To put it mildly, I have been obsessing about home lately. I don't even know if what I've been doing qualifies as homesickness. I think it goes beyond that and crosses over into possible pathological disorder. I do something like wash my hands in my host family's bathroom and am flooded with images of memories I never even knew I had, washing my hands in various places around my house. I almost started crying in class today (I am not exaggerating, I had to wipe an actual, literal, tear) because out of nowhere I got this picture-perfect flash of what it will be like meeting my parents at Dulles. And I think about American food like... All. The. Time. Right now as I type my brain is cycling through possibilities of What I Would Eat Right Now If I Could. In fact, it does that on some level for most of my waking hours. Yeah, it's that bad.
Now, I have been quite ill, and as everyone knows sickness can pretty quickly wear down a person's resistance and resolve. Came down with a bad cold and cough two Sundays ago, which morphed into a terrific stomach flu last Sunday, and is just on its way out today (God I hope so, anyway). Nothing makes me want my Mom more than a series of 3, 4, and 5 AM staggerings to the toilet with a 102 fever. Also, that approach of SPRING which I have been so exultantly crowing about since January has yet to make an appearance despite promises from several Georgians.
I am trying to keep my spirits up. I promise you I am. I gave myself quite a long and impassioned pep talk last night as a matter of fact. I want to re-find my mojo and rekindle that excitement about visiting all those places I keep saying I'm going to visit soon. I am likely going to Armenia in a month. Armenia. That's awesome. How many people do you know who have been to Armenia?
I fear that I just might be... coming to the end of it. The end of my metaphorical expat strength, although that sounds unnecessarily dramatic. I struggle to remember to enjoy the extraordinary and remarkable things around me because I know in my heart that I would a jillion times rather be eating tuna noodle casserole and drinking Two Buck Chuck while watching House Hunters International with my parents and dog while wearing my green LL Bean robe and playing Angry Birds on my iPhone.
Back during the summer, when I was having some issues with various things, I wrote in my journal something to the effect of "If you slip into Waiting, that will be it. Any remaining joy will leech out of this experience, and you will find you have wasted your time here."
That still could not be more true. In fact, it is truer now than ever, because I am in a new place with new people and have more opportunities than ever before. With my second job, I have the means to take advantage of these opportunities in a way I couldn't otherwise. My new host family is great, and I know very well that I simply could not be placed in nicer accommodations. I have precious little to complain about (besides recent gastrointestinal explosions) and I still have three more months here. That's a long time to wish you were somewhere else, especially when I fought so freaking long and hard to get here in the first place.
It's not so long that I can afford to waste any time being unhappy.
Yes, I am aware of the irony. Also aware that I need to snap the fuck out of this. I keep trying. Looking back, it seems I have been trying ever since I got back from Okinawa. I keep blaming the winter, but how far can that excuse really stretch?
Again, I think I might be just done. "So long and thanks for all the kinkhali, Georgia." I don't want that to be true but if it's one thing I know about myself, my heart rarely if ever listens to my head.
My homesickness is so encompassing that it is even affecting my motivation to solidify my next step. I am researching options across the globe -- mainly Chile, Argentina, and Turkey, but even as I write my cover letters, and mean everything I say, I can't stop thinking about cleaning up the backyard garden with my Dad and then sharing a beer on the wooden swing. I think about all the birthdays, get-togethers, dinners and Caps game viewings that my friends keep on having without me. While I am making memories over here, how many memories have I missed?
But the thing is, I know that returning home, for good, will not be the blissful idyllic party that I am so constantly imagining. And this, unfortunately, becomes the heart of the matter. As I said in an email last night to a friend:
"If I give up, and come home for more than just a visit, I will need to get a job. I do not want a job. I do not want a job so violently and completely that I would rather voluntarily exile myself to the second world for the foreseeable future than face the possibility of getting another Ursula for a boss."
Of course, when I say job, I am talking about the kind of job I would have to get back in DC. The very crux of everything I ran so hard from, gave up everything to get away from. The possibility of going back to THAT? After only little over a year? Makes me feel like dying. It would, in fact, feel exactly like giving up, like the most complete and abject failure of my entire life.
I'm not doing that.
So here I am. Grimly, teeth-grittingly determined to enjoy these last months in Sakartvelo, and praying that the two months or however long I get before The Next Phase will be anything close to long enough.
Now, I have been quite ill, and as everyone knows sickness can pretty quickly wear down a person's resistance and resolve. Came down with a bad cold and cough two Sundays ago, which morphed into a terrific stomach flu last Sunday, and is just on its way out today (God I hope so, anyway). Nothing makes me want my Mom more than a series of 3, 4, and 5 AM staggerings to the toilet with a 102 fever. Also, that approach of SPRING which I have been so exultantly crowing about since January has yet to make an appearance despite promises from several Georgians.
I am trying to keep my spirits up. I promise you I am. I gave myself quite a long and impassioned pep talk last night as a matter of fact. I want to re-find my mojo and rekindle that excitement about visiting all those places I keep saying I'm going to visit soon. I am likely going to Armenia in a month. Armenia. That's awesome. How many people do you know who have been to Armenia?
I fear that I just might be... coming to the end of it. The end of my metaphorical expat strength, although that sounds unnecessarily dramatic. I struggle to remember to enjoy the extraordinary and remarkable things around me because I know in my heart that I would a jillion times rather be eating tuna noodle casserole and drinking Two Buck Chuck while watching House Hunters International with my parents and dog while wearing my green LL Bean robe and playing Angry Birds on my iPhone.
Back during the summer, when I was having some issues with various things, I wrote in my journal something to the effect of "If you slip into Waiting, that will be it. Any remaining joy will leech out of this experience, and you will find you have wasted your time here."
That still could not be more true. In fact, it is truer now than ever, because I am in a new place with new people and have more opportunities than ever before. With my second job, I have the means to take advantage of these opportunities in a way I couldn't otherwise. My new host family is great, and I know very well that I simply could not be placed in nicer accommodations. I have precious little to complain about (besides recent gastrointestinal explosions) and I still have three more months here. That's a long time to wish you were somewhere else, especially when I fought so freaking long and hard to get here in the first place.
It's not so long that I can afford to waste any time being unhappy.
Yes, I am aware of the irony. Also aware that I need to snap the fuck out of this. I keep trying. Looking back, it seems I have been trying ever since I got back from Okinawa. I keep blaming the winter, but how far can that excuse really stretch?
Again, I think I might be just done. "So long and thanks for all the kinkhali, Georgia." I don't want that to be true but if it's one thing I know about myself, my heart rarely if ever listens to my head.
My homesickness is so encompassing that it is even affecting my motivation to solidify my next step. I am researching options across the globe -- mainly Chile, Argentina, and Turkey, but even as I write my cover letters, and mean everything I say, I can't stop thinking about cleaning up the backyard garden with my Dad and then sharing a beer on the wooden swing. I think about all the birthdays, get-togethers, dinners and Caps game viewings that my friends keep on having without me. While I am making memories over here, how many memories have I missed?
But the thing is, I know that returning home, for good, will not be the blissful idyllic party that I am so constantly imagining. And this, unfortunately, becomes the heart of the matter. As I said in an email last night to a friend:
"If I give up, and come home for more than just a visit, I will need to get a job. I do not want a job. I do not want a job so violently and completely that I would rather voluntarily exile myself to the second world for the foreseeable future than face the possibility of getting another Ursula for a boss."
Of course, when I say job, I am talking about the kind of job I would have to get back in DC. The very crux of everything I ran so hard from, gave up everything to get away from. The possibility of going back to THAT? After only little over a year? Makes me feel like dying. It would, in fact, feel exactly like giving up, like the most complete and abject failure of my entire life.
I'm not doing that.
So here I am. Grimly, teeth-grittingly determined to enjoy these last months in Sakartvelo, and praying that the two months or however long I get before The Next Phase will be anything close to long enough.
I KNOW.
ReplyDelete-katie
There are other kinds of jobs out there. They don't have to be in the kind of ridiculously stressful line of work you were in before.
ReplyDeleteI know... but unfortunately stress is *usually* commesurate with salary, and DC is an expensive place to live. :)
DeleteMary, you and me, we're so alike in so many ways. It's kind of spooky. But, while I endured an endless parade of unfulfilling jobs and longed for something more, you have done something about it. Mary, your Georgia adventure is a once in a lifetime chance. Embrace it, build memories, and love the hand that life has dealt you. Go to Armenia and watch the sun set over a strange landscape. Revel in your freedom to do this thing. You will always have home. You can always come back. But don’t come back until the adventure is complete. There will be plenty of time to get back to the work-a-day world. But for now there is so much more to do, to see, to experience.
ReplyDeleteDamn, I am just one lucky daughter to have you for my Dad.
DeleteEven in my most homesick moments, I do know what an incredible adventure I've been given. That's why I so want to shake this off and start kicking ass again. :) Coming home will be one of the best things that has ever happened to me, but there is no sense in wasting all the time that comes before then!
Love.
There's nothing wrong in wanting the comfort of home. I've always said that I've wanted to build a life so my adventuring friends could always find a place to rest in between adventures - an adventurer's inn to coin a trope.
ReplyDeleteThen you can head out to kick ass, see new things, and explore once again.
There's a reason there's a cycle in D&D of: Inn/Town -> Dungeon -> Inn/Town to restock/resuppy -> Dungeon so on and so forth. There needs to be recovery and restocking of supplies, not just of the physical but the emotional and mental.
I'm being inordinately geeky aren't I?
Man, I miss geekiness so much!
DeleteAnd I need a serious restocking of emotional supplies. Even if I am only home for a short time, I definitely want to stop by your adventurer's inn.
That sounded strangely dirty somehow. :)
It is the weather, Mary. I know you think it is a weakness in you or something, your burnt out, but i have not spoken with a single TLGer in the last two-three weeks who is happy, whether they have been here a year or a month. Endless days of rain (it is proper snow in Poti right now, WHAT IS GOING ON) with constant promises by host-families and co-teachers that the weather will straighten itself out soon and they can never remember a fall like the one we just had or a spring like this one (small help when I have only been here for the fall and spring mostly...)are enough to drive us all up a wall. Add that to the fact that a mere 8 hours away (in time-zones), our family and friends are wearing t-shirts and shorts! Of course we are cracking. But none of us will be broken, we have made travel plans, we are breaking up the routine and when we return from various other countries, the weather WILL be better. Or at least warmer. Because it just has to be!
ReplyDelete(Did I come off as panicked about that as I feel?)