We live in the future

It has not escaped our notice, being so far away from friends and family, how fortunate we are that we live in an age of email, text messages, smart phones, digital photographs and even video calls.  (Video calls!  This is “the future”!  When I was a kid, the concept of a video phone was half-joking.  And not only can we talk over the computer, but it’s FREE.)  It helps us so much to be able to communicate so quickly and easily with everyone back home and with each other.  (Being without phones for our first month here, and without internet for a week recently has increased our recognition of how wonderful these things are.)

In the past 72 hours, we’ve spoken by video call with every one of our parents, as well as two of my sisters, and I’ve “spoken” by text to my brothers.  Without being able to do that, we’d be feeling even further isolated and distant from our loved ones.  We’re able to show them our new apartment as we get things set up, we’re able to chat about everything from the logistics of selling our house to simple things in every day life.  (Amanda even tried to teach Benjamin to play the spoons today over Skype, and she and I are playing games with our iPhones from 4000 miles away.)  Benjamin is able to keep a connection with his family at an age where memory can be a fleeting thing.  He loves talking on the computer to his family — he knows all the sounds that happen when we’re setting up a call and he will excitedly come over and ask, “Mommy, who are we calling?” (which is often then followed by a request list of everyone he can think of).  For Liam, some of his first memories of his family may eventually be of talking to them on the computer.  And, for everyone at home, as heart wrenching as it may be to see my kids’ progress via computer calls and digital pictures, I can only imagine how hard it would be if the updates came less frequently and vividly.

It’s also keeping me sane — it’s hard not to feel isolated when I’m spending 10+ hours a day at home with the kids.  Benjamin is a good communicator for a 2 year old, but realistically, he’s not always listening to me or inclined to respond.  And, as much as I love discussing dump trucks or Team Umizoomi, I like a little more variety in my conversation.  It’s a nice thing to be able to have a “grown up” interaction, even just by email, during the day.  And knowing that, when things get hard, I have so many friends and family out there, willing to talk and be supportive, is hugely comforting.

But, it’s not just talking to people back home.  I can look up a map of where I am and where I want to go.  I can find a place to eat or a U stop while I’m out and about.  I can let Dan know where we’re going and when we’ll be back.  I can even look up how to say things, or translate what I hear and see.  I have a safety net here, in a strange city, where I don’t speak the language, because I have my phone in my pocket.  And, we can coordinate more mundane things, like grocery shopping and dinner plans.  I truly have a hard time imagining having taken this on before this type of technology existed — in the same way I can’t believe that there was a time where I went out driving alone in my car as a teenager without a cell phone . . . with the plan of walking to a pay phone if something happened to my car!  (Uphill!  Both ways!  In the snow!)

We are so grateful for technology.  It’s keeping us in touch with our families, and it’s making the transition here easier.  (I love my iPhone.  I don’t care.)

Help at Home

We received our air shipment today.  We have no idea why it took so long, but now we can close the “waiting for our stuff” chapter of this adventure and move on to all the other (and more exciting) parts.

While we’ve been here, getting relatively settled, and waiting for our stuff, we’ve had a ton of support back at home with the mountainous pile of tasks that were left undone after our departure.  My mom has been doing a tremendous amount of work for us: preparing our house for sale and dealing with getting my car inspected so it can be sold.  My dad and my brothers spent part of this week painting our old apartment.  And that is all on top of the fact that we literally would not have made it to our plane if it had not been for the help of my collective family.

I am so grateful for their help and support.  (Especially considering that, on the whole, I think they’d rather we hadn’t gone at all.)  It is nice to have my stuff, but I’m truly fortunate to have the support of such wonderful, loving people.

To my family:  I love and miss you all so much.  Thank you for all of your help.  We feel very loved.  I can’t wait to see you and show you Vienna!

Mother’s Day

018I love being a mom.  It is the single best decision I have ever made.  I am so thrilled, amazed and overjoyed with my boys — I am grateful every day for having them in my life.  I am humbled to be entrusted as the guardian of their kind hearts, open minds and sweet spirits.  I love them more than I knew was possible.

I love my Mom.  She is loving and generous and thoughtful.  She gave me magic in my childhood (and still does now).  She is fierce and determined when it comes to her family.  She is strong and resourceful beyond my understanding.  She is such a source of comfort and support for me and it brings me so much happiness to see the love she and my children have for each other.

034I love my step-mother.  I cannot imagine the challenge she took on in coming into our family (which at the time had four teenagers).  She is warm and funny and confident.

I miss my grandmother.  She was tough and mysterious and particular.  She told great stories.  She would have loved my kids.

I love and miss all of my family very much today.  I am really feeling the distance.

Auf Wiedersehen, Hollandstrasse 8.

012We left behind our first “home” in Vienna this morning.  I already miss it.  We moved into a new place, in another part of the city.  It’s smaller, it’s not as nice, and it’s not as much in the area that we want to be in.  That said, it is really neat to check out a different part of the city, and I think it will ultimately give us a more well-rounded view of Vienna.  It’s clean, it’s safe, it’s near a metro and it has everything we really need.  Benjamin is sleeping in the living room, but he’s happy.  Liam has a gigantic portacrib (I think he’s the only one whose sleeping situation improved) and he’s asleep and happy, too.  That’s what’s important.

Yesterday, I was really stressing about this place and this move.  It’s not ideal, and it’s not what I wanted to have happen.  I can think of several other places I’d rather be staying at the moment (not all of them on this side of the Atlantic).  But, so what?  It’s not really a big deal.  As my sister, Amanda, said, “This will be a fond memory soon.”  She may be entirely right.  It’s quite possible that the effort that goes in to making this place our home for the next week will cause it to be remembered fondly in the end.

So often, it’s the shared challenges that we remember with a laugh and a smile with our families.  I was talking with my dad this afternoon about exactly that, when he reminded me of “that camping trip when it rained”.  I think everyone who has camped with any regularity has a good “rainy camping” story, and in our case, we awoke in the middle of the night with the runoff from the mountains actually running (with some volume and force) THROUGH the middle of the tent.  I think it was spring time, and not warm at all.  We spent the rest of the night cranky and sodden in the car, and went damply home (early) the next day.  At the time, I’m sure I was grumpy about it.  I know I was wet and cold.  Today, my dad and I shared a sincere and happy laugh about it.  I really, truly, remember that trip fondly.  It’s a memory I share with my dad and my siblings.  We ALL remember it.  We shared the struggle together, we got through it together, and it even contributed to my mental picture of myself (and my family) as relatively hardy campers (even though we didn’t last the rest of the weekend, it didn’t stop us from camping again, many times).  I don’t remember exactly how old I was (early teens?) and I don’t remember much of the other details about that trip (they all tend to blend together as a happy melange in my mind).  But I think of it fondly.  I think if it’s possible to have a happy teenage memory of being soaked, miserable and cold in the woods with my family, then it’s certainly possible that this little apartment will be remembered with a laugh and a smile (if at all) as part of our adventure.  Thanks, to my family, for reminding me of that.