Its so weird sometimes how life turns out..
One year ago I left Sweden for the third time in a year, left the land of home to continue searching for something else in west. It was hard to leave last year, it was hard to let go of last years summer.
But a 2 month long summer cant kill a 6 year long dream, I needed something else, I needed something completely different from what I had been told was to be my future. I needed a lifelong adventure and living in a different culture and country is one of the easiest yet hardest way to pursue that dream. Easy because all you got to do to be able to life a life long adventure is to move, find out what to do to be able to support the decision of moving and then just do it. It was easy for me, because I had many, many years of dreams pushing me forward to actually take the step of moving. Its hard to pursue this dream because its far away from what is known to you, its far away from the culture you grew up in and far away from people who helped shaping what you are today.
But to pursue this dream was the most important thing for me and here I am, doing it. Therefore it was hard to leave last summer because there was an emotional conflict between my heart, brain, past and future. I had a hard time to pick a side, a hard time to figure out my goals if my present situation would change, I mean, then what? Its to hard, was my concluding idea, I couldn’t do it, not now and not later – I was where I needed to be, I am where I want be right now so all in all, a hard decision then made a life easier to life for me today.
I had my past visiting me this summer, when I realized, I am not that girl anymore.
I grew up sometime between then and now and there was not much to recall from the girl people knew then and the girl I am today.
I have a job, a job that I could never do where I come from, a job that means something for someone else then me. I have children, parents and co-workers depending on me on a daily bases and you know what, that’s more fulfilling then anything else could ever be.
I got married in the time from then till now, something I never thought was possible.
My life has change, its more real now and its more me. I just knew back then that the life I could get if I would have followed my heart was not what I wanted and I didn’t know what I was looking for, but I knew that wasn’t it. The life I could have got would have been perfect in so many eyes of others, easy would have been my description. Instead I struggle today, now, I try to figure out how to be married, how to be a good wife, how to reach out to all the kids in my class and inspire them to keep fighting for a future for them on. So in my eyes I traded easy for hard. Because nothing in my life right now is easy, but this is what I always wanted, never have the future printed out on a map in front of you like I would have back then. Nothing is wrong with that life. That life just wasn’t me. I like that other people plan, that makes the world go round. I like not knowing, I like struggle, I like climbing. My future isn’t what most children dream it to be like, I don’t want tons of money, I don’t want 4 houses on 4 different continents, I don’t want any of that and that’s something I have said for years now. That can never fulfill me as a person, but my life now gives me something more, my life now gives me relief, relief that I know nothing. I know nothing about my future, because it is an adventure. Just the way I want it. I am a teacher, and I love it, because children are what we need to focus on.
I also live in a surreal world.
In a world where the country I live in is a war that I can’t understand, agree with or even support – which is hard, since in all this I also have a husband who will fight this war, a war that I can’t see any logic in. My husband on the other hand I need to support, so if I cant support the war, how am I going to support my husbands actions in going over seas to defend this country?
That’s a surreal reality I could never see for my self one year ago, so yes, everything around me has change, but most of all – I haven’t changed, I just found the way I need to go to live the life I wanted for myself.
But it’s not easy, not at all.
But I had to let go of things not as important to me anymore.
Friends from the past were one thing that I had to let go off, there was no room, there was no time and there was no connection anymore, to loose a best friend is hard but it’s even harder not to feel the urge to fix it. I don’t want to talk, I don’t want to keep in touch because it hurts to see what have become of what once used to be a relationship of two best friends, there is nothing there anymore and that is nothing I need or want to be reminded off.

But there are those high lights from the past that I can’t loose how much life change, as family and those childhood friends that will remain strong through life long journeys, because our friendships have all ready been through all the changes that are to be through. Like Malin who is coming in the end of November, and my sister who is coming here over Christmas. I am looking at tickets for her now, and any day now, they are booked!

So, my life changed, but its not for the worse, its actually for the better, its just harder then it used to be, the issues are bigger and the worries are real. But the real, real is the real value, it’s the life I wanted, realness.

Love, em