it).

The weekend before we flew out to India we took the gals to Jackson Heights, Queens-AKA “little India” for some authentic Indian food. The bad news is that Jackson Heights Diner has gone way down hill, but the good news is that Masan found her perfect “Indian dress.” It was “sea green” and very “fancy.” Evie decided she wanted the same one, but in purple and pink. Dan and I agreed to find a kid-sized one in India to bring back home for them.

While we were in Bengaluru we asked our relocation specialist Kasturiikaa if she could take us to find a kid-sized sari. She took us to a beautiful store with high-end silk saris for children. Gorgeous, but way too simple for our gals who love sparkle. We drove around for a bit seeing similar stores with similar inventory, until she finally called her boyfriend to ask where his niece got her dresses, which turned out to be a local Indian market. Kasturiikaa was hesitant to take us, not because it was unsafe, but because expats or foreign tourists never go. She says that she herself would never shop there. But Dan and I were game and on a very serious mission to find sea green “fancy” Indian dresses, so we went to the market. Dan needed an ATM (about 50 percent of the cash machines we visited during our week-long stay were out of money), and Kasturiikaa insisted that our driver (lots of people have drivers because to drive in that town is a death wish) go with Dan-apparently she was really concerned about us.

While Dan was at the cash machine K (not her nickname but for purposes of blogging while using an iPhone it will be) and I headed to the shops-picture the small stores all over Chinatown in Manhattan. Not more than a block out of the car a homeless man asking for money touched me and K became very upset on my behalf. She can’t believe this man has touched me and that she’s taking clients to this market. Clearly she needs to hear my story of the homeless guy in my neighborhood who insists on hugs. 

At that point I noticed a gorgeous Hindu temple just sitting behind the market. Strangely, it’s not considered a famous temple or tourist spot, but it’s huge and gorgeous. From what I saw, there are large and small Hindu temples scattered all around Bengaluru-adjacent to malls, at traffic lights, behind shacks-reinforcing the spiritual in the mundane, which I think seems like a great idea.

    Back to the mission-the first couple of shops didn’t have dresses for kids, but by the third we were in luck. They had shelves up to the ceiling on every wall filled with boxes of dresses. Every style-from traditional looking dresses to tunics and leggings to what looked to me like pageant dresses. Surprisingly, they were of good quality with ornate detailing. Not the sort of thing you’d find at a Chinatown market. Perfect for Masan and Evie’s vision. But alas they didn’t have sea green. Every other color imaginable. We settled on hot pink and blue, which the girls have seen on Skype and approve of.