Even when life becomes like an overgrown garden, with competing shoots searching for the sun, there is joy to be found.
It has been a tempestuously busy time the last few months, buffeted by the gales of a glorious holiday, a rollicking personal life, and significantly changed professional roles.
In the midst of all the noise I found myself unceremoniously tumbled out the other end of this “epoch in my life”, as a little red-headed Green Gables habitant might call it.
Tumbled out of this wild time full of weeds but somehow very creased and confused. Wondering what even was all that? Why did I say yes to all those opportunities? Did I do right by the job that was entrusted to me? And was the south of France, watching little tugboats drive by in Basque country but a fever dream? Will I ever get through all the e-mails and reports?
Snapping at my heels these past months as I ran at full kilter up an almost vertical learning curve, is the unsettling notion that I was losing sight of my usual life. A life where I am always at table with a close circle of friends and loved ones, or with myself and a cup of tea, watching things grow in my garden, smelling the jasmine in my little haven where no one can reach me.
And the closer the weather system of cc’ed e-mails and the winter Icarian sun got, the farther my carefully balanced life slipped away.
Time available for introspection and to spend with loved ones became a premium, and cancellations and rescheduling became the norm as the calendar filled with meetings and crises that required urgent management.
I took double the time required to manage most tasks because of the acute learning that was needed to respond with some level of intelligence. I waded through seemingly endless reams of both PDFs and paper to try to make some sense of multiple cogs of the massive machinery of public service. I turned up to anything I could, and soaked in the wisdom of everyone around me, leaving home before the leaves in the garden unfurled for the day.
The complexity, the moment where people, systems, and intent come into form was a thing of chaotic beauty.
But striding alongside this fascinating intellectual exercise was the knowledge that I was failing terribly in my role as friend and confidante. The more present I was on Teams the less I was on other channels where chatter, memes, invitations, and essentially, life was happening.
I was so lucky we had our regular dinners to keep me attached to our shared lives. But when I turned up for anything, I was distracted and could feel myself being a bore with more work chats and, like a nightmare, observed myself listening less and talking more. My stress. My learnings. My impressions.
At one point I wondered if this was what Bridget Jones meant by “autowitter”, as surely nobody in their right mind would find me interesting at this point.
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Halfway through this epoch of madness, I found myself in yet another meeting where I was frantically trying to keep pace. For a moment I looked up from this laptop and found myself staring at the wilderness of my garden through the window.
The first and most noticeable breach to the ego was the near impenetrable thicket of weeds that carpeted the ground, piling on one another gleefully, mirroring the wilderness of this time.
After a few moments though, with my acceptance of the chaotic undertones of my own greenness, I found myself fortified by the steady and deeply rooted plants amongst the overgrown little garden. The faithful chilli, jasmine, kaffir lime, blueberry, mandarin and lemon trees, standing proudly and striving still to be seen in the sunlight that is so dearly missed this past winter.
This is not the first time I have felt almost snowed under by workload and self-imposed expectations, and it won’t be the last. And every single time as I stumble along in state of amnestic overwhelm, I have to relearn this valuable lesson – that whatever happens in life to throw the carefully balanced life out of its centre, the deepest rooted, most practiced, most valued aspects of this well lived existence will always remain.
The constants of strong relationships, where we take turns to give each other time and company in bad times and good. The running jokes in the group chats that continue and wait for your return, even if you don’t have time to partake as much. The toddlers growing up around us, asking increasingly invasive questions as they develop incisive vocabulary. The seat that awaited me at our shared tables, where each other’s absences are always missed. And the knowledge that when I have room in the schedule to tend to my garden but one of theirs grow over, my table will be ready in its turn.
And for my own part, despite the choking undergrowth and competing agents in pursuit of my sanity, a furtive glance at the tops of chilli plants during work-from-home meetings is enough to ground me.
For the values we all hold most dear in our innermost psyches also have the tendency to stick their fiery heads up above the pompous noise and bluster to hold us accountable. With each season that I am challenged with a messy patch and pushed to grow, I see my centre with a little more clarity. The years may grow with the number of rings in this sapling’s future, but the core remains the same.
One day, when balance returns and I find myself once again regaling in the scent of jasmine or plucking some chillis and kaffir lime leaves to host lunch, I will take stock and look at the lessons I’ve been blessed with from this period of hectic learning – the wounds from inexperience for the cuttings they provide.
The bulbs of inspiration from mentors will be carefully sown, in the hope that one day some of them may lay down healthy roots, flower and fruit over the cacophony of wild times to come.
Dr York Xiong Leong is a general paediatrician in Eastern Health, Melbourne, working in public inpatient and community paediatric services, and a medical educator with Monash and Deakin universities. One of the best compliments he has ever received is “Babe you barely live on this planet”.
