the other day was what i like to call my 7 year “move-iversary”. it’s been seven years since i set foot on this damp and crowded island, intending to make a new life for myself. seven years is a long time, and while i still occassionally marvel at the equal amounts of courage and naivete i had when i first arrived, the fact is that for better or for worse, this city has been “home” now for a while.

i suppose the strangest bit is that i truly never intended to be here this long – because while i like london, i have never loved it. oh, i may have my random days of infatuation (usually coinciding with the rarity of a warm, sunny weekend), when i can hardly believe that i live in a city with so much history, but overall, london is just not that great a fit for me. too bound in tradition, too restrictive, too far from anything resembling nature, too crowded. as much as i’ve gotten used to it, i still can’t believe that in a city of 8 million people, the shops all close at 6pm, the tube closes at 12:30, and you can’t buy a bottle of shampoo over 250 ml (8oz).

but i have gotten used to it. it’s the norm, now, for me to use anglicised spellings, metric measurements, and telephone numbers that can have anywhere from 9-11 digits. i’ve stopped puzzling over these things (which still, to a large extent, baffle me) and simply internalised them. this is home, the not-so-new normal.

and it has become immensely easier over the years to be an american, here in blighty. my first flat had no internet (something which i promptly rectified), no cable, and a fridge the size you’d use to store beer in a frathouse living room. everything was small, different, and confusing. it was alien, and alienating – i found myself clinging to “friends” reruns and hiding in my room a lot.

but it was also the kind of cultural immersion of the kind you’d be hard pressed to experience nowadays. things, as they say, have changed. these days there are actual coffeemakers you can purchase in the shop (instead of making do with a one-cup caffetiere/french press). there are more crappy american television shows than you can shake a stick at. there are actual lactose-free products in the dairy aisle (seven years ago, the phrase “lactose intolerant” was completetly unheard of, and trying to explain that you couldn’t eat dairy in a country which reveres milk and cheese was like trying to explain monogamy to tiger woods.) there is skype and there are free long-distance minutes handed out like candy by the mobile companies. there is (loathe as i am to admit it) facebook – allowing me to reconnect with people i thought i’d lost, and helping us to stay interwoven in each other’s lives. there is (holy of holies!) live-streaming baseball, and international amazon.com shipping. being an expat today is completely different – the boundaries between europe and america are becoming more blurred every day.

don’t get me wrong: there is still lots of stuff i miss. american-sized jeans, flavoured coffees, good antiperspirants, and bras are all things i still stock up on when i am back in the states visiting. (the bra thing? don’t ask. i have never found a good-fitting bra here, ever.)

but more importantly, there are things which cannot be imported. spending time with my failing grandfather. being present for the births of my nephew and niece. hot summers by the ocean, going for hikes in the mountains, the freedom of driving speeding down a wide, empty highway. so many of the loves that make my heart sing are so far away.

and to complicate matters, there are freedoms i enjoy here that i would never want to go back to living without. universal healthcare, ample holiday allowances, ease of travel, good beer, eu privileges and protections. these are the fully british rights that i have incorporated as part of my worldview, that have shaped my priorities and politics, for future and forevermore.

i have lived in this strange place of limbo for seven years now – one foot in each world, fully a part of neither, being at “home” in a place i still don’t understand and don’t love, being away from “home” where my family lives but i no longer fit in.

yes, it has gotten easier, thanks largely to technology and the creep of globalisation. (evil globalisation – the boon to the expat. who knew?) but even after seven years, it’s still not easy. i don’t imagine it ever will be – expatica complicates and changes your life in a way that no one can predict. it remains difficult for my family, (and often myself) to understand why i electively live so far away from some of the things that matter most to me in the world. it’s a compulsion that has taken me down a path that i couldn’t reverse if i tried. or wanted to.

like me, this post is a bit of a mish-mash that doesn’t know where it’s going. all i know is that being an expat has long since gone from being a choice about *where* i live, to a choice about *how* i live. from a piece of nomenclature, to a fundamental piece of my identity. the world will change, and my place of residence will change, but that bit of me that has irrevocably changed, will never change.

as long as seven years may seem when i reflect back, looking forward, i know it is only just the beginning.

stranded – sambassadeur

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