A stranger in two worlds

Tonight is my last night in London until December 28th. So strange. It's become home for me. It's the place where I want to rest my head, it's the place where I work, it's the place where I play and the place where I have love.

But I also call the USA home. It's where my family is, where my closest friends are located and where my childhood and early adulthood memories are based.

I have two homes. And I think that makes me lucky.

Many people when they move to a new country have quite a few adjustment issues. Some become depressed, so just can't deal with the differences. I think moving to London from Boston is much easier than many other moves. Both cities are quite similar in feel - there's a variety of 'sections' of the city, some of which actually have a large village-like feel. Both get crazy busy in parts with tourists...but you can still see lovely sights despite that fact. Both have a similar transportation system in buses and trains.

The only truly hard part for me was leaving my friends and the familiar. I knew where to go shopping, or how to rent a place...how to do my laundry and how to deal with medical issues. Here, in England, it's a bit different. And the language, while similar, is not quite the same. I had no clue what a courgette was...or that someone would readily call me 'love' without batting an eye.

When I head back to the States, I actually feel quite odd. People are driving on the opposite side of the road. Their accents are different. You can access stores so much later - yes, 24 hours means it's open 24 hours every day of the week! The subtle changes in what I call things over here makes it tough to talk about items at times...I have to change my thinking/wording to American.

So - I don't fully fit yet over here. And I probably never will...though I'm quite comfortable in my life in London. But I also now don't feel like I fit in the US. And I'm not quite as comfortable with that. I think all expats who stay in a country for a good period of time feel that way. Maybe it helps us in this transition. Maybe it makes us citizens of the world.