I thought you might be wondering what the life of a stay-at-home wife consists of while living in Holland. It is different than what I would expect it to be like if I were still in Vancouver.
First of all, in Vancouver, I would likely get up and walk the seawall to the Starbucks on Granville Island. A nice brisk walk and a destination with an incentive – an Earl Grey tea misto! Here, there is a beautiful park close by, but no Starbucks. It is hard for me to get up and walk alone without a destination. Especially since I am getting some exercise from the daily biking.
Secondly, if I was in Vancouver, I probably wouldn't be making a daily trip to the grocery store because my fridge would be able to hold more than one meal at a time. Seriously, our fridge is so small; we have only three condiments sitting in there. In addition to tonight’s meal, the shelves are full of the necessities: vla (Holland’s version of pudding), wine, Brad’s lunch making materials (cheese & meat), and milk for coffee.
If this was Vancouver, I wouldn’t have to be so creative with dinner because I would have an oven. That means an easy casserole would be the quick dinner fix. I’d have more time to do something else besides roam the aisles of the grocery store trying to figure out what to fix for dinner that was easy enough to translate. I could hardly contain my excitement when my family sent me Rice-a-Roni in a care package.
In Vancouver, I would definitely have a dryer to dry my clothes. You know, instead of drying them on a clothes line and ironing out the crispiness! Have you ever ironed underwear? It was new for me too. The only consolation was that it is a good excuse to watch TV. Now I iron quite often.
Speaking of TV, if I was in Vancouver, I wouldn’t feel justified to stop what I was doing and sit down to an hour of Oprah everyday. At 3pm. With coffee and cookies. Because it is the only English TV I could find.
Finally, if I were in Vancouver, I would probably be WORKING, so I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the challenges of being a stay-at-home wife. I guess this really isn’t all that bad after all.
posted by Mollie @ 11:38 PM
2 Comments:
hi Molly, I write to you through this medium because I don't have your emailaddress yet. Mine is simonepas@hetnet.nl I was nice to talk to you this morning and to drink a cup of coffee at Puur. I hope you will soon find a family doctor and if some problems occur, please call us and we will see what we can do. gerald told me that the 'huisartsenpraktijk antoni deusinglaan'is the one in the hospital where also future family doctors are getting education. Ter Borg (mine) knows Dick Hoekstra, Gerald's boss and so also Brad's. If the assistent is giving you a hard time maybe I can call and talk to him personaly.
Hope to hear from you soon. Simone
Thanks for the insights into your daily life...I didn't really "get" until now how open your schedule is. It occurs to me that while your circumstances are very different than mine, and as you say, as yours were in Vancouver, that we all have unique opportunities and constraints in our lives. As I think about what you share about your new life in Holland, I wonder what experiences you are and will have that later you will look back on as once-in-a-lifetime opportunities and lessons.
I can think of dozens of ways that I "redeemed" the time in the various places I have lived, but sadly I can also think regrets...at 18 I was too scared to travel beyond Munich by myself, so I went home without doing that. When I was in Skopje I didn't focus enough on building friendships with my co-workers/housemates and now we have completely lost touch. When I was in Boise I didn't go skiing NEARLY enough (and it was cheap and 16 miles away!!).
Writing this makes me think of all the ways I'm not capitalizing on the cool things in Vancouver, actually. Maybe I'll walk down to the Seawall and go to that Starbucks today! In honor of you and in honor of CARPE DIEM!
Miss you guys lots,
Kel
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