In grade 4 we read Gary Paulsen’s “Hatchet,” and I quickly followed it up with many of Jack London’s greats. I fed my starving little literary brain on morsels of Northern ice and adventure, scraps of wild men, embers of fires circled by snarling wolves. I grew up yearning for a life of unrivaled adventure and fierce independence.
Before boarding the plane to Sweden last August, my father held me tight and recalled those old dreams, “you always wanted to run away into the Northern woods… This is a better way to have a northern adventure.”
And I’m sure that he was right, but it’s been an adventure of different dreams.
Living abroad is an adventure and a bore all at once. Everything is new and different, and even the simplest things can be a trial. Food shopping is interesting at first, but as you grow tired of living your life by means of pictograms you find yourself cooking the same, safe, recognizable dishes over and over again.
At first the different language exhausts you and interests you, but you shortly find yourself tuning it all out… living in an auditory vacuum. In fact, when I was back in North America over the holiday, I found myself exhausted because I couldn’t help but listen in on every conversation around me—I felt obligated just because I could understand them.
The exciting sheen of originality wears off. You find yourself craving familiar things you thought you hated. I miss London traffic. I miss Hockey Night In Canada, The Beer Store, and even traffic on the 401. I miss giant stores that have whatever you want whenever you want it. Heck, I watch TV now. It’s become my best friend because it talks to me in my own language and shows me all kinds of pictures from back home.
I would kill for a Timmy’s and a breakfast sammich.
People seem to get me wrong all the time though. I’m not miserable here. In fact I quite like it, but Sweden is not my favourite country. I see why Swedes love it: it’s beautiful, there is a system for everything, everyone and everything is taken care of, life is calm and smooth and pleasing. If you fit into the parameters of the system, that is; if you don’t, you’d better enjoy breaking trail.
I’m happy I came here. I’ve met some really amazing people, I’ve had some great life and work experiences, and I’ve seen parts of the world I probably never would have seen otherwise. But I’ve come to a point where I have to make my decision…
Should I stay or should I go?
It’s a tough decision. Personally, I have no life. Professionally, things are pretty solid for me here. Back home that equation stands right on its head. So the question is, does the happiness variable come out equally in both equations? I’ve been mulling it over for months, but now I have an official deadline: have to tell Greg in Mid March.
Another fave author of mine, Terry Pratchett, mused that “the trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.” And that’s the obnoxious story of my decision, it seems.
I’m asked almost daily if I’ll stay. I understand the interest, but really… It’s a bit of a personal question, and it’s not something I plan to tell strangers (or anyone) before I tell my boss. But I guess that’s the thing with Expat communities: we throw away the formalities because we’re all breaking trail on the same mountain.
Over and over again I hear that I “have to stick it out at least two years. I cried for two years, then it started to get better. Sweden is a really great country, you know…” Uh huh. Sounds fun. The parts they forget to consider are great: I have NO Swedish spouse to tie me here, my country’s pretty darn good too, and I have a life—a good one at that—back home. I’m tired of people assuming Sweden is better than Canada and that I was yearning for a life I couldn’t find there.
Truth be told, I just wanted a job.
So remind me again why I want to cry for 2 years? A negligible increase on my maternity leave, a decreased pay, and less medical benefits?? Riiiight. Thanks for the input. I’ll make my decisions and you can stick to yours.
Seriously though, I do generally appreciate input. I am just really tired of the assumption that I came here fleeing from some lack of life or worse. I came because I wanted to teach. Now I have, and I wonder if that’s enough of a life to give up all I have at home for yet another year of my life.
I’m also sick of the guilt factor. I’m a teacher, so it’s a given that I care deeply about the kids. I’ve bonded with them, and of course I consider the fact that my mentor class has had a new co-mentor every year they’ve been there. I would love to see them through their final year at our school next year, and I would be proud to have stuck by them and supported them for as long as I could. But, just as I need to consider them, so too do I need to consider me—perhaps a little more heavily.
Yes, I am young.
But my life is finite, and I plan to spend some of it just enjoying—not just struggling and living for others.
I’ve been meditating on a Theodore Roosevelt quote daily for about a month now. “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checked by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory or defeat. “
I know I appreciate it. I know that it represents how I’ve tried to live my life. But I can’t figure out how it weighs into this decision yet. More on that later, I suppose. For now I’ll be spending my vacation time balancing those equations, searching for that elusive happiness variable.
Wish me luck. I wish you love and light.
