So I’ve moved to this new country, to live in a new house with a new husband. I have no doctor, no dentist, no optician, no job, no income, no marriage certificate, no car. New friends are lovely, but my old ones are far away and I miss my daughter and my dad.
I can drive but I’m on the wrong side of the road, sitting on the wrong side of someone else’s car, without a single mental map to help me work out where the hell I am.
I speak the language but I don’t understand the idioms. Why do they use z instead of s in realise and leave the u out of colour? I eat pretty much the same food but I don’t recognise all the brands. Ditto the clothes. I don’t know which supermarket is better than the others and is it wrong to bag my own stuff? Will people understand me when I speak? Will I understand them when they answer? Going shopping on my own feels like a big adventure and I can’t work out the difference between the various coins and notes when I hand over money.
I am completely wiped out by the eight-hour time difference, I’m suffering energy-sapping jet lag and temperatures so high you could fry an egg on the driveway. I feel at home and yet everywhere I look is someone else’s stuff because all my worldly goods are still in a crate, waiting to cross the Atlantic.
Everything I do is new, and although I’m blissfully happy I’m also restless and frequently feeling out of control.
Ever had that dream you’ve fallen off a cliff or out of a plane? That stomach-churning free fall? That was me.
I wasn’t miserable, but that feeling of not knowing anything was making life hard. I was trying not to be a whiny Pom who kept comparing things with how it is back in England, and anyway, I like the way they do things here. It was just so very different – the same, but different, and for someone who claims to like change, I was finding it more of a challenge than I had anticipated.
One night, towards the end of those first few weeks of limbo and I was the only creature on the planet who was awake (apart from a few chirping crickets and the gently snoring, adorable new husband beside me), I had a conversation with myself about feeling adrift. As I talked away inside my own head, I eventually realised a few home truths. I decided I should stop being so hard on myself because I wasn’t doing anything intrinsically wrong. I couldn’t expect to move 6,000 miles and not feel out on a limb sometimes, no matter how thoughtful and understanding my husband was, nor how kind his friends.
Right then, I had a cartoon moment when a lightbulb came on in my head and I realised how ridiculously simple it was. Like respect, roots are earned and not given. It was just a matter of time.
That’s how, several weeks later, I find myself in a completely different frame of mind. Yes there’s still stuff that’s new and unknown, but so what? I’m building a life, and I’m thoroughly enjoying it. Yes I still miss family and friends, but I’m waking up each day to a dozen emails and messages and keeping close contact with everyone I love and care for.
