Friday, January 30, 2015

Welcome to my blog!

Lets start at the very beginning...

ex·pa·tri·ate

noun
  1. a person who lives outside their native country.

That is what I am, well was. And now will be. Confused? Don't worry about it - I will explain.

It was a blustery day in Greenwich, CT and a wonderful women named MaryEllen was 9 months pregnant...

Too far back? Sorry!

Fast forward to 1994, a house in the suburbs of Atlanta. The same women, MaryEllen and her 3 adorable kids were up to their noses in packing boxes. Clothes everywhere, kids crying about not wanting to move and ME was about to pull her hair out. Marc, her husband had received word he was being relocated to England.

From 1994-1996 this family of 5 lived in a 3 bedroom, 2 bath house in Virginia Water, a suburb of London. Marc worked in Richmond and MaryEllen worked from home with the occasional business trip. Bridget & Peter attended TASIS (The American School in Surrey) while Hannah, the youngest was at Virginia Water Prep School. Bridget did 2nd and 3rd grade at TASIS.

Que June 1994, Marc calls a dreaded family meeting in the dinning room of Whispering Pines (in England houses have names) and announces that we are moving. Now as our eyes danced with visions of American candy & hot summers in Atlanta he dropped the "Not Home" bomb. We were moving to Belgium. Belgium? Some random city in France? Please keep in mind I was in the 3rd grade, so geography wasn't my strong suit.

So off to Belgium we went. From 1996-2000 we lived and loved everything Belgian - from waffles to lace to chocolate to tapestries. All three children attended St Johns International School in Waterloo (Que the ABBA song). As my 8th grade school year rolled around there was talk of what to do next - return to the US for my to get an American high school education or to stay in Belgium. Unfortunately or fortunately - however you want to look at it, my father's company made the decision for us. So in the summer of 2000 we packed all of our earthly belongings and made the track across the ocean once again.

I attended both high school and college in the US, growing more accustom to the practices I had left behind so many years before. Expelling to my new American friends what it meant to be an expat was nearly impossible. They couldn't understand our family's wanderlust - our vacations to other countries and regions. They were content with the beaches of Florida and the mountains of North Carolina.

As the years past my desire to see the world died off. I was content as a college student, living and loving and partying/studying hard. I didn't see a point to studying abroad, I had already lived there. I talked about living overseas a few times with friends but the conversation ended there. It wasn't until I found myself single with a lot of time on my hands did I reconsider the possibility of becoming an expat again.

I started the journey by becoming certified to teach English as a second language. After an intense 8 week program I "graduated" with my certificate and a huge binder full of activities for new English speakers. Armed with this information I started to look for ways to use my new knowledge. I attended peace corp meetings, researched Teach for America (not international but it would get me some experience in the classroom) and volunteer programs around the world. Non of it seemed to be what I was looking for, so I put the dream on the back burner and continued on with my life.

Que September of 2013 - a little pho place just outside of Atlanta. Steve and I had our first date. We laughed and talked for 4+ hours. I practically had to make him ask me on a second date. He finally did, weeks later. We had lunch at the food truck park in Atlanta. Then in November he took me to a nice Brazilian steak house where he asked me to his company holiday party in December. If you've been keeping track that's 4 dates in 4 months... ya, it was a slow starting relationship.

In May 2014 I got a new job in Braselton at Carters & OshKosh. I moved in with Steve because it cut my commute from 1 hour to 20 minutes. This was my first time living with a man so it defiantly had its growing pains but so far so good.

Steve has always been interested in international IT., so when a company approached him about a position based in the UK he was very interested. After a stressful 2 week period of interviews and waiting he got the job!

And this is where our story begins....