Maybe it's all those glossy magazine spreads that did it. Or just some pent-up longing for a calm, communal escape. Either way, I’d convinced myself that we had all the makings of a perfect family summer vacation before us. A couple days with the kids in California’s central coast with some old friends and their two boys. Then a jaunt up to the wife's parents’ place in the Bay Area for a few more days, making it home in time to get started on some overdue home projects.
It started off promising enough. After a long but beautiful drive up the 101, we made it to our nice vacation home in the oak-dotted hills of Santa Margarita, just outside of San Luis Obispo, before sundown. The kids wheeled their scooters around while the ladies made them dinner and got us settled into the new digs. Christian and I camped out by the charcoal grill and cranked out a quick dinner for the adults before we got the kids off to sleep. Auspicious beginnings.
We woke up the next morning and had a nice little outing to Avila Valley Barn. Took a tractor ride to an orchard where we picked peaches off the tree, bought some fresh veggies for dinner that night, and picked up some boxed lunches to take to the beach a few miles down the road. Things were starting to look downright picture-perfect.
We got to Avila Beach and things began to unravel. The five-year-old started to tantrum, but our usual countermeasures - redirecting, ignoring, finally even giving in - came up short. The tantrum continued, escalated. And for the rest of the day, for the rest of the trip, things carried on like this. Moments of calm inevitably undone after a shoe didn’t feel right or the food we made tasted yucky. Meltdown, after meltdown, after meltdown - like some flip got switched and the daughter we knew somehow transformed into this ball of explosively short-fused anger and angst.
We made it back home at the end of the week spent, exhausted. The wife and I, nerves frayed, were constantly at each other’s throats. And the following week was more of the same. Doors slammed, tempers lost, a whole lot of yelling, hand-wringing, and book-consulting. It’s been the most challenging couple of weeks I’ve, we’ve had so far as parents.
The stupid thing is that since we’ve been mostly immune from this kind of behavior, I thought we were somehow above it. You know, like patting ourselves on the back because we’re such awesome parents. And now here we are. Starting back at zero. Figuring it all out.
About a month ago, my dad texted me a quote from Karl Ove Knausgaard’s “My Struggle”:
“...nothing I had previously experienced warned me about the invasion into your life that having children entails. The immense intimacy you have with them, the way in which your own temperament and mood are, so to speak, woven into theirs, such that your own worst sides are no longer something you can keep to yourself, hidden, but seem to take shape outside you, and are then hurled back.”
I'd hear it all the time before we had kids, that being a parent is the hardest job you’ll ever have. But I was nowhere near prepared for the depth of the challenge. How it’s not just about surviving the sleepless nights and the endless battles with kiddie clutter - though they do take their toll. But how on top of it all, you’re forced to confront all the messy, unresolved parts of yourself. Because no matter what, those kids will find a way to dig inside of you and pull them out for everyone to see.
For me it’s been one long, grinding lesson in patience and letting go. Because if I let myself, I can stay fixated on things forever. Like how much of my pre-kid self I've had to let go of. Like how unfair and completely pull-your-hair-out maddening it can all feel. Like how little of that perfect family vacation we ended up getting.
Things calmed down for a couple weeks before they got crazy again at the start of the school year (we’ve come to the conclusion that the 5-year-old’s moving into kindergarten was the catalyst for most of this extreme behavior). But we're all dealing with it. And we're learning, finding the balance between kindness, understanding and setting clear expectations and boundaries.
Man, it can be tough, though. Through it all, I try to remind myself that we've been given this amazing gift with both of our beautiful, unique, and spirited little girls. And that it's our job to summon up the patience, courage, and poise to understand them, guide them, and give them the tools to navigate their own lives.
In the meantime, here I am.
Taking deep breaths.
* I was fully prepared to milk this trip for a handful of blog posts. In the end, though, I found myself regularly seeking peace and calm under the canopy of large trees. Hence, the pics above.