Hiraeth

Have you ever felt homesick for a place you’ve never been? Or a place you only lived for a short time?

I have found myself so homesick for England this past week. I mean really, really homesick. Have you ever been to a place that gives you innate peace? That’s how I felt when I went to England for the first time at seventeen. A life-long Anglophile, this was the trip of a lifetime for me. I went with my mum as a graduation present - just me, her, and a jam packed itinerary of all of the British rock n’ roll landmarks (plus, obviously, all of that world history!) It was the trip of a lifetime, and I was so lucky to have that experience…

Despite never having been to London before, we navigated the city without a map. Not that London is so hard to navigate, but considering I was just a teenager who had left the United States a grand total of once in my life (and that was on a family holiday to the USVI), it was a bit of a shock for my mum, who had also never been to the UK before; her heart lies in Paris.

The trip was a whirlwind. In fact, I am pretty sure I didn’t sleep for the first four days. Yes, you read that right. Four full days, and four full nights… jet-lag hit me like a sack of bricks almost halfway through. I saw a seagull assassinate a pigeon in midair, by St. Paul’s Cathedral. A waitress laughed at my mum for ordering decaf tea (I mean honestly, who does that? In England, of all places?). I had proper fish and chips (duh). And, most importantly, I crossed Abbey Road barefoot. #noregrets #sorryforholdinguptrafficbutnotreally

Little did my family know this trip would unlock an entirely new level of Anglophilia (that is an awful word, we won’t ever use that again). It confirmed what I had unknowingly felt in my heart for all those years… that I was meant to be there, rather than here in the US.

The Welsh call it ‘hiraeth’, meaning a deep longing for something, especially one’s home; a sense of homesickness tinged with grief or sorrow over the lost.

My subconscious (and then later, my conscious mind) took the wheel at this point. I chose to study history and international studies in university. I took several mini trips abroad that went toward my degree. I did my semester abroad in London, and I knew that my heart truly lay there.

So, after graduation, I took a year off and worked - but then I did what any young adult (well, maybe a stir-crazy young adult) would do and applied to graduate school in the UK (much to my parents chagrin). I figured I could feel less guilty about leaving them behind because it was for my education, right?

Sort of.

In August 2011, I booked a one-way flight to London, and I’ll tell you what, I hoped I would never look back. In September 2011, I boarded that flight feeling nervous, but overwhelmingly excited. I cried a little, for a moment, having left behind my family and my best friend, but once we reached cruising altitude, I was okay. Technology made the thought of the distance between us much easier to process.

I’ll have to write another blog post on the actual experience (and perhaps tell you more about how I met my husband! Cue Taylor Swift’s "London Boy” - we’ll ignore the fact he’s not really a London boy though) but for now I’ll stick to the overall feeling of homesickness… Moving to London was an adjustment; very different from a semester abroad, but the most amazing sixteen months of my life.Ups, downs, ins, and outs, but above all else, my body and my mind were at peace even when my life was arguably the most tumultuous.

Thing was, the plan was to never come home. I can say that now, I’ve been home for ten years (sorry mum, surprise!).

But, the US and UK governments had other plans, though, and with ever-changing visa requirements and the cost of it all, I found myself returning stateside in January 2013 after a heartbreaking goodbye to my fiance (now husband) that made the British Airways rep feel so bad, he upgraded me to business class.

It took two more years before we were together again permanently, but looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing.

But now we’re here, and times are changing. A lot happens in ten years, I’ll tell you. We got married, we had kids, we’ve bought houses, made friends, lost friends, I started dancing again after twenty years, I lost my dad… and if time has taught me anything, it’s to make your own happiness and not to waste a minute… so… here’s to the next adventure.

xx

P.S. remember: the biggest risks often reap the best rewards.