This is me jumping back on the horse and practicing imperfectly doing things. An imperfect blog entry beats no blog entry. Perfection, as I’ve learned recently, is both a trap and an illusion: perfection does not exist. So might as well take action.

I’m currently sitting in the kitchen of my London flat, quietly typing on my wireless keyboard while my daughter (Elliott, now 5.5 years old) sleeps in the bedroom. It’s a little past 7 and she’s still recovering from jet lag after spending just about 2 weeks in Seattle (8 hour clock difference), our first international trip together, where it was just her and I who flew together.

Some fleeting special moments from yesterday

• Instead of dining out in Wimbledon, she convinced me again to stay in and eat dinner at home – thankfully, my Italian female friend (Francesa) had cooked pasta for me while I was away so we have lots of tasty food upon landing from Seattle
• She tried to paint my nails but we ran out of pink and red (only two colors) of nail varnish
• She bicycled to the station while I walked with the leashed dogs
• She was motivated to draw yesterday so she followed the instructions from the book titled “How to draw almost every animal”
• I setup the Nintendo Switch yesterday and she and I played both Super Smash brothers but her favorite game is “Pokemon” – because she cannot read, I’m left sitting next to her reading out loud the captions while she navigates the controller.
• While holding the Nintendo Switch she accidentally called me “Andy” (my ex wife’s current partner) – though at first, I felt a little sting here, I in the moment recognized that she associates Nintendo Switch with Andy since they play together (Mario Kart, according to Elliott). I’m also proud here for all the emotional work I’ve done (and continue to do) since I in the moment recognized this and can see how some parents, in the moment, would feel jealous (valid and justified)
• I napped next to her in bed while she watched (on the projector) the new series of “Unicorn Academy” on Netflix
• We tested out the instant milk tea and Boba – unexpectedly quite tasty and I gave her the majority of the boba pearls
• Watched GoPro footage that was recorded when she was just a few months old, in the midst of the pandemic – so many emotions float up in my body. Joy from seeing her as a baby. Grief for what was