I would like to write something eloquent and thoughtful here about this past week. I would like to share some sliver of enlightenment that I have dug out of the difficulties of this several days. But alas, I'm barely functioning, running almost entirely on nervous energy, and a diet composed primarily of coffee and red wine.

So, eloquence and enlightenment are out. (But actually, I wrote a guest post here wherein I think I might have used my lifetime quota for enlightenment.)

Maybe next week I'll have thoughts about that?

Anyway. For the past seven days, we've been living between our apartment and a hotel room. Sleeping in the hotel, returning home to get changes of clothings and spend some quality time with our toys.

We have a bit of a situation in our apartment. After what feels like a lifetime of stopgap solutions and bandaid fixes, we're finally getting some emergency work done to *hopefully* solve this problem.

But these repairs are fairly extensive, and so we've had to empty our entire apartment. Every last stitch. Save for one bookshelf. It's all in storage. And we're up in a hotel room for the next while.

Meanwhile, I've been working on a fairly major assignment, organising shoots and sight visits and interviews. This project kicked off in earnest the day that we had to move out of our apartment. Between a morning and an evening shoot, I had to rush home to relieve my husband from the move, to shlep and cary and fret about the vast quantities of junk that we own, and whether or not it would all fit in the storage room, and whether or not this whole exercise was a futile, because would the workmanship be professional enough? Would the job be done properly? Would the problem just come back?

I don't know.

But as of right now, our ceilings have all been torn down. We are still living in a temporary apartment. Our stuff is in a massive jumbled mess, thrown into a pile without any semblance of order. I am convinced that we own far more junk than any human family has the right to be in possession of.

I haven't been sleeping well.

I also haven't seen my kids for more than a couple hours in three days. And anyway, it's all kind of wearing on me.

But this sounds rather whiney, which is not my intention. Really. I'm tired. I'm stressed out. But I'm also working on an exciting project. It's something that I really want to, like, knock out of the park. And I'm just going for it, ceilings or no. We have an incredible nanny who has been indispensable these past few days, allowing me space to freak out without freaking out the children. I have a community of friends who have invited the kids to play, helping me keep them entertained while I've been working / moving / working / trying not to ball my eyes out.

And also, the chef and I have been working together fairly well through this? He's been doing all the parenting these past few days. He's moved half the apartment himself, while fielding phone calls about the latest smoked salmon crisis. He didn't freak out when, in the middle of all this, I had a sudden urge to open my wallet and release my feelings to the tune of too many million rupiah.

And, I've also become more committed to the idea of simplifying our life, and tidying the clutter. And we'll get a fresh coat of paint on our walls.

So.

It has been difficult. But not impossible.

(Although, I'm going to have to go through a serious red wine / coffee detox after this. But, let's not think about that until I at least have ceilings again, okay?)

The State Of Things Right Now