I will have left all my favourite English creatures and will most likely be a disgusting ball of emo mess.
I will have said goodbye to Hannah, Jaacqy, Goncalves and Lee Lee…
I will have had my final drink (when I say ‘drink’ I actually mean like, six litres of cider and most likely two bottles of ‘pump it up’) and fag with Janey, most likely a tearful affair that ended in the listening to and re-creation of ‘Always’ by Bon Jovi, made perfect only by our drunken writhing.
I will have had my final moviedate with Pow, most likely fueled by some meat-based food and danie’s magical cups of tea. I will have been tearful and most likely made him a bounty of fabulous little goodies and toys for him to dot around his house to remind him that danie hearts him big time.
I will have placed my final box up in Pow’s roof for storage…
The only thing that keeps me sane through all these thoughts is the knowledge that just slightly over a year after my departure from all things English I will be returning with Muffin… he and I will return to the world of accents and Scotch Eggs. We will return and endeavour to begin a new life with a new culture and a new world to explore…
This decision has not come lightly, but has come with a great amount of relief from me. Granted, I was quite happy to live anywhere I could be with my Muffin, I was VERY concerned about the levels of unhappy that would accompany any move that took me away from England for too long.
England has been the one place that I have been pining to live since I can remember… since I was perhaps as young as five I’ve been talking about wanting to move to that far-away, mystical land that is always depicted as covered in mist, sheep and bad teeth… I’ve always dreamed of walking the cobbled roads, drinking the pints and meeting the Queen.
I think I was seventeen that I finally said to my keepers at The Home, ‘Right, that’s it! When I get outta here, I’m moving to England and there’s nothing anyone can do about it!’
From then I began looking into ways that I could get into the country that always highlighted all my dreams… perhaps I could travel over via boat on a visitor’s visa for a few months at a time? Become a student? Get a job? I had NO idea how I was going to do it, but I was determined…
I guess it was nothing but dumb luck that on that particular day, in that particular chatroom, both The Estranged and I signed-in and started talking about our love of ska, punk and thrash music.
Blah, blah, blah… courting, OMGLOVE, visas, marriage, visas, etc...
Fast-forward to today, now officially in England for five-and-a-half years, I am here and happier than I have ever been in my entire life. In that time I have hand-crafted this life that I could have only ever dreamed of, and even THOSE dreams would have fallen short of the things I have actually achieved. The people I have met, stuff I have seen and things I have done are the things that I’ve always hoped... things that would alter my life in such a way that i am left humbled and madly in love with my life and everything that makes it up.
when i first told Muffin that i would move back to america for him i meant it... my habit to make decisions at the click of a finger made me say yes without thinking it through... contemplating what sort of repercussions would be suffered not just on my behalf, but by all my nearest and dearest. it was only after multiple moviedates with my powface and drinking sessions with janeyface that i realized that it just wasn't going to be able to happen as a long-term thing... my heart is here... here with the markets, windy roads, imperial measuring system and bar one... how could i EVER tear it away from all the things that it's spent so long falling in love with?
the answer is simple really, it wasn't possible... for the weeks running-up to Muffin's visit i prayed to all the gods of luck and wishing that he would fall just as madly in love with England as i had all those years ago...
i could never actually have asked him to move here myself... i needed him to fall in love with it himself and want to move here without my asking. he has children and i would NEVER directly ask him to leave them... ever.
it was ten days into his visit and we were sat in the back at a Pizza Hut, moist from the persistent rain and awaiting the service of a fairly sassy gentleman called Steve. we were sat rummaging through our Selfridge's purchases and i became slightly emo, thinking of Muffin's not-too-far-away departure... it was when he saw my tiny sad face that he asked me for a piece of paper and a pen. over the next six minutes he wrote out something in secret on his side of the table... i waited and mused about what i would bake with my newly acquired dried lavender sugar. just as i was about to have a mental breakthrough about some amazing lemon and lavender cakes Muffin shoved the piece of paper under my nose... it offered me a PROJECTED PLAN that featured timescales from July 2010 (when he returns stateside) all the way to October 2012 (when, it dictates, Dane will marry Danie)... they outlined all things in between those dates including danie moving back to america, moving out to washington and our move back to the UK... i read it and my eyes immediately developed a watery residue in the corners.
the remainder of the meal was spent discussing options for him... jobs he could get, places i could store things and costs for flying back and forth to visit his little ones.
since this conversation my heart feels about twenty stone lighter. i feel relieved and overall like this will be the best decision for both of us...england is a place that will allow us to embrace a lot of things that we would not typically be able to become familiar with Stateside... we will be able to live lives that will make both of us happy whilst ticking the box that very few people get the opportunity to fill in which says, 'live in more than one country.'
as much as i still feel like a little kid who pouted until they got their own way (which, whilst i am aware that i DO have a tendency to do this, i did NOT do it on this occasion. i was honest and made sure that dane had the time of his life so as to allow him to make a decision all by himself.), i am being promised that he has made this decision and is happy with it, which makes danie a VERY happy girl...
so there you have it, danie will be returning to america in september for one year and then prancing back to the UK with the love of her life for the foreseeable future. we plan to make very frequent trips back stateside and exist in a state of bliss for... well... ever.
that's all i have for now. glee and delight.
thanks for reading.
