Beauty Cultivated
“It’s dinner time! Sit down, sit down,” I usher my girls to the table as I shoo flies away and set down napkins and milk cups. The set-up is a bit clunky - dinner happens to be soup tonight, so there’s no one-handed business here; my husband and I shuffle back and forth from the kitchen to the patio, carefully transporting one steaming bowl at a time. This particular soup is quite the odd choice for so many reasons: it’s the height of summer, we’re eating outdoors in 90 degree weather, and dduk gook is a meal typically reserved for New Year’s day. But my two very, ahem, “particular” eaters slurp down (and earnestly request) this meal year-round, and I will absolutely not turn down an opportunity to shovel home-made broth / Korean cuisine into their little yogurt-loving mouths.
On Pain
One of the most interesting parts of parenting has been seeking to know my child, then realizing that I’ve been merely grazing the surface because the depth of her whole person is just beginning. The knowing and not quite yet. If you’ve met my 6-year old, she really should have her face printed next to the dictionary definition of fun. This girl is always relishing the chocolate croissant, raving about the flower fields, setting out for that next vacation. She’s pure sunshine and what a privilege it is to be in her orbit - we’re always basking in her light.
Moments That Make Us
I came home from a weeklong trip in the Smoky Mountains last Friday with not much to show for except 17 mosquito bites, jet lag, and a hodgepodge of photos. Five years ago, that reality might have felt like a “wasted” opportunity - what is the point of a picturesque vacation if not staged, filtered, and posted after all? No, scratch that. Five years ago, that reality would’ve never happened because you know I’d have kept my phone in my back pocket, ready to capture that perfect moment in a square - a moment that was lost as a bodily experience, but forever documented in my feed.
On Waiting
Behind every image of a peacefully sleeping newborn in a lovely, coordinated, organic cotton onesie with a perfectly textured muslin blanket draped around her legs is a mama who’s going on her third day debating shower or sleep, internally reaching for herself over that twice microwaved cup of coffee - are you still there? Or we've snapped that sweet, five minute stretch where she actually stays sleeping in her bassinet because it’s a feat worth capturing in the midst of what we’ve discovered as the world of contact napping (who knew this was a thing?).
A Story of a Girl, a Bag, and a Fall
Several weeks ago, I experienced one of my actual finest moments in 32 years of life. It was a typical Monday at work, except that on my agenda was to make time to take out the trash - a task that should be routine, but one that I inevitably put off by simply shoving down MORE trash with MORE force (a flawless system 🙃). That particular day, after loading a dolly with three full trash cans to take out to the communal bin in the alley behind our unit (oh, the joys of small business life) only to find it overflowing with someone else’s demolition project, I let out a sigh of annoyance and turned my dolly around to lug it up the sloped parking lot and back to our studio.
On Beauty
Let me tell you about an orchid plant. My mom brought this one for Charlotte on her 5th birthday last year, fully bloomed, the color of sunshine in June. The wonderful thing about orchids is how little maintenance they require at the point of receiving them - even with some haphazard (no) watering, you have a lovely arch or two of flowers for weeks. It’s always after the last one falls that I never quite know what to do next - do I let the small pot sit dormant with its few leaves and the now hay-colored stalks? And nevermind pressing the soil to determine whether it needs water; I’m still not sure how to read that stiff, rocky material around the roots. I confess, many gifted orchids have ended up back in the soil.
On The Golden Years
“Why’s he holding that stick, mommy”? Comes my three-year-old's voice from the backseat.
“Which stick?” I absently respond as I maneuver into the left turn lane.
“That one!” She says emphatically, pointing out her window. I quickly glance in my sideview mirror before making the turn and spot an older gentleman steadying himself on a wooden cane as he makes his way down the sidewalk.
My stomach drops - an odd reaction for such a benign question. After a rapid string of mental cartwheels, I do my best to explain that as our bodies age, they sometimes get weaker and we may need a little extra support to do things. And then, her reaction:
The New Year.
I’ve situated myself in a familiar place, at the table next to my front window, where I can look up and find words in the light sway of the oak branches. I’ve been here dozens of times before, settled into the rhythm of writing what I’m processing, hoping that in the sharing it can somehow tug at something inside you, too. That’s what we always intended for our blog, for us to give you a peek into our lives and what goes on behind the curtain here at Our Heiday, the dance we’re constantly learning. It’s felt impossible in the past couple of years to find space for this to happen while adjusting to life and work in the new normal. I’m hesitant to refer to the terrible c-word, but here we are beginning the third year of the pandemic and finding that there’s empowerment and comfort in choosing old rhythms again, even if to a different tune. A recommitment to the blog, a recommitment to finding community with you, dear reader, who chooses to find your way back here. While we won’t be writing weekly, you’ll find us in a more sustainable flow of writing monthly, things we’ve let marinate for a good while - it tenderizes, you know.
A Pandemic.
There are so many words, and there are no words. What started out as a world health crisis (lives, so many lives) has quickly morphed into a world heart crisis - 2020 has been a year of unraveling, exposing the insidious places where disease consumes and multiplies. We’re reckoning with our own complicity in the racial, social, and economic oppression of our Black brothers and sisters as we’ve participated in white-dominant spaces without explicitly moving toward anti-racism. I shared this on our Instagram stories a couple weeks ago, but the fact that racial justice was a part of my life for nearly seven years before so quickly slipping into a sleep state in my brain says so much about my inherent privilege. Doing the work, honoring the work already done by so many.
Scenes Of Hope
Goodness, it's been far too long since we've written a blog post. Our commitment to writing weekly quickly unraveled when I went on maternity leave for our baby boy after a very unexpected, quick adoption process; the timing happened to coincide with our graphic designer, Hyeyoon, heading off on her maternity leave, and Dot trying to manage severe pregnancy nausea. The start of 2020 was our barely staying afloat in just maintaining the day to day and right when we were just getting a rhythm going, a global pandemic hit. Now we're in May and the world is still reeling, figuring out how to recover. How quickly things can change, yes?