Author: Robin Chartier

Living with Camille is a bit like setting off fireworks on the 4th of July. We ooh and ahh and are surprised by each beautiful bit that is revealed, left breathless by the variety that often exceeds even our best expectations. And then someone sets off the Piccolo Pete and we all run for cover until the screaming is over. (If you don’t know what a Piccolo Pete is then you are fortunate to have never been subjected to these ear piercing disappointments that are found at the bottom of a box of fireworks bought on the side of the road. They are my 4th of July nightmare. No sparkles, all ear splitting shrieking.)

She gets away with more than the boys ever did because we are both so freaking tired. Truth. These days I might threaten and actually count to three, whereas with the boys I would only say “One . . .” and then I was on the move. God forbid they weren’t jumping to attention before I could get the words out of my mouth. But old lady bones move more slowly and her will gets worn down. I’m a different kind of mom than I was back then. In some ways for better, in some ways for worse. The Middle Eastern “inshallah” (God willing, I can’t control anything) culture has even found it’s way into my parenting some days. However, since I don’t want girlie to grow up to be obnoxious and self centered, I’ve been making a conscious effort to direct her behavior a bit more strictly lately. It’s my gift to the world.

The other night we were watching the Survivor season finale on TV and when they revealed the winner, Camille was not impressed. “She sucks!” 
In mom mode I said, “Baby, that’s not nice. We don’t say that. Don’t say it again.” So then of course, Bob pipes in with, “What did she say?”
“Hmm, if I said it wasn’t appropriate, why would I repeat it? It’s not worth talking about.”
Bob: “I just wanted to know–“
Camille pipes in loudly, with a hint of glee in her voice, “I said, SHE SUCKS!“

Exasperated, I gave a mini lecture about not obeying and told her to go upstairs until she could come back and apologize and follow directions. She stomped off upstairs to her room and Caleb and I went back to watching Survivor. To Camille’s credit, Michelle did suck, but it sounds particularly dirty coming out of a 5 year old’s mouth and I can’t have her thinking she can go around telling everyone exactly what she thinks about them. Real life example: this past week we were at Calvin’s sports awards ceremony at school and they were announcing and giving awards to all the varsity athletes. They read the name, everyone claps and the kid goes and picks up their award. At one point the coach called Calvin’s ex-girlfriend’s name and everyone in the auditorium is clapping. Then I spot girlie out of the corner of my eye, sneering and giving her vigorous and repeated thumbs down with both hands. Hysterical, but oh Lord, help us.

So anyway, she went upstairs to “think about how she could improve her behavior” and a few minutes later comes back downstairs, giggling, with a folded note in hand. She gives it to me and scampers off.

We have a house. It’s been confirmed. I saw a sketch of the floor plan and it freaked me out a bit. It’s big. Huge. Cleaning it would be a full time job! It’s a traditional Middle Eastern home with an inside kitchen and a separate “dirty kitchen” that is accessed from the outside for all the heavy cooking so the smoke and food odors don’t spread throughout the house. Just imagine me frying things up out there by myself. #notgoingtohappen It appears to be palatial, but I think I’m going to miss our smaller open-floorplan home here. Our house has great character with crown molding and tray ceilings and wrought iron railings, chandeliers, and sconces. It’s also really dated, with harvest themed tile in the kitchen, cracked bathroom fixtures, and old plumbing, but our one of a kind house has been perfect for us.

This new house has enough bedrooms that the kids have already started claiming ones for themselves, but I’m tempted to still have them share. They do not need their own bedroom and bathroom. Yes, the house has enough bathrooms for each person to have their own too. So much for the growing up years being “good preparation for college” in the Chartier household. My kids are going to show up in the dorms looking for a place to lay their Persian carpet and wondering why their private bathroom has 5 stalls and 3 showers. Rude awakening indeed.

I was originally going to write a post about how CrossFit is similar to a church community and how it takes the place of church for a lot of people, but that topic has been done to death. Google “CrossFit as church” and you’ll find a million comparisons that can be drawn: from the detailed discussion of the scripture passage (WOD/workout) to a shared communion of coconut oil and chia seeds, a lot of people are finding their religion in the body as their temple.

CrossFit is definitely not my church, but I had a spiritual experience there today. Since it’s Thursday it’s destined to be a difficult workout. Sort of that “last chance before the weekend” thing that all the rah-rah athletes get behind. In my mind all it does is make me tired and sore and ruins a perfectly good weekend, but whatever. In preparation for the pain I put on my running shoes instead of my lifting shoes this morning. Even though it’s over 100 degrees outside, there’s little chance for mercy on a Thursday. And sure enough: 5 rounds of 800 meter runs with other junk in between. For those not on the metric system, 800 meters is about 2 laps around a high school track. Not terribly far, but too far in the heat and when you can see that the exercises in-between runs are going to make your legs wobbly and tired and make running even more difficult.

But off I go. I had promised a friend that I would pray for her and I realized that the running rounds would be the perfect time for prayer. I’m usually praying for myself to survive it anyway, so why not add some other people to my list? I dedicated the first round to her and the words started to flow through my head as the steps passed beneath my feet. I’ve never been a good prayer or a good runner, but this combination seems to be working. I run with my eyes closed anyway (seriously, I do — if I close my eyes then I can pretend that I’m not actually running and that I’m somewhere else more enjoyable) so all I was focused on were my thoughts of her and God’s love for her.

The second round went to Calvin, my oldest son who is traveling, playing sports, and seemed to be getting sick when I briefly talked to him the night before. I prayed for his health, for today, for his future, thanking God for making him who he is and for keeping him close . . . I covered it all (I run really slowly). Before I knew it I was back around to the start and I hadn’t even taken a walking break yet.

Rounds 3, 4 and 5 were more of the same, but along the way I felt like I was praying from my spirit. I’m usually a distracted prayer: “God please be with my kids as they are at school toda– did I remind Caleb to talk to his teacher about his missing assignments? Hmm, do they have enough lunch tickets? Crap, I’m supposed to be praying — Lord, please help them to be kind to the kids that they come in contact with and show your love to them . . . I wonder if I have time to go to the store before they get home? We are almost out of milk.” And so it goes.

But praying while running meant that if my mind wasn’t occupied by prayerful thoughts then the only thing left to think about was the pain of running and measuring how much further I had to go. I almost felt like my friend who is a true prayer warrior, who can go on and on with passion and persistence — when I pray with her I spend much of the time wondering how she can think of all those things to say and not run out of words. (I prayed for her today too!) When the choice was between thinking of other people or thinking, “one more step, one more step,” the people in my life who I love and care about were a welcome distraction.

I finished. I survived. Hopefully some people in my life have been blessed by the prayers I was able to construct through my pain. And now I need a nap. And a few Motrin. (try swinging 50 lbs from the ground to eye level 150 times and you”ll be hunting for a Motrin cocktail too. And wondering why anyone participates in this craziness.)

As people get ready to leave Bahrain, they will often get nostalgic and post countdowns on their Facebook pages: 10 Things I Will Miss About Bahrain (or 10 Things I’m Happy to Leave Behind if they are feeling cynical about their time overseas). It’s a bit different for them because they are headed back to the United States, to a completely different way of life — no more Dairy Queen delivery where Blizzards arrive by moped, no more affordable house help or daily car washing. No more hot desert nights, surrounded by palm trees and warm breezes (unless you happen to be stationed in 29 Palms!) Abu Dhabi will be different than here, but after 5 years in the Middle East it’s less like moving to Mars and more like moving down the street.

I don’t like drawn out farewells. I’d rather enjoy a place right up to the last minute, with no regrets, and then be gone and throw myself into the next place. So far it’s been easy because we don’t plan on moving until the end of July. See how that military preparedness creeps into every area of my life? I have learned never to announce any time frame as fact. 

At first the end of July was four months away, 1/4 of a year — WAY in the future . . . but I realized the other night that we are almost at the 2 month mark. Yikes! Before I know it we’ll be counting down in weeks. But there’s still Ramadan to get through, the end of school, and even more paperwork. Plenty of time.

The point being, I’m still here. Still present. I haven’t done any planning for Abu Dhabi since our move doesn’t seem real, but I’m beginning to see the signs. The gardeners came to trim the date palms in our yard and tie up the developing bunches like they do every spring and I felt a twinge realizing that we won’t be here to eat this harvest. The kids’ school held reregistration for next year and I had to send in the the packet marked, “Not returning.” Church has plans/dreams for moving to a new location with better space and facilities, but we won’t be here to make the move with them. Supposedly. I haven’t emotionally made that leap yet.

I will be excited to go, but not because I’m tired of Bahrain. No need to rush out of here, but I am excited about Josh’s next job. I have high hopes for the next 2 years. We need a change. We have all experienced a lot of advantages from our time in Bahrain, but time as a family hasn’t been one of them. Even when Josh is here, there are demands on his time and energy that end up being a drain on all of us. Supposedly his next job will offer more time with us and less pressure. I guess we’ll see . . .

Calvin is 95% better — well enough for soccer practice at 5:30 in the morning, unfortunately. I’ve been so spoiled this year since Josh has been dropping him off and then going to the gym to work out himself. Two days of driving and I’m already weeping for his return.

One more funny hospital story: since I didn’t have any signal in Calvin’s hospital room I would go downstairs and outside every few hours to make sure I didn’t have any messages. One of those times I was headed back upstairs and got in an elevator with 2 of the hospital’s janitors (I’m assuming based on their jumpsuits). I pushed the button for the first floor (British system, the first floor is the first level above ground floor) and the elevator doors slid closed. Except for a 4 inch gap. And it didn’t move. The guys hit the “doors close” button — nothing. Then they hit the “doors open” button, but again nothing. I started to get a little panicky about being trapped inside an elevator inside of a hospital — a turducken of my nightmares.

Channeling Carter and his Egyptian elevator escape, I wedged my hands in the crack between the doors and tried to pull the doors apart. There was no way I was staying in that elevator if it was humanly possible for me to get out. Fighting and pulling as hard as I could to get them to slide open, I managed to wedge a space large enough for me to hop through and I dove toward the light. The janitors popped out right behind me (both smaller and skinner) and one of them muttered, “broken,” under his breath as we all headed to a completely different bank of elevators to try again.

I would have loved to have taken the stairs, but I couldn’t find them. 3 days in the hospital and I never found any. All doorways that looked like they could be stairwells led elsewhere. I found the electrical system and the janitor’s closet, but no stairs. Glad we didn’t have a real emergency!