Bucket List

I'm on the plane, sitting in first class again (a girl could get used to this), finally headed home after what feels like a forever long time away, even though it really wasn't, and I'm reading the latest O Magazine. This isn't a magazine I typically pick up, but I saw on FB that there's an article about forgiving others in this month's issue and it caught my eye. So while looking for a magazine at the airport (magazines are my travel treat - I almost never buy one unless I'm traveling), I remembered the article and picked up O. Even though it's not a magazine I normally read, I still have to read it cover-to-cover since I have it. No skipping ahead to the article I was interested in for me. Magazines are meant to be scoured over with every word and picture analyzed. I don't want to miss anything! So while pouring through the pages, I come across an article that talks about things to take off your bucket list. Things that are only on there to please other people, for example. And it gets me thinking about how bucket lists are all the rage right now, but I've never sat down and really thought about what would be on my list. What would I be sad about if I never experienced it? And then a thought occurred to me - would living abroad have been on my bucket list prior to this? And the answer, of course, is yes. In fact, living abroad was on my unofficial bucket list for years. I would check overseas opportunities while at PwC and GT and spoke with people about how that would work. It was something I had been interested in before, just not something I had really thought about for years. I think things have been so consumed by the many consequences my marrying Davie came with, both good and bad, that I haven't given much thought to long term beyond wanting to be together and wanting to have kids. And maybe I never thought about him and I living out of the country since I know he came to the US for a better life. Given that fact, I don't think I had considered talking to him about leaving this country after he worked so hard to get here. (Other than making his leaving to work out the Visa situation a requirement, of course.) But it's kind of silly that I hadn't thought about it since he's lived in other countries before. There's the US and Nicaragua and Costa Rica. So for him, and most of the people he knows, I think, living in a different country isn't the same as it is for most of us. It's not nearly as big of a deal. 

All of that then got me thinking about why I've been so upset / worked up about leaving now, if living overseas is really something I would have said I wanted had you asked me 5 years ago. And I think it really all comes down to control. I HATE not having control over things, and this is a decision that was mostly made for me. So I've been upset about the loss of control, and understandably upset at leaving everything here behind, but I really need to be focused on the exciting adventure that is ahead of us. I have a hard time feeling more than one thing at a time, I think. I wholly commit myself to whatever emotion is strongest and I come to grips with it and consider it from all angles and talk it around in my head until I get to the point where I don't feel it as strongly anymore and I'm able to put it down and move on to the next thing. But that's been hard for me to do with my angst around moving because there's so much wrapped up into it. And I want to be happy but I'm also mad and frustrated and sad and scared and nervous and it's all just too much. But I think maybe I can start putting it down now. Realizing that, while it may not have been 100% in my control, this is still something I have been interested in for years and that I think Davie and I will be very well suited for. I think it's also something that he and I may have come to on our own, had there not been other pressing things we were trying to accomplish. I think we're at around 34 days until we go to Costa Rica. I'm getting more excited and less upset as each day goes by. My hope now is that I'll step off the plane, find Davie and immediately feel like I'm home. I know it probably won't be that quick, but I do think I'll leave there with a more secure feeling that we are doing the right thing. And, if that's the case, I may just end up happy about crossing "live overseas" off my bucket list yet. 

I will say one thing that will always be on my list is spending as much time as possible with my boys!!