No Posts for a While

While in L.A., I had an experience that had me questioning whether or not I should continue my blog. Whether they held any value for anyone other than me. I had a conversation with a friend and it got me to thinking about my life right now and what it has become. Without going into the sorted details of the exchange, I will just simply state that it was brought to my attention that I was no longer the person that this person knew in L.A. and that I had changed and not in a desirable way. And that this change was evident in my blog entries.

I tend to share my experience here with my family and friends through this blog. The funny and sad experiences, the ones that make you slap your forehead and say, "Oh Duh," and the mundane. For those who care enough to read my blog and want to hear things about my life here- well, folks, that's the silly and mundane are also part of it.

Yes, I am different. Yes, a lot in my life has changed. I now have two (almost three) kids. Circumstances have brought us to Germany, and while I find it a struggle and did not want to come, I am trying to be supportive of my husband and also make the best of it here. Though not easy, I do feel the experience is enriching our lives and certainly given *me* an empathy for my second language students and their families that I did not have before. Gerard and I struggled immensely with the transition here and our relationship, but we seem to be on a better path. Though I was not ready to quit work and be at home full-time (and I still desperately miss teaching), I also know that it took a forced move like this to have me home for a while. It is time with the kids that I know in the long run I will not regret having.

So yes, I have changed. I no longer talk about my teaching work on a daily basis. My day to day struggles are now with German culture, language, and raising my kids in a foreign country. My blogs at the beginning were more about getting settled, and now yes, they are more mundane. This is where I am in my life right now and if I hadn't changed at all, that would seem unnatural. So the blog doesn't have to hold any value for anyone other than me. It's out there and if anyone else happens to get anything from it, that's great, too. I find value in it and will hopefully look back to this as a time in my life I wish to recall, for better or worse.