My list of things I'm going to do during our first visit home.
1. Buy 20 lbs of bacon and eat some every day we are in the USA.
2. Buy 10 jars of peanut butter and repeat #1.
3. Go to Target and Somerset Mall with the express purpose of buying nothing. I simply want to walk around in awe of all the things I could buy if I wanted to.
4. Drive anywhere with no fear of having to maneuver the Hill of Death.
5. Wash dishes in a dishwasher.
6. Enjoy all the land and space we have in Michigan where there is nothing except wildlife and flora and fauna.
7. Make it 30 lbs of bacon.
8. Starbucks House coffee. Grande. Black.
9. Recycle something.
10. Enjoy the smell of Michigan.
11. Seeing options for underwear that are NOT thong related.
12. Speak English without folks staring at me.
Kids lists to follow....
Before reading any further, I'm behind in posting pics of all the wonderful things we've done in May and June. I apologize...but only a little.
See, we are busy living it all and doing it all so that we can capture the video and the pictures. So, I'm truly too busy having fun and making memories to post it all.
HOWEVER, I promise to do better. I've actually developed a plan and carved some time out that isn't at the end of the day (when I'm about to fall over from exhaustion!) when it'll be effective to put up the photos and articles. :)
Today's post is a little different though.
I try to answer the elusive question "Why?"
1. Why did you leave all your family and friends?
2. Why Brazil?
3. Why leave your job?
4. Why leave your house?
5. Why uproot your children like that?
My answer is simple.
Why not?
This usually gives people a smooshed up face and then out comes the avalanche of additional questions.
1. Well, er, ah...I mean, isn't hard?
2. Aren't your children sad and confused?
3. Aren't you tired?
4. What will you do when you get back to The States?
5. Don't you miss everyone?
6. What DO YOU DO all day?
7. How do you get around? I mean, you don't speak Portuguese right?
etc. etc. etc.
So then I ride their wave of confusion a little bit with them. Almost like I imagine a surfing coach rides on the same board with you. Helping you to try and get the feel of the balance needed.
I begin to provide some easy answers to the questions above.
1. Yes. It's been very hard.
2. Sometimes the kids are sad. Sometimes the kids are confused. We have amazing conversations though. And I am learning so much about being in tune with my little nuggets. It's really cool how much they are teaching me!
3. I'm exhausted. Like a "Newborn-Baby-At-Home" exhausted times 100.
4. I haven't thought about what we'll do when we get back to The States. After all, we are living in Brazil and I'm just starting to figure that all out.
5. We totally miss our family and friends.
6. If I gave you a list of all the things I do all day, you'd be exhausted too. Suffice it to say I'm currently the walking mortar of our family unit.
7. I don't speak Portuguese, this is true. Currently I'm using A LOT of charades and Portu-English to communicate. [See #3 above].
Feeling a bit peevish about providing these basic answers I started thinking about why we did move to Brazil. First, the obvious answers popped up.
1. Great career option for Hubby.
2. Great sabbatical for me.
3. Fiat provides some wonderful financial incentives for this type of experience.
4. Brazilian weather = fabulous!
After these initial answers, I have to go a bit deeper into my mind (soul, third eye?). The next level really looks a bit more selfish, but after conferring with Aaron, he's definitely in the same space. I feel confident listing them here.
1. Avoid "Groundhogs Day" in previous lifestyle.
2. Amazing experience for our family and our children - even the hard parts.
3. Fulfill dreams of travelling.
4. Fulfill dreams of actually LIVING somewhere else, not just vacationing.
5. Exposure to learning and living in another language.
6. So many studies say that people, especially children, who have international experiences are more empathetic, more ambitious, more aware, more _______.
As I dig even deeper for answers, I seem to circle back to the beginning answer of "Why not?"
Finally, this morning I came upon a TEDx talk that provided for me, THE BEST answer.
As humans, we don't want regret. Or, more specifically, we don't want to have guilt about regret. I know that many times when making a decision I ask myself "When I'm 70, how do I want to remember this going down?" That gut reaction of what my future self might say about my current self is where I truly begin to find the answers to my current questions. My future self provides clarity through the quagmire and also says, "Hey, don't fret about the fact that you didn't get the pounded silver handles on your new cabinets. Trust me, when you're 70, you won't care about that anyway." High-five Future Self! Got it!
Larry Smith is the speaker in this TedTalk. I don't know much about him yet. I will be doing some research on him to find out more. I like his style and I like what he says. At the 12:40-ish mark he states:
"Go for it kid, just like I did."
Once you watch this 15 minute video, you will hopefully understand why we decided to come live in Brazil.
Larry Smith - Why you will fail to have a great career
DEFINITELY a great 15 minutes to spend today!
