On a cold, partly rainy morning one year ago today we landed in Dublin with absolutely no clue how this new adventure would work for our family. The kids were partly excited, mostly scared, and we were all super jetlagged.
The first three months anywhere always feel like you’re walking on the moon for the first time – nothing is familiar, most places or ways of doing things are foreign and uncomfortable, and you just think it would be so much easier to say never mind and go back home.
In Dublin, it rained for the first 45 days, and then we took our first family trip (to Zermatt, Switzerland) and suddenly I remembered why I agreed to move to Europe in the first place. The journey was easy, and the boys had so much fun. And we saw sunshine again!
After 90 days in Ireland, I looked up and realized that I was finally starting to get the hang of things. The bureaucratic nonsense was mostly behind us (for the time being) and we were nearly done with the school year in one piece. At last– summer! A glorious two months with friends and family both here and in the US, and I eventually came to terms with the fact that Ireland doesn’t have summer as I think of it. It’s more like a warm spring and a lot of daylight.
On the plus side, the fall and early winter were quite warm and pleasant, especially Christmas when my parents visited us again. What a lovely treat to take a sunny walk on December 25th in just a light jacket.
Despite the cold and darkness of the early weeks of the new year, just last week my kids woke up with daylight streaming through their windows once again. And so here we are, a full turn around the sun and a heck of a lot more knowledgeable than we were in early 2024.
Without a doubt I have learned a lot more about myself and our family in the past 365 days than I have since our first year in China. That time in our lives stretched us so immensely that I often cannot believe we really said yes to that opportunity. And given how settled we were in our lives back in California I sometimes think the past year has been more like a fever dream than any kind of reality.
All four of us have had serious ups and downs adjusting to the current setup. And I can’t say that we won’t have just as many this year, too. But I can say that I am immensely proud of everything we’ve dealt with and pushed through. We are all learning and trying new things and I know we will continue that throughout 2025.
One of my favorite musicals is Rent, and Jonathan Larson’s seminal story asked us all how we measure a year of our lives? I think he was right – it’s measured in five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes of laughter, strife, journeys to plan, and most importantly, love. Whatever happened to us in the past 12 months, and whatever crazy thing I know will happen to us in the next year, we love each other, and we wake up every day ready to take on what life throws at us.
An Ocean Away 
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