No. 3, Balcony; bird feeder; red chair

Our time in Almaty is racing towards conclusion: on June 15 we’ll say goodbye to the city and country that we’ve made our home for four years.

It’s impossible to guess what we’ll miss about Kazakhstan. The truth? Our departure will not be unwelcome, but preserving an authentic, essential piece of Kazakhstan feels both urgent and important. So I ask:

What are the conditions for memory-making?

How do we accurately capture our experience?

And in doing so, should we be troubled that these images and narratives will become Holden’s only memories of this place?

My answer? I’ll take photographs, 100 of them, approximately one each day until our departure. Their content will be mundane and material, but all of them will be meaningful. And all of them will hold a story, however small, for Holden to unfold.

I’ll start today.

So we’re moving. But not back to America. Not even out of Kazakhstan. Nope—we’re moving just 300 meters down the street, all in the name of earthquake safety.

Framed by soaring, craggy mountains, and built on loamy soil, Almaty is next in line for an earthquake of catastrophic proportion. (Those mountains are so dramatic and so pretty because they sit directly on top of the Talas Fergana Fault.) So we’re moving to an apartment just down the street because it’s safer than the one we’ve been living in.

Needless to say, all this talk of earthquakes and new apartments (and, well, buildings falling down…shudder…) has me focused lately on Almaty’s structural landscape. I eye construction sites, counting the rebar in poured concrete buildings or shaking my head at a new building with a poorly hung tile façade. I suck air through gritted teeth when I notice an attempt at cost-savings: there is grout on only the tops and bottoms of those cinder blocks…

Meanwhile, all of this looking at architecture has inspired me to photograph it, too. Almaty’s structures have a distinctly crumbling, Soviet look to them; perfectly photogenic in black and white winter scenes, or in colored shots, the buildings standing stark against the coming spring. Some of them will withstand the force of “the big one.” Many of them will not.

I completely underestimated the commitment required to successfully complete my “2015 project”—you know, the one where I post a photo plus a 250-word mini-essay each week during 2015—um, yeah, that one.

So here we are. The last week of the year. The last day of the year, actually. I’m furiously writing this final blog post, hoping to get it posted before midnight tonight.

But I have nothing to say.

Nothing new, anyway. Nothing that hasn’t been said a thousand times already on every parenting website or mommy blog out there. Nothing pithy and brilliant to ring in the new year…

Sam and I were just discussing how, remarkably, we both feel like the same non-parent people we used to be. We’ve obviously added a giant responsibility (plus minor sleep deprivation) to our lives, but we still feel the same. Did we think that by becoming parents we would suddenly become wiser and more respectable? We look at other parents and think, “Now, they look like parents. We don’t look like parents. We’re the same as before.”

But of course we look like parents. And of course we aren’t the same.

My 2015 project crashed and burned—but not because the project itself was complicated or overwrought. It’s because being a mom is tough (and finding 45 quiet, consecutive minutes to write has been nearly impossible in these first few months). Parenting is the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I like to think it’s hard because I’m doing it right.

New Year’s Eve used to hold such magical appeal. It was a new beginning with new surprises. I have distinct memories—okay, okay, some less distinct than others—from so many New Year’s Eve celebrations. More than from most other holidays. I think because it’s a hopeful holiday: everyone seems to want to be a willing participant in becoming their best, true self.

This year, I don’t want surprises. I don’t want anything new. In fact, I want something old. My hope for the new year is to dig out the old part of me who’s been buried under hours of pumping, the sweet-sticky smell of spit-up, and lost sleep—the artist, the writer, the wife.

{Above: Remnants of last night’s incredible firework display. On view from our kitchen windows.}

I mark the days by tiny milestones and barely-there changes in my son’s squishy baby wrists, or how much longer he stays awake, gazing at my face between feedings. I rejoice at his small accomplishments; I attach meaning to every gurgle and grunt.

“Treasure every moment,” we hear. “It all goes by so quickly.” But the truth is, I don’t want to treasure every moment—there are so many that aren’t sweet, aren’t seraphic. And I don’t think it makes me a terrible mother to say that I hope some moments do fly by—like the ones where I’m taking long walks in the middle of the night to console my desperately screaming child, or the ones where I have to let him cry those soulful, shuddering cries for just a few more minutes because how dare I take a shower!

Then I recognize the fleeting nature of those moments—of every moment. One of thousands, millions! I see all of them as fleeting moments in a timeline marching forward, forward, forward…

Sometimes I stand in my bedroom doorway watching Holden sleep. And somehow, through the fog of tiredness, strangeness, and disassociation that afflicts all new parents, I can finally imagine this little person becoming, well, a person—with desires and opinions, questions and passions.

With each tiny milestone, I see him inching further from me, and from Sam—from my body, from our lives, and closer to the person he will eventually become. I won’t treasure every moment, but I will own each one: the smallness, the sweetness, and every single challenge. This journey is ours.

Welcome, Holden, to this crazy world. Sam and I keep needing to remind ourselves that you know nothing about it—nothing! Not yet anyway. You don’t know that you’re American, or that you won’t grow up in the United States. You won’t remember living in Kazakhstan. You don’t know about dinosaurs, hot fudge sundaes, the internet, video games, mountains…you don’t know any of the people who are excited that you’ve finally arrived.

We have so much to teach you. You’ve already taught us so much:

Female bodies are freaking impressive. I’m probably the billionth woman to be blown away by my body’s ability to grow a human, then feed it too…but HOLY CRAP that’s cool. (Is it possible that I’ve transcended the obsession with my body as a mere object? In other words, my boobs make FOOD!)

It’s possible to do most things with just one hand: peruse Facebook, feed the dog, feed myself. In fact, most of this post (including this sentence) was typed using one hand…in the middle of the night.

Love is not a resource that diminishes. Since Holden’s come along, we don’t find ourselves giving a smaller slice of the “love pie” to everyone else in our lives. Instead, we’ve found that love increases infinitely: there is only more love.

Time, unlike love, is a diminishing resource. Accomplishments are a thing of the past. Life has been boiled down to what can be done in the hour-and-a-half between eating-burping-changing-rocking-back-to-sleep sessions. If we’re lucky. And awake.

{Above: A moment of peace. Obviously this is an opportunity to put things on our child’s head, then take pictures.}

Sometimes, all you can do is shake your head and say, “Oh, Kazakhstan.” The epic short-sightedness of Kazakhstan’s latest legal gaffe is mind blowing. Read on:

Recent legislation has deemed many of the popular tourist areas in Kazakhstan, and other (as of yet, unspecified) locations within 25 kilometers of the border “closed zones.” In order for foreigners (yup, even diplomats like us) to legally visit any of these sites, they must send a written request on official Consulate letterhead to the Almaty Immigration Police Department 20 business days in advance. Each request is good for one visit only. There is no clear information about how the new law will be enforced, but perpetrators will either be arrested or fined a hearty sum.

Sam’s first reaction to this news was, “Congratulations, Kazakhstan, on losing your 2022 Olympic bid!” (Another of Sam’s reactions: “Wait, isn’t our apartment within 25 kilometers of the border?” Why yes. Yes it is.)

But seriously now folks, let’s discuss:

Almaty’s southernmost border clings to the foothills of the Tien Shan mountain range, which marks the border between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. The best hiking, camping, and skiing that Kazakhstan has to offer take place in these foothills and surrounding mountain peaks and passes—all of it within 25 kilometers of the country’s border.

Some people who we imagine will be affected by the new law:

Olympic athletes—who tend to be (duh) foreigners—will certainly want to visit before the games, practice on Medeu’s sky-high skating rink, and build red blood cells on Shymbulak’s ski slopes. Assuming the law sticks (and KZ wins the Olympic bid), they’ll be required to obtain a permit for each of their visits to these locations. Meanwhile, do I even need to mention the foreign spectators who hope to see the Olympic athletes in action?

Tourists looking for an unique destination for outdoor adventures are no doubt attracted to southern Kazakhstan’s mountains. But personal experience tells us that the requirement to obtain a permit for these visits will be minimally publicized. Off-the-beaten-path adventures might end instead in arrest—for a broken law that foreign hikers had no idea existed.

And on a personal note, I believe that Kazakhstan’s great outdoors is its greatest asset. The bureaucratic black hole into which our requests will undoubtedly disappear, in combination with the difficulty of choosing hiking, camping, or skiing destinations nearly a month in advance (due to weather conditions, avalanche risk, etc.), makes Kazakhstan’s single most attractive characteristic off-limits to the very population that it should be courting.

Oh, Kazakhstan…

{Above: “The Lenin Hut” is a well-known landmark to those who frequent Kim-Asar Gorge—now off-limits to foreigners.}