Passport Hopes

I called the Canadian passport 1-877 number and checked on the status of my passport. Not only had it arrived at the passport facility, the file was opened and appeared to be acceptable and I should have a passport send out by July 21. I was assured that it would be sent fedex and I will receive it by July 23 (I had written on the application that my date of departure was July 23). How wonderfully friendly and efficient the French Canadian/ heavily accented but precise English/ officiant was at the other end of the line. I realized how infrequently I have positive experiences when I try to call an office and have to wade through several levels of voice commands before I give up or reach an unhelpful clerk at the other end. I fell so much better after that phone call, and hopeful that my plans to leave at the end of July remain intact. No more excuses to hold off on any decision!

So many months of waiting and anticipating and worrying and enthusiasm peaking and plunging and we are almost there. Maya had her first video violin lesson today and it went reasonably well ( I may send Eric to New York to help Maya's teacher manage her technology). We are on skype almost nightly with my parents, my mother remains skeptical, my father very intent on learning how to maneuver the mouse and intuit the behaviour of the computer.

The house holds onto me, it resists my efforts to pack up and leave. I wait til late in the evening and the darkness to box up our lives. I keep running out of boxes; tomorrow is the day to visit Starbucks to pick up the boxes they put aside for me. It may be that the only way I can make progress is to ask a friend to come over and help me; we will push each other to move forward, to make decisions about purging. For now, it is clear when I have to stop; I begin to question throwing away anything the garbage pile gets smaller.

Eric is pushing me to commit to a date for our departure. I have no home after July 15, except that I do have friends who offer me their homes. Maya wants to stay for another week of ballet school, she has a violin recital August 1. Is that a good reason to stay? Originally I planned to fly to Ecuador the second half of July to look for a home and have Maya learn Spanish and get to know friends from her new school and her new home. Eric has indicated that I should work a little more to have a 'cushion' in the bank when we go. That makes sense, so should I stay longer to work? He has a cabin in Woods Hole until August 2, so I do have a 'home' for another several weeks. What would I do in Cape Cod? It would be a vacation, why not take time off and just be? Ecept that Ecuador is calling. The sooner I move to my new home and begin to put our new lives together the better, but I would be alone with Maya until the mid-August, when Eric arrives one day before our anniversary. I have been giving him a hard time about forgetting our anniversary. Last summer on our anniversary we were in Paris with the children, and I bought tickets for opera arias in 'the oldest church in Paris -St. Julien Le Pauvre' and we ate at a less than stellar Indian restaruant around the corner from the church, where Maya listened intently to Bollywood films. I waited for Eric to remember that it was a special day, for the children to remark on it. Only after another two weeks, once we arrived home, did Eric suddenly remember that he had forgotten our anniversary. Anyway, I have reminded him often enough so that he is not planning to forget it this year. This is a repeat of our past life; we married on August 17 and Eric moved to Balitmore August 19. I stayed in Salt Lake City with the children and closed my practice and supervised the movers for the next two weeks, and flew to join Eric in early September. In retrospect I often wonder if the way we made the move created obstacles and 'karma' issues, that we should have moved together and started our new lives as a couple rather that separately. If I move to Ecuador alone with Maya, will I feel overwhelmed and alone? Would we do better if we arrive as a family? I cannot decide.