Putting away the Puzzle

I guess what this is all about is trying to get my head around our blessings.

Which is hard. Because we are inundated in a culture of want, of aspiration, of striving for something better, of fixating on what comes next. Plus, I'm a planner. And an over-thinker...

For the last decade Brent and I have lived in many beautiful places: six cities in four countries, with travel to a dozen more. And for the last six years we have called San Diego home. Iconic Southern California: palm trees; white sand beaches; eternal summer. But it also has plenty of concrete. And freeways. Gridlock. People. Box stores. Crime. Urban sprawl. Standardized tests. Smog. 

Which is a stark contrast to my current view: driving through New England, surrounded by
Vermont's verdant green hills, feeling the familiar tightening in my throat which accompanies the drive to the airport. Every. Single. Time. This place feels like home. And as beautiful and vibrant as life is in San Diego, it feels temporary. Like we are familiar visitors, long term tourists, snowbirds that forgot to leave in the summer, six times.

Brent gets the feeling too, both in Vermont and in Victoria (don't even get me started on the power Vancouver Island holds over me). It's been going on for over eight years now, this strange puzzle we just can't seem to solve, but keep playing because it is always there, always demanding out attention. How To Move Home. 

Ten months ago we came close, so close we started touring schools for T to start kindergarten. I met with my potential new employers. We took our umpteenth tour with the kindest real estate agent on the planet, who has been indulging in our dream to own a home in Vermont since we met. When that opportunity fell through we nearly fell apart. 

Luckily, the closed door/open window metaphor seems to apply...in the ensuing months things have gotten better in San Diego. Work improved with a promotion and new opportunities, opportunities I may not have in small town Vermont or Victoria. T's school options started looking better; N started attending their excellent preschool. Brent went back to school. Significantly, we also took a closer look at the community we have formed in San Diego. We still miss family, achingly so, but we have small circles of very close friends who offer each other a pseudo family. And we do our best to go home, a lot.

Should that be enough? For now at least? I feel like that's where we need to get to. 

The challenge of being a family that travels, starting with a couple from two countries who met in a third and have lived and will continue to live in far flung locales, is that you will never be able to be in all places at once. You must accept that and do what you can to divide your time and maintain your connections to your homes however possible. As for so many clichés: easier said than done.

Because I feel there's something else at play now that we have kids: time. My biological clock was fairly quiet while I was having my babies. Now that we're done it has gotten markedly louder, ticking the moments away from their first cry, to their first steps, and now toward the rapid end of toddlerhood for N and the first day of Kindergarten for T. It, more than anything is turning my eyes towards the Puzzle every time I manage to get it tucked safely on a shelf. Its incessant marking of their growing up reminds me daily, sometimes hourly, that my firstborn did not go to St. Christopher's Montessori School, as I did. She will not start kindergarten at the Neighborhood Schoolhouse in the woods as Brent did. They are not growing up Canadian as I always assumed my children would, singing Oh Canada, learning about multiculturalism and hopefully attending French immersion. They are not growing up in a home or neighborhood surrounded by trees and nature where even at age 2 and 5 we would be comfortable with them playing outside on their own until the sun dips low and we call them in for dinner, like my parents did with me. They don't have their cousins in town to take them to a beach with driftwood trees taller than they are, looking out at the snow capped Olympic mountains across the straight. All of my best childhood memories do not exist in San Diego. 

For some reason it really bothers me that our children will grow up with different sights and smells that will one day make them nostalgic. I guess because it was precisely those childhood feelings and memories that created my sense of Home, and to where I want to return (in addition to the distinctive ocean, mountains, towering pines and cedars of the Canadian west coast, I'm certain that I fell in love with Vermont so quickly because it reminded me of the quiet forests, rivers and lakes of Half Moon Lake, where I was born in Alberta). As time passes, T and N are forming those same (nostalgic?) memories of the desert, the Santa Ana winds, crowded beaches, and the smells and bustle of a city of 2+ million.  When their father and I want to retire in B.C. are they going to choose to settle their families back in SoCal?

So what options do we have? Obviously, finances tip the scale. The reason we went to and have stayed in San Diego is our work. There are very few places in Victoria or Brattleboro where we could earn a comparable pay check and have the professional opportunities we have now. But there are a couple. My chances of actually being employed by them would be much higher if I had my PhD, which is a possibility if we stay in San Diego. 

 

So a long term plan is forming...Stay in San Diego, do my PhD while the kids are still small, while I continue to work and move up the professional ladder. Then consider looking for positions in Victoria or Vermont. T will be 10, N, 7. B and I, over 40?! Oh Lord.

Can we keep the Puzzle shelved that long? Will my clock keep ticking for another 5 years without deafening me or worse, stopping all together? Will we become complacent to life in a metropolis by that time, unable to leave the perks and move to a smaller, slower way of life? Will our children have lost the best, most impressionable years of their lives for them to be in such an environment? 

As soon as the plane lands in B.C., or the car from the airport crosses the Vermont state line these questions begin to clamor in my brain, clouding our precious time with the urgent crisis of how to solve the Puzzle - how and when? Sometimes they stop once we land in San Diego, often they don't.  So during this trip I tried to focus, as I said at the beginning, on our blessings. Rather than obsess about the future, appreciate our present. We spend a week or two every summer and winter and occasionally spring and fall in our homes - both of them! 

Our kids are growing up 90% outdoors, in a virtually bilingual city; they are getting 2.5 years each in a fabulous Reggio Emilia preschool, have four neighborhood playgrounds within walking distance, spend many weekends building sand castles on beaches most families only get to vacation to, and are surrounded by an excellent group of multicultural friends who are learning similar lessons of community and social justice from their parents. My current job has allowed them to travel to places like Prague and Nepal, and make annual trips to see their mom give presentations at the UN. 
 

They also get to see their cousins at least 2-3 times a year, go swimming in Vermont rivers, hiking in the woods, and skiing in the winter. They know their way around Oak Bay, Windsor Park and B.C. ferries and see their grandparents nearly every other month in San Diego or B.C. or Vermont or New York or England. Last night Noah's lullaby request was Oh Canada.

They are getting the best of three homes now, and while short trips aren't the same as settling into the routines of living somewhere, the regularity with which they visit our families in Victoria and Brattleboro build the kind of familiarity and nostalgia I formed with England - a place I still consider one of my homes.

So I'm going to try my best to put away the Puzzle. Stop fretting over our life path, and whether we've somehow vered off where we are supposed to be. I need to disengage from the hype around fast paced professional achievement VS meaningful rural (or Canadian) living. Maybe it's not an either/or. Maybe we're doing exactly what we're supposed to, and the only reason the clock is ticking is to remind me to stop focusing on the future or I won't get to enjoy these too-quickly passing days. 

 

What the World Looks Like

I wrote this post mid-July. Unfortunately, the bombardment of Gaza has resumed, violence continues to rage in Iraq, Syria, Ukraine, and elsewhere; ISIS beheaded a colleague's friend last week. It is still relevant a month later.

Today was a bad day.

Last night four young boys--someone's babies--were blown up on a beach in Gaza. This morning a Malaysian Airways 777 passenger plane was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 passengers on board. Buddhist extremists are killing Muslims in southern Sri Lanka. Iraq is descending into civil war after a decade of occupation and conflict that has cost upwards of half a million lives.

These are the news headlines these days. But to me, they are affecting the communities--for some the families--of women I know.

That is the result of the work I do, fostering personal relationships with 44 women from 35 conflict-affected countries. We have women peacebuilders and human rights defenders from many--maybe most--of the world's hot spots, and we just selected four more.

It means the numbers aren't dry statistics, they are friends' nations, and their families. I wrote once that issues of war and peace do not take place primarily in board rooms at the UN, they take place in people's living rooms, on their soccer fields, on a beach where their children like to play.

So my reaction isn't to change the channel, or let simplistic reporting drone in one ear and out the next. It's to get on Facebook or e-mail and make sure they're OK. To tune in to the discourse, what intervention will there be? Is anyone speaking sanely? Is violence simply going to beget violence yet again?

What would foreign policy look like if the majority of the world had friends in these conflict zones? Would anger rise hotter and faster? Would the desire for revenge flow freely between borders?

Or would more people cry out for calm? Demand that their political and military leaders be more creative in their diplomacy; work harder to seek solutions.

If everyone knew the women I know--and the tens of thousands like them--the peacebuilders who are finding and implementing non-violent ways to resolve these conflicts, they might have hope. Hope that military solutions aren't always, or even often, necessary. That amping up the violence only leads to more violence. Revenge only perpetuates a cycle. It is shortsighted. And it is cowardly.

The warhawks like to perpetuate a misconception that peacebuilding is "soft." In even mainstream circles, peace is equated with idealism. Those who seek dialogue are not as tough or courageous as those who turn to military solutions in the face of violence.

But if they knew the women I know...the women who are risking their lives, and that of their families not to end these conflicts from behind the barrel of a gun, but from the equally courageous approach of speaking to "the Other." Women who are just as likely to be raped, tortured or killed by holding a meeting with families of combatants, or the combatants themselves, or the military or political leaders ordering those attacks. Women who are vilified, ostracized, targeted, not only by the enemy they are willing to approach, but by their own communities, for doing so.

If you knew these women, knew the names if their children, spouses, parents; if you knew the activities they were engaged in, if you knew they were probably in the protest that was violently suppressed, they were in meetings in the villages the drones are targeting; you would see the news differently. You would see conflict differently. You would see peace differently. 

But not only because the stakes would be higher, touch closer to the familiar, but luckily, because within these tragedies you would know there were those fighting for justice; there were those mobilizing, now, for an alternative to further violence. And those women are powerful, capable, dedicated and strong.

Even in these dark times, there is reason to hope.

Puppy Racketeering

It's been a few months since I've written. You may have been wondering what we are up to. Well for the last two weeks, it's been a long and frequently private, shadowy process. Handing over our most personal and private identifying information. Long (40+ qu.) essay-answer applications. Payments (read: bribes) to shady individuals. Private interviews. Inspections of our home and family. Classified correspondence with a faceless and shadowy group of mysterious power brokers. Treated as pawns in a game of high-stakes espionage played with opaque rules and hidden traps.

You'd be forgiven for assuming one of us was applying to join a clandestine government agency or crime syndicate. No, we're just trying to adopt a rescue dog.

We thought the rescue route made sense. Young dog needs loving, nurturing, responsible home, we have a loving, nurturing, responsible home, and want dog = match made in heaven!

Evidently not. The underground world of elite dog rescue (elite because we are drawn to breeds like Labrador retrievers or golden retrievers which tend to be more in demand than the latest iPhone) resembles more like a racketeering ring run by a clique of righteous old dog ladies. They hoard the most desired dogs (puppies) and wield their power over the uninitiated potential adopter with glee. Fees up front. Grueling interviews with secret rules. Then, arbitrary judgements handed down with no accountability, transparency, or recourse.

Home Interview 1:  sketchy questions, with vague assurances that our application will now go to a "committee" for "review"... if it is "approved" then we will be "allowed" to e-mail foster parents of dogs we like on the website.
Supposedly we are successful, but two attempts to e-mail foster parents with promising initial e-mails are then followed by radio silence. Our follow-up calls are eventually answered with "Sorry, we have already matched that dog to another family..." It feels like getting dumped.

Home interview 2: the volunteer inspects our fence while we play happily with her 6 month old gorgeous lab puppy that she brings just to taunt us. She confirms that we are interested in a young dog 2 months - 2/3 years old. Interview ends with her stating we likely won't be approved for a puppy because we have children. Children have toys. Puppies could choke on toys. My retort that small children can choke on toys too and we managed to keep them alive falls flat. I don't think this woman knows anything about kids.
Her e-mail that night brims with false enthusiasm, "You've been approved to adopt a dog 3 years old and above!" It feels like a slap in the face. Evidently volunteers are mere cogs in the organization's wheel. Young kids = no puppies, it's for the good of the party my Comrades!


We are now in line for our third home visit. Even though we'd be thrilled with (even prefer) a dog of 6 - 12 months, it looks like that could involve knocking someone off and half a year's salary in ransom. Shockingly, a litter of 5 week old lab pups was just posted on the third agency we applied to, and some initial e-mails have indicated they are considering us DESPITE the fact that we have young kids... However, going through another one of these home visits, handing over another non-refundable "donation" and then sitting on pins and needles for 3 weeks until the pups are old enough to go home, without any assurance that we will be get one of the final matches may prove more than we can bear.

So my friends, for all of you considering the journey to dog ownership through a lab or golden retriever rescue site, we recommend the following:

1. Give up now. Choose a breed more readily available at your local humane society, e.g. a pit bull.
2. Lie on your application. You are now an extremely active retired couple in a 3000 ft house, with an acre of land, no kids and 5 pure-bred retrievers. Send your kids to a babysitter, erase all evidence of their existence, hire actors and take a big house hostage for the home interview.
3. RUN don't walk, to a breeder.

Stay tuned to see which of those options we choose!