Only Part Way There
and friends who won't let you quit in the messy middle.
Hi friend,
I’m Ness, mother to three, living in the margins of many things that feel part way done. These words have taken a few weeks to squeeze into position, so thank you for choosing to spend time here.
You’ll know everything is predictable and obvious until it isn’t. The middle of seen and unseen, the obvious and more subtle, the predictable and then the guesswork of life. There is black, white and so much grey. Writing is so much grey - the messy middle of ideas, words and meaning then trying to make sense of that. It is not until the words start that the meaning becomes a little more clearer - here are some grey words trying to catch a bit of clarity.
“Mum, why do you have the map on” Willow asks, with her direct view of my navigation screen from her middle seat, as we drive out for school and kindy.
“You know how to get there" she says with a hint of laugher as if she has remembered something I have not.
She knows me well.
"I like to see what traffic is ahead" I respond - but the backseat crew know this because they see the map each time we drive out.
I truly have a crush on google maps and I am not sad about it. My kids love it as much as I do - the red, orange and blue lines directing our journey as I verbally describe traffic conditions over our raging car karaoke sessions.
Despite knowing my way around roads and routes I will often always put on the map for familiar journeys and the unknown destinations for the same reasons. To see time and be on time.
To see time and be on time.
These two parts of me—my planner's brain and my need to know what’s next—feel permanently wired into my prefrontal cortex. I can’t unsee time. It walks beside me like a hand clasped in mine while crossing a busy road. Take away time estimation, and even the most familiar car rides lose their shape. Time gives form to motion. It tells me where I’m going.
The map is my safety net—something to anchor the unpredictable. Most mornings and afternoons, the school run unfolds without incident. It’s just “usual traffic.” But perhaps what reassures me most isn’t the map itself, but the estimated time of arrival. The knowing we’ll get there, and when. Even when a detour comes up, the red and orange lines let me adjust. They help me rewrite expectations in real time.
The last month has been red-lined. Every ETA keeps shifting. Every route, a suggestion. We’re in the thick of arranging our move—from a rental into our home. A home. A home. I let the phrase land softly. Let it sink in.
Last week we moved from holiday mode back to school. Mid-year. The messy middle. We’re not yet on the home stretch of the year and January’s fresh reset wore off back in March. There is this longing to be either at the beginning or at the end, certainly not stuck in the middle.
I did not expect this. We come to a full stop, seeing a forever-line of cars beyond where I can actually see the road.
Pausing, I look at the map. There is no indication of red lines. No heads-up. I feel cheated out of my original plan.
Luke and I are on our way to sign the legal papers for the house. Today. Friday lunchtime, is the only window of possibility - child-free to get this done.
“Maybe I’ll just turn around and go another way,” I offer up as my usual knee-jerk reaction to keep things moving. I’ll take any direction over sitting still.
“Just wait it out,” Luke replies, calm and clear. “It’ll move soon. There’s nothing you can do.”
But waiting—stationary, stuck, going nowhere—is one of my greatest challenges. Let me be in motion, either in a line of traffic or in life. Waiting in the messy middle of a plan that is not moving, feels directionless. Stillness feels like time slipping through cracks. Yet I know it’s not true. The destination hasn’t changed. We’re still on the way, even if the path is blocked. The plan isn’t broken—it’s just adjusting. The discomfort of delay is heavy.
Eventually, the traffic shifts. Up ahead, we see the cause: a construction truck reversing into a site, blocking both lanes. It had to happen. And now, we can move on.
We check the clock and pivot.
Luke drops me off, collects a child, drives back, runs 200 metres with the child in the rain, and joins me just in time—only one person ahead of us.
No goal was lost.
It’s not just the house that’s consuming this messy middle. This semester my university paper reveals that I do in fact still have some imposter syndrome. Who even am I, attempting this? A renovation, a move, and the never-pausing rhythm of family life all happening at once around studying another paper. One paper a semester is the goal, and it is slow going.
I’m trying to get my head around axons, positive and negative ions, action potentials, and lobes of the brain for this science paper, but it’s jolting. This week is busy so I hover over the withdraw button on my paper.1 I want to move things along. Maybe i’ll just do two papers next Semester - that might be quicker. Progress will feel more stable, managing day to day will be smoother if one thing goes now.
So I whisper separately to a pair of friends that I’m out. I make my speech and wait for them sign off, like a permission slip to withdraw- just this semester.
But they won’t have it. 2
“This is hard -yes - but this is your hard”
“Come October, it’s done”
“It is a busy season, so will the next and the next”.
“Give it one more week"
What I heard: keep going the same direction, even if it’s slow. The path of least resistance is tempting but it is temporary.
We are three short days out from the shift—from renting to owning (!!!). There are tradespeople tag-teaming jobs, while I meet them with kids in tow. Today there are two of these meetings onsite and I have the snack bag prepped.
Friends are showing up. Grandparents are stepping in, there is paid help and the jobs to finish are endlessly long.
There are no curtains, the kitchen is not yet painted and we have no wardrobes.
The walls are taped and marked. There’s the smell of fresh plaster and paint.
This is the messy middle, yes—but it’s also progress. Not necessarily fast-moving progress though. More like a map-in-motion, painted in every colour.
There is good in working out the messy middle. It feels like a privilege waking up at 3am thinking about curtain colours and where a shutter will go on a window.
The margins in the next four months will feel slightly slow, the house will remain unpacked, unfurnished and university will absorb margins for the semester. Client work will mark my diary and school activities will reside around them all.
There is discovery in the choosing.
Playfulness in the design.
Excitement in the unknown.
Friends visiting in the unfinished.
The messy middle is a windy path of unfinished, unrefined, doubt and not being fully prepared.
But there is a destination to get to… as slow as the path may be.
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I’ve been here before. Stop. Start. And it is no surprise that this creeps in again. Because the path of least resistance is tempting but temporary.
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