The Expat Papers

The Life and Trials of an American Expat in Europe 

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My ‘in between’ life

So we heard back from the interview my husband (aka HUZ) had in Düsseldorf – it was a no.  Oh well.  Trying to see the positive side of things, Huz still has several applications alive in Frankfurt and, if truth be told, I would prefer Frankfurt anyway.  It has always held a special place in my heart – it’s where Huz and I met, got married, and had our son.  Every time we go back it’s like we never left.  Maybe in our hearts, we haven’t.  In any case, I’m trying not to be too disappointed.

I went to register with two temp agencies – one last week, one this week – and I’m going to spend every waking moment this week contacting every agency I can find.  You would think I would have no problem finding temp work.  I have a degree, years of experience as an administrator, and am willing to do pretty much anything for a minimum of £10 an hour (which is not a lot in London). In Bournemouth, I always had plenty of temp work.  You’d think London would be ripe for the picking.

This led to a pretty sleepless night on Friday.  I mean, I left my perm job to take temp work.  For me it was not only a leap of faith, but getting out of a dead end job that I genuinely hated.  I worked very hard for 18 months trying to make something of it, but in the end I couldn’t get even make a burlap purse from a pig’s ear let alone a silk one.  But at least it was a paycheque.  I finally got to sleep by telling my self that worrying was not going to change the situation – and that we have plenty in the savings account.  We are not going to starve. Still.

Another issue that keeps jumping up and yelling at me is housing.  As you know, we are in a little Airbnb flat at the top of a lovely house.  It’s not a separate flat, but her son’s old room.  You come into the family home, go past the living room and the other bedrooms, up the stairs to our accommodation. We have a door on our ‘front room’ and one on the bedroom, but none to the actual flat.  So, do we stay here or move on to something else?  It’s inexpensive and at least here we don’t have to worry about the nightmarish checkout/inventory that estate agencies put you through.  I do not, under any circumstances, want to go through that again.  I mean, we got the inventory report back from the flat we just left.  After spending two days cleaning it myself, then paying £200 to have a professional come in and do an end-of-tenancy clean, the report still noted that there was the ‘occasional cob web’ in the corner of the bedroom ceiling and that something or other had ‘very light dust’ on it.  That is just ridiculous.  

If we decide to stay here, how long do we give it?   The earliest we would leave is the beginning of June, which is two months.  But we need to tell the landlady at the end of the week if we’d like it for the rest of June.  That would take us to three months.  At what point do we move into something more permanent?  And at what point do we just call it a day and stay in the UK?

I may be jumping ahead of myself here.  Huz is supposed to hear from one of the firms he’s interviewed for by the end of this week.  I may be worrying about things that may never actually happen. 

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Learning to be happy

First - happy Easter everyone!

We have successfully moved into a temporary flat in Tulse Hill.  It’s the smallest place we’ve lived in our 32 years together.  Heck, there isn’t even a door to the ‘flat’.  Instead, there is a door to the bedroom and one to the living room, but no front door.  You simply arrive in the hallway at the top of the stairs.  And you know what?  It’s the happiest I’ve been in years.  

Yesterday, we walked for miles exploring Dulwich - a village and park set in Zone 3 London - and I was genuinely happy.  In fact, although I’ve had a few grumpy moments, I’ve smiled more in these past two weeks than I have in the past two years.  I’ve left a job I didn’t like and a flat I didn’t like and suddenly it’s like someone lifted a blanket of negativity off of me.  I had a nice meeting with the temp agency and am certain they will be able to find me something. We have decided (after a conversation with Hubby’s sister) that we would continue to pursue the German dream.  Hubby had interviews in Frankfurt and Düsseldorf that went well and we are hoping to hear something by the end of next week.  

I think the biggest change is that I have simply decided to not worry about things.  I could worry.  Heck, it’s one of the things I do best.  But when I feel it creeping on me, I make a conscious decision to say ‘no’. After all, let’s say I do worry - is it going to change anything?  No, of course not.  Instead, I am trying very hard to choose to be happy.  it’s harder than it sounds, but learning to be happy (rather than to be a misery-guts) is a skill I really need to master.

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Finding Peace

I’ve found the past week or two stressful – much more so than usual.  These stresses aren’t related to the fact that I’m leaving my job next week (with no permanent job at hand – I will temp for a while) or that we are moving out of our flat next week (and into an Airbnb while Hubby looks for a job across the channel.)  On the surface, anyway, these aren’t the irritants.  Everything else is.  Yesterday, I had an episode so strong that I genuinely thought I was having a heart attack. I had chest pains and couldn’t breathe.   At one point, I was questioning my own sanity.  Was I going mad?  And if I was, how could I tell?  I sat at my desk with dark storm clouds brewing over my head.  Everyone steered well clear of me. 

Then I did something I’ve never done before.  I slowed down.

I worked, but I didn’t try to multi-task.  I took frequent breaks.  I prayed.  I did one thing at a time and did each very slowly.  Eventually, the cloud lifted and a peace descended on me.  I looked out the window, and noticed that the sky was actually blue and – hey – the daffodils in the little park across the street were blooming!  By the time I left work, I felt like a new person.  I prayed again and gave thanks.

Maybe deep down I am worried if this crazy plan is going to work.  I mean, who in their mid-fifties does this?  If we do move to Germany, am I going to find a job?  I was happy in Germany once, but will I be as happy this time around.  Or am I just a grumpazoid who won’t be happy anywhere? 

Then I listened to a message from one of my favourite pastors who reminded his listeners that God will straighten the path and make the rough places smooth.  I was thinking about this as my husband bounced through the door of our flat with good news.  Last month he had three German interviews that went really well but the department suddenly had a hiring freeze imposed upon them – and that was that.  The woman who interviewed him emailed yesterday that another department (without a freeze) was hiring for a similar position and that he should apply.  How nice is that!  It not only raised my mood, but also brought back hope. 

Praise the Lord!

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48 Hours

Life can change so very much in just 48 short hours.

My husband went down to see his 88-year-old mother this weekend.  Up until now she has been fine – or at least putting on a brave face. But in the past couple of weeks her hip has been causing her so much pain that she cannot walk.  My husband has never seen her like this and it was tough. Her doctor told her that she needs a hip replacement, but on the NHS that could be tricky. First there is her age.  They don’t like to say it, but older people wanting non-life threatening surgery go to the back of the list.  We saw this with my father-in-law who had prostate cancer back in 2004.  In the US they would have taken it out immediately. However here, because of his age (82) and the fact that very few people actually die of prostate cancer, they refused to do the surgery.  He didn’t die of cancer.  He died of pneumonia that his body could not fight off because it was also busy fighting the cancer.

Even if the NHS did do the surgery, I don’t know if Mum would take it.  Before you can be discharged from the hospital, you have to have trained nursing /social care in place – something there is a huge shortage of because of funding cuts.  That would mean that my mother-in-law might have to spend months in the hospital before this could be arranged.  Even if the family could take off work, it wouldn’t be enough because eventually we’d all have to return to work.

This has left us in a quandary.  I had hip replacement surgery a few years ago (I have private health insurance.) I was in the hospital for a week and it took three full weeks to be able to walk to the shops – and I was just 50!  What is it going to be like for someone nearly 90?

With that in mind, we’ve decided to postpone our dream move back to Europe. What is really sad is that at our age, this may have been the last chance for us to do this.  The reality is, no one wants to hire someone really close to retirement age.  And so it is.

So now I guess we look for new jobs here that pay really well so that when we do retire, we can do so in style.

Na ja, as the Germans say.   Na ja.

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The View from the Sidelines

Have you ever felt completely powerless to change your own life?

Moving to German-speaking Europe and finding a new job are the two things I want to do more than anything. However, these two things are completely reliant on my husband finding a job first.  After all, he is still (until article 50 is triggered) a citizen of an EU country; I am not.  Right there, that means I follow him.  He also makes twice as much as me.  Unfortunately, there isn’t much paid work these days for historians/museum people – which is what I did back in the US after a break to raise a family and get a master’s degree.  So I had to go back to administrative work.  I’m good at it, but I don’t necessarily have a passion for it.  I figure if I have to do work I don’t necessarily like, is it too much to ask that I do it in a place I like?

So now I sit and stare at my computer, fingers jangling up and down, moving frantically back and forth between websites, as if doing so will make something magical happen.

We are making positive steps toward our goal.  At least I think they are positive steps.  I resigned from my job a couple of weeks ago – my last day is March 17. After that I will look for temp work. No great loss, really.  I was a temp before I got this job and was actually making more money than I am now.  I rationalised that doing this will give us more freedom when my husband is offered a job. I don’t know if that’s the truth since my notice period is exactly the same as my husband’s.  I think I needed to cut that mental string.

We are also leaving our flat in mid-April.  The landlady was reluctant to agree to a month-to-month lease and we didn’t want to commit to another year in the UK.  So, we are putting our tiny household into a storage facility and renting a flat through Airbnb until mid-May.  After that, I have absolutely no idea.  Do we keep looking in Europe?  Do we set a cut off date?  If so, when? 

This weekend, Hubby will be sending out another flurry of applications and emails to recruiters.  In the meantime, I will be standing on the sidelines – a spectator in my own life

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An Introduction

I am an American expat currently living in London. I've been in the UK for four years now: two spent in southern England and two in London.  I’m female and from a city on the East Coast of the United States. I am married to an Englishman who I met and married in Germany a long time ago.  I tell you this partly as an introduction and partly because it colours how I see the world. 

I’m not saying much more because, for the first time in my life, I want to be completely anonymous.  I’m not advertising blog this on Facebook or Twitter.  I’m not telling anyone my name.  Maybe it’s a way for me to get stuff off my chest without pissing anyone off.   Maybe I’m hiding.  Maybe I’m just a grumpy old woman.  Who knows. 

Right now, I’m not loving living in London.  Don’t get me wrong, London is a magnificent city.  I wouldn’t say it's beautiful, but its sheer size makes it something spectacular.  However, the thing that makes London spectacular also renders this city a very difficult place for me to live.   It’s unbelievably expensive.  It’s dirty.  It’s congested.  It’s noisy.  It’s chaotic.  Some people define this as having a ‘buzz’.  I’m finding it all a bit intrusive.  So we are looking for pastures new – somewhere in one of the German-speaking countries in Europe.

This blog is not meant to encourage or discourage anyone from moving to one place or another.  Just the opposite.  I know other expats – both from American and Europe – who absolutely love it here.  It all comes down to personal preference.  Instead, this blog is a chance for me to simply share my experiences and my life.  Maybe along the way, I’ll learn something as well.