Twenty-four hours ago, I was driving along the Welsh countryside, stopping occasionally to look at calm stretches of chilly ocean landscape, other times to lay in luxuriously thick grassy fields and squint up at the sun.

Now, I'm in a perfectly deserted office environment in Stockholm, deserted since people are off on their holidays already and a bright, sunny day outside. Boring as hell. What a life.

I had a really nice time in Wales. I always enjoy trips to the UK, since when I am there, I feel like I'm in a "middle ground" between the US and Europe. I can breathe deeply and calmly, and understand the conversations around me (well, ok, some of the accents are a bit tricky, but I get the gist of it all). In the grocery stores I always know what everything is and how to use it. I could deal with the practical bits, like bureaucratic nightmare issues. It's ironic that I enjoy being there so much-once upon a time, I was a real flag-waving anti-English person. This, because an ex of mine was English and being there simply reminded me too much of him.

I would move there, if I could, for a number of reasons: 1) I am comfortable there, 2) I feel like I would enjoy being there, 3) I feel much more at ease, since I know the language, 4) it seems like it would be easier to make friends there. It would be tough to move there for other reasons: 1) it would feel a bit like I was "following" D, 2) my spouse has made it clear that moving to the UK not an option, in fact moving away from our house in Stockholm not an option, and 3) it would definitely mean that some envelopes would be pushed, relationship-wise.

Maybe some decisions will be made for me, anyway, in the future. But I am definitely feeling stressed by them.

- H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 12:07 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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