Long time no post... again

Wow, it's been a seriously long time since I've last updated my blog. Facebook is certainly taken over this little blogs role in my life, except I find myself reliving my life as status updates and photos rather than a personal retelling of what's going on. I'll try and rectify that with a little post here.

Since my last post, I've gone to London and visited with two friends I met in Italy in 2004, I've done a 10 mile hike up a steep hill in the cold, wind, fog, and rain, I've visited two ruined abbeys (thanks to Henry VIII for those), a quaint seaside town, and driven my beloved Bug several times with the top down. I found our second trip to London a little anti-climactic, the hike more difficult than I anticipated, the seaside town almost identical to American seaside towns, except replace your pizza joints with fish-n-chips spots, and the ruins of abbeys to be haunting and cool.

On a more daily basis, I guess one would say I'm surviving, but not thriving. Oh I love the travel opportunities and have built a small social life, don't get me wrong. I just don't feel I have any purpose here. Hopefully things will be more personally fulfilling when I start another Masters degree program this fall, but until then I'll just concentrate on all the little things that need doing. My grandmother and DH's grandmother are coming to visit us for two weeks in May, and that's going to require
a considerable amount of preparation and planning. DH and I would also like to move to a different house this summer when our lease for this place is up - so there's house hunting and moving plans to make.

Still, when DH and I talk about going "home" it's something that I am keenly looking forward to, even though I don't think we quite know where "home" is. We'll have had strangers living in our DC house for at least two years, probably not caring for it as if it were their own. It's going to be so strange to return to that house - if we even do - knowing that others were washing their dishes in our dishwasher, showering in our bathroom, and letting their dog poo on our lawn (hopefully that's the only place it goes!). We've long talked about selling the house anyway; it's really too big for the two of us. So, in some ways, I don't feel like I have a "home" in DC to return to.

By the same token, I don't feel like Harrogate is "home." It is a temporary situation, and mentally I can't think of it any other way but temporary, which probably makes life more difficult and easier to deal with at the same time. Again, things may (hopefully will) change when I start school in the fall, but I just don't have any personal investment - emotional or otherwise - in our life here. It's an extended vacation from our "real life."

A lot of people struggle being expats because of how "different" things are (early shop closing hours, social structures, daily routines, etc). I find that element of living abroad quite easy to deal with. It's more the difference in my role - or rather the absence of a "role" - that I'm struggling with. People throw suggestions like "volunteer" or "get a job", and I've certainly looked around to try and get into those types of activities. But again, it's a question of personal investment. Back in the States I was very invested in my career, and found where I thought I was heading very personally and professionally fulfilling. There's simply nothing comparable open to me here; the exception being this degree program I'm going to pursue.

Is it possible to temporarily redefine oneself? Temporarily excuse yourself from where you really want to go in order to find another path to happiness, knowing all the while you fully intend to return to your original path? With the clock ticking all the time (two years and two months) down to when we plan to return, it's a difficult mental exercise to perform.