About a month ago, Allie and I went for lunch in Romsey after “nursery” pick up. Allie was, and still is, incredibly cute in her school uniform and spectacles charming people everywhere we go. Whilst we were eating, three older ladies joined us in the back of a small café. They had just come from Cameo Club, a ladies’ monthly social group and one of the ladies arrived without her handbang, which caused a literal three alarm fire calamity I bore witness too.
The lady shop owners took action and rang the local hall (and to my surprise offered to run up and get it for this lady, but no answer…). Meanwhile, the three elderlies dug out their mobile phones, sorted out how to use them and slowly left messages here and there (quite possibly one of those messages was left with MI5). Many ‘oh dears’ were uttered by this lady and her pals…..she had no money to buy her tea, no bus pass to get home, and on and on. I piped up, trying to be kind and reassuring, and told her “we’ve all done it” and “it will turn up”. I told her about the time I invited my friend Sarah out for lunch at a New Mexican restaurant in Edmonton, and showed up penniless.
The ladies ended up asking where we were from as I have very distinct accent here. I am often mistaken for Americans and not to brag, but people really perk up when they here we are Canadians. Many people here have connections to Canada and they seem to love our country. Purse lady had a brother who moved to Canada, married and worked in Toronto for years, and retired to Elliott Lake, Ontario.
Shortly thereafter, I ran into purse lady in the town centre – with her purse! She had already been to the bank and paid her friend back for lunch (the horror of owing a friend money seemed unconscionable) and was happily trotting around doing her shopping before she got on the bus home.
Now had this scenario played out at home in Canada at Tim Horton’s (or in the USA) the cashier most likely would have been Filipino (in the USA, Mexican), had English as a second language, and quite frankly given two fucks about some o ladies missing purse. Not because they do not care, but mostly because of the 20 people queued up behind them looking for donuts.
Despite the hordes of people living on this small island there is still a strong sense of community in these parts, people know each other and help each other out. Somebody at Ikea helped me to my car last week because I was alone! Reminds me of the Maritimes thirty years ago. In many, MANY other ways, I think the world has passed England by, but not in this way. Maybe the rest of us have it wrong.
I wanted to write about this story because it is light and all my attempts at blogging that past few weeks have been a dump of negative energy, which I mostly deleted in a fit of “this blog is stupid; nobody is going to read this”, followed by classic self-loathing “I can’t write; I am stupid, old, and fat”.
Moving internationally is really hard. Learning a new way of life is tiring. Unpacking, organizing, replacing every wretched curtain and light shade in this house, getting a near concussion pulling coats out of the crawl space, I mean, hall closet, a disappointing 40th birthday, tired kids, tired husband, missing my tribe and old routines, trying not to eat my feelings, death of Tom Petty, and this week Gord Downie….….you get the picture.
One thoughtful gift my husband got me for my birthday was a book, which I heard about on BBC Radio 4, while living at the cottage. It is total chick lit about an Irish couple who go “on a break” for six months. Everybody is getting it for Christmas – it has laugh out loud humour, mid-life crises, great sex and also touches on a real issues like women’s access to abortion (which but the way in Ireland is still completely illegal, including in cases of rape, incest or fatal fetal abnormalities, women travel to England or take illegal online pills).
https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/273732/the-break/
I am pushing through and looking forward to officially starting my job next week. The thought of trying to make some friends here still seems like too much work. I am thankful for some lovely American ExPat wives who have pulled me under their wing and showing me the important things, e.g. where to find good mac and cheese, condensing dryer moral support, and how to how travel to Geneva for £50 from Southampton. THANK YOU ladies.
I am holding out on my English neighbour who could be a friend. She has 3 kids, looks like Posh Spice and stepped out of Vogue, is partner in a law firm and already slipped a Christmas party invitation under our door. Of course she is skinny too. I want to hate her for all these things but she’s too lovely. Her husband, equally cute, runs a ½ marathon about every other weekend and makes all of my attempts at fitness, well, laughable!
For a last bit of fun, I have to share this. I booked a cleaning service online, mostly because of the business name, and like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious they magically appeared on my doorstep last Monday morning. Just like Mary Poppins, except, well Latvian and Polish, but I digress they could clean like nobody’s business and a house cleaned by somebody other than yourself, even if only clean for 5 minutes, does a woman good.
Italics – some of my favorite English words used here.
A few photos of 40th birthday tea, it was lovely but not Big Bang 40. That’s to come in 2017/18.
