Bad Of The Country

The funny thing about writing a blog is that it makes you think of your life as chapters in a book. How can I give this week a plot, a beginning, climbing action, climax, and conclusion? A thesis, an argument, a rebuttal?

I was thinking about tackling the subject of homesickness this week, and of course it would be simplest to treat it like any other chapter in any other work of fiction (as one really should approach any blog they read). Indeed, there exists a very clear format that can be followed by anyone.

All you have to do is commence with something that would make me miss my family, my home, my friends. Maybe how the constant rain reminds me of walking through downtown Portland with soaking wet hair, how the glow of the city lights somehow seem more beautiful against the angry gray sky. Or how talking about politics makes me think of the evenings in my living room with my family, screaming and laughing and debating every subject spanning universal healthcare to the best Star Wars movie.

Then you begin to tie these things together, make them gather on each other, until every thing I see reminds me of home. You could add a scene where I am contemplating buying plane tickets, one where I am calling home every minute, another where I am begging people to come visit me. You could draw on psychological models, make references to Greek Mythology, add in some talking animals, if you want, whatever you like as long as at the climax of the story I reach acceptance.

The falling action of the story would be simple. As I felt more at home in Caen, I would be able to start appreciating the differences from the familiar. Caen would become my new home, my new place of comfort and safety. I would long for my dorm room bed. A galette would replace my mother’s apple crisp. French children would become my new nieces and nephews.

Homesickness plot over. Turn the page and move on to the following conflict in the following episode.

However, all that would be a lie.

Homesickness, as with everything else in life, cannot be confined to a chapter. There is no clear beginning, middle, and end. Instead, it branches out, it disappears and emerges. It does not respect the two dimensional neatness of a piece of paper or computer screen. To make it obey these conventions, I would have to resort to gross exaggeration and flat out lies.

Homesickness is not a chronic disease; it is an acute pain that happens from time to time, more like heartburn than cancer.

I never pine for my home or my life before I came here. This experience is too exciting, too rich, and too glamorous in my eyes for that. I have never wasted hours wishing for my bed or spent days imagining my friends joining me here. I cling instead to the moment I am in now, because I know it won’t be long before I will be missing it.

But sometimes, when I least expect it, I feel a pang for what I have left behind. I want to go feel the cool urbanity of Seattle. I want the warmth of the fireplace in my house. I want to pick up my nieces and nephews. I want to surprise my brother at high school with a slurpee.

This lasts for only a few minutes generally, and while they are unpleasant, I don’t wish them gone. These are how I am going to get to the airport on December 23rd. How I am willingly going to return to Ellensburg, WA. How I am going to appreciate these miniscule little details of my life when I return.

In all honesty, I believe that while this version is less dramatic, it is more meaningful. Aside from the simple virtue of it being the truth, this story reveals the moments that are truly important in my life. They are a clear vision of what makes me happy; a guide to what I should maintain when I get home. A brief revelation of who and what I will be when I return.

And so I will welcome mal au pays or rather, when I am homesick for English, “bad of the country”.