How to make everyday life work

This week has been one of the craziest, busiest weeks in my life recently, with me trying to keep up with all my 4 jobs and get a lot of work out the way before Zoe gets here in less than a week. It has also been crazy because I let it: when Zoe is not here, I tend to work long hours, sleep too little and try to be social. To top things off, lots of little stupid things happened such as me getting a 100$ fine in the subway, by the police for walking in through the exit door without asking the attendant first (yep, not because I didn't have a ticket, because I have a weekly pass. I just tried to save time/energy from the turn stile rejecting me, I had gone two subway stations too far and needed to go up and over, entering the subway again before 18 minutes had passed) and the Instacard shopper forgetting my bagels (how could he? It was the most important part of my shop!). Bigger things such as teaching, conference chairing and paper deadlines were just standard parts the week. But it got me thinking that I need to write an updated "how to make it as a single parent in New York" since the last post like this was written in Stockholm (alas, it was "how to make it as a single mom in Stockholm").

• New York does not have the exact same concept as arstiderna.com, instead I buy groceries on Instacart (which is expensive because you have to pay for shipping plus tips) or FreshDirect. Instcart has the huge advantage that I can spend 10 minutes when I get to work, collecting my standard groceries and have them delivered in evening when I get back. They are always on time and they are good at providing exchanges when the item you ordered is not available. Except when they forget my bagels. 
• When I really don't have time to cook I get food from Munchery. They have great kids meals too and instead of traditional restaurant delivery which is always half-cold on arrival, this you have to heat yourself, for 10 minutes in the oven. It is prepared with that in mind and tastes really good, always.
• I do not have a cleaner here in New York, I simply can't afford it. Instead Zoe helps cleaning on weekends and I just care less than I used to.
• I have a score of fun babysitters with more or less flexible hours. There is the pole dancer (who I also helped getting a job in a bar) and the Danish college student. There is the girl who always bring her ukulele and the strict librarian type girl with glasses. But more importantly, I  prioritize spending time with Zoe and sometimes bring her to my office where she usually enjoys a bit of iPad time and free snacks. 
• Laundry is much less of a problem than in Stockholm. I simply take it out and pay 14$ for 10lbs. We drop it off on the way to school and pick it up on the way back the next day.

As for the things I hadn't figured out two years ago, there are still some things I haven't and probably never will:

•  Zoe still watches television (on her iPad) every evening when we get home while I prepare dinner. We have a rule that there is no television/iPad time before after 6pm because I don't want her to spend the afternoon watching television. But sometimes, it spills into book reading time and she is not happy about putting down the iPad. This doesn't mean she watches television every day, sometimes she just plays with her toys and forgets about it. 
• I'm still not a morning person and neither is Zoe. But we have improved our mornings tremendously, particularly after she started having to be in school at an exact time. We pick out her clothes the evening before, she can now get ready almost by herself. We braid her hair the night before so she can brush it herself (if not, it tangles and I have to spend 10 minutes brushing a screaming, crying girl). This doesn't mean I got it all down and occasionally things just break down. We still laugh at the thought of the morning when I placed a jar of Nutella with a spoon in front of her. "Sorry sweety, I have nothing else, this is your breakfast".
• Missing Zoe. I always miss Zoe terribly when she is not with me. This is something I will never get over, I feel cut in half when I don't have her.
• Having someone to share your day with. Two years ago I lamented not having someone to talk to about little everyday things, sharing the ups and downs and in particular the little cute things Zoe says. Living in New York has altered my everyday mood completely and honestly, I have nothing much to really complain about. More importantly, Zoe has grown and is now capable of more detailed conversations. We play the "tell me a funny thing about your day" game at dinner every night and I get to tell her about my annoying boss, the funny lady on the subway and that I talked on skype to a friend. She tells me about lunch, how another boy got kicked out of the classroom and that her teacher gave her a star for her letters.

All in all, things look slightly different than two years ago, but mostly for the better.

 

 

Happy New Year, happy new year

I was carefully painting my nails dark burgundy, while sipping champagne and eating the traditional Danish new years dessert: Kransekage, a lovely small cake of baked marzipan, sometimes with chocolate inside, while remembering again that this was my first New Years Eve ever, without Zoe. I guess you could count the ones before she was born, but that was different. This was going to be the first one where I would not be able to say cheers and let her have a sip of champagne, laugh from her facial expression and her running around popping the crackers and generally be cheerful. Not that it would be a lonely evening, I was invited, with a friend, to a large dinner party where they would be plenty of people and children, because that is after-all the age we are all at now.

Zoe and me New Years eve 2013

But reflecting back on 2015 (thanks Facebook for providing me with memories from this day, particularly my status from 2 years ago: "Well, 2013 was even worse than 2012 and 2013 is ending on an all time low. Let's see if 2014 can get any worse." 2014 was not worse, but pretty low too), I realized that 2015 was in fact the best year for me in a long, long time, if not forever. Despite the occasional low, in 2015 I moved to New York and managed to focus much more of my attention on spending quality time with Zoe. Yes, I always spent a lot of time with Zoe, most of it fun, but it is hard to really enjoy when you are miserable (I still remember sitting on the floor behind the kitchen counter of my tiny kitchen in Stockholm crying silently, while she played in the living room, just so she wouldn't notice). Now I have three great jobs to come back to in New York, friends, colleagues, an apartment with a view of the Empire State Building and a life that I really love, all built up within one year. How can it not only get better in 2016? I believe in it, for both Zoe and me.

Game over

My phone rang at 2 am in the morning New York time. It was Zoe. I answered happily but still partly asleep. "Mommy, do you know where my baking set is?", she asked as this was the most important thing in her life right there and then. I explained that we had left it at grandma's place and that we would get it next time were were there. "I want to bake a pumpkin cake", she continued and I promised that we would do that as soon as we were reunited. It was early Saturday morning in Stockholm and I realized that she had woken up by herself and decided to call me from her own phone. Nobody else in her house were awake. We chatted for a bit more and I told her that she could call me any time before we said goodbye. I fell back asleep with the phone still in my hand.

It was such a relief to see that she could finally call me on her own and that she did it. A few days later when she called to say goodnight and get a story (or two) she cried again though. "Mommy", was all she could say. She wore her bracelet, the one where I have the other heart part, which I was also wearing. I told her that no matter what I would convince her dad that she had to come over here. And if he still wouldn't let her, I would come back to Stockholm for two months.

On the train home from half a weekend in New Jersey, visiting a friend who had offered to cheer me up and distract me with red wine and good food, I mentally started going through the things I would have to do if she would not be allowed to travel here. Zoe's dad was still refusing me to take her here, saying we didn't have an agreement but since I thought we did have an agreement, I did not know what to do other than keep asking him. After making this mental list of things I would have to do if I had to go back to see Zoe for two months (quite my job here, losing most of my income for two months, losing my deposit on my apartment because I'm leaving with less than a month's notice, kick out my own renters in Stockholm, cancelling my committee meeting in December etc), I realized that this is not an option. I have to get her here. My head started spinning. What more could I offer him? Money? More time with Zoe when we get back? Because the game is over. I can't stay here for much longer. If I can't have Zoe here, there is no way I can be in the US. And circumstances seem to be dictating my next cross-Atlantic move.

After I had read two stories for Zoe, we said goodnight. She told me it was just the girlfriend that evening, her dad was at a cafe (probably out for work dinner) but that is was okay. After all, I'm glad they get along. She is a good friend for Zoe and that's all that matters.

Happy mom is a good mom

It was the usual routine. I video chatted with Zoe while she was having dinner but at one point she started crying because she misses me so much. I tried comforting her, but I always tear up too. Her dad then cut our conversation short as usual because Zoe needed to take a bath (they do bath every night) and we hung up, after she promised me she would call soon again (although I always call her). I had just explained how I'd made a Skype id for her and that she could now call me from her own phone (she has an iPod touch for games, which she calls her phone). And as always, I felt a rock in my stomach and I considered grabbing my bag and head for the airport to catch the first flight to Stockholm to see her.

Walking home later from the Grumpy coffee shop where I had enjoyed a flat white while editing a student's paper, I had a minor revelation. I am here in New York because I know it is best for me and I cannot forget that. And that's the irony. Because even though from the outside, it looks like it would be 'best' for Zoe to have me close by in Stockholm, it would not be best for her to have a depressed mother who hates her job very much. In fact, I don't think it is fair for parents to give up their own happiness for their children, it only bites them in the back later through guilt feelings and blame. It's not simple though and it also doesn't work well in a motherhood popularity contest.

The west village apartment

I reminded myself to think about my situation and opportunities here again. Just lie down and think thoroughly about is. Is this what I want? The New York job, the West Village apartment, the Brooklyn boyfriend? At night I did just that. And even after two phone calls with my new colleague who needed my help on a document that very evening I had no doubts about those three. These are exactly the things I always wanted. Now if just Zoe could get the only thing that she wants too, then we would be all fine.

New York living

I have to admit that I love jet lag this way. I'm not a morning person but 6 hours time difference makes me into one and within the first week of my New York adventure I managed two 7am yoga classes. Not only were these yoga classes a great way of starting my morning, they were also some of the best yoga classes I have ever taken. Perhaps this was simply due to me being able to fully understand exactly what the teacher said because the past three years my random Vinyasa has been in Swedish and it was hard of me not to laugh when the teacher sad in his/her singing Swedish '...och hunden' (literally "...and the dog"). Just like ballet is in French (it's a different story but when I took ballet class in California I missed out on half the movements because the teacher pronounced all the French terms with a thick English accent), yoga is in English.

But jet lag doesn't last forever, especially not when going to secret speakeasy clubs on a Tuesday night, drinking bourbon. My healthy, hip lifestyle got ruined in one fun evening leading to a hangover on a week day. Luckily I am moving to my "permanent" apartment in the West Village where no yoga class is to be found before 9am. Which makes it hard for me to go because I like to get a good start to my working day sitting at my desk at 8:30am. Or at least that's my plan here.

Sometimes I just can't believe my luck. Things just come to me, perhaps because I try hard or because because people recognize me as a good, honest person. Or perhaps because the moon is looking after me. Perhaps because when all comes down to it I'm a positive person and I am more happy about the great things happening to me than sad about all the crappy things. In any case I managed to score the most gorgeous apartment in the middle of everything. It is exactly five blocks away from where Friends were supposed to take place (yep, I checked the building in the show and it is on the corner of Bedford and Grove Street) and 20 minutes walk from my work. My bedroom window has a view of the Empire State Building. It's bigger than my place in Stockholm, it even has a separate bedroom. The lady who has the apartment is the sweetest thing ever, and her books and art make the place a living place. I'm paying 500$ less than what others are paying in that area because she "rather wants someone she can trust" than a lot of money. I got the keys today and walked over after work, just to take in the place. It's typical New York with non-adjustable heat, a bathroom with broken tiles and windows that are unable to shut completely, leading to a constant draft. There is no hall way and no place to put shoes and coats and one of the ceiling lights is not working. The view from the living room is across a tiny backyard, two meters from the other wall and the other windows, so you really just want to keep the blinds down the whole time. But it's New York and it's mine. And I love it.

Home is where your duvet is

For the past couple of weeks I have been looking at apartments, each sunday as is customary in Sweden, going to 'viewings' with Zoe to see if we can find something just slightly bigger. Or that is, one with a bedroom for me too so I can get a proper bed and not have to sleep on a sofa bed. It was actually a comment from Zoe's dad that got to me and made me think about moving. He said, during one of our not so easy conversations about things that I also have this "strange apartment", as in, that it is not appropriate for me and Zoe. It is 34 square meters, roughly 360 square feet, one nice sized living room and a small room for Zoe that just fits her bed and toys. The kitchen is separate but open towards the living room. The large bay window faces east and it is on 5th floor, which means it is very light and I love having breakfast at the balcony. It is located smack in the middle of everything, 10 min from daycare, five minutes from 10+ cafes and restaurants. I love it and think it is probably the best apartment I have had (ironically perhaps apart from the one Zoe's dad and I bought, the one he took over and lives in now). In any case the comment got me thinking and I found myself going as far as to talk to my bank and get a maximum price, almost cry over one apartment that I couldn't afford and seeing five or six potential ones.

Today we saw the last one though. It was a slightly bigger one but not by much, it had a bedroom for Zoe and an alcove room for me. The wallpaper in the kitchen was hideous though and the built-in beds needed to be lowered. Worst of all though was the location, it took us 30 min including a bus half the way to get from daycare and as we walked away, I felt we had ended up on the countryside. No people, low houses, lots of trees and no shops. I knew this was exactly the one I could actually afford so if I wanted a bedroom for myself and one for Zoe that will fit a bigger bed, this was it.

Setting up a picnic

When we got home, I started cooking while Zoe went to play in her room. I handed her her doll through the gap between the kitchen and her room (probably made to let light into the kitchen) and she proceeded to bring her duvet out in the living room, setting up for a picnic. When dinner was ready she insisted that we sit on the floor, her bare legs under the duvet, and eat the edamame beans and the spaghetti I had whipped up. I let her because it looked so cozy. And then I realized what I should have realized several weeks ago. Zoe is completely happy here in our 'strange apartment'. She is in no need of more space, a different setup or even a bigger bed. She is entirely happy here and so am I. In fact this apartment makes living in Stockholm more acceptable. I can hear the buzz from the city and we can see the moon from the window. I decided not to look at any more apartments at all from now on and throw away the brochures I had gathered. This is our home. Our wonderful home. 

Everyday life as a single mother

I often wonder how other single parents do it. I don't know many and the ones I know I'm not close enough to to actually ask that question. So I rely a lot on what I hear in the media, in magazines and actually what my own mom tells me about her experiences from my childhood. But most of these sources talk about emotional issues, larger problems and overly dramatic events such as custody battles and big life changes. Nobody talks about the day-to-day life of actually being able to get through the day, fed, cleaned and well-rested at night, both mother and child, while still working full time. The gist of the problem is of course that there is nobody you can send down after milk if you forget and find out at 8pm when Zoe is in her pajamas. There is nobody who magically does the dishes while you sleep. And Sweden has no pick-up service laundries, instead you have to take it downstairs at a scheduled time. I certainly haven't cracked the nut yet but here is a list of the things I do have down, which make everyday life easier and doable for me:

1. I get food boxes from arstiderna.com ("the seasons", an all organic food delivery). These are boxes with all the ingredients for dinners, either for 3 or 4 days. A box arrives Monday and Zoe and I have food for the rest of the week. It is delivered at my doorstep.
2. I have a cleaner. Completely crazy because of the size of my apartment but I still have a bathroom and a kitchen and I still cannot imagine when I would be able to vacuum apart from the evening when oh, Zoe is sleeping (right…)
3. I have two babysitters who are very flexible and who I can ask to pick Zoe up and feed her dinner, so I can work extra long on deadlines.
4. I do laundry at night: I take the load down when Zoe is awake, she goes with me. Then I leave her sleeping to go down and put it in the dryer and a second time to pick it up. I have told her that I do that so she knows I will be right back if she wakes up. She has never woken up yet. I remember my mom doing the same with me. 

But there are also a lot of things that I haven't figured out yet and that I don't now how to deal with:

1. Zoe watches quite a lot of TV when she comes home from daycare. I have to cook quickly and often quickly means in 30 seconds, so Zoe watches TV while eating snacks, crackers and cut veggies. She uses my iPad to access netflix with all their kids TV. I'm pretty okay with most of what she watches but I would like her to spend less time on it. I often join her after dinner and we chat about the shows, while having a cup of tea.
2. I'm not a morning person and neither is Zoe. She is (like most 3 year olds) very slow in the morning and needs constant coaching to get ready. It takes me almost 3 hours from getting out of my bed until I'm at work. And Zoe cries for 3-10 minutes when I leave her at daycare. Still.
3. Picking up packages, taking back library books, buying specialty items are all a nightmare. I don't have any flexibility on a weekday to go the long way home from daycare to pick up a package or pass by a hardware store to get a small light bulb for my exhaust fan. These are small things but annoying when I haven't been able to see what I'm cooking for over a month.
4. Missing Zoe. I miss Zoe terribly when she is not with me. Although the initial freedom is nice, I feel cut in half when I don't have her. I'm sure her dad find it equally hard.
5. Having someone to share your day with. One thing I miss the most about being by myself is that I have nobody to share the day with. When something annoying happens, I'm stuck with it inside my head and when good things happen I get to share it on Facebook and get five likes. When Zoe says the cutest thing I cannot tell anyone (but this is also a problem with us having our 'own' language), instead I try to write some of it down.

Many of these issues are not often discussed, perhaps due to triviality and lack of interest, perhaps some are unique to me. But I'm constantly working on improving my everyday life, both for practical reasons and for improving my happiness.

What did you do at work today mom?

Like most evenings we were sitting down at our dining table in the large bay window, having dinner, Zoe and I. She was happily munching away on cucumbers and pasta when she asked "what did you do at work today mom?" I tried not to laugh because it sounded so much more grown up than her 3 year old self could contain, but I have heard her ask that a few times before, obviously modeled upon my eternal "what did you do in daycare today, Zoe?" Because she is 3 and have a hard time remembering even the smallest things from daycare on command, she most often says "I don't know". I then encourage her, or try to give her a "template" for conversation by telling her exactly what I did that day at work. It is an excellent exercise for me, and I believe for any adult, to try to condense and describe a workday so a 3-year old can understand. I often try to explain that I write articles so that others can read them, that I teach adults difficult things. She has been at my work several times so she has mental references to my office and my colleague who had to look after her once.

So when she asked this particular evening I tried to explain in a simplified way what had happened. "Well, I had a meeting with my boss. And he said he thought I should be in charge or more people. In fact he gave me a whole new type of job where I get to tell others what to do". Zoe seemed unimpressed. "I'll get more money", I explained and she lightened up. "Zoe want money too", she said and I laughingly promised her that we could go and buy her a present next weekend.

So there you have the big news. The head of department offered me the position as head of one of the sub-departments (our department is so large that it is divided into four, each the size of a small academic department). After a week of considering I accepted on several conditions (that shall remain unmentioned here). I was very surprised about the offer because our department is heavily 'old male' oriented to say the least but a colleague had put in a good word for me and I honestly think that it is a good idea to have some 'young fresh blood', seen from an objective perspective. From a management perspective, I am that. In fact I'm the only female in a leadership position there; oh wait, I'm one out of four or five female faculty members out of 50+. Well, that's natural science for you. After accepting I speed-read Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In and discovered that it is very much a book about leadership and I actually felt I could use a lot of her expertise and experiences. We will see how it goes, so far Zoe seems mainly excited about the doll-pram that she might be getting because of mom's new job. 

Walk of shame

The walk of shame when you are in your thirties is walking through your local neighborhood, past the daycare, using your child's stroller to move the last boxes and suitcases from the family home to your own little 400 square feet apartment. Divorce is never pretty. 

Toys

I have always prided myself in buying good quality but few items for Zoe. That goes both for clothes and toys. Yet, between presents and mommy guilt, I feel she does get new toys all the time. Most recently we added another doll to her collection but I made sure to give away the teddybear that was always lying on the floor receiving no Zoe-love at all. Now I hope another baby will be happy to cuddle him, since he was  imported all the way from India where the Leela Hotel staff gave it to Zoe as we left. What they didn't know was that Zoe does not care for teddybears or any other stuffed animals in fact, but likes only dolls, or babies as she calls them. In any case, I was pleasantly surprised when I cleaned up her room earlier this evening to see that all her toys actually fit into
one box. Except of course her "babies" and the books (the cabinet contains clothes and drawing tools). She loves playing in her room and is getting better and better in playing on her own, and who can blame her, when having such a lovely room? 

Lost in Ikea

The American in me is of the impression that kids get kidnapped and stolen all the time. The US media and society makes you believe this through sensational rhetoric of the odd cases and the common notion that you never leave your child unattended. The Scandinavian in me knows better. The only stories we have from Denmark and Sweden are the mentally ill young girl who took a pram with a baby for a walk back in the seventies. She and baby was found less than an hour later. A couple of years ago a car thief stole a car with the keys in the ignition while the dad was at a bakery getting morning bred (a stable Danish Sunday routine); the thief left the car two blocks later when he realized there was a little sleeping baby in the car seat in the back (this makes totally sense to me, dad didn't want to wake up baby for the 5 minute bakery run and he left the keys in as not to lock the baby inside if something happened). Basically nobody steals babies/kids in Scandinavia.

Zoe's future bed she got to decide.

And this is what I kept telling myself as a narrative for the full 10 minutes after I realized Zoe was lost in Ikea. "They don't steal kids in Sweden, they don't steal kids in Sweden". At the same time I cursed my own need for coffee and my politeness of standing in line for that cup of coffee. Zoe and I had ventured out to Ikea to buy a shelf and a picture frame, and after eating lunch in the restaurant we went downstairs where Zoe found a slide that fitted her in size. After asking if she would please go with me to the cafe (50 meters away but around a corner) she insisted that "mommy go get coffee, Zoe play on slide". I had never left her like this before except when she could see me but she had been at her best behavior and I thought it would take less than 2 minutes. I asked her to stay there and went off. Unfortunately there were 5 people in front of me and my judgement of time and how many kanelbuller they were going to buy was quite off. 3 minutes turned to 5 or 6 and when I ran back to the slide Zoe was gone. I called her name and asked the other parents if they had seen a little girl in a grey sweater and pink pants. They looked very judgingly at me and said that she had been there but then left. I could sense their complete uncaring judgement since I was the crazy mom who had left her two year old at the slide by herself. And who goes to Ikea on their own with a child anyway? (well a single mom who lives in a foreign does, thank you very much) I certainly deserved the panic that I was now experiencing. I found an Ikea employee fairly quickly and spoke English. My Swedish is not suited well for panic. After a nerve wrecking 5 minutes of the employee calling the central information she said they had found a little girl upstairs. I ran up the escalator and found Zoe sitting with two very nice Swedes, a mom and her 10 year old daughter, on a couch. Serious but not scared. "Zoe!", "Mommy!". She explained to me what had happened: "Zoe waited and waited and then Zoe go find mom in the cafe". She had not understood that I went to the cafe around the corner but thought that I went back upstairs to the restaurant where we had had lunch. So she had taken the escalator on her own where she had been overwhelmed by the largeness of all of it all and not been able to see me. The mom and daughter had quickly seen that she was on her own and asked if she was looking for her mom. I thanked them profoundly and we sat there just for a few minutes. Of course they don't steal kids in Sweden. And of course Zoe doesn't have the patience to wait for 5 minutes for me. We continued our shopping and got the necessary things. But I didn't let go of Zoe's hand for the rest of the day.

Home Sweet Home (again)

Zoe's room

Today I went to the bank and signed the papers. The apartment is finally mine! After several months of negotiations, paperwork and weekly calls to the bank, the sale went through and I am now a sole home owner for the first time in my life. I wanted to celebrate but tomorrow I'm leaving for the grand US trip with Zoe, so I don't have time to have anybody over for champagne. Instead I hope to have a housewarming in the near future after Zoe and I get home. But for now, I'm just the happy owner of a beautiful, tiny but homey, apartment in Stockholm's hippest area.

Home sweet home

Yesterday one of the final pieces of my apartment puzzle fell into place: I was accepted by the housing association of the apartment where I'm living and which I'm buying directly from the owner. Housing in Stockholm is complicated to say the least and to have a stable home one must buy. Or be extremely well-connected to get one of the few exclusive rental places that are available. Getting accepted was a bit tricky because they decided initially to reject me on the grounds that they couldn't see I had had an income when looking at my tax papers from 2011. Which is of course true because I didn't live in Sweden in 2011. So after not contacting me for extra information or even notifying me but instead sending a physical letter to the owner who was on holiday I finally got them on the phone, explained and within 20 minutes of having sent them my employment contract, I was accepted as a member. I still wonder what the board members were thinking if they were thinking anything at any point before seeing my employment contract. How would I have gotten a mortgage without any income? But it finally seems that I will be able to sign a contract for my own apartment within the next couple of days.

This good news coincided with me being in Copenhagen to work with a colleague on research and give a talk on a my work. It was nice to be among friends and nice to see old colleagues again. But it wasn't before the train home that I started reflecting; my days had been packed and planned from the start to the end. I had managed one impromptu lunch with a newly acquainted colleague, one unscheduled coffee with a amazingly sweet new friend but every other minute had been scheduled from before I arrived. As much as I enjoy even planned socializing I really miss the kind of spontaneity that characterized my social life before, what you can have in the city you live in. For ten years my social life in Copenhagen has been pre-scheduled from I arrive because otherwise I won't get to see the people I want to, and often I still don't get to see the people I want to. Getting on the train, I sat down for the first time in four days and relaxed. Wondering what I was going to do on the five hour train journey back. Read a magazine. Write on my funding proposal. Eat chocolate. Sit and stare out the window listening to Anya Marina. With five hours on my hands I managed all of them. I reached Stockholm, and (almost) my home sweet home just past midnight.

New York in Stockholm

For roughly 20 years my big dream has been to live in New York City. And from about 10 years ago when I started frequenting NYC for a week or so regularly, this dream has turned into a major goal of mine. New York is, apart from Copenhagen, the city where I feel instantly at home with its busyness, diversity and cheer coolness. It is the ultimate living space for me. Yet, I never managed to relocate there. Instead my choice of career and field have dictated other temporary homes and my personal life has lead me to places I never thought I was going to live, Stockholm being the most odd one of them. I am now living in a Scandinavian capital, clean and airy, friendly, yet reserved. It is a small capital (a bit smaller than my native Copenhagen) but at least is it one and the public transportation beats any city I have ever been to. Still, this was not a city I would ever have chosen myself. Ever. And I am now living here, not because I chose it but because I have to. I could certainly get a job somewhere else (I have recently had several serious suggestions) but my daughter and her dad is here.

On the surface this seems to potentially lead in one of two directions: I could either become a bitter, angry and generally grumpy person who hates everyone here because here is not where I want to be, or I could "suck it up" and learn to live with my situation for better or worse. But neither of these options really feel right. I must admit that I occasionally am on the verge of being slightly bitter but the better part of me refuses to even entertain that thought. But I am in no way a person who would ever "suck it up" either; I sometimes stay quiet in situations where I don't want to get into trouble but in my personal life and career, I am not known for just letting be. If anything, I do too much and tell everything about my detailed problems at that moment, just to make a slight change and get out of my problems of my own.

Instead, I realized, I am trying to create my own New York in Stockholm. I live in the most urban area with tons of cafes merely a few blocks away. I have American friends that I work with in these cafes and I speak mostly English throughout the day, even with my Swedish friends. I live on 33 square meters with my 2 year old daughter. We eat bagels. I go out for dinner despite not being able to afford it and buy no clothes for myself for 3 months to make up for it. I enjoy the fast pace of the Swedes and listen to loud electronica in my earphones when I take the subway. I travel as much as I can to get out of here which of course is a bit of a contradiction but it gives me momentum to continue staying. I still believe that one day my dream will come true, one day I will have a small apartment on Manhattan and live my life there. But until then I just try to create my now little NY here where I am stuck until further notice.

Christmas Eve morning

It is all quiet and dark when I wake up, no sound apart from Zoe's calm breath next to me. I am in my teenage room, the room my parents have converted into guest room and let me and Zoe stay in when we visit. It is full of book cases along each wall, storing my dad's inherited book collection. Each time I am there I discover a new book that I have never seen before and contemplate reading it. I rarely get to read anything here though because Zoe wants my attention 24/7 and because I enjoy my family's company very much; our evenings with coffee and knitting, chocolate and interior magazines and conversations about our lives. I turn to the chair doubling as a side table next to the bed and pick up my phone, hoping not to wake Zoe with the light. It is 6:30 and I see text messages from last night when I went to bed early. Facebook notifications. Nothing important. "I'm on this number" I reply quickly and turn to Zoe. She will sleep for another couple of hours, her 'schedule' is much later when we are here, which I like, I enjoy having her up with us in the evenings although she sometimes gets overtired. I get up, dress quickly into comfortable but warm clothes and go into the living room where a half-decorated Christmas tree is waiting for presents and more decoration. It looks almost pathetic with one side bare and another side of sporadic glass figurines. I start picking out more decoration from the boxes and put them on, poking my fingers on the needles. I remember Zoe's surprised annoyance when she realized that pine trees hurt. She had quickly lost interest in putting any ornaments on the tree after she got poked the third time.

I give up quickly too and take the long walk through the hallway back to the kitchen. My parents' apartment is one of the 1890s upper class European apartments with all the period features intact: The kitchen in the way back, the maid's room behind the kitchen, the dining room with an oval wall and a bathroom that has been renovated because all it was initially built with was a narrow wash room with a sink and a tub. Toilets were downstairs in the back yard. Even the little buttons in each room for calling the maid are still there although the only one that is still working is the front door. I make myself a cup of coffee, the nutty one, with their nespresso machine. I still cannot use the large restaurant-grade Italian espresso maker that my mom has, or perhaps I just know that my coffee would never live up to her creations.

I take the coffee back to the sitting room, another room from the living room, one next to my dad's office which was originally the "gentleman's room". It is 7 am now. Still pitch black outside and no sound from anywhere. This is my Christmas eve morning. To a Scandinavian this is the same a Christmas morning is to the rest of the (Christian) world. We celebrate the evening of the 24th and today is the magic day. Presents have been wrapped, food prepared. I am not sure how much Zoe understands yet but this will probably be her first 'real' Christmas. Her vocabulary has expanded rapidly the past week: juletrae (Christmas tree), rensdyr (reindeer), julemanden (Santa Claus), julepynt (christmas decoration), just to mention a few. I suspect she knows the words in English too but haven't checked not to confuse her.

In an hour or so I will go and wake her up. We have so many things to do. We have to wrap the last present, put them all under the Christmas tree. We have to make 'konfekt', the marzipan and chocolate pieces that are an integrated part of Danish Christmas. We will watch the Disney show on television, the very same show they broadcast each year on this day. And tonight we will eat duck, potatoes and cranberry sauce, the latter being an inspiration from my many years in the US, no Dane would know what that is. We will light the candles on the Christmas tree and sing songs before handing out presents. I am so happy that I get to spend this day with Zoe and I get teary eyed when I think about how she is sorely missed somewhere else. I cannot even begin to think about next year. I promise myself to take one day at a time. Just like Zoe does.

Lights out

As much as I love my apartment, with it being small and cozy and high ceilings, those high ceilings come with a certain cost. Emotional cost. The beautiful windows and almost 3 meter ceilings also means that, like most apartments on Södermalm, the block was built in the 1920s. Now, it is well-kept and the kitchen is of course renovated (in fact less than 3 years ago) but one thing they have not exchanged is the power box.

Zoe and I came home one late afternoon last week and I was in dire need of a coffee so I turned on the espresso maker (my department for some reason tends to run out of milk at the most annoying times like the day of my 8am class and I cannot drink coffee without milk) and I was about to heat up leftover lasagna for early dinner. Zoe wanted to watch a bit of cartoons so I put my laptop in the charger and turned on a 30s Donald Duck episode. Then everything went PUF and the apartment went dark (yes, it is very dark outside at 5:30pm here now). Zoe started screaming, 'oh no, oh no' and I started wondering what kind of electricity system we had here, because I have lived with a range of types through my time as an international dweller. Then I remembered that it was the old system with fuses and that a fuse had probably blown. I had to use Zoe's high chair to reach the fuse box and as I looked on the shelf below I realized what I had suspected: The owner had not left me with any spare fuses. I tried desperately to calm Zoe but looking at the clock it was now close to 6, the time most stores apart from grocery stores close. I took Zoe with me and started ringing doorbells at my neighbors. Nobody home. I found one guy above me who nicely enough came in, looked and seemed more confused than me. "But we modernized" he said and recommended me to go down and buy a new fuse. We got our shoes back on and ventured down. Before I left, I cleverly took a picture of the fusebox so I knew what I was looking for. I grew up with this type of system so it couldn't be that difficult. I put Zoe on my back in the Beco, since her stroller was already parked in the basement one flight of stairs below and I did not have the strength to pull it up again. She was overly joyed to be in the 'back pack' as she calls it.

At the grocery store no fuses looked like the ones in my picture. It didn't help that they were named something different than what I had talked to the upstairs neighbor about. Swedish electricity terminology was not something that came easy to me. I concluded that we needed to go to a hardware store the next day. By now we were hungry and when I asked if we should go for pizza on the way home (there would certainly be no cooking at home that evening) Zoe said "No, sushi!", so we found a sushi bar in the big food hall and had dinner. Zoe was still uncomfortable, probably picking up on my concern to spend the night without power and keep asking if there would be light at home. She asked if a friend of mine could come fix it, which I was surprised about; said friend did not usually help out at home but he is one of Zoe's favorite people.

As we were finishing the salmon nigiri, I realized something that I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about at first: there were three fuses in the fuse box and it seemed as only one had died. Not that I knew because it seemed to be tied to everything in the apartment (hence probably the problem with over-heating in the first place), but the bathroom light had still been on. We walked home and I eagerly went up on Zoe's chair and switched the fuses around. Now I noticed that the inside of the fuses actually resembled the ones available in the grocery store. I cursed a bit. I should have known that, I now remembered exactly how they look from my childhood where my mom would proficiently exchange them regularly. Okay, I turned the main switch on and WEOU WEOU WEOU WEOU, turned it quickly off again, climbing down to comfort a very scared and now loudly crying toddler. The fire alarm was apparently attached to the final fuse. After comforting Zoe I did one attempt more, which Zoe was not happy about, she kept repeating as she curled up in the couch "scary, scary, scary". When the sound went off again I gave up. I'll fix this tomorrow I told Zoe and we got out tea candles and the small reading light she had gotten from earlier mentioned friend. She said she wanted to sleep and I let her fall asleep in my bed, in my arms.

The next day we had to wait getting up until it got a bit brighter but then we hurried to daycare. She was really clingy and I told the teachers what had happened. I rushed back, past a grocery store and home to fix the problem. As I managed to keep the power on for slightly longer while the alarm was going, I realized that it was not the fire alarm but the gas alarm that was plugged into the wall above the fridge. It had probably broken in the process and was sounding like most broken alarms do. I unplugged it and changed the fuse and electricity was restored within five minutes. All I had needed was 5 minutes Zoe-free time, something that was not an option the night before. It annoyed me slightly that I hadn't thought about taking the fuse out and bringing it to the grocery store in the first place but there were so many ifs and buts and it made me remember how much longer things take and how much of my energy and brain I spend on my child when with her. Zoe could definitely have been without this experience but I made sure to explain and show things to her when we got home later that day. I took a 'work at home' day and worked from a cafe to get beyond the whole thing. And I made sure to leave three extra fuses in the back of the top kitchen drawer, the very same place my mom kept ours.

A room of one's own

One of the 'features' of my new apartment is that Zoe has her own room. The apartment is tiny and I sleep in the living room but Zoe has a small room of her own, a concept that she already loves. There is an open space between her room and the kitchen, done obviously to get light into the small internal kitchen and where I was a bit worried about this at first (how do I make coffee at night without waking her up?), it has shown to be one of the best features in the apartment. She enjoys playing in her own room knowing that I can peek down at her and knowing that I am right there. When I fetch a glass of water for her at night she does not run after me because she can see me open the fridge and I can say hi while pouring it. Okay, I don't make coffee (I have a noisy espresso maker) at night anymore, but I do wash dishes and boil water for tea. She sleeps fairly heavily and so far I haven't accidentally woken her up.


I prioritized decorating her room over my own (well, getting a sofa bed was a fairly big priority, for almost three weeks I slept on a borrowed mattress on the floor) and I think it is almost there. When my mom was here a couple of weeks ago she bought a roll of wrapping paper with the Mumins on and stuck directly on the wall. Eventually I want actual picture frames for the posters I bought in Ann Arbor last week when I was there for a research meeting. And the rug desperately needs a non-slip plastic sheet underneath so we don't slide in it all the time. But these things are details. For now Zoe has a wonderful room of her own.

Polishing the heirloom silverware

I moved to a new apartment a week ago and opposite the one I had over the summer this one is unfurnished. I am not going into the details of the housing market in Stockholm, other than mention that it is brutal and unlike any other in the world due to very specific Swedish housing rules. When I saw the mini one-bedroom very bright apartment with an elevator to its 5th floor, located 5 minutes from Zoe's daycare I jumped at it. Or that is I wrote a very detailed plea to the subletting guy who then apparently felt I seemed like the best candidate for this expensive 355 square feet (33 m2) apartment and let me rent it. So now I have a place for 6 months. It might not have furniture, it might only have a bedroom big enough for Zoe's bed and toys, a kitchen so small that the freezer door doesn't open entirely, leaving it impossible to use the top drawer but an apartment with a little nook with giant 1920s windows where we can sit and eat our breakfast. Except so far, Zoe has insisted on sitting on the kitchen counter for all her meals, dangling her little feet over the edge and asking for babyccinos because she shares space with the espresso maker.

Breakfast at the kitchen counter

In terms of furniture I have had to be creative. I have taken the furniture I felt that Mark could do without, such as the table we had stored in the basement, extra chairs and kitchen stuff. The whole setup reminds me of our early days in our mutual apartment, before our furniture arrived from the US. In fact, I have taken into use my old heirloom silverware again because that was the only utensils I had. I bought a used bed for Zoe on Blocket and I am sleeping on a borrowed mattress on the floor. I splurged on two things that I am waiting for: A BoConcept convertible sofa bed that looks great and a Bestlite lamp. For all the used and borrowed stuff there is something about choosing a few key pieces for my new life. And as long as I have somewhere to sleep, my espresso machine to make babyccinos and silver forks to eat with, I think Zoe and I will be okay.

It's here! (after 5 months)

Our furniture and things that we shipped from California are finally here. The moving men dropped it all off yesterday afternoon while I was teaching and Zoe was at daycare. We had been told that they would assemble all furniture, unpack everything and put things back where they were supposed to be. This of course seems like a great idea for people who move from one apartment to another of exactly similar size and number of rooms. However, we have moved from a 1400 sqr feet, 2 story, 2 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath condo to a 700 sqr feet, 2 bedroom small city apartment. In theory we have the same number of rooms but in reality we have about a 10th of the storage space and then of course only one bathroom (all older apartments in Sweden come with only one). It would obviously be a challenge to fit our things but we had cleaned out well already in California, so we were optimistic. Nothing had prepared me, however, for the state the movers left the apartment in. They did unpack some of the things. But since they didn't have anywhere to put them (for some unknown reason the first box they had unpacked was full of books, which was rather frustrating), Mark had instructed them to leave most of the boxes as they were. They then assembled the furniture. And left. Except for our double bed, none of the furniture was placed on the spot Mark and I had agreed on. This is the living room and kitchen.

Living room part

Living room towards kitchen

Today Mark worked all day unpacking and putting books in storage. My contribution when I got home from work was to sort out the kitchen cabinet. I am happy to see my old cups, have proper dinner plates and being able to make a pot of tea. It even looks neat. We have so little kitchen cabinet space here that I have a whole box of things to store in the basement, plus a box to give to Stockholms Stadsmission (a local charity). Tomorrow I'm going to start looking through Zoe's clothes, many of them that will now be too small. 5 months is a long time for a growing toddler.

Furniture overload

Today was one of those dreaded days where chores were in order, more specifically furniture shopping chores. Our half container with all our belongings arrives on Thursday, which means that we have to be ready to receive furniture and boxes full of clothes and books, and somehow make it all fit into our new minimalistic apartment, half the size of the condo we had in California. One slight problem is that we never really had any good bookcases or shelves in California, instead we kept all of our work books (as well as for some odd reason my copy of Anna Karenina) in our offices. The remaining few private books were piled into a small cheap (temporary, yet used for 4 years) bookcase in Zoe's room. Here in Stockholm, both Mark and I, work in open plan offices with very limited book storage. Since we did not ship the so-called temporary bookcase, the books that arrive on Thursday are therefore doomed to either  1. lie in piles on the floor, 2. be stored in boxes in the basement or 3. be unpacked into a brand-new set of lovely book cases that we have bought here in Stockholm. After thorough research, this designer book case is my favorite (the multicolored one) and Mark agrees. Except we do not have 8000 skr ($1200) for a book case at the moment. We barely have money to pay Zoe's daycare. Option 3 is therefore out. Instead were are looking closer at option 2, which brings me on to the trip of today. We are probably going to have to store them in boxes until we can afford a decent book case, but we have no storage space in the apartment apart from one large closet that barely keeps our current clothes. We therefore needed supe-cheap shelves that can go into our basement storage unit, a small narrow space that comes with our apartment (Swedish apartments are great about storage space, most gets at least one unit, all heated and dry so you can store anything). Where to go for shelves? Ikea.

Now I don't dislike Ikea, in fact I grew up with mostly Ikea furniture, but as an adult I have tried to limit my Ikea index (the percentage of Ikea furniture in one's apartment), emphasizing instead longer lasting distinct designer furniture and I am proud to say that our place in California had a very low index. In fact we are only shipping three Ikea items, two of them by mistake (two very cheap side tables that I never meant to have the movers pack but suddenly fund wrapped up and on top of the sofa inside the container), the last one being Mark's beloved arm chair. This doesn't mean that I can't enjoy a trip to Ikea and there are always accessories that are useful to get such as curtains, spatulas and pillows. But moreover, Zoe had not been to Ikea since she could walk and knowing her love for new homes (she would squeal from joy like a home stylist on caffein each time we went into a new apartment when we were house hunting), I thought this was a great place for a family trip. I even told Zoe happily that she was going to an indoor playground and that there would be meatballs (a favorite dish of hers).

She was overly excited. This is the best place we have ever taken her. Not only were there escalators that she could go on up and down, up and down (holding Mark's hand), shopping carts that she could ride ("look Zoe, this is like when we go flying", I found myself saying, realizing that most kids would be more familiar with supermarket carts but if we ever took a cart in the US, I had Zoe in a wrap or carrier. These days we only use baskets). There were also kids tables and chairs all over and she was equally thrilled whenever she saw one more. Her excitement probably got amplified by the half cup of coffee she managed to down as I let her taste mine (?!?) in the cafeteria but it was all cheer love of the situation and she was easy to distract if we had to continue and for example leave her "new" bed behind (yep, she found a toddler bed and lay down to relax for a moment, what kind of kid does that?).

We managed to spend 4 hours there to buy two book cases and a stool. We were looking for other things but in the end we were not able to make such big decisions (agreements)) as to buy a bookcase for the living room when we (I) really want the Woody one. The only crying moment was when Zoe had to be put back in her stroller and rolled out into the snow where we had to wait 15 minutes for the bus. It was sweetened a bit by chocolate cookies that I had bought in the food shop and generously handed her as she picked out the chocolate heart in the middle. Hopefully, Zoe is now prepared for all the furniture that will appear in our otherwise sparingly equipped apartment on Thursday.