Through the Looking Glass

Found

Written across the center of her website and catching one's attention immediately, Robin Pascoe invites the reader to "Find yourself in my books." Available on amazon.com, I ordered a copy of A Moveable Marriage earlier this afternoon, because on Tuesday I discovered that her invitation doesn't disappoint. She spoke in Polanco to a room full of women, astonishing me as I recognized myself in her words. Not only did I find myself, I found myself validated, realizing I may be somewhat isolated, but I have never even once been alone.

Her audience was the expat woman, and in particular the woman who follows her husband to the country where he'll work, leaving her own career behind, along with the comfort of an established identity. Whether the woman is from the same country as her husband or not makes hardly a difference; she will suffer a great loss, and will often be blindsided by the grief.

I understand exactly the experience she described. It is the most difficult thing I've ever had to wrestle with. To hear that it is so common and so natural, and from someone who has lived it herself, was nothing less than a balm. In that hour, I was able to let go of the ideas I held that I have been a wimp, not adaptable enough, an ungrateful and ugly American whose troubles don't merit the tempestuous inner monologues they've provoked.

A year ago, writing to friends and family to let them know about my new life in Mexico, I talked of wedding plans and my favorite sugared figs, my in-laws and Day of the Dead. And I said that culture shock was something I hadn't expected. "It's an identity crisis," I wrote, and in a large part, I still believe it is.

Arriving in Mexico, I suddenly found myself without success at work to define me, or my friends, or my good income and the freedom it had lent me, not to mention the freedom that comes from a safe city. I missed all those things because I love them, but also because they helped buoy an identity that I liked a great deal, and without them, I felt desperately lost. In spite of the happiness that finally being with my husband brought, I grieved, often alone and confused and unsure what I should do. And it soon became clear that the financial side of life we'd both expected was not going to materialize any time soon, obligating a past sense of financial control to disappear in the wake of professional Mexico's reality.

In her website, Robin says that, "Family therapists who counsel expatriates agree that grief is an overlooked dimension of the culture shock cycle...Ask accompanying expatriate spouses anywhere in the world to identify the most overwhelming loss they feel after moving abroad and identity will likely be the near-unanimous reply," and "the sense that something is missing from their lives—possibly forever—doesn’t altogether disappear with their culture shock."

Had I known from the beginning that this would happen to me, too, along with the advice given to alleviate the situation, I may not have begun dealing with digestive problems that continue to bother me every day. “When emotions associated with grief or trauma are shoved onto the back burner, they will eventually rear their ugly head in some manner,” believes family therapist Lois Bushong, and I know she is right. But advice taken late is still better than never, and I now stand by its helpfulness to the end. Connecting to expat communities is invaluable, no matter how important it is to also try integrating into a new culture. It has helped me feel like I am reinventing my own life, for myself, releasing me from the complete dependence on my husband and his world to define who the new me would be. But not living near to other expats has been both difficult and a likely blessing. For too long, I desperately needed contact with others who shared not only a common expat denominator, but also similar interests and backgrounds. On the other hand, though, I have seen, learned about and understood so much more of Mexican life--and spent so much more meaningful time alone with Patricio--than I might have if I'd lived close to the safety net that an expat community provides. My circumstances, though still not easy, have helped to slowly work on reinventing myself into someone I'm beginning to like a great deal, too.

And I agree with Robin when she says that reinventing oneself is one of the greatest gifts an expat life can offer. Finding myself in her talk encouraged me to continue remaking myself. I'll keep taking more control, and it feels unbelievably good.   

smells like teen spirit

patricio and i have discovered our own fresh chile supply, right in our friend enrique's back yard. clinging to the high, south-facing wall is a tangled web of thin trunks and thousands of leaves, and suspended in the tangle--smooth and shiny and golden yellow--are more manzano chiles than enrique cares to pick. spotting a win-win harvest situation, patricio volunteered some picking service yesterday, and he brought home a pound of those lovely yellow, fiery fruits.

he was home early, giving us a lucky chance to spend more time together. and looking down at the weighty bag of manzanos in his hand, we knew without a word that we'd spend the afternoon in the kitchen. we'd talk about the day, the rain, and the presidential debate, side by side as we cooked up the chiles in a sauce of escabeche.

the kitchen air was soon suffused with spices boiling in vinegar, mixed with the sharp, nose-tingling smells of sliced-up onions and chiles. while we sautéed garlic and onion, soaking chile with more oil, we also soaked up the happy vibes sent out in each other's presence.

dating long-distance, and married for two months before finally calling the same place home, i think we lived through a smallish, extended crisis. and it made us particularly conscious of--and grateful for--the time we spend together. there are days when we still look at each other, with something like wonder in our faces, hardly believing we're still sitting across from one another.

it reminds me of something i see in our neighborhood, when the sun moves low and gives way to the dark. all along our street and in the park a few blocks down, the teenage contingent finds its way outdoors. some get together with their best friend groups, sitting on the curb or a driveway slab, talking about everything and nothing . or they'll pile onto a park bench, underneath the cedars, or play impromptu soccer in the dust. their energy is almost palpable; they love to be together. and so do the couples, girlfriends and their boys, whispering and giggling in front of their house's gates.

the teenage sisters who live next door often stake their claim in front of our hedge, just out of view from their living room window. with our own windows open to let in the breeze, snippets of banter make their way in, too. they hang out with their boys, wind, rain or shine, like the rest of the neighborhood kids. it's a funny balance for them to strike: that bubble of adolescent intimacy, blocking out the rest of the world, yet outside and in the open, for anyone to see.

i know it's different--that sense of urgency, the feeling that they're all that matters, and the need to be connected. but patricio and i, in our own small way, more than remember how it is. walking to the store, driving to the ranch, or making chile in a spicy-tart sauce, is still sometimes the only thing that matters.

pixels and paper

given that he didn't have any work that couldn't be managed over the phone today, patricio took me out on an all-day date in tlalnepantla. let's call it lunch and a movie, with a little errand thrown in to try keeping us from feeling completely frivolous. in truth, the errand may be considered frivolous in spite of it all: we picked up the cd's from the photographer's studio, the digital record of our wedding. frivolous or not, it felt like a small triumph as the block of jewel cases landed in patricio's hands. the force is now with us; we can bombard all our friends and family with images of december 29th with only a few clicks of the mouse-- clickably enlargeable moments like:

navigating cobble stones past the fruit and nut stand en route to the chapel,

sitting in that chapel, one of the happiest in world history,

and carrying that post-chapel happy to the dance floor, discovering the uniquely sublime pleasure of accessorizing my favorite dress with pastel paper deer antlers.

stepping out of the photography shop, we ambled toward the street where the newly unjunked jetta was parked, passing the printer's shop where our wedding invitations were born. the thread of memory that ties me to that tiny business leads to last march, when the printed word sealed our first promise. two days after patricio read a letter to my parents, his clear, warm voice asking them for my hand, we sat together in his hotel room opening various envelopes and deciding on a design for the spanish invitations (the number two would mean more than just "people" over the course of our wedding trajectory: two weddings, two sets of invitations, two honeymoons...kind of like joy squared). running my hand over the ivory example we loved, i learned that choosing between big  name invitation printers wasn't something most comprometidos do here in mexico. couples like us turn to independent printers, those who create their own designs and cater to the whims of their customers. they're infamously slow, eternally behind schedule, professionals at both printing and amiably postponing the delivery date. but the box of beautiful, artfully printed paper was a reward worth the wait.

josé salazar dominguez prints everything from baptism invitations to quinceañera party favors, binding and assembling everything from simple announcements to master's theses. his shop, like the knife grinder's, is a cluttered little empire unto itself--but a heavy treasure of levers, gears and wheels steals the foreground behind the counter. scraping the years of grease off the thick iron back-bar with his forefinger, he nodded, remembering that the beast was manufactured in ohio, in an era long before any of us were born.

though he didn't transform card stock into our invitations on that press, he still prefers it over his newer model to individually imprint page numbers. long documents still have printing privileges on that ohio artifact; to watch how it's done, click here.

unexpectedly, lunch and a movie today turned into a foray through recent memories--ones permanently imprinted--and helping us feel the welcome weight of our very good fortune. so very nice.