HelluvaGirl

I was sitting on the terrace last Friday night, having a smoke for the first time after seven years, thinking about something I’d said that day.

My colleague and I were having lunch in the office kitchen earlier and talking something until I saw her round eyes raised at me when she asked:

Did you just hear yourself?

I thought about it and replied:

That was pretty awful, wasn’t it.

What I said absent-mindedly, constantly thinking about my project with helluvadeadline, was thank God Pia’s leaving for the weekend – I’ll be able to work.

Quite the Lars moment when he spoke about Hitler at Cannes – and how do I get out of this sentence?

How did I get here in the first place? Since the times the Witches of Eastwick – pursuing their successful careers – called me Junior? Now they are raising kids, giving birth to more, starting new families and saying no working woman will ever be a fulfilled and succeeding mother and spouse – if she works her arse off, that is.

What can I say? I grew up at the age of 31 when I separated with Pia’s Father. Till then, I was a child, constantly looking for a father figure, circling my ring of compensation for the shortages of the past.

Now I don’t want to be saved – that, I do myself. I want to be loved. That’s one of the several good things that came out of the great loss. That’s what I mean when I say nothing’s ever purely right or wrong, good or bad – I might have forever damaged Pia by taking away a life with both parents. But what I gave to her is a mother that is not spoilt, inferior and ever-hiding behind someone’s shoulders – I gave her a mother who is grown up, responsible, very tired but mindful and in touch with the reality that involves time-planning and petrol prices (I was teaching her the phrase the other day, there is no such thing as a free lunch – both in Lithuanian and English).

So while I’m basically an adult for a mere couple of years, I might still be looking for balance when dividing time, prioritising targets of attention and learning patience when on the edge – often failing, true; but I still think I’m in a better place than the flower pot.