The Help

Hi. If you read both my blogs, you might have clued in to the fact that I posts some things on both this blog and Return to the Nesterlands, and other things only on this blog. This is my 'secret' blog. This is a blog for the inner circle, if you will. Last year I sent a whole heap of people (including my mother and mother-in-law) a link to my other blog, as I wanted to inform far away relatives and acquaintances of how things were going. But sometimes it's hard knowing who's reading what you're writing. Especially if you want to write about them or write how you feel about something when you know certain people will want to give you advice you don't need. Though there are other people whose advice I desperately want, but they never post or comment. Go figure. I want a blog that is very popular and will win awards, but I don't want some people to read it! That's the problem with blogs, you can't really be choosy about your audience. I trust my life to strangers more than to the people I love. I can't keep a diary these days either, my words just do not come out in private. I can only wear my heart on my sleeve nowadays. Have I become an exhibitionist?

The truth is that I am finding it harder and harder to be at my mother's house. It used to be the best place in the world, this house. Really it was. It was the horn of plenty. Food, love, fun, it was all here. Too much of everything. The good life to the point of overkill sometimes. But like an over-ripe mango it has just gone past its sweetness and has become messy and a little disgusting. I can see so much truth now, so much reality it hurts. This place is like a cracked mirror and I can see a completely disfigured version of my life that is grotesque and a little scary. It has become a source of hopelessness and it overwhelms me. I don't want to lose this place, but it's already gone, and I can't let it go, but I want it to be gone.

I wonder why I come here, why I stay for so long and why I do what I do. I love my mother, I want to help her. I have always wanted to help her, and I always have helped her. I hope I always will. I have always cleaned things for her, done her super disgusting jobs and sorted out her mess. She has always showered me with love and support and gifts and generosity and the only way I have ever been able to repay her is with my amazing cleaning and organising skills. It's one of the few things I feel confident about, these skills. I might even boast about them. I kick ass when it comes to organising.

I have also learned in the last few years that I am a natural helper. I am constantly offering people my help, sometimes when people don't want it. I am a helpful person. Just yesterday I was at the hardware store and in the queue in front of me was a dad with two little girls. He had two bulky boxes and some smaller items and he told the lady at the check-out he would have to come back for one box as he was unable to carry both boxes to the car. So I offered to carry one, and helped him and his girls to their car.

I hold doors, lifts, hands, secrets.

I care. I just do. And I wish everybody did. That's one of the things I love about my friend Phiroze. He's super helpful, I think he is even more helpful than I am. Everybody needs help with things, and if only everybody used some of their skills to just help other people, we'd be more connected, more grateful and probably happier.

Nearly everything I do is helping people. I haven't really realised that until just now. I am here to help my mum, to help Phizz pack for the US, the help my friend Emily prepare for her baby. My current job is a helpful job. Looking after other people's children is one of the most helpful things one can do, I think. I tidy up, I do dishes, I fold clothes. I help my husband with his renovations to our house, I help him with his presentations and his reviews for work. I help my mother-in-law with her computer related questions. I help my friends with things all the time. I help my sister with handyman jobs. It's not hard. It's easy. I want to do those things. It makes people happy. I want to make people happy.

But it's not easy when I need help. Because the help I need is not necessarily easily available. I could really use some help to build my confidence when it comes to finally starting my career. I would love a coach. I would love to know how to network better. The difficulties for me are not really ones that helpfulness would sort out, like my citizenship issues, my finances, my split life. I need emotional help. Hahaha, god that sounds a bit sad. I need emotional support. And quality stuff, I want people to really care. Sometimes I feel that people don't care as much about me as I care about them. I know it's a common feeling, I am not alone in that.

Maybe I am a needy person. I think I might be. I am clingy and needy. It's embarrassing but true. When I meet new people that I like I can be like a puppy. I want to be cuddled all the time. I want people to want to be with me. I want to be the most amazing company. And I want to hear it. I often tell people that they are awesome, because I know it's a nice thing to hear. I don't hear it often enough. But maybe I just need to hear it more often than I others. I don't know.

Anyway. I best get off the computer. There's jobs that need to be done. 

Amsterdam Days

Well, that was fun. I have spent some wonderful days in Amsterdam this week, mostly hanging out with good friends, my cousin and my sister. I spent two of them playing tour guide, which was fine, except of course for the fact that I know very little about Amsterdam. But I know little quirky facts and I guess I know my way to the most interesting landmarks.

One place that I discovered for the first time myself with my friend Dunja, who had just landed from Melbourne wednesday morning, is the new Public Library of Amsterdam. It's a really great building with wonderful architecture, and there are floors and floors of books, music and films. I really enjoyed the children's section, where there is a very large dolls house, or rather, mouse house made by Karin Schaapman with more than a hundred different little rooms and mice. It was amazing.

I spent more time than usual just roaming around Amsterdam and pointing out its loveliness, and the more I see it, the more I appreciate its beauty and quirk. Amsterdam is a nice city. It's old and cute and amazing.  The Dutch are a funny folk and our language is ridiculously tricky and silly. I wish I had had my bike with me, though and I was so pleased Dunja and I got to ride rental bikes for a few hours on our lovely day together. I have really come to the realisation this year that they only way I really enjoy seeing a city is by bike. I am a bike person. Walking starts to hurt my feet way too quickly and it's way too slow. Yes you can appreciate the streets and sights a bit better on foot, but when you ride, you can always stop and take a short walk around if you see something you like. Bike beats walking for me hands down.

I also really enjoyed seeing my best and oldest friend Emily who is only two months away from giving birth to her first child. This time last year we were talking about how we were far off having children, but Emily's child had other plans! If you have followed my blog regularly you will know I am currently more likely to say I will never have children myself, and that though I find them amazing and fun, I would not want to have them around all day every day. I have the utmost respect for people who can manage their own happiness and that of their family. I struggle to get out of bed and put one foot after another some days, and to have to manage children at a time like that seems impossible. And the biggest worry I have about having children is that my family is all here, and many of my friends, and I would have to travel with my children if I want them to know these people. Shudder. I find flying 24 hours by myself hard enough as my tolerance for anything seems to not travel with me, let alone tolerance for tired and cranky children.

But all around, my friends increasingly bring those little people into their lives (and inevitably mine), it's what people my age do. And the truth is that your friendship changes. Children claim all the attention. They need it. They have so many questions, they want to know everything, they are amazingly observant and fantastically curious. But sometimes I want all their mum's attention for myself. Luckily Emily and I have talked extensively about this phenomenon and she's very aware of the changes her little one will bring along. To be honest I cried when she told me she was pregnant. And not out of joy. I have very few friends left who are not bound to a child. She understood, though, and of course it took me very little time to become excited and happy for her. I have to say pregnancy has given her a strength I have not seen in her before, a confidence, a content enriching her whole being and life. I am thrilled for her. It's amazing what a person who has not yet been born can do!  

I'll be heading back to Amsterdam soon, to help Phizz with getting ready to move to the US and an expense report, and also to see my friends and sister as much as I can. I will also attempt to do some exercise there at a gym and hopefully ride a bike. I feel at home in Amsterdam these days. And I am beginning to know my way around which is awesome, especially when riding. I no longer have to stop at every street corner to check on google maps whether I'm going in the right direction.

Today is a really wet rainy cold day and Mum and I are doing chores around the house. I am also playing a ridiculous amount of Rumble (an iPhone words game) both in Dutch and English which is good for my bilinguality. According to my spellchecker that's not a word, but you know what I mean.

So my dear readers, that'll be all. I have to say my last few posts have hardly been as good and witty as I would like my blog to be, but it's just the way it is. I miss my words. They used to come so easily, but we had a messy breakup (a stranger interfered with our relationship) and now we don't always connect the way we used to. It still hurts. Anyway. Ciao.