Homes, sweet sweet homes
How lucky I am to have two places that I can call home. Two places that are separated by seas and borders and a short plane ride. Two places whose existence and re-integration I am so confident in that I am willing to give them both up for a year or more.
Despite being in limbo between two segments of my adventure, being unemployed and (in terms of having my own place) actually homeless, I can still say I have two homes. I’m feeling especially grateful for this privileged situation while Europe suffers its biggest refugee crisis since the end of the Second World War; while 11 million displaced Syrians struggle to find anywhere at all they can call home; while daily news updates tell us of yet another sunken boat and hundreds more people drowned while desperately seeking refuge somewhere, anywhere; while country after country in Europe closes its borders to them. What a mess this situation is and what a lot it has given me to think about. This truly is a horrid reality for too many people which too many countries (bar the Germans at the moment) seem unwilling to help try and solve.
So yes, this week I’ve been incredibly lucky to flit between the two places I confidently call home. My Copenhagen trip was brief yet I managed to fit in a few trips to school where I was reunited with my wonderful friends, colleagues and also my 6th graders (now all grown up and in 7th grade) as they enveloped me in the hallways, showering me with hugs and stories and incredible enthusiasm at my return. Taking my friend’s three children to school one morning was a lovely way to experience part of their routine and allow myself a lovely piece of normality in between the craziness of my windsurf course and the adventures I have to come in Bali and beyond. I even managed to run Copenhagen's annual DHL relay race with my colleagues - a fun, exciting and extremely Danish experience that thousands and thousands of people enter each year with their companies. By the time you reach the 3km mark, the course takes you winding through tent after tent where people are BBQing and boozing - torture as you finish your final 2km with the glorious scents of BBQ food drifting up your nose!
I realised quite easily while visiting Copenhagen that, although I only lived here for just close to five years, this place feels more like home than anywhere else right now. These are the streets that I know so well; this is the culture I feel a part of; these are the people who have shared my most recent years and thus know me better than anyone else at this moment. It is sad to leave all of this behind.
While home visiting my parents in Manchester, I didn't really give myself enough time to see my old friends before leaving again. It's a shame to have to pick and choose and prioritise when in an ideal world I would see them all. I did manage to spend a day out at Knowsley Safari Park with my beautiful goddaughter for her fifth birthday though, which we both thoroughly enjoyed. It was also the August Bank Holiday weekend (the last long weekend in England until Christmas) while I was there. Gone are the days of sunshine, warmth and BBQs that I remember from our many August Bank Holiday camping trips to Wales while I was growing up, however. Apparently this holiday has been a complete wash-out the last few years. I experienced this for myself when I went to support Dad in the National One Metre Model Yacht championships in Lincoln on Sunday to Monday. On the final day of the tournament, it rained and poured and was so cold that I even donned a bobble hat along with my three layers of clothing and extra waterproofs. Yeyyy to British summer time!
Enjoying British Summer time with Mum and Dad at the
Model Yachting National Championships
There've been times over this week where that niggling voice in my head has been asking, 'What am I doing? Why am I giving all this up? Why am I abandoning all of these people that I love and care for? What the hell am I doing?!!!!'. And during the times when this voice has been at its loudest I've been trying to work on being mindful and living in the present moment, enjoying each and every day, each moment I got to spend with each friend, each experience as it came. This seemed to work far better for me than thinking too much about the future, whether that be the next few days or the next few weeks, months or even years. I could drive myself crazy thinking, thinking, thinking about this kind of thing after making such a huge life-changing decision. I keep reminding myself that, the reality is, I've made my decision and it wasn't one that I made lightly. Nor was it a decision that came without thorough planning or saving. And finally, nor is it a decision that is set in stone that I can't go back on if I want or need to. I am living such a life of privilege that opportunities like this shouldn't be wasted. How lucky I am to have the CHOICE.
For now, it's back to airport-time as I wait for my third and final flight to get me to Bali ready for the next leg of my adventure. I'm struggling to know what time or even day it is at the moment - all I know is that Mum dropped me off at Manchester airport at 9.30am on Tuesday... Since then I've been part of an emergency evacuation due to an oven fire, flown to Hong Kong, waited there for five hours and flown to Kuala Lumpur where I now sit writing this while waiting for my final connection in an hour or two.
In the Female Nomad book I read and blogged about recently, Rita Golden Gelman talked about how she didn't necessarily need the same set of people in her daily life over a period of years and decades so long as she had a group of people constantly in her life (if that makes sense)... I've thought about this a lot because it kind of fits in with the expat lifestyle I've adopted over the past eight or so years with so many people coming and going. As I sit here writing this, I'm overwhelmed with the reality that the decision I've made to take this 'career-break' year off and do these adventures is an lonely one. I don't have my people around me and nor do I have new people around me yet. This feeling of loneliness (of course exacerbated by my incredible fatigue and jet lag right now) can quite easily creep up. I knew it would; I was expecting it. I know I just need to acknowledge it. I must remember that I carry a part of all my people with me while I wait for a new set of people to enjoy my next adventure with me. This will surely help push these feelings away...
Agh... It will happen soon, won't it?
