Thinking about 'THE MOVE'

As the days whittle away...I am beginning to feel the anxiety in the pit of my stomach...

My friend, Rachna, asked me if I was getting ready to move...I laughed and said I am in denial. Since then I have been thinking about what I need to do to prepare. It all seems overwhelming. At this point I am not ready to leave.


It seems like many people have plans for us. Even my househelper has plans. She wants me to go to school, become a teacher and come back to work at the school. I think she doesn't really understand why 'The Sa'ab' wants to go to school again.

The most disconcerting thing for me right now is the 'not knowing'. I really can't say that I know what comes next...and I can't even articulate what I want to happen next. Living here has changed me and I know that I am not who I was, but I also know that I am struggling to find the redefinition of myself.


There are so many things I love about life here. The physical environment is second to none, to be able to stand outside our house and see the expanse of the valley beneath us; to be able to take a short walk and stand in awe of snow capped mountians. And then there is the cultural environment...a culture that operates on the basis of relationship, that views a person more holistically than most, that wants to teach you how to become one of them.


And then the girls...this place on the side of the mountain is more home than anywhere else in the world. They don't yet know what it is to be Canadian...they have grown up, at least partly, in one of the most multiethnic, multicultural, multinational, multireligious environments imaginable...and now they need to prepare to give it all up with us. Being a wife and a mommy I have become so aware that my decisions are not my own. My husband and children will be deeply affested by my choices and so I cannot make a decision as if I exist in a vacuum.


On the other side of this is the knowledge that when we land 'home' there will be familiar faces and the loving homes of friend and family. But that brings the slew of new questions: Will we fit back in? Will our friends and family have time for us? Will we annoy everyone with stories of the life we left? ...and that's only the tip of the issues that whirl in my head.

I try to set the anxieties in balance against the coming blessings...but the coming things, both blessings and challenges, are all unknowns. And it is the unknowns that are the most troubling...