So – happy 2019!

It’s been a busy couple of months… since the last post, we had the holidays, the boy got through exams  at university (lots of drama there…), he got himself a new girlfriend, my daughter turned 14, and my husband and I spent a lot of December together while he used up vacation days.

Oh and while hubs was here at home, I felt rather slovenly during our morning coffees, watching him on his computer, filling up the coffee cups,  me taking our Cody bear out for walks … generally being quite lazy in between getting the holiday cheer going.  I would post my updates on IG of course, and spend time surfing (it becomes a black hole of hours on the phone, ipad, my Mac, Facebook, it’s getting ridiculous).

What was dear husband (DH – OMG haven’t used that acronym in a while! ) doing on his computer?  Why he was applying for a work visa for a special assignment.  Overseas!  And yes – this activity was fully and completely endorsed by me!

We’ve talked over the years about living somewhere else, working in another country. The world is a big place. We have both worked for multi-national companies with corporate offices housed in Europe or the US. Throughout our working lives, this has been a blessing, a chance to see more of the world and experience at least a few other cultures. The opportunity to travel for meetings gets you out to see different places -at least once you escape out of the meeting rooms. On the flip side, work travel can be highly overrated especially once you have a family. In fact, our fertility struggles were compounded by our work schedules and the travel associated with them. We actually finally conceived our firstborn while on a well-orchestrated fertility cycle combining a work trip to Montreal for me, and a flight from Europe for my husband to meet me there. The effects aren’t only felt by a young family – it gets harder the older the kids get. I learned this first hand.

The opportunities to work abroad have come to my husband’s colleagues and they have seized them. Although he protested the fact, I knew that he was sometimes regretful of not pursuing possibilities of his own. Often the timing to do something different was not ideal with my career in the picture. However, with this latest gig, the timing seemed perfect and the assignment a great fit with what they were looking for and the expertise he could provide. And I am on part two of my stint at home – no career barrier from me at this point in time.

So with that, he did the paperwork, he booked his trip, got on the plane, and is now overseas for a least a four month stint.

It’s been a month. We haven’t been apart this long since we started dating – oh, that would be approximately 32 years ago. Yikes. This is a major adjustment.

Hence I must blog about it.