Freedom!

Greetings from the Internet Cafe & Game Centre in downtown Lovech, Bulgaria!

I come here every year and they sort-of know me and my very bad Bulgarian. I actually love this Internet Cafe. Not just because I can blog and catch up on email, and certainly not because it’s always in semi-darkness and there is techno music playing at all hours of the day or night. No. I love it because it is here, giving access to technology to people without computers or Internet access at home. In some small way, Internet Cafes ensure that people aren’t completely cut off from the modern world just because they can’t afford a computer.

Today I am here all alone. This freedom comes courtesy of my husband’s teenage niece who I’ve hired to take care of the kids for few hours every morning.

Do I, you might ask, feel guilty about leaving my little darlings? Well, the thought did occur to me as I ran out of the apartment this morning. Luckily, I was too fast for the thought to really catch hold of me and have any effect.

It’s hard to feel guilty when the first weekend of your vacation is marked by a lot of work!

That’s an uncharitable thought. Let me explain. My mother-in-law died of breast cancer in January. She was in terrible pain and had been for a few years. Logically, we knew she was gone, but when you live far away from someone, the impact doesn’t quite hit until you return and expect - just from habit - to find them where you left them. 

So, when we came in from the airport to an apartment with no power and full of dust, the shock hit us on a practical level. Then, our 3 year-old who only understands that Baba Nadka is “gone” refused to walk through the door. My husband and his cousin were behind the kids and I, but not just because I left them with the luggage while I took the kids. In Bulgaria, obituaries and memorial notices are public. A photo of the deceased with the dates of their death and an expression of grief are pasted on the front door of apartment buildings and on garden gates leading up to houses. The first view my husband had of his family home was of his mother’s death notice.

Then, the first view of his family’s apartment was of darkness.

For the past few days, we’ve been clearing dust but stirring up different kinds of grief. And the baby, our lovely little baby, has had a red string tied around her left wrist by a loving great aunt to ward off the evil eye. It must be working because she smiles and laughs and smiles some more. We watch her and move from one extreme of emotion to the other every few moments.

And, for me, these moments of freedom I am stealing (yes, stealing is the right word), may just be the difference in keeping a grip on those extremes. I want this time to be the full dance of life, completely honest, but with control. The opposite of emotional chaos.

This seems to happen to a lot families. One life out, another life in. I know it’s happened to at least three readers here. How have you been dealing? Do you have any coping mechanisms to share?