Finally!!!

well, here it is!  The news that I think everyone else saw coming but us, and is in fact only news to us:

 

We have decided to accept a permanent position in Sweden and stay here, ummm, “permanently.”  I’ve long ago learned through this process that there is no such thing as a plan, or really having any idea what the future brings, so I use this word very lightly.  I have no idea how long permanent means or what that means in general.  All I know is that for now, we are staying in Sweden. 

This was not an easy decision to come to.  In fact, I think this was the most difficult decision we’ve made in our nearly sixteen years of marriage.  For months we talked about this.  We had lists and budget plans and researched schools and researched potential housing…We talked a lot.  We talked a lot to each other and to all of our friends.  We talked so much it became obvious the answer wasn’t going to come from talking. 

I really hoped for a very clear sign of what we “were supposed to do.”  When we first came here, there were so many undeniable signs that I just hoped for a repeat of the universal flashing neon lights pointing us to the proper junction.  After losing hope in any fated indication or intervention, we turned to the ridiculous signs of forced fate:  a coin toss using both a krona and a quarter.  Both agreed.  Yet, clearly we couldn’t finalize such a life decision on a coin toss.  So we played rock paper scissors.  Once again, this contrived sense of searching for a sign agreed with the coin toss.  Still, that wasn’t enough. 

When we really understood that lists and three nights of family discussions weren’t actually getting us to a decision, we decided we would do this:  each person write down a number between 0 and 100, 0 being definitely wanting to stay in Sweden, 100 definitely wanting to go back…any number in between that fit the person’s feelings.  Then, we would average the numbers together, and that final number would be the final decision.  I’m not going to say who wrote what, or even what the number was.  I’ll say it was pretty close to 50, but it was lower than 50, so the final decision was to stay in Sweden.

The next step, however, was waiting for the official offer letter of employment.  As in all things within a large corporation, this took a long time.  Officially we decided nearly a month ago, but I didn’t want to make an announcement until it was truly, irrevocably official.  And, yay, that finally happened towards the end of last week. 

So, yes, that brings me to the next obvious point.  My feelings.  Our family’s feelings.  For me: mostly pretty good.  Extremely relieved that step is over.  A little nervous.  A little anxious about all the next steps.  In ways, pretty excited.  But, I don’t have any regrets and I don’t wish we’d gone another way.   The girls are ecstatic.  I’m sure they have some of the above feelings as well, but I definitely have to agree that this is the best place for the girls at this time.

I really feel that there wasn’t a “right” or “wrong" answer here.  We just had to do what felt the best for us with the information we had available at the time.  Many reasons that this feels like the best decision right now are:

• the girls school.  Meagan only has one year left.  She can actually graduate with her class and not transfer to a new IB school (which is very challenging the last year anyway) her senior year.
• Free college.  Clearly this was a huge factor that we considered a lot.  With so many articles about US schools losing funding with budget cuts, high increases in tuition, and that college loan debt now surpasses credit card debt, it’s very difficult to not see this as a great opportunity for the girls to receive an education without putting themselves into debts they’ll be stuck with most of their adult lives.
• Job security.  Really, we weren’t sure what the job situation would be if we went back.  Surely we would find one, eventually.  But that eventually didn’t feel very good.  Here, there is a job and there is a 3 month minimum warning period if you are to lose it.  Not to mention the severance is much better here than in the states.
• We weren’t going “home.”  I don’t even know what “home” is anymore.  We would most likely go to Texas, which no offense to Texans, just doesn’t feel like a good fit for our family; probably especially after living in Europe for four years.  But, no matter where, it wasn’t where we left from.  So there wasn’t a huge draw to go back, wherever back is now.
• The US doesn’t feel very secure.  I don’t know.  I haven’t lived there in a while.  Of course we see a different picture of things living outside of it and just reading articles and watching news stories.  With this incredible and massive national debt, housing crisis, unemployment…Who knows what will happen. As a matter of fact, one day Meagan was telling the story of how hard it was to make this decision on the subway to one of her friends.  All the pros and cons on each side and why it was so hard.  Just as she was getting off, a Swedish man that had been listening in said “tell your parents to also think about the economy in the US.”  Being that it is so extremely rare (I don’t even think this has ever happened to me) for a Swedish person to interject their own thoughts into your conversation, this just goes to show the picture the rest of the world has of the US right now.
• Sweden feels right.  This is also hard to explain.  It matches us in a lot of ways.  I know we’ve evolved personally to also fit in, but I think it was always a pretty natural fit.  But, not only that, we all have really good friends in here and in many ways have made lives here.  This isn’t to say it’s a perfect fit, but after living abroad, I know a lot of people have this feeling.  It feels as though you are both a part of everything and a part of nothing, all at the same time.  We’ll never be Swedes, but I think it would be a very difficult transition to be “American” again too.

And, naturally, with the pros, there are cons.  And of course I recognize them.  For me, this is a pretty huge deal.  I mean, it’s a big deal for all of us.  We’ll become permanent residents of another country.  That’s pretty huge.  But, in a lot of ways, the girls just keep going to their same schools and Bryan keeps working at his same job…My life will change dramatically, and I don’t even know how quite yet.  But, the thing is, I’ve decided to take this in small steps.  I can’t think about winters yet just, because it is spring now and it is gorgeous.  I can’t think about all of the moving and coordinating of moving we have to do this summer, because for now, all we can do is just try and prepare by selling some things.  And really, this has been a stressful and pretty trying few months, so to just take this day by day, all I want to do today is relax, lay on my hammock and enjoy a brief moment of peace before the real work really begins.