Performing Without a Net.

"Now in the center ring......performing without a net! ......"

C'est moi ! Yes, in the sparkly tights on the high wire, just me, and I just figured out that something is missing, something important, oh yeah...the safety net.

I am suddenly remembering today, this mention of a 'support network' that someone back home had stated would be necessary for me to take on this grand adventure; the one about moving to a foreign country, not speaking the language, being the comfort go-to for two young children and oh, yeah having a new baby on the way at 40-something. Was I not listening? Did I cover my ears and chant "wa-wa-wa-wa-wa"?

I do recall answering something to the tune of "Well we have all of my husband's family there, lots of nieces and nephews, cousins...." and that same person who was stating the obvious looking knowingly unsatisfied with my response and nodding slowly. (Consequently this person was an experienced ex-pat from another country living in the US).

So why is this all coming back to me today?  Well remember I quit my full-time teaching job last week? The one with the 180 students per day and 29 classes per week, 8.5 hour long days, that threw me into total immersion-hell working with 50 other teachers, 5 of which spoke a little english.......the one with the unruly students who sent me into pre-term labor that pushed me to slow down and take to bed for a few days to get things back under control? Yes, that job.

The first few days of academic career post-partum were really good--I rested, I wrote, I read. This week however things took a different turn.  When the kids were gone to school and spouse off to a job, the house got really quiet, and a little dark, and a little claustrophobic....I had a weird desperate sensation to open all of the windows even if it was cold outside, the quietness in the house was deafening and the thought of having the next 7 hours on my own made me feel nauseous and dizzy. 

I thought about calling someone before I noted that it was around between 1 and 3 AM local time to whomever I might call.  No one was 'awake' on Facebook to chat. In my non-almost-seven-months pregnant state I would have gone for a run to work out the strange anxiety that I could only attribute to this sudden sensation of isolation.

Then I realized I was in grave violation of rule #1 of Andrea Martin's 'How to Successfully Immigrate in a Foreign Country' from Expat.com. which states:   


1. Stay positive and keep motivated!

Whatever the reason that you moved abroad, the most important piece of advice is to stay positive and keep motivated. Do whatever it takes to keep a smile on your face when you are feeling lost, homesick or frustrated. Exercise, join a sports club, socialise with new people, travel and explore, start a new hobby, write a blog, attend motivational seminars. Find a way to keep your brain active.


Worse yet, I had completely ignored my ex-pat friend back homes advice about making sure I had a support net-work in place for these moments!  I have no net!  No safety net, no network, no-net-nothing! No wonder I had the sensation of plummeting to the hard concrete floor under the big-top-tented crazy world that I found myself in.

And the only solution?! Take a deep breath and get busy!  When the going get's tough---I needed something to do and FAST!  Off the list went anything too physical--clearing (bulldozing) out the room that will become 'Poppie's' nursery which is currently serving as "I-have-no-idea-where-to-put-this" storage since we moved in was a bit much to take on (while trying to avoid pre-term labor again)......scraping more shreds of wall-paper off the walls of Leo's room held no appeal.  So I turned to the old stand-by--cook something!

....and the first thing that came to mind was....CREPES.  Believe it or not, I had never made them before.  For some reason the task of making crepes had defaulted during the past 15 years to the French spouse--after all it is in his blood...n'est ce pas?

So this is where I would normally post the recipe and some beautifully styled images of my creations.  But c'est impossible....because 1. the recipe is way too basic (milk, eggs, flour, butter) and 2. the technique is easily mastered....and 3. there was no way that in the midst of pouring, spreading, folding and eating those magnificent little bad-boys was I going to stop long enough to take artistic photographs of the event. That and the fact that I could easily lift a pretty picture of crepes off the Internet and paste it like this:

So there you have it!  Let me just say this....who needs anti-anxiety meds in this world when there is sound advice, Facebook friends and a mere 3 minutes of effort to crepe eating Shangri-la? 

Pas moi, mes amis !  Bon Appetit!