figure it out.

Turning 40.

I've decided that for my 40th birthday, I will give myself the gift of time.

Time to be more present.

Time to be less on automatic.

Time to be more intentional.

Time to be less passive.

Basically, I'm going to get my ass of social media. Probably not forever. And probably not completely.

Just putting some boundaries up.

A big reason for starting up the old blog again (yes, this one) is to give myself a place to reflect // document life without the need for external validation.

I've been looking over this Tumblr and can see a few very specific phases of my life have been publicly shared on this platform:

-Late 20's Loni. Fresh out of a break-up. Living alone. Trying to navigate dating and adulting and lots of emotions.

-Camino Loni. Photos and thoughts from a life-changing 800 km walk.

-In-Love Loni. The months and year after meeting Kjartan, so (so) in love and ready for adventure.

-Guest-appearance Loni. I've made only a few posts in the last nine years including one about motherhood and raising babies in Denmark and another reflecting on grappling with being an American in a country that does not acknowledge racism.

What's been missed?

-Mom-of-3 Loni.

-Donor conceived Loni.

-Found my biological father Loni.

-Adult orphan Loni.

-Grieving Loni.

-Loni in Denmark.

-Sober Loni.

I'm excited to give more of a place to these versions of me... they've been a long time in the making and although I live them each day, they've also been dormant in reflection, intention and presence.

Black and gold balloons. Over the hill. Colorful confetti. Hiding family and a surprise party.

I remember when my dad turned 40. It felt like a big moment since nearly all of his family came into town and there was a big party at our house. I was six. 40 felt old.

Today, I'm 5 days away from that same hill. Standing on the top of it, feeling gravity pull me inches closer to being "over" it. I guess every day from now until next Wednesday, I'm being pulled down. Or maybe on Wednesday I'll just lose my footing, slip and officially fall.

I can't imagine that the second half of this life will go exponentially faster than the uphill climb, although according to the metaphor, that's what I should expect.

A long, grueling hike uphill.

Followed by a fast decent.

I've been reading a lot about time though. And how it might actually go faster as we get older since our experience with time is greater. When we're still ascending, time is relatively new. By the time we decent, our perspective is different.

As you can probably tell by this post, I'm rambling.

Trying to make sense of turning 40.

I'm not sure what I expected.

In some respects, I'm just happy I'm still alive. Still here. There are people who never make it this far.

I find myself wanting to cocoon. Wrap myself up, be doted on, hide from the hill altogether. I miss my mom. I miss being parented. I miss the appearance of a Hansen's cake.

My favorite birthday was my 18th.

I had a long day at school. Rehearsals for South Pacific after school. MC'd the Ugly Man pageant. Came home about 10:00pm and my mom had a Hansen's cake waiting for me. I wore my old "Peace and Love" ratty t-shirt and sweatpants as I blew out a handful of candles. I ate a piece of cake for dinner and went to bed, feeling the tingle of sweet exhaustion.

I loved that birthday.

I hated my 30th. Kjartan and I were long distance and I sat alone most of of the evening until my ex-boyfriend came over with a cake that my mom had paid him to deliver. We sat on the communal couch (I was living with roommates) and chatted a bit. At the time, the birthday was so not how a 30th should be. The Dirty Thirty should be a crazy night. A milestone event. Probably not sitting at home and stewing over your partner.

But actually, in retrospect, I guess it was pretty good. Sweatpants. Cake. Sweet exhaustion.

I'm trying to make my 40th birthday some kind of special.

After a long hunt to find the right kind of birthday cake in Denmark, I surrendered to making my own. A number cake with a 4 and a 0. I'm actively engaging in a search to find the recipe for a Hansen's cake to recreate.

Maybe it's a genuine wish that I have to make my birthday special.

Maybe it's a deep desire to taste the same cake from my 18th birthday.

Maybe it's a way to keep spinning and avoid thinking about the impending crash into the chasm.

Fuck that.

What does over the hill mean, anyway?

Half way.

It wasn't my mom's half-way. That was 33.

It wasn't my dad's half-way. That was 36.

Maybe I'm already climbing down. That's depressing.

I think I'll just hope for a good day, with cake, sweatpants and sweet exhaustion.

Well, we're here again.

Back to tumblr. Back to writing.

A lot has changed since I used this site frequently about a decade ago: I use capital letters now, I'm still married, I have three kids, a company, both my parents have died and I live in Denmark.

Instead of rehashing the last ten years, I'd rather explain why I'm back.

Last March, I stopped drinking alcohol.

I'll probably write more about that in the future but for now the only relevance is that becoming sober has given way to a lot of "ah-ha" moments... one of them being that I really don't want to be on social media anymore.

When I think about how I've leveraged Instagram and Facebook these past years, it's been a space to reflect and share moments of life that I find interesting or note-worthy. I like to leverage SoMe to reflect on these moments.

But I don't really like being tied to it.

Or feeling like I live moments through the intent to post about them.

And I'm tired of automatically checking SoMe... for what?

I still love reflecting. And sharing. And writing.

So, here I am. A tumblr bitch once again. I think writing a blog again might satisfy my urge reflect, share and write.

I'll probably be changing some of the formatting, the tag-line. "Navigating the 30's" doesn't apply to me in two weeks, so there's some necessary updating that clearly cannot be postponed for long.

Does anyone even use tumblr anymore? Well, I guess if you're reading this, you do.

And apparently now I do, too.

Photo: Me. An-almost-40-something-with-no-parents-three-kids-working-sober-married-american-in-denmark.

It wasn’t very long into our relationship when Kjartan told me about “Snoop Bar.” His friends from medical school took a turn bartending at the university club for a few hours on a theme night. They wore gangsta clothes, played Snoop, served gin and juice and painted their faces black. Yes, the future doctors of Denmark, used blackface. 

I was horrified. 

And Kjartan couldn’t understand why. To him, they were having fun. They were impersonating a celebrity personality and his followers who just happened to be black. There was nothing wrong with it, no racist agenda. Kjartan even said I mean, no one was offended... To him, this act was beyond racism. By acknowledging race and painting their faces, it was actually poking fun at racism, thus demonstrating that they were not racist. 

It was early enough in our relationship that I could chalk this one up to a cultural misunderstanding but it did beg the question, what the fuck is wrong with Denmark? 

Fast forward three years. Eleanor and Finn have a summer party at daycare this week. A flyer was sent home a month ago asking for RSVP’s and volunteers to bake cakes, man the popcorn booth, etc. Although my understanding of Danish is still developing, I could read that the theme of the party was ‘indianer’ (Indians). This must be a mistake. Looking closer, there was a child drawn totem pole and wigwam in the corner. It also mentioned an “American Lottery” game would be played and tickets could be purchased from Gitte with a chance to win the jackpot! I’m still trying to ignore the Indian/gambling connection there... With three small kids, my time for processing all this was limited so I hung the flyer on the wall and hadn’t looked at it since. 

My kid came home today with her face painted and a cardboard headband on. 

Again, I was horrified. 

How could Native American culture still be used in today’s society as a party theme? How could a public institution marginalize a group of people by boiling down Native traditions into face paint, dreamcatchers and headbands? Was I too sensitive? Again, what the fuck is wrong with Denmark? 

The short answer is: nothing.  

I’ve spent a few years trying to understand more about Denmark. Is Kjartan right? Is Denmark just so beyond racism that Danes can stand to not be politically correct? Maybe, but I doubt it. The recent rise of the Dansk Folkeparti (Danish People’s Party) in local and national politics has prompted stricter immigration laws, mainly targeting Muslims. Copenhagen has just passed curfew laws and harsher punishments for residents of ‘ghettos’ which mainly house low-income people of color and... Muslims. While many Danes would argue vehemently against being called racist, the current political climate would show differently. 

So, is Denmark racist? 

Maybe. But can we hold a country accountable for something it’s never really had to deal with... yet? 

As an American, I have a unique sensitivity to diversity. I’m not saying all Americans have this. I know there are racist scumbags littered all over the USA. But as Americans, we are constantly confronted with diversity. It is a foundation of our country’s past, an ideal that we have fought hard to preserve and a reality that continues to create many challenges for us to fully embrace as a nation. To be an American can mean speaking different languages, practicing different religions and having very different values. There is no one way to be American. With this comes a natural awareness of diversity that I’ve taken for granted most of my life. Most Danes just don’t have this. 

I’ve learned that Danes also have a very different frame of reference than Americans when it comes to diversity. Although Denmark has experienced it’s share of immigration periods, Denmark is still relatively untouched by outsiders. Assimilation is the rule. Diversity exists, but Danish culture has largely remained the same through the ages. The official language is Danish. Everyone here is expected to learn it. Danish culture, customs and traditions are taught as classes in public schools. While other religions are tolerated, the official religion of Denmark is Protestant. Tax payers automatically pay into the church unless they specifically opt out. Even on Christmas, almost all Danes follow exactly the same traditions down to the type of food that’s served. Winter vacation is called Christmas vacation because why would you call it something else when everyone celebrates Christmas? On the whole, Danes are a very progressive group. They sympathize with refugees, have valued women equally for decades and embrace all the letters of LGBTQIA. The status on outsiders? They are welcome, just as long as they don’t influence daily life too much. There are probably many Danes who would disagree with me on this one. But I ask a very honest question... how have different cultures made a significant impact on your daily life? 

Another reality is that most Danes don’t live in truly diverse places. 

The year I spent in Copenhagen felt very diverse but neighborhoods were still relatively segregated. As a city of 1.3 million, there was still a good chance of meeting a variety of skin colors and religions on the sidewalk no matter where I went. The last two years, we have lived in Southern Denmark. First in Sønderborg, a city of 30,000 and now in Gråsten. We are a town of 4,000 surrounded by water and farmland. Aside from a handful of engineers from India working at the local Danfoss headquarters, it is rare to encounter anyone of color on the daily. The diversity of this area is measured by the existence of Germans (since we are close to the border) and non-sønderjyske (people from other areas of Denmark). When we moved, the local newspaper did a little write up on our story because it was so rare for non-locals to relocate here. Even Kjartan has difficulty understanding the local dialect. It’s still Danish, he assures me. So, while the embracing of diversity exists in theory, most of Denmark doesn’t have to put it into practice. 

This lack of diversity also makes me wonder:  If an act can be taken as offensive but there’s no one around to offend, is it still offensive? 

If there are no black students at the university club during Snoop Bar, is it still offensive? 

Yes, says I. But, again, I’m sensitive. 

There’s also the whole bit about history. Danes do not have the same history of slave trade and systematic oppression that America has. Does that exempt them from cultural sensitivity? Can ‘indianer’ be a party theme because Denmark did not participate in the Trail of Tears?  

I have some fear for Denmark. With increasing immigration and globalization making our world smaller, Denmark will have to evolve. It will be influenced by other cultures. Diversity will hold a new meaning and I’m not sure all Danes are ready for the change. I expect that things will get worse for minorities in the near future before Denmark eventually surrenders to the reality that accepting diversity means more than just saying we’re not racist. 

I’m not sure where all these ramblings leave me. After I got over the initial shock of Eleanor’s Indian costume (for lack of a better term), we read a book about the Pilgrims and the Native Americans. We watched videos of the Oneida Nation Pow-Wow and talked about the traditional dress of the dancers. I tried with all my mama-power to make Native American culture more than just the theme of the week. Eleanor isn’t even three years old and I think it was more for me than for her. And then I took a picture of her because I actually think she looked cute with her face painted. On Thursday, I’ll bring a cake for the summer party. I will marvel at her dream catcher and ask her questions about what she’s learned. I really, really hope kids will not be running around with tomahawks, making ‘Indian sounds’ by banging their hands on their mouth... 

It’s hard to believe most days that it’s been one year since I lost my mom. The cliche rings true; It seems like yesterday... when I arrived at the hospital early in the morning to spend a little time with her before she went into surgery. There was a storm coming. The hospital staff went into some sort of ‘storm code’ and made us close the drapes to the windows on our 7th floor room overlooking much of East Green Bay. The sky was dark, the air sticky and still. 

Where is your father? Despite feeling unwell and unable to get out of the hospital bed the last week, my mom still had her feisty spirit intact. Infallible. 

She called his cell phone. Where are you? I could sense that even though we had fought the insurance company the last few days to get the operation approved, my mom was nervous. It had only been two weeks ago that my mom’s doctor performed a chest x-ray, investigating what was thought to be a bronchitis. The shock of finding a tumor must have been difficult to digest, scary. Unimaginable. 

We both expected my dad to be operating on Phil Time; a reality that we had come to accept. My dad would always be ‘on his way’ though his actual arrival time would be variable. This morning, he was up early and almost at the hospital. 

The rain started pelting the window. 

When my dad arrived, I went downstairs to find a cup of coffee and took a moment to walk outside of the small hospital cafe to feel the storm hit. Hospital employees ran from their cars, shielding their heads from the rain with jackets and wind-blown umbrellas. I assumed most were running late due to the weather. They entered the building out of breath and relieved to be out of the wet. 

Back upstairs, my dad sat near my mom’s bed, gently stroking her leg. 

He announced he would take a walk down the hallway to take a look but my mom quickly shot down that idea, thinking he would get lost, or take too much time, or miss her being called downstairs into surgery. 

He settled for peeking out the drapes inside the room. 

The operating doctor arrived and talked to us briefly about the procedure. He would go inside, look through her airways and if possible, insert a small stint. The stint would give my mom a chance for breathing better, for getting treatment and to prevent things like the pneumonia and blood clots she had been hospitalized for the previous week. 

An attendant came to drive her downstairs. My dad took a photo of her going into the elevator and she flashed the middle finger. Further evidence that even lung cancer couldn’t make my mother go down without a fight. 

The last thing I said to my mom before she was taken behind the doors to the operating room was I love you, Mom. I guess it was the perfect thing to say. Looking back, I can’t really think of anything else I would have liked to say. Just I love you, Mom. 

The next few hours blurred together. The first clue that something was wrong was a nurse who rushed into the waiting room and informed us that my mom had lost a lot of blood during the procedure but they were still working on her and doing everything they could. My dad and I held hands, unsure of how serious the situation was. Another nurse visited us again. She told us my mom’s heart had stopped but they had been able to start it again. It’s good news. 

Then the hospital clergy came. They sat down next to us in the empty waiting room and asked if we wanted to pray with them. We politely declined but when they left, I started to understand the gravity of my mom’s condition. I called Kjartan to come meet us and he dropped Eleanor off at the neighbor’s house.  

We stayed clueless for a while. They moved my mom to another operating room and attempted to remove one of her lungs to stop the bleeding. In the end, they had kept her alive for over three hours, manually massaging her heart and trying their best to save her. Afterwards all of the doctors visited us. They sat with us. One even cried with us. She was the first patient he had ever lost. 

There was a sort of numbness that followed. I was crying but it all seemed empty. The flood of family and friends who came to support us over the next few days was incredible. But still, I was numb. Even in giving a small speech at my mom’s memorial service, I could feel myself saying the words, even believing them but unable to really give in to the reality that my mom was really gone. I think that’s all normal. There’s no right way to grieve. 

When we arrived home to Denmark, I found myself oscillating between business as usual and complete devastation. It usually happened in the shower. Maybe it was the solitude. The break from work and kids and life that allowed me to feel it. I could just cry. Let the tears merge with the water. 

It’s hard to believe that I haven’t talked to my mom in a year. We would talk almost daily. I’d count seven hours backwards and judge whether it was a reasonable hour to call due to the time difference. Over FaceTime, my mom would have her first cup of coffee and hear about the new thing that Eleanor did or we’d exchange some gossip that we saw on Facebook. That’s tough. I really miss that. 

After a year, I’ve found there’s no easy way to lose a parent. My mother was a fundamental part of who I am. Profoundly. Some days I have to remind myself that she’s gone, and other days I feel my mom’s presence so intensely that I refuse to believe death can take someone away. I’ve had days where I’ve needed to mentally walk through the day my mom died, just to remember that it happened. I’ve even had some regrets about the time I spent with her. I think about how wonderful it is when Eleanor cuddles up with me in bed and I wonder why I didn’t do that with my mom. Such a simple thing that would have brought her so much joy. Why didn’t I do that more? Looking back, I wouldn’t have gotten so annoyed with concerns about my safety or whether I was eating enough. I’m thinking about getting a motorized scooter to get to/from work and I can still hear my mom’s voice, so clear, questioning whether it’s a good idea and reminding me to wear a helmet. These things are imbedded in me, they haven’t disappeared with her. 

Maybe the hardest thing though is knowing that my mom would have loved to know my kids. I hear people who have lost parents say that a lot. I was a few weeks pregnant when my mom went into surgery, so she knew there would be another baby on the way. She was excited but I also think she was also scared that a diagnosis of lung cancer would prevent her from being a part of it all. As Eleanor gets older, I see so many ways that they would have connected. There’s a lot of Patti in Eleanor. And of course there’s a lot in me.

Whenever I was home visiting, whether in college or living in California, we would get pedicures at the same nail salon near Target. My mom really hated to have her feet touched and would always squirm when she got a pedicure so I always kind of wondered why she wanted to get them. Each time the technician finished with my mom’s feet, there would be a pile of dead skin on the floor. We would laugh and it became a running joke that her feet were so bad. She would always talk about her feet, Philbrick Feet. All the women have them. Small toes, high arches, square. I have them, too. 

And now Eleanor has Philbrick Feet. At two years old, her toe nails are painted pink and we call them Ooh-La-La Toes. Eleanor can name many parts of the body: arm, the other arm, leg. But she thinks toes are actually called Ooh-La-La Toes. I think sometimes about how my mom would have called them that. How she would probably have taken Eleanor to the same nail salon to get her feet done. A special day with Nana Lou. Painting Eleanor’s nails is just one way I keep my mom with us. 

Even after a year, she’s always with us.

i started with the traditional narrative approach. i got stuck. i couldn’t remember the event with enough details to effectively capture and sustain with long pieces of text. or at least i couldn’t do this without it turning to some kind of fiction. 

next, i moved to taking what i had already written in this blog and trying to place it together with some coherence. there wasn’t enough detail, there were reflections and feelings but no facts. 

then i went through my instagram photos. there is where i remember. i remember the colors of things, who was there, the way they laughed. i can recall exactly how the wind felt or how i thought about the moment. 

so the book has become a conglomerate of all these. there are photos, there is long text and there are parts of the blog.

it’s not easy to try to write a book while being on maternity leave, regardless of the expectations i held for my ‘free time.’ does that even exist with kids? kjartan has been incredible at finding me a few hours each week to get outside, ride my bike to the cafe and just... write. i’m transported back. to me before kids, before denmark, before all this happened. for a few hours, i am able to process this incredible journey. not just the one that happened on the physical camino, but all that has followed. process. this book may take another four years to finish. 

At any given time of day, I look out my office window and see a bus-stop like station filled with young students from the local university. They are huddled around the ash tray, shoulders at their ears, trying to keep any trace of heat in their bodies as they smoke. It doesn’t look like they are enjoying themselves. It looks painful. Like a chore.

I want to yell to at them to stop. To explain what a person with lung cancer goes through at the end of their life. To tell them that by dying early they will be hurting their children. They will never see their grandchildren grow up, they will never tell them stories or witness their first milestones in life. By smoking, they are potentially removing themselves from the lives of people who need them.

I don’t say anything. The ‘end’ is too far off. There’s always a chance they won’t develop cancer. They have yet to know the love and joy of having children and the guilt and pain of letting them down. It’s a useless effort.

Although my mom stopped smoking over 20 years ago, her risk of getting lung cancer was still high. Maybe that’s the most important piece for people to know now. The common knowledge that lungs can repair themselves after a smoker has quit is only partly true. There’s still a heightened risk, there always will be.

I’m not mad at my mom. I wouldn’t want her to go back in time and quit smoking sooner because I’m sure she had her reasons. I can also use the rationalization that everyone dies of something… if it wasn’t the past summer, it would have been 10 years from now. My mom still would have died. We all will.

I do wish my mom never would have started. At 65, she had so many more years ahead of her. Time for her grandchildren, for playing tennis, for traveling, for going door to door and getting more Democrats elected. I can’t say she could have single-handedly turned Wisconsin blue in this past election but you better be damn sure she would have tried. 

So, if I can’t shout my feelings from my office window, or if no one will really notice if I wear a white ribbon, at least remembering people like my mom might make us more aware. 

It’s really the only hope we have. 

Dear American Mom, When Eleanor was six weeks old, I sat up in the middle of the night, crying and struggling to breastfeed. I remember thinking of all my friends in the United States, like you, who in this situation could be facing a 8:00am work meeting. I was caught between extreme sadness on behalf of women who never get the opportunity to stay home and overwhelming gratitude that I at least had the opportunity to choose.

I’ll confess. Before being pregnant, I had never given issues around parenting much thought. Things like breastfeeding in public, length of maternity leave, options for prenatal care: all just abstract concepts that someone, somewhere cared a lot about. As an American, I knew the conditions for having children weren’t exactly ideal, but I had no idea just how challenging it could be until I became pregnant in a country where everyone is supportive of these issues.

Believe me, American Mom, I feel for you.

Raising my daughter in Denmark, has been one of the most challenging ‘projects’ of my life. I’ve found that no country is completely free from the inherent difficulties of parenting. I get frustrated when she wakes up four times per night, I worry about her constantly, being a Mom is hard. But I have experienced some incredible supports that I really wish you had, too. I’m not writing this to brag. There is no political agenda hidden in this piece. I just want to share with you the experience of having Eleanor in a country that really supports women and family life.

Experience #1: The country wants families to have children. When I was applying for residency, my Danish husband suggested we get a note from the doctor confirming I was pregnant. I couldn’t understand his logic.

Why would we do that? Why would the government want another baby? Another person to pay for? They’re never going to let me in!

My husband had to explain that in Danish culture, a baby isn’t a burden. It’s seen as a hopeful representation of what the future can be. It’s not just the ‘duty’ of the government to take care of the family, it’s a responsibility and one that is gladly taken. The government wants families to have more children. This required a total mind-shift for me. I always felt that having children was supported only with a cautionary tone from the United States government… Sure, have them. But make sure they don’t cost too much, disrupt too much and they’re your responsibility! In a restaurant, Uncle Sam would be at a nearby table giving glaring looks to the crying baby at the restaurant while Denmark would probably be trying to make it laugh. Denmark is a tough country to get residency in and I’m convinced a major reason for why I was able to come was because I was expecting.

Experience #2: All medical care is free.   From the excellent prenatal midwife visits to the three-day hospital stay, everything was taken care of and I felt really safe.

Experience #3: 52 Weeks Paid Leave. Denmark has one of the longest paid leave agreements in the world, but it’s not just the length that makes it great. The 52 weeks paid leave can be split between the mother and the father. With Eleanor, I’ve taken the entire leave because it’s made sense with my job but next time my husband will probably take most of it. This set-up also supports women in the professional world. Because men and women can both be gone from work with the arrival of a baby, employers are less likely to discriminate against women of childbearing age when it comes to the hiring process, allowing women to get and keep high-level positions while also having a family.

Experience #4: Nurses Visits. A few days after I returned home from the hospital, we received a call from the local health nurse scheduling an appointment for her to come to our home. I was nervous about this. Was she inspecting us? Our house? Was it possible she would take Eleanor away if she didn’t think we were good parents? All of my fears were completely unwarranted. Our nurse was Janne (Jah-Nay). A 50-something hearty Danish woman with her hair in a bun and the experience of holding a thousand babies under her belt. Each visit, Janne would weigh Ellie, do some simple tests and spend as much time as we needed drinking coffee and talking about how things were going. This service is provided by the local municipality and the nurses visit every two weeks until the baby is four months old and then continue to come every three months. I knew that I could wait to ask Janne when any concern came up, or she was just a text message away. I wish every new mother had a Janne!

Experience #5: Mother’s Groups. 52 Weeks of maternity leave has the potential to leave a woman and her baby isolated so the local municipality also organizes Mother’s Groups based on the age of the baby and neighborhood. The groups meet once per week and are easily spotted rolling their prams on a Tuesday morning to the local cafe or on a walk around the lake. With limited Danish, I joined an international group and met with moms from Belgium, Poland, Lithuania and Ecuador. We had coffee in each other’s homes, talked about common baby problems and provided a valid excuse to get dressed in real clothes and leave the house for a few hours. Some Mother’s Groups continue meeting long after maternity leave is over and remain friends even twenty years later.

Experience #6: Low cost child care. Most parents return back to work when the baby is about one year old and they are guaranteed a place in public or private daycare from the age of six-months. The cost of this is dependent upon the income of the parents, but families will pay a maximum of 25% and low-income families will pay nothing. While I’ve always known I will go back to work and Eleanor will go into daycare, the important thing is that we have an affordable option when it comes to making the decision. There is nothing financial that is forcing us to do something we aren’t comfortable with.

Experience #7: Families get paid to have kids.  For each child a family has, the government kicks in a ‘child support’ check averaging about $700 every three months. It’s designed to help with the additional costs of diapers, food, etc. so that finances won’t play a huge factor in whether a family makes the choice to have children. 

I think of my American friends often. Those of you that must return to work too soon. Those that work just so they can afford child care and are pulled financially in different directions all the time. Those that feel isolated because they’re staying home and my friends who have to think twice before going to the doctor because the visit isn’t covered by insurance. I wish you had these services if you wanted them. I just wish you had more freedom and more options.  

Like any country and culture, there are good parts and bad parts. Denmark isn’t perfect. But at least it’s a visible cheerleader for women and families. Inevitably, the conversation about benefits in Denmark always turns political. You might think about dirty words like socialism and phrases like high tax rates. I know that Denmark draws these arguments but I’m asking you to look deeper. Don’t discredit the services that Danish culture has worked hard to protect because you think it could result in more money taken from your paycheck. The key to supporting mothers like you, doesn’t lie in a certain tax percentage or in a political party. It comes from a cultural mindset that doing everything we can to support women and families is what’s best for our country and for our society. It’s really what’s best for everyone. 

It’s nearly midnight and Eleanor is awake for the third time crying from a fever that she just can’t seem to shake. I’m exhausted. I’m emotionally drained. You know the drill. And just when I think life can’t be any harder, I think of you. 

In this moment I have learned to appreciate every support I have from this little country to make my life a bit easier and a lot happier. 

I respect the shit out of you, American Mom. I just wish America would do the same.

Mom love,  A sister in Copenhagen

like most first time babies, eleanor was late. as her due date of september 3rd rolled around, i franticly checked the what to expect online forums at every twinge of pain. was this it? could today be the day? almost always the answer was: no this isn’t it and today is not the day. for eleven days i woke up in the morning and started crying because it meant another day of being very (very) pregnant. 

throughout my pregnancy i held some anxiety around labor and the birthing process. part of this may be attributed to the fact that i was living between countries: receiving my prenatal care through the united kingdom but planning on moving in my third trimester to give birth in denmark. the option of carefully planning my desires for labor seemed almost impossible given the fact that i knew little of how things were done in either country. my only ‘plan’ was to get the baby out safely, whether that happened in water, with pain medication, or through surgery, i didn’t feel like i had the mental space or physical time to really consider what i wanted. to be honest, that was ok for me. knowing how my labor actually went confirms that my birth plan probably would have radically changed once it started regardless of how informed i could have/should have been. maybe i should have been more committed to figuring out what was ideal, like trying harder not to fall asleep during my hypnobirthing podcasts but (again) i don’t really believe it would have made a difference. 

on monday, september 14th, i started having mild contractions in the morning. kjartan and i arrived at the hospital for an existing appointment and i remember seeing a very pregnant woman walking through the hallways screaming every few minutes. judging by the volume and desperation of her cries, my contractions seemed to pale in comparison. i still question whether women in labor should be allowed to come into contact with other pregnant women. it provided a grim insight into what would soon come and really filled me with dread. the midwife confirmed that i had not actually started labor and gave me pills to induce the process. we returned home and i waited for something to kick in. 

that evening, the contractions became progressively worse. i stood in the shower, i bounced on the birthing ball, we even started to time them using a nifty little app on my phone. around 2:30am, we called the hospital and they advised us to come in. at only 1cm dilated, i was not even close to being in active labor. the midwife gave me a dose of morphine and suggested that kjartan and i sleep for a while. by morning the contractions had stopped completely and the hospital didn’t have enough room to keep us to induce further. we were sent home again with an appointment the following day to have my waters broken. the morphine made me nauseous. thankfully, i was able to wait until i was off the bus to vomit. pregnancy taught me to always carry a bag to throw up in or at least have ‘a plan’ in case of sickness in the most inconvenient places like public transportation. when we arrived home, i was shaky, still sick and absolutely exhausted. kjartan and i laid down and slept for a few hours (the best sleep of my life to date), only to be awaken by a phone call from the hospital. they had room for us now and we should come back as soon as possible. 

i didn’t want to go. i didn’t feel strong or empowered and the taste of pain i encountered over the past 24 hours gave me enough fear to want to postpone the entire thing. indefinitely. knowing this would never be an option, kjartan and i set out for the hospital once again, pulling our little suitcase that had made the trip three times in the last two days. 

although i had not planned on getting pain medication, when i reached the hospital, every conversation with a midwife, secretary or someone in uniform went something like this: hi, i’m not sure if you’re the one to ask about this, but i would like an epidural. thank you. i was hours early in requesting one but i was so terrified of the pain that i really didn’t want to miss my chance. 

a midwife broke my waters and suggested we go for a walk around the hospital. within 45 minutes, i was the very pregnant woman roaming the halls, stopping to scream at every contraction. i was the one scaring other women. i walked outside, i picked some lavender from a garden plot, i made it back inside before a storm hit and rain began to pelt the windows. as the contractions grew closer together, we made our way back to the birthing unit and were admitted into a room. 

the next few hours are a blur. painful. not dilated enough. too early for pain medication. an annoying midwife who made audible sighs of pity with each of my screams. an enema where i had to tell kjartan not to follow me into the bathroom because i didn’t need his support that badly. the anesthesiologist came with the epidural. an syntocinon/oxytocin drip to speed up the process. relief for a few hours. sleep. a change of shift and (thankfully) a new midwife. 

i must have seen this in a movie, but i was under the impression that once a woman received an epidural, there was no more pain. contractions done. i was wrong. or at least this was not my reality. sometime after i woke up, i began to feel the contractions again. they started as pressure but over time they progressed into full-on pain. five hours of this. between each one i was shaking uncontrollably. during each one, i was concentrating hard to breathe and counting to ten so the stabbing sensation in my back would finally stop. the new midwife was incredible. she had me up on all fours, using a towel to move my hips back and forth: a mexican technique called rebozo. i admit that i felt really out of it during this entire period, primarily due to the pain medication. i even refused more of it which is probably why my fantasy of an epidural-pain-free-birth never came to fruition. i spiked a fever, they tested for infection. they took blood from the baby, her heart rate increased. i dilated from 3cm to 8cm in two hours. 

i only snapped at kjartan twice, which i consider a victory. i popped him the middle finger when he told me try to breathe, loni. and almost killed him when he continued to ask if i was having a contraction... right in the middle of the contraction. i only swore once, aside from the occasional shits and fucks when the pain got bad. the midwife informed me that if the baby wasn’t out in five hours, we would have to ______. i didn’t even remember what the plan was, only that i busted out with another five fucking hours?! i apologized later. 

pushing was the easy part. eleanor was out in 25 minutes. 8 contractions kjartan tells me. it felt like relief, it felt like progress and it’s really the only part of the birth that i felt in control of. when she was born, ellie was placed directly on my chest and i remember talking to her while i wiped away the spit bubbles from her mouth. it was incredible to hold her and simply overwhelming. i didn’t want to see the placenta. i don't remember kjartan cutting the umbilical cord. i just held this little person with a pink knitted hat, who was chirping away. 

what do you think? is she an eleanor? kjartan asked. 

yes, she is an eleanor. 

she was 3.7km (8.1lbs) and 53cm (20.8in) of perfection. and she was all worth it.

we are in transition of seasons. 

as a teacher, i’ve never forgotten what it means to have a ‘good summer’. the kind where you hang out at the beach all day, stay up late with friends and just soak in the absolute freedom of great weather and few responsibilities. this year, my skin is pale and my hair much darker than usual, both signs that this summer has been different for me. perhaps even non-existant. this last trimester of pregnancy has made the sun a sworn enemy and my hips cringe at the thought of sitting on a hard beach for more than 30 minutes. did i take advantage of this summer? could i have done more to enjoy it? will it ever be the same? 

there’s something strangely metaphorical about the seasons right now. being 39 weeks pregnant, i’m feeling the same anticipation for bringing this child into the world and still wondering about the things i’m leaving behind. i’ve come to the realization that it’s human nature to romanticize the past in many ways. what we looked like in our youth. places we lived. friends who meant a lot to us. the person we think we were. at times i find myself longing for what i’ve left behind, thinking it’s a better version of me. not with everything. but with enough. somewhere hidden in these fantasies is a reality that we can’t really ever go back. like fall will come, so will this baby. the evolution of me will continue. 

we are in a constant transition of self. 

since i’ve been reading a lot about child birth lately (and with good reason!), i’ll share that i’ve learned the most painful part of labor is the phase referred to as transition. for those of us who have not been through it yet, it’s the last part of active labor when the cervix dilates from 8 to 10cm. it’s right before the pushing. transition is probably the perfect name for this period. it’s the space in between i can’t do this and it’s almost over. 

i suppose the real dilemma here is: how do we live a fulfilling life in this space? how do we move beyond the past, forget about how many days we spent (or didn’t spend...) in the sun and yet prevent ourselves from continually looking into the future for excitement? for hope? for some, the answer may lie in being mindful. in appreciating the present. i get that. i’m trying that. 

for me, the solution may be in accepting that every life-season has a period of transition: a time of in-between, a natural flow to events when we’re neither here nor there. and an understanding that within transition, lies fear and pain but also a fundamental happiness because relief is almost in sight. 

near the second set of escalators we could hear the beginning chords of space oddity. we looked at each other, capturing a glimpse of nostalgia for the movie we both love: the secret life of walter mitty. the musician was kitsch. a man in his 40′s playing guitar beside two muppets who pretended to keep tempo on drums. 

we rode the stairs up. singing along this is ground control to major tom... 

instead of following the crowd though the ticket gates and out exit four, kjartan pulled my hand and took me into the queue headed back down the escalator. 

we rode the stairs down. still singing and the stars look very different today...

we did this one more time. up. down. laughing and crying and remembering what it was like to be really, truly in love. 

kjartan pulled out a £10 note on our final trip down and placed it in the musician’s open guitar case. the music stopped for a moment as he publicly thanked us, perhaps in disbelief that a bowie song could elicit such generosity. 

we rode the stairs up one last time. him facing me. proud and lucky. 

so, i’ve been stuck. 

i don’t feel equipped to write a ‘story’ in the conventional sense. anything i’ve done that feels semi-worth reading has come from significant pain and in the format of shorter/in-the-moment pieces. not a recount of several months and certainly not in the form of a novel. i’ve thought about narrating photographs, capturing the essence of the camino without recounting my entire tale. i’ve tried my hand at past tense, present tense and using old blog posts to tell the backstory. nothing feels right and (more importantly) nothing has given me the creative surge to really get going on this project. 

so, i’m still stuck. 

i started walking the camino two years ago today. july 4th. i should write about how much has changed in my life in 24 months, but i think the best way to honour the day is to share some of the writing i’ve done about it. put it out there. take the risk of being vulnerable with something far from perfect, something far from comfort.

like the unknown journey the camino would inevidably take me on, today i celebrate bravery, change and taking life one day at a time. <3 

July 4, 2013

Independence Day

     Like a good little pilgrim, I set my alarm for 5:00am after I showered last night. It was a night of restless sleep and I awoke to the sound of rustling in the bed across from me. A woman was already dressed and rolling up her sleeping bag, I had not even heard her come into the room. Instantly I began to feel anxious.     

     Get up, Loni! You’re Late! A voice inside me panicked. It was a mix between my annoying subconscious that speaks up when I feel like I’m doing something wrong, and my father. Maybe because he struggled with me every day of high school to get me out of bed. 

     Five more minutes! I would say. He would threaten not to drive me. Or get cold water to pour over my lethargic teenage body.            I jumped out of my bunk and forced myself to get ready. Quickly. Like a drill that I had practiced over and over again, attempting to get perfect when the Camino finally came. I frantically brushed my teeth, threw my hair up in a ponytail and changed into my hiking clothes. My instinct was to be first. Get to breakfast first. Be out the door first. Win it. 

     I ended up winning this morning. I ate a breakfast of toast and jam prepared by Daniele.  As I went back upstairs to get Becky, I noticed other pilgrims through the open front door. They were clearly in rain gear. Poking my head outside, it was confirmed. I needed to prepare for rain. A group of about ten pilgrims passed the opening, all wearing ponchos or rain jackets or at least some kind of plastic covering their packs. I hadn’t prepared for this. Mentally. I had the supplies: an Osprey cover and a water-proof jacket. But I had not done the drill. I had not practiced putting the cover on and I had never worn the jacket that I ended up borrowing from Edith, my Camino Guru. In the hallway of the albergue, I frantically dug out my rain items and did my best to put them both on. I felt panicked. Like I wasn’t doing things right. Everyone else somehow knew to dress for rain, why didn’t I? What did I miss? I repacked my gear in haste and opened the door once again to begin my journey.      The air in St. Jean was cool, a light mist surrounded the cobble streets. I refused to see the long, black dead snake along side the road as a bad omen. I tried to block out my daily horoscope that warned about traveling and advised me to stay close to home. But deep down, I was scared. Since the beginning of May when I made the decision to walk, my life had been an endless series of preparations. Weekly visits to REI to learn about the best equipment. Hikes three to four times per week in my boots and with my pack to prepare my body for the challenge. Hungrily reading literature and blogs and articles about the Camino, making sure I knew what to expect.      The truth was that there was no way to really prepare for this moment. I was on the cusp of change with one leg in my past and the other mid-air, not sure where to land.      I awkwardly positioned my walking stick in my right hand and followed a few pilgrims out of St. Jean. My cadence was uneven compared to the steps of the people around me. I attempted to walk in their rhythm without even being sure of my own.

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     “Loni!” A voice yelled from behind. It was Hot Jack.  

     “Hey!” I desperately tried to not seem out of breath, fit, in control, despite walking up a mountain. 

     “How are you this morning?” He wasn’t even breaking a sweat. We chatting for a bit, talking about our nights, or the differences of our nights to be more specific. Jack’s albergue was filled with young pilgrims, perhaps more of the tourist types that Danielle would have refused to harbor. He introduced me to the guy he was walking with, Robin, yet another from Ireland. Jack was controlling the pace of our little group and I was finding myself struggling to keep up as we approached a steep section of the climb.      “I’ll have to go slower, I’ll catch up with you later.” I admitted defeat, couldn’t hang with the big boys. I could tell Robin was nearing his limit as well, but he continued on with Jack. Watching them go, I slowed to a more manageable pace, allowing myself to breathe harder. My eyes drifted to the ground. There, on the wet path, was an outstretched snail. I was going his pace.      To be fair, I was walking faster than some on the climb from St. Jean to Rosecranvalles. I passed Allan and met his wife, Angela. Allan was struggling. Even more than me. I wondered whether his age was going to be a factor. I passed a woman and her daughter from Germany. Just as the rain began to pour, I arrived at Orrison, a tiny village atop a mountain with one pub. I needed some shelter.      As the door to the pub opened, I could see I wasn’t the only pilgrim needing refuge. The room was filled with a musty, damp smell from boots and packs and newly warmed bodies.      Too early for beer. I ordered a cafe con leche and noticed Robin sitting towards the back. He motioned for me to join him and we began to talk. I learned that Robin worked with special needs kids and was also an aspiring artist. When he spoke, he tucked his hair behind his ears with his hand. He asked questions and even made some jokes, although some I would have to ask him to repeat due to his thick Irish accent. Robin made me feel calm. He was my first Camino friend.      An hour later, we decided to leave the dry, warm oasis and venture back onto the mountain.

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     Robin and I walked together from Orrison to Rosecranvalles. We talked about relationships. I told him about Ian. Robin didn’t offer advice. He just made statements like, That’s shitty. or I hate it when that happens. We searched for the place where Emilio Estevez’s character supposedly died on the Camino in the movie, The Way and decided that it must have been really dark or something for someone to actually die on the route we were on. Around noon, we crossed into Spain, noted by a tiny sign by the trail. A local sold snacks and drinks from a trailer and we decided it was time for a break. Robin brought me a Coke and we sat on rocks overlooking the Pyrenees, listening to the baa-ing of the sheep.

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i want to get away for the weekend. 

monday is a bank holiday, kjartan is absent (camping in the woods) and with a baby on the way, when will i ever get this time again? 

before leaving for work, i frantically searched cheap flights. to barcelona. to rome. to italy. the cheapest deal was to ireland although i couldn’t stomach paying money just to to spend a weekend in another cold/dark/damp place. i was a coin flip away from clicking purchase on a plane ticket to barcelona when the coin came up tails. i closed the computer and left the flat. 

friday night i found myself still searching airfare. this is just such a great opportunity! i pictured myself waltzing around paris, enjoying a mid-day ice cream and reenacting a mini-eat-pray-love weekend. just some time to get away. 

but then something stopped me. i could argue it’s money, although that’s never really been a significant factor in any decision i’ve ever made. #truth. i took a moment to breathe and started to count the number of days i had spent in london in the last month: 10 days. since august: maybe 60% of my time has been at home, the rest split between traveling for work or copenhagen or other trips. 

the secret to this weekend wasn’t to get away. the secret was to settle in. 

i’d like to report that i’ve done a fantastic job of this. i’d like to post photos of ‘me dates’ around various neighbourhoods of london, drinking good coffee or visiting cozy bookstores. maybe even just a reconnection to my artistic side would suffice. but none of that has really happened this weekend. 

i spent saturday morning still looking at airfares, one last attempt to escape the city, or perhaps myself. by afternoon i surrendered, got lost in some netflix and broke the promise to be out of the flat by 1:00. then 2:00. and finally 3:00. aside from a quick trip to the grocery store, all bets were off. 

sunday was better. i went outside at least. i had initially signed up to do a ‘all things camino hike’ outside of london with a meet-up group but my anxiety got the best of me. i didn’t know if i could handle a 7 mile strenuous hike or spending the energy meeting new people. i took a hike of my own, 10 miles along the hackney marshes. despite the occasional rain, the weather was warm and it smelled like spring. i thought about a lot of things. hard things. i thought about how these thoughts would be better received on a barcelona beach. 

my mind found a memory of going to ikea in august with kjartan when i first moved to london. i chose bedding/furniture/etc. to match the apartment, a brand new, ultra-modern high rise. lots of windows, light wood and white walls. i remember explaining to kjartan that since this was probably the only time i would ever be living in a place like this, i should just go with it. find the matches. i can live with anything for a year. 

the problem is that i’ve been saying this for a while now... i can live with anything for a year. 

one year isn’t that long. it’s not long enough to really make friends or join a sports team. it’s hard to find a favourite wine bar and it’s hardly worth putting up decorations on the wall. one year is hard to invest in. 

the past two years have really been one years. i can say i’ve been adjusting to a long-distance relationship, new marriage, last year in san diego, new job, new city, new countries, short-distance relationship, co-living, etc. 

but i haven’t been adjusting to anything. it’s been adjusting me. 

the only lame metaphor i could think of yesterday during my hike was that of a stone in the ocean being moved millions of times by powerful waters. each movement grinds away a tiny part, moulding, shaping the stone until it’s barely recognisable to it’s original form. it’s evolution, it’s how we change and at some point, it’s just exhausting. unsustainable.