Tag: Paris

On November 15th, David and I will be moving and we’ll be taking our two cats and our 22 boxes with us. Torrevieja, with its close proximity to David’s family and its cheap rent has been a good transition place for us. But it isn’t our home, and we’ve known for a while that we don’t want to stay. We just didn’t know where we wanted to go. But now we do, and I’m excited for what lies ahead.

But the decision didn’t come easy. In fact, it was only after days of talking and examining our lives, including our past, present and future that we were finally able to come to a decision. The two contending locations? Altea, Spain or Paris, France.

I was 20 years old when I first came to live in Paris. I arrived as a student in the Spring of 1998, instantly joining the thousands of other Americans who were also coming for a semester abroad. I was eager to use my French, experience new things, explore Paris! But four months was too short and my experience too typical. I knew that I would be back, but I didn’t quite know how.

My senior year in college, I found my golden ticket to return. While my friends were interviewing for high paying corporate positions, I was applying for a job as an English assistant that offered a minimal salary, but compensated with an invaluable work visa.

For some, life is defined by success: the high-paying job, the potential promotions, the nice car. For others, life is defined by a systematic order of doing things: find a spouse, buy a house, start a family. For me, the value of life lies in the relationships that I’ve built along the way.

I have friends that are preserved in my childhood. Friends that I used to play with in my family’s treehouse, that I celebrated my birthdays with by bobbing for apples, and that I starred in plays with bringing the whole mountain community of Idyllwild out to enjoy the performance. I moved away from that small town—so small that it didn’t even have a fast food restaurant