We're on Christmas break now. The holiday is over. The house is clean, more or less. The fridge is full of leftovers. There are no looming deadlines. It's taking a while for that to sink in: there is no stress, at least that of the life-treadmill-hurry-hurry variety we normally have.
Naturally, I am sick! Of course. But today I got a wild hair to go to the hardware store for some light bulbs. See, we have an extensive to-do list for the house before we put it on the market. I decided I'd cross one thing off the list and pick up the sixteen (!) fluorescents needed in the basement, and what the hell, the missing ceiling tiles too.
We got to work as soon as I got home. My motivation snowballed a little and I grabbed the primer to paint over the spots where Sophie drew with Sharpie on the walls a few years ago. I got kind of quiet as I painted over her toddler art. I started thinking about how many tiny jobs it's going to take to do this; how many tiny goodbyes I'll make to this house we moved into just six weeks before becoming parents. How hard it will be to see it empty and walk out of it for the last time. This is the longest I've lived in one house, ever, in my 43 years. I love this house and fulfilled almost every one of my HGTV fantasies with it as my blank canvas. It's been my creative outlet. It is truly a dream home.
But it will have to be someone else's dream home in a few months. I have to be okay with that. I've dreamed about moving abroad for about two decades. My favorite word is "expatriate." As safe as I am now, I need to wake up and scare myself. It's fun to be scared, it makes us feel more alive. That's why people like roller coasters and scary movies. It's scary to do this! But even with the baby steps, I check in... and I still want to go through with it.
One month, seven days until the job fair.
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Friday, December 12, 2014
Long time no blog
Sorry. I've just been dealing with a lot of swirling thoughts about this move. For several weeks I fell into a pretty deep funk about it. Not having any control over something that is so big, that's going to happen so soon and change everything so dramatically, is frustrating beyond belief. It is this behemoth concrete elephant in the middle of my life right now that will not budge. I still check the job updates every few hours; they do change that often. Google-Earthing any town I'd like to move to. Looking up real estate prices and what the houses or apartments look like. Even looking up weekend trips and flight prices from those towns.
One thing that has helped is that I sent out a few letters of intent. There was one day where Nick stayed home sick from school. I saw new jobs open in Vietnam (South Saigon Int'l) that morning. During my free time, I researched the school and the neighborhood and decided that Vietnam was exactly where I wanted to go-- it looks almost better than Bangkok! I was so excited about applying but waited until I talked to Nick about it first. I got home that afternoon, opened up my phone to show him the job listing, and... it had already been deleted. Arrrrghh!!
So I decided to send them a letter anyway, saying that I'd seen the science job briefly, that Nick is interested in the English position, and to please keep us in mind if another science job opens up. Then I decided to send a few more "please consider us just in case" letters to other places. And I got a response from the director of Rabat American School in Morocco, one of my very top choices!
I took out the names so they wouldn't show up on a Google search. This letter made me feel uprighted. Boosted. All of the other robo-responses I've received have been like, "Due to the volume of responses we get..." like I'm one of several hundred faceless randoms groveling for admission into an exclusive club that may or may not take me. This one makes me smile every time I read it, and has given me a modicum of patience. I'm still having a hard time getting motivated to get our house & belongings ready to move, but I think that will come once I have any idea at all where we're going, just SOME kind of direction. So far I've written to a few schools in Germany (I'm particularly proud of those letters and the way I worked in my German experience), Barcelona, and Amsterdam. Throwing things at the wall, seeing what sticks.
I have a countdown app on my phone that tells me how long we have until July 1st (6 months 18 days), a date I picked arbitrarily because it will be within days of that date that we actually step on a plane. I created a second countdown on the app for the job fair in February (1 month 24 days), because that is likely when we'll get our jobs. Once I know, the ball can start rolling. Seeing that shorter time is helpful.
I am fiercely, scarily in love with my kids right now. I spend all day missing them, thinking about their soft faces, the smell of their necks, and tiny voices and giggles. No, this is not because I was mother-shamed about complaining in my last post (oh yes I was), and I'm making amends; I was complaining about the constraints of motherhood specifically in this country. But these girls are just magical little creatures to me. I lose sleep watching them at night. I cannot wait to start this new adventure in our little family bubble, watching them learn a new language (I can already hear them giggling over it together, whatever language it is) and go to the same school as us. Helping them when they struggle and cry over all of the adjustments, just like I did growing up. I am so proud of them, and they make me quite proud of myself. Although I might take a little too much credit; Nick does the bulk of the parenting and he is the best person I know in the world.
I'll try to write the next post sooner than a month from now, although it is just a bunch of More Waiting. Still, I've started to keep a list of Things I Will Miss (about the US) and Things I Won't. That will probably be next.
One thing that has helped is that I sent out a few letters of intent. There was one day where Nick stayed home sick from school. I saw new jobs open in Vietnam (South Saigon Int'l) that morning. During my free time, I researched the school and the neighborhood and decided that Vietnam was exactly where I wanted to go-- it looks almost better than Bangkok! I was so excited about applying but waited until I talked to Nick about it first. I got home that afternoon, opened up my phone to show him the job listing, and... it had already been deleted. Arrrrghh!!
So I decided to send them a letter anyway, saying that I'd seen the science job briefly, that Nick is interested in the English position, and to please keep us in mind if another science job opens up. Then I decided to send a few more "please consider us just in case" letters to other places. And I got a response from the director of Rabat American School in Morocco, one of my very top choices!
Dear Abby and Nick,
Thank you for your interest in a position here at Rabat American School.There is no need to apologize for candour — I thoroughly enjoyed the enthusiasm in your note! As you mention we don’t yet have anything for science and English, but I am forwarding your email to our Secondary Principal, Mr. Paul S------. We will definitely keep you in consideration, and should something relevant come up we will follow up with you then. In the interim should you see something of interest please don’t hesitate to write again.I wish you both the very best of luck in your current job searches.Best wishes,(Director of Rabat American School)
I took out the names so they wouldn't show up on a Google search. This letter made me feel uprighted. Boosted. All of the other robo-responses I've received have been like, "Due to the volume of responses we get..." like I'm one of several hundred faceless randoms groveling for admission into an exclusive club that may or may not take me. This one makes me smile every time I read it, and has given me a modicum of patience. I'm still having a hard time getting motivated to get our house & belongings ready to move, but I think that will come once I have any idea at all where we're going, just SOME kind of direction. So far I've written to a few schools in Germany (I'm particularly proud of those letters and the way I worked in my German experience), Barcelona, and Amsterdam. Throwing things at the wall, seeing what sticks.
I have a countdown app on my phone that tells me how long we have until July 1st (6 months 18 days), a date I picked arbitrarily because it will be within days of that date that we actually step on a plane. I created a second countdown on the app for the job fair in February (1 month 24 days), because that is likely when we'll get our jobs. Once I know, the ball can start rolling. Seeing that shorter time is helpful.
I am fiercely, scarily in love with my kids right now. I spend all day missing them, thinking about their soft faces, the smell of their necks, and tiny voices and giggles. No, this is not because I was mother-shamed about complaining in my last post (oh yes I was), and I'm making amends; I was complaining about the constraints of motherhood specifically in this country. But these girls are just magical little creatures to me. I lose sleep watching them at night. I cannot wait to start this new adventure in our little family bubble, watching them learn a new language (I can already hear them giggling over it together, whatever language it is) and go to the same school as us. Helping them when they struggle and cry over all of the adjustments, just like I did growing up. I am so proud of them, and they make me quite proud of myself. Although I might take a little too much credit; Nick does the bulk of the parenting and he is the best person I know in the world.
I'll try to write the next post sooner than a month from now, although it is just a bunch of More Waiting. Still, I've started to keep a list of Things I Will Miss (about the US) and Things I Won't. That will probably be next.
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