As we walked up the hill to catch our tram into downtown he sang loudly as he marched onward. I was conscious that Jackson’s exuberance was screeching into the silence and peace of our new neighborhood. We had only been in Switzerland a couple of weeks and I was already keenly aware of how quiet the people were here, including the small children. As we walked I asked Jackson what song he was singing; his reply was “what song, mom?” It seems he goes through life with a soundtrack playing. It brings so much joy to our family, and I have to admit, at times it sends me running for Tylenol with a pounding headache many a day around 4 pm.

My goal from the beginning of each move has been to learn to appreciate our new home while still maintaining some of who we are and where we are from. I remember clearly in those first months how my blood pressure would rise each time we left the house knowing that Jackson would push the social norms and likely offend someone. I would prep him before getting on each tram or train and pray that he would get lost in people watching and not be quite so noisy. But then one day it hit me, I was stressing in an effort to fit in, and the result was stifling to my son’s personality.  I wanted him to respect the social climate but what I was doing was allowing my insecurity to pressure me into thinking that he had to be seen and not heard. But the truth is that being sensitive didn’t mean being silent.

So for the last ten months we have worked and worked to teach our little ones “tram rules” and “noise laws.” If it is late afternoon and we are playing outside for goodness sake I allow him to use his outside voice. With the occasional, “Let’s make sure the whole neighborhood can’t hear us.” But if we are taking an early morning walk, especially on Sundays, we try to explain the need for our neighbors to have some quiet rest. This is no task for the weak-willed. We still have days when my blood pressure boils and it is nothing short of a miracle that we don’t get asked to step off the tram. But mostly the boys feel the “climate change” as we enter the tram and know to knock it down a few notches.  They can point out the window and talk to us but their voices can’t be so loud that everyone can hear.

When it comes to teaching cultural sensitivity I often feel as if I am working for something unattainable. But as motherhood would have it, I was completely surprised and encouraged last week.  We got on the tram on Friday evening after a casual dinner out with the boys. They were WILD, as in Owen screaming to see the fish tank, eating not a bite and Jackson wishing oh so hard that I would suddenly think it was okay to get up and down from his chair to walk around the food court while we ate. With dinner done we hopped on our tram and the boys settled in. They sat quietly next to us and looked out the window. Two rows in front of us a toddler popped her head up above her seat and shot Jackson a vibrant, mischievous look. She proceeded to get into a standing position, shrieking and growling to get the boys to laugh and enter in. While Jackson smiled and laughed a bit he stayed in his seat and did not get up like he would have in the past. Looking around you could see people becoming visibly uncomfortable with noise level and interaction. The excitement in this little girl got so rowdy that the lady sitting in the row between us turned to look at us to see what on earth we were doing to cause such commotion. Jackson and I just smiled politely at her. When the little girl and her mom reached their stop she continued with the show and began loudly yelling “goodbye” to the boys in Swiss German.  Our boys paused and then looked to us to see if it was okay to holler goodbye. We encouraged them to say goodbye and they both with all friendliness and nearing outside voice levels said goodbye to the girl.

Sure there are days when excitement cannot be contained and the volume knob is not reachable. And on those days I remind myself that these boys are not by nature quiet. SO we roll with it. But there are also days where I see new maturity that allows the rambunctious to sit and take in the world we currently live in, which happens to be a quiet, reserved place.

As we head into this weekend we have NOT A THING planned, with the exception of our normal Sunday evening church! I think this might be the first time in a long time we have nothing penciled in. I am looking forward to doing a few projects around the house and taking some long walks. It might be almost pumpkin patch time!

Weekly Happenings at the Kolb house…

1. Owen is an exceptionally good climber and his #1 goal this week has been to play on top of the coffee table. Or the dining room table. Or the patio table.  Oh yes, and his #2 goal is to bring rocks in from the atrium and dump them onto the tile floor. I tried to describe the “terrible two’s” to a Swiss friend this week…ironically it isn’t in their vocabulary!  Apparently only American kids get ornery at age 2. Still not enough to convince me that I would rather be Swiss

2. Jackson loves school. And this my friends is the last day of the first of three weeks of Fall break. What kid gets 3 weeks of fall break? Anyhow, he is missing his buddies and routine! As am I! I love not rushing in the morning and I love that he and Owen are getting more brother time but I do miss the down time of only having one boy at home!

3. Learning to be brothers takes a long time, maybe a lifetime! The boys are daily sharing lots of laughs and playing battle of the wills.

4. Owen is having a burst of new words this week! He is so proud of himself and it is neat to see Jackson encouraging him.  When we ask him “who loves _______ ?” He yells “I do”. Some of his his other words lately are “M&M”, “baball”/baseball, “taco”, and “ummy”/yummy.

5. My semi-OCD tendencies come out when I do things like making family albums from 2009, 2010 and starting 2011 at the same time.  As well as taking some online Speech Path courses. 10 hours of classes done and done with 2009, halfway done with 2010 and not even sure I will last through 2011.  I may not ever go back to Speech path but at least I will have family albums, right?!

6. And just so Seth doesn’t feel left out I will add that he basically runs the show in the consular section right now! After a summer of training all of the new officers and getting shifted over to American Citizen Services he is now covering for people as they receive their shipments of household goods. Somehow he keeps his cool even though he is often doing his job and the job of many others. Did I mention he is still in the bidding process and we are SO ready to be done?!

Jackson quote of the week:

Yesterday I asked Jackson what he thought we could do to make Seth’s day easier. I suggested Jackson collect trash from the bathrooms since it is trash day today. Jackson responded with “no, that’s not really what I was sinking (read: thinking), I sink maybe I should go take care of organizing daddy’s money for him, his coin basket is making his room so messy”.

this is a random pic from last yr at this time! Amazing how they have grown!

So there you have it, a whole lot of nothing at all. Have a great weekend, folks!

I received the neatest email yesterday. I was in touch recently with a long time family friend because I had had a dream about her daughter and thought it was so random I should tell her.  I expected a reply about the dream, which I got, but most of her message was telling me how she has prayed for me throughout my life and how she continues to think about us. She described knowing me as a child and watching me grow up. She is someone that knew me as my personality was developing, shared her kids as playmates with me and was and is a dear friend to my mom.

I have expressed here in the blog before how one of the downsides of our lifestyle is the struggle of really knowing people or them knowing us.  Yes, we are busy and we are social and we have gotten to know people wherever we have lived. But in terms of lifelong, you know me well enough to call on a bad day kind of friends, they are far more rare.  I feel like it is so important for our kids to have people that really know them as much as it is for Seth and I. People that see their personalities forming, quirks and all and take joy in them.  My blog is my effort to help friends and family stay connected so that in some small way they might share life with us and feel like they somehow know us even though we live far away.  Catch me on a bad day and I would for sure let tears fall feeling my efforts don’t quite cut it. Catch me on another bad day and I would cry equally about feeling far from my nieces and nephews and friends kids, wishing I could be more a part of their daily lives, hearing about the little things and the big accomplishments. I don’t blog because I have lots of free time or because my kids are well-behaved enough to entertain themselves happily so I can have a hobby. In fact at this moment Owen is screaming next to me, drooling on my leg because his brother just yelled at him to get away from his masterpiece building, yada, yada.  It doesn’t slow down around here yet I feel like this is an effort I want to invest in for the sake of relationship.

As I went through my day yesterday I was thinking about friends we have had along the way in Dallas, DC, Bogota and now Bern.  Each step of the way we have had friends and family that have filled this role.  It’s always a risk to open up and allow people to be close, to share my kids (even on days when they embarrass me to death with tantrums and such), and to do it all knowing we will only be in close proximity for a short amount of time.  As we continue on this FS path I will admit that although in some ways it becomes easier to meet people and make plans the vulnerability and investment part becomes harder.  As we are already into this final year in Bern I am trying to be focused on knowing and being known despite the distance and time line.  And I will cherish that sweet message from a friend who was able to remind me where I came from and looks on to where we are headed.

My sister-in-law sent me a link to a blog yesterday. It was a blog of a mom from Vienna where we used to live. Her son died in the flooding last week. One day she was posting pictures of her two children starting school together and a few days later she wrote what she had spoken at his funeral.  She was strong and candid and honest. It could only be God’s grace that is carrying her through this horrific time.

Today my mind is so full. We are awaiting results of tests run on a family member, recovery of another family member, reconciliation of others, and possible job loss for yet another.  All of these things seem big to me today and if I am honest my heart feels heavy, yet they seem so small in the midst of pondering this mom that has lost her boy.

We all know that life is too short and we all know that we should savor every moment. But why do I need reminders like this to jolt me back to the reality of our limited time together?! Clearly I need reminders. This mom spoke at her son’s funeral about the time she accidentally took him to camp on the wrong date which meant she and her son got a day and a half together that she hadn’t planned on and looking back had been such a treasure to her.  Last night we had expected to have guests around in the evening. When their day trip took longer than we expected we both jumped on the opportunity to have a family night. We got the boys out of the bath and pulled out the Hullabaloo game. For 30 minutes we were silly and laughed together.  It’s moments like these, when plans change, that I am aware of my need to snatch up those moments and savor them.

Today will be filled with wiping drippy noses, coaxing resistant yet tired boys into naps, and a blend of “hurry up Owen” and “slow down, Jackson”. The day will be full and I am positive by the end of it I will be tired. But hopefully I will have eyes to see and ears to hear all that has been given to us today.  All of those moments that were ordained before I could even make a silly plan.  I am currently reading “A Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are” by Ann Voskamp. I highly recommend it. It comes in such a timely manner when I need so desperately to be jolted into the reality of being thankful for all of those little things…even when there are big, tough things.

As my sister-in-law said in her email, “hug your kids tighter”.   Definitely hugging tighter and when I do throughout today I will be praying for this sweet mom who grieves her loss.

these are some of the things I am savoring today…

little boy wanting to be a little “big” boy

brothers learning to be brothers (Jackson had a rope tied to his jeans and was getting Owen to pull him out of the tree, Owen gladly stepped in)

tom sawyer