When you realise how much you've changed...

This blog's main subject until now was living in Greece, which I must say, it's still "all Greek to me" to this day even though I've been living here for some years now. The people, the tabu's, the unrealistic obsession with the glorious past, the food(no wait, that is the only thing that makes total sense here), nothing here makes sense to me but then again, you know what? It doesn't really matter that much anymore because now, there is something that I know and understand even less and it's taken the entire spot light. It's called motherhood.
No matter how much you read about it, no matter how many friend advice you receive on the subject, when it actually happens you realize that all you read is basically wasted ink since nothing and no one can prepare you for this.

Every day is like a carousel: laughter, cry, desperation, relief, anger, worry, frustration, fatigue, fatigue, fatigue (no, it's not a typo)  and any other state that you can think of, blend all together in a beautifully unstable time bomb that starts rolling like a snow ball getting bigger and bigger until one moment, when your significant other comes home and asks you: "how was your day, honey?" and then BOOOOOOOM! There goes the snow ball which by then is the size of a mountain and it hits him in the face with the force and speed of a TGV.

Believe it or not this is the happy scenario. The alternative one is the one in which, freakishly obsessed with controlling your reactions you bury the bomb as deep as you can every day. After a few months you are sitting on the deafening ticking of a bomb that would make Little Boy jealous and all it needs is a spark.

You don't ask for help even though you could use all the help in the world because you're sure you can do it and besides you expect the other to notice that you need it, to notice you're struggling, to notice you...to NOTICE. By the time you do ask for help, it doesn't really make any sense to the other one since..well..you've been doing great this far? what changed? why change? ....and that is the spark....

Myriad of emotions break free from their cages and they run wild like rabid animals, thirsty for blood, with teeth and claws as sharp as glass shards. They are all yours, you recognize them, you bread them patiently for months and yet now you have absolutely no control over them. They're taking over. You are under siege and defenseless.

The carnage seems to last for ever. And yet, at some point, the smoke starts clearing and you get a glimpse of the crater that's left both inside you and around you. They are not done yet, they will be haunting you for months but at least they are back in their cages for now. In all this mess, there, behind the ashes of a burning hope there is a pair of eyes looking at you enquiringly.
"Is there something I did, love?"

And here is when desperation kicks in...

The Post Office Adventure

It's not that I didn't have what to write, since life here is an adventure on its own but lately I haven't found the time. Today i got a bit of free time from my new "job" that I'll tell you about some other time so i figured to write to you about my post office adventure since it's still fresh in my mind.


I don't know why but something always happens...maybe i just attract trouble:))
The previous time when i had to send a package, I took the baby in baby wrap and went to the post office. Lots of people there waiting, some more agitated then other, anyway, bottom line, i didn't want to ask permission to get in front so I waited for about 40 minutes. 

When i got almost in front, there was another person between me and the clerk, the clerk sees me and asks me to come forward, in front of the one person left. After 40 minutes of waiting, there was really not much of a difference but still she insisted. 

This fact though started a whole wave of comments behind me, as to why do i get to get in front. The clerk tried to explain that mothers with babies have priority since it's difficult for a small baby to wait that long. Still that didn't seem to make that much sense to the other people waiting, one of them even made a joke saying that the next time he'll come to the post office he'll come with his mother so he'll have priority also. He must have been around 45-50 years old.

And now, for today's adventure at the post office...
This time the baby was in a carriage. The last time I got there with the carriage i got stuck in between the doors because the getting in and out of the post office should be an art..
They have doors as the banks do.. you press a button, get through the first door, close the door, press the second button, get through the second door and the same when you get out with a different set of doors. The ones who made these doors, thought really hard how to make things even more complicated then they are so they made both doors to open on the outside leaving about 30 cm between the doors when the second one is opened. 

Having this in mind and the fact that the guy who helped me get unstuck the last time told me that an easier solution would be to push the  button for discapacitated entry and they will open another door, I did just that. Pushed the button..and pushed...and pushed... 
After about 5 times i started wondering that maybe the post office is, for some reason closed, you should never exclude that as a reason even if the schedule says it should be open. So I squash my nose against the window the way small children do then they want to have a peek. 
Surprisingly, there were clerks inside. Ok, clerks that were trying hard to look very busy while ignoring me waving outside but still, that meant it was open.

At the end of my patience, I started knocking and finally someone, with an annoyed face that was saying "You are bothering me!Press the button already" looked at me. As if i was stupid enough to not understand even that, she yelled at me from the other side of the doors "press the button to get in" I showed her the carriage and she got even more pissed "press the damn button"
"Ok", I though to myself, "maybe she knows something i don't"
I pressed the button, got between the doors and surprise.. the space did not dilate from the last time i was there and i got stuck again.. 
One of the clerks came to help, .. figured she cannot so she told me to go back the same door  ahmm.. no.. guess what.. you can only open it from the out side.. 
She had to go out, open the door for us to get outside again and open the another door that led us inside. Not the discapacitated door though since they've placed a nice big flower in front of it and it couldn't be opened. Who needs doors for discapacitated people anyway?

While inside, she took the envelope i wanted to send, I gave her the money and then she walked away from the desk.
I looked at her a bit puzzled and I asked her for the receipt. She looked at me as if I swerved her of her mother. She had to come ALL the way back, push THREE buttons, PRINT the receipt and give it to me. Pfiu!!Hard work...