Normal'ish

A new blog.

A new chance to fill it up with stories, pictures and the little to big happenings of our family, our day to day tales....and what I call our "normal'ish" life.

What really is normal?

I've been wondering about this quite a bit over the past few months. I believe my definition of normal was first rocked about when we moved here to the city. Living here is unlike anything we have ever expected. Even now, after a year of living here, the day to day events which are feeling normal enough by habit - are not normal considering what we have experienced for the better part of our life. What my husband and I grew up with. What we experienced for the first 8 years of marriage and for the most part of our 3 children's lives.

I've caught myself so many times in life - and especially this past year - saying to myself, "Oh when things slow down a bit....' OR '....when things get back to normal'. Which I find rather ironic. As what really is normal?

Really. Who defines normal?

It must be ourselves and what we are used to. However, with how full life is and how it completely changes with the beat of our hearts each day - how can one ever expect for it to stay normal? Or BE normal?

There is the little saying that goes something like this - 'Normal is only the setting on your dishwasher'. (or washing machine, or some such gadget) That seems to be right. For it seems that the minute something goes well, and it might be a tad easier on my self, or my life - I want to claim it as normal. It's like my inner being wants to cry out 'Let's try to get back to that one little instant in life - that time when things felt NORMAL'.

And yet it's all very relative isn't it. It's like chasing clouds - they move, they evaporate, they change forms. Although the subject of clouds is normal - they very way they exist is not.

Perhaps the reason that normal does not really exist is that - well, we are here on earth to experience a vast array of decisions, choices and experiences. So if we continually experienced normal - than would we becoming better people each day? Would we be progressing? Would I become the best person I could be, by staying "normal". Ah. Blogging is the cheapest therapy in the world! I now have written down, what I thought in my heart would be true. Now that it comes down to having it on cyber-paper....it's the black and white. The truth. As much as I might think I want normal - that really wouldn't help me become the person I want to be - the person that I hope to become and need to become.

I concede. I have a life that does not meet the "normal" status-quo that I thought I might experience in life. We don't live in a home in the suburbs and we don't have a car. We live in a city where life is fast-paced and hectic, and completely not the norm that I had thought I would be experiencing at this point in my life.

Therefore, I shall try my very best to stop saying that 'life will get back to normal'. And enjoy the life that we have - the one we are living right at the moment. The life where there is joy, hope, frustration, sadness and a lot of learning. Oh and course there is happiness, laughter and smiles. To everything there is an up and sometimes a down. That is a part of life that might be almost considered the 'N' word!

I suppose the only part of my life that I would like to be normal-ish....are the parts of my daily life which I would like to become more habit. To help make me into that better person, as they would become habit, tradition - a bit of normal in the everyday life where things are not.

Does that work? Can we have a tad bit of normal in a not-so normal day and life? I believe there must be a way for the two to c0-exist together. So perhaps after all....I'm not conceding entirely. I am still working and looking for the ways in which to have a bit of normal'ish in a not so normal life.

Which doesn't make a lot of sense when said that way - but feels rather right to me. I'll stick with that thought until proven otherwise!