Tag Archives: parenting

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom

The “Oribi Mom” Column

Newspaper Column Regularly Featured in the South Coast Herald

Since 2020, this little newspaper column has become a standard feature in the Lind household. It’s an actual newspaper – the kind that rubs off black onto your fingers – publishing our comings and goings here in Oribi Gorge.

Part of the motivation behind it was to give the Lind children something in black and white one day after we get old and don’t remember all the details. The local community here also seems to have enjoyed the offering, which tries to share our story 400 words at a time. A few neighbours and friends have appreciated some of the humour, relatability, family drama, and close encounters with nature. International readers just gasp, wondering why we choose to live in a place where Black Mambas do.

Why Oribi Mom Started

Ambitions to be a journalist in the teen years were short-lived. If you’d asked then whether we’d like to just blog for a local newspaper whenever inspiration hit, it would have seemed inferior to “real” journalism. What a crazy idea.

Fast-forward to about a month before the entire world shut down because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the need to share our experiences felt overwhelming. At eight months pregnant, South Africa’s hard lockdown had cancelled just about everything. Things got complicated, including the smooth, quick route needed to reach the hospital three hours away.

Instead of calming soundtracks and earphones, we had to remember to pack our eldest child’s birth certificate in the hospital bag — just in case. What if the police stopped us on the highway to ask why we were out of our home when the government had expressly told everyone to stay put. We’d even rehearsed the speech to say in between contractions. “Yes, he’s our son. Yes, we had to bring him with us. No, there’s nobody to look after him at home. No, we couldn’t go to another hospital because the doctor is at the one three hours away (another long story).”

We hadn’t found much online about going through a late-stage pregnancy during a global pandemic. Nobody else crazy enough to try it? So, we wrote one. And we’ve never looked back.

Thanks for reading!

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom: Are You One of the Oldest People in the Room?

“You might be the oldest person in the room if you’re the only one not dancing to the Paw Patrol’s theme song.”

PHOTO BY PIXABAY

June 18, 2024

Apparently, it’s normal to feel a little bit overwhelmed when you have three children (or any amount of children, actually).
They’re quite loud and always hungry. They’re also super emo, whether they’re two and trying to talk, six and discovering that girls and boys look different, or signature teenagers wrestling their natural hair into some crazy modern style.

When you get old, and I’m not saying that I am yet, it seems as though the only time you realise that you are potentially older than you thought is when there’s someone significantly younger around.

You Might Be the Oldest Person Here If You…

You might be the oldest person in the room if you’re the only one not dancing to the Paw Patrol’s theme song.

You might be the oldest person in the car if you’re trying to secretly have a nap and find the people talking like babies for fun quite irritating.

Can’t you just look for birds and buck and tractors and TLBs in silence for a bit? Please?

You might also be old if the thought of a run actually feels exciting. It’s like an adventure or an epic journey you can take because, well, you still can move your bones. Maybe you’ll see someone waving or find a rare bird along the route.

Even more exciting is returning home sweaty, well-exercised, and, more importantly, entirely injury-free. Yes, these legs still work, even though stretching is no longer that thing you remember three days later when you’re feeling a slight hamstring twinge.

If you’re old, stretching isn’t optional. Also, if you don’t want to get old and fat faster because an injury has broken your stride, you should probably start stretching, as well.

But what do I know? I’m not old (yet).

Grey hairs might be making an appearance now, right at the top by the roots. With a 6, 4, and almost 2-year-old that’s probably inevitable, but it feels a little early as a not-yet-40.

Maybe You’re Not That Old (Yet)

I don’t dance to cartoon theme songs much, though that ’90s techno beat still gets the foot tapping a bit, involuntarily.

Lame sprinkler moves and lang-arm sokkies were never my thing. It’s more a side-to-side foot shuffle with elbows bent and swaying. Cool, I know.

Getting old has its moments, but this privilege denied to many is straight-up God-given. I’m grateful.

Published here.

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom: Daddies Deserve Their Silver

“They give him grey hair rather than gratitude, but that’s a vice the young sometimes only acknowledge when they’re no longer young.”

PHOTO BY PIXABAY

June 22, 2023

“Can you say Mama?”

“Dada.”

And that’s how it’s been for all three of our munchkins. They really love their Dad, and that’s never something to take lightly in this crazy, mixed-up world of ours.

Fathers are so important in children’s lives. Where else would they learn how to play practical jokes on their mothers or their future wives? How else will they learn how to braai the perfect steak or spot a forward-pass when the ref misses it?

Everyone needs a father figure, even if there isn’t a biological Dad in the house. Our home is blessed to have a mommy and a daddy present, and still, it’s a challenge to be the role models these little people need.

Life gets busy. Tasks take the place of time. Housework steals moments for reading books together or watching a bird in the garden. But we do our best because we recognise that it’s an utter privilege to have these small ones in our care.

I’m not sure our boys are old enough yet to realise what a treasure they have in their Daddy. They give him grey hair rather than gratitude, but that’s a vice the young sometimes only acknowledge when they’re no longer young. When they’re suddenly less young, and they need to become responsible for someone else’s well-being, they might see it.

The grey hairs were tokens earned, a priceless collection of all the moments of love.

I hope that our boys see that value invested in their lives as soon as they are able because it might just change the way they see the world.

To all the Dads and Dad-fill-ins out there, I hope you collect many grey hairs and that the young see their worth. Keep sowing love. You’re storing up treasure that won’t rust or fade.

Published here.

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom: Teetering Into Winter 2023

“Using terms like “when they were little” feels crazy when they’re five and three. But they’re boys now, not babies.”

PHOTO BY PIXABAY
June 13, 2023

We’re back into the stage of head bumps, bleeding gums, and closed baby gates now. Teething and learning to walk is hard, even for the third time running. Granted, the poor child has pushed out five teeth in just two months, and a sixth is just poking its enamel out this week, too. Thank goodness we live in South Africa and have easy access to droewors, hey.

Somehow, babies manage to get themselves into the strangest predicaments before you know what’s happening. For example, he can quite easily get under the bed, but do you think he can reverse to get himself out again? Of course not. He can also get up onto a molly box, which is just high enough to cause Mom to panic about him going head-first off it. Let’s not talk about the stairs that run off the porch. We’re still being quite diligent about keeping that little gate closed but, with two brothers around, it’s only a matter of time.

The new game is to unpack the Tupperware cupboard. That means taking every single item out and spreading them around the floor. There’s also an affinity for the bookshelf. I remember now why we made a kids’ books shelf to distract his two brothers when they were little. And it truly does go by so very quickly.

Using terms like ‘when they were little’ feels crazy when they’re five and three. But they’re boys now, not babies. They don’t unpack the bookshelves or get stuck on tables or try to stick their heads through the security gate bars anymore. Though, the three year old did manage to vomit into the nebuliser this morning, so there’s that.

In a few weeks or months, they’ll be walking. And then they’ll be in their first job interview. Hopefully, we can keep up, and take it all in.

Published here.

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom: Rainy Nights Where the Wild Things Are

“The owls were there before lockdown, and they are still eating insects on the lawn all these years later.”

PHOTO BY PIXABAY

 

November 15, 2022

It’s been a rough week. The boys aren’t sleeping through and the baby is up every two hours still. Loadshedding isn’t helping me find my groove, especially when the geyser switch keeps tripping. Rain is keeping us inside but helping our tiny macadamia trees grow.

Last night, I went to bed at 6pm with the children and fell fast asleep. At 7pm, the lights came back on and two spotted eagle owls started making a racket on the lawn. They make a sort of screeching growling sound right outside my window. Why? They’re chasing crickets!

One sits on the top of the garage playing lookout and the other one screeches and screeches while hopping awkwardly on the grass. They are hilarious to watch, running as though they had brand new shoes that were too big to go fast and waddling like they have a full nappy. They hop and bow and watch me watching them through the window. It’s too dark to video but the spotlight lets us see them in full view.

These huge birds are very impressive. And, them waking me up was a grand piece of luck. I forgot it was Wednesday and almost didn’t send in our grocery order for the weekly Thursday delivery. It’s a remnant of COVID lockdown that’s still going, and it is a lifeline to us fresh milk and bread lovers.

The owls were there before lockdown, and they are still eating insects on the lawn all these years later. I hope some things don’t change too quickly. Our little one is almost four months old already and changes every day. He’s started to giggle, and his two-year-old brother has started playschool.

Time is marching on. But hopefully the owls and all the other beautiful creatures at the farm will be unchanged when we look back on our lives here one day. They make me smile on the bad days. The farmhouse wouldn’t be the same without their summer shenanigans. And, at least they’re controlling the thriving cricket population making holes all over our lawn.

Published here.

Oribi Mom, Travelinds

Oribi Mom: Running Into Summer on the South Coast

“Summer is coming and it feels greener since the pandemic started making its exit.”

Jogging on beaches in Indonesia was often beautiful but home has less plastic rubbish. PHOTO HEATHER LIND

November 5, 2022 

I’ve started running again. Okay, let’s call it what it is: a slow jog. A very slow one after three babies and a long year.

The last time I started jogging was after Baby Number Two. I was bitten by a night adder about a month into my routine and it didn’t go so well after that. But, I’m back again, kicking up dust and looking for bird distractions up the crazy hills.

I’ve tried to catch up to the giant water mongoose that lives by the stream, but it’s too quick. I’ve snuck up to the African Pygmy Kingfisher that lives in the bank, but my cellphone camera is woefully inadequate to get a clear picture. I usually see a bright blur darting out in front of me and know I’ve missed it.

Panting Up the Hills Is Part of Running Again

It’s also a little embarrassing coming into view of one of the occasional workers in the macs. It’s about that moment you realise that you’ve been panting aloud like some old dog all the way up the hill. Did the person just on the side of the ridge wonder why an old gogo was coming up the road in the middle of nowhere?

The crowned hornbills sometimes sit at the tops of the trees and laugh at me while I pant up the steep bits. With an elevation gain of about 150 metres during the jog, the steep bits include the first 2.5km or so. If I can make it past that, I can ease up the heart rate and cruise downhill for most of the way home.

There’s one part of my regular route I’ve named Death Hill. That’s probably slightly dramatic, but it certainly makes you feel like death warmed up when you’re at the bottom of it and want to get to the highest point on the farm. If you can push through, you can turn around and have a full view of the sea in the distance, Gamalakhe next to that, and Oribi Gorge and Paddock the other way.

You can also see some of the Southern Drakensberg on clear days. The view alone is worth a little bit of sweat and embarrassing panting most days.

Jog or Run or Walk, But Get Out and See the World

I’ve jogged many places in the world, including around a tiny Indonesian island where we snorkelled with turtles every day. I’ve jogged in the Mara Triangle in Kenya and wondered about lions hidden in the grass. Now, I’m running on my farm on the South Coast and it’s just as beautiful.

Summer is coming and it feels greener since the pandemic started making its exit. Who knows, maybe we won’t even have to cancel the holidays this year.

Published here.

Oribi Mom

Oribi Mom: Do What Makes You You

“Parenting three under five is probably not the time of life to be writing books for fun but the opportunities will come if I let them.”

Do all boys love TLBs and other giant machines? PHOTO HEATHER LIND

September 5, 2022

Have you ever heard and then seen a huge swarm of bees approaching as your newborn sleeps on your lap? It’s quite terrifying at first. You wonder whether they are going to come straight at you on the porch or pass by. The sound is incredible, a crescendo out of nowhere … before disappearing as the bees speed off to wherever they are going.

How can you describe that feeling of uncertainty when a thousand stings approaches and you don’t know the outcome? I think it is called exhilaration. Not knowing whether the next moment will be a good one is a physical experience as well as a mental one. It heightens the senses, pumps the adrenaline and gets the muscles ready to do their thing.

Your Body Suddenly Says, “Pay Attention”

It is the same kind of feeling that my almost five year-old gets when he sees a yellow or orange crane arm extended into the skyline. A digger! Will it be huge? Will it have a hook? Will it be operating as we drive past? The excitement is palpable as we drive via the N3 to Pietermaritzburg with all the roadworks in play. Every ten seconds a new shout of ‘excavator’ trumpets from the backseat all the way into town.

I recently had a fresh injection of exhilaration seeing my very first full length book in print. It didn’t matter that it was a ghostwriting project that my name will never be on – those are my words right there in black and white forever. What a feeling!

Why would I write a book for someone else? Perhaps a better question is why would someone hire me to write a book for them when they could do it themselves. The short answer is that some people have ideas they don’t know how to express in the way that does them justice. Writers can do it and do it well for the most part.

Your Mind Says, “Stay Calm and Breathe”

For me it is a job that I can do at home with my three boys in tow. Finding a client who wants to pay me to do what I love for six months to a year is well, worth any sacrifice of fame or prestige. One day when I have the time to churn out all the books that have embedded themselves into my imagination I won’t need a professional ghostwriter. It is still a dream to write my own books for now, though seeing this first one done and dusted makes it feel a lot more achievable. I know it can be done even as I feed my third baby and watch my toddlers wrestle on the grass.

Parenting three under five is probably not the time of life to be writing books for fun but the opportunities will come if I let them. Eyes open for those exhilarating moments of bees, books, and being me.

Published here.