Day 68

We are 3 days from returning back to the United States for 2 weeks. Up until today I was bursting inside with excitement. I could not wait to sleep in our bed, sit in our hot tub, drive my car, see our friends, see my mom and my girls…I could not wait to breathe the cold morning air and go through my belongings.

Living in Mazatlán and it ‘feeling’ like home has creeped deep down inside me. I thought one day I would wake up and it would be HOME but instead I feel like it has taken time but has started to become part of me. I am anxious to return back to MD. I am very anxious about entering the United States because it has become lawless and unpredictable. It is unsafe in many ways that directly affect our immediate lives. America is angry. America is dangerous and I have had the luxury of living in societal peace. The culture here is warm and loving. I don’t speak Spanish fluently yet, but I can feel the acceptance, tolerance and appreciation of people living their lives here.

Mazatlán is everything I want life to be. The only thing that is missing are my loved ones. I miss them. It causes me to have one foot there and one foot here although I find myself slowly withdrawing the foot in America.

It has only been 68 days here and we are working daily to establish roots. Every step has been met with a challenge, so I feel that it is testing our commitment. It is testing our will to really buy in to life here on a permanent basis. Rick and I don’t spend our days talking much about our future beyond the weeks ahead, but we are working daily to define our space here. The things that I was looking forward to having back when we return feel less important now. I didn’t expect to feel that this week.

Rick and I have had only each other for 68 days. We don’t have friendships yet (although we are working on it) and we don’t have a life independent of each other at all since we moved. It feels normal and right. I expected this to be challenge as well. We went from a busy social life to none at all. This might shake most marriages, but I am learning that our marriage is stronger than I gave it credit for.  I assumed that this period of my life I would be challenged on many levels but instead, things are easing, and life is simpler. When we decided, we would move to Mexico, I cried. I cried because somehow, I knew that I would find myself profoundly happier with a simpler life. And I am already starting to feel it. It’s that creeping feeling that is settling inside me and calming me into the next phase of my life.