USA Update

So, I have officially been back in the USA for 4 days now. I got in late last Thursday so therefore today is officially my 4th day here. It is also my 4th day off of work. I have taken Friday and Monday off as vacation but plan to work out of Boston for the rest of the week.

Because my last post went on and on forever and ever, this time I will spare you the details and instead leave you with a very short list (relatively speaking) about what I've been up to since I landed back Stateside because I'm sure you are all very curious about what I'm up to and if I'm at all living up to my vacation to-do list. So, here goes:

First of all, I'm very happy to tell you all that I got CARDED on the plane on the way to the US! What is going on here? This is the second time in the past month (I must be doing something right). We didn't actually get to the point of me needing to show my actual ID. However, she did ask my age in a very skeptical tone and when I told her that I was the very old age of 32 she burst out laughing (and embarrassingly, so did everyone around me) and she actually said: "Wow. You look no older than 18!!" Well, that might have been stretching it a bit. But it did make my day err.... well, my week actually.

Since arriving home to my parent's house in Western Massachusetts, I have been very disappointed in the terrible cold and rainy weather. Blah! Where is summer? I want to lay by the pool!

On Saturday I attended the wedding of one of my oldest friend S. Despite the pouring rain, the wedding and the reception were fantastic! At this point I have to give a shout out to S. I have known S since we were 3 years old and we went to elementary school together. S and I have a long history that dates all the way back to his first bowl cut (over the years for some reason he chose to sport a bowl cut hairstyle most off the time). In elementary school he was like the way too "cool" kid who was always bullying everyone else. In high school he was the typical popular guy who played every sport. He was the guy who relentlessly teased everyone - although I think that he suffered his fair share of well-deserved teasing back. In college, he was the smart engineering student who knew how to have a good time and still get top grades.

Somewhere between elementary school and high school S and I became good friends and that friendship lasted us all the way to college at UNH. Over the years we have shared a lot of memories and good times (and some bad such as the infamous night that I split my head open at his girlfriend's apartment in college - oops). In high school he was a star basketball player and me being the cheerleader I was always had his name and even made up a special cheer for him (yes, we did relive this at the wedding). In college I remember driving home with S in TRUCK (pronounced loudly TRRRUUUCK) - it was a slow going ride since Truck only had 4 gears. People would joke that one day we would get together (I mean that's what you do in small towns right)? But S and I never had a romantic interest in each other. He is like a brother to me and I hope a friend for life.

I'm so happy that S found a beautiful bride in N. They are a beautiful couple I wish them the best of luck!

The wedding enabled me to to catch up with 2 of my best friends from high school who I went to the wedding with. So great to see them!

I also got to catch up with many other friends from high school mostly the high school "boys" at the wedding. Funny how quickly we all revert back to our high school selves and even the way we used to talk... As the mother of the groom said, "You all have such a special bond, and whenever you see each other, you pick right up where you left off." She is right...

As I so often do lately, I managed to feel out of place being one of the only single people as well as one of the few people without children - I guzzled gin and tonics as the couples went on and on about children. Not that I blame them or hold it against them (I'm sure I would be doing it too), it's just that I can't really relate and I certainly have nothing to contribute.

After a night of hearing my friends who are new parents talk about the early 5 am "wake up calls" from the kids and watching the married couples interact (not always in a very encouraging way) I have decided that I am in NO RUSH TO GET MARRIED OR HAVE CHILDREN! Perhaps single life is not all that bad...

I marvelled at the differences between American and Swedish weddings including: at this American wedding most guests (including the Maid of Honor) seemed to be wearing black which is a big "no no" in Sweden, the DJ serves as the person who gets the wedding going rather than the toast master, American weddings tend to have an emphasis on family members while the Swedish wedding has an emphasis on friends, the religious American ceremony vs. the very short and non-religious Swedish one, and the fact that the American wedding ended around midnight while the Swedish one raged on all night. Up next a San Fransisco wedding. We will see how that compares.

I have been trying to wean myself away from work but so far it's only been met with minimal success. Today while I was taking a nap (as you do on vacation) I had work stress dreams the whole time. I also have been unable to stop checking my blackberry (that damn blinking red light) and tonight and last night I actually found myself working for 2 hours! I hope I can find it in me to really leave work behind for awhile once I get through this week.

Today (Monday) the sun peaked its way through the clouds for exactly one hour. Unfortunately, that hour exactly coincided with the contractors who my parents hired to work on rebuilding our barn (no idea why this is important -it's not as if we have barn animals or anything). So, I sat in the house feeling very sorry for myself that I was missing the sun since there was really no way that I could strut out in my bikini in front of the 5 workmen. Thank you Mom and Dad for this great planning. I've been dreaming of a day at the pool for so long! I guess I have to wait a couple more weeks.

In general, I have been feeling a bit stressed and am not in vacation mode at all (probably because I know I have to work the rest of this week) I've been running around trying to sort out things, do work, get to the gym, etc. It has so far been anything but relaxing and so far I have not really crossed a single thing off my to do list and I'm struggling to find time to even sleep. And with this week in Boston and next week in San Fran, it doesn't seem like I will have much down time. Well, I guess that is the life of an International Woman of Mystery. I guess I should just get used to the fast pace.

I'm off to Boston for the rest of the week to work out of the office there and of course - have some adventures. Will keep you posted. So, stay tuned for a Boston update!

Have a great week!
XOXO

My Friends are Getting Married, I'm Just Getting Drunk

I was once asked to join a Facebook group called My Friend are Getting Married, I'm Just Getting Drunk. I don't think I joined the actual group, but the name of the group really struck a chord with me. It seemed like (still seems like) the perfect description of my life. In fact, I think a more apt description would be All my Friends are getting Married and/or Having Babies while I'm just Getting Drunk.

Once upon a time in the not so distant past, it seemed like all my friends were single. Together we enjoyed girl's nights out that consisted of talking about all the men in our lives over glasses of wine, getting drunk, dancing, flirting with men, possibly going home with some man after flirting and dancing with him, then calling your each other the next morning trade stories and laugh about the many shenanigans that took place the night before... You know the deal.

But sometime, when I wasn't paying attention everything changed. It was like the rest of the people around me suddenly grew up and started being adults and I just stayed the same fun-loving immature single gal. Suddenly I look around and everyone is either married, getting married, getting divorced, getting married again, or having their first - and in some cases their second or third - babies!Let me give you some statistics to prove my point. Since last November, 5 of my close friends have had babies, this summer I will attend 5 weddings. And sad but true, I can only count 4 single friends and unfortunately not one of them lives in London. And with Facebook bringing you into up-close-and-personal contact with the daily lives of your 500+ friends and acquaintances through exuberant pictures and status updates (seems like the thing to do is post your baby's picture as your profile picture), I can't help feeling like there is some kind of massive marriage/baby boom going on out there? And how have I managed to miss this? When I decide to just get drunk and not get married?

I try to think back to when I was a little kid and what I envisioned my life to be like when I was older... Where did I see myself at 31 years old? Honestly, I draw a big blank. Besides wanting to live abroad and become an International Woman of Mystery (seriously - I actually saw that as my destiny but that's a whole other blog in itself), I didn't really ever see myself getting married and having children. But I didn't actually see myself NOT doing it either though. I just never had a visual picture of myself with a baby and a husband. I guess I just thought that at some point there would be some natural progression towards that lifestyle - that like all the others around me (or so it seems) I wouldn't have to think about it - it would just happen. However, so far. It has not happened. And actually, I still have trouble conjuring up an image of myself with a husband and a baby - I mean can any of you see me with a baby on one arm and a man I go home to every night? Exactly... See... that's what I'm talking about.


The very strange thing is that I feel that my childhood and upbringing should have given me a good view of marriage and kids. I mean my parents are still married. I had a great childhood. I love my parents and they love my brother and I and they brought us up well (although admittedly I might be a little biased here). And despite the fact that my brother and I both currently live abroad, we have an extremely close family and enjoy spending time together and try to do so as often as we can.

But if I reflect back on my childhood, I have to say that I have never really seen myself as a very maternal person, nor have I ever seen myself as a traditional wife. To me the word HOUSEWIFE has always equaled a dirty word. I knew early on that I was going to be a career woman. I think this in part comes from having a very strong and dominating Mother. There was no question who ruled our household. Even today she is more driven and ambitious than my Father - and she makes more money than him(Dad - if you are reading this - don't worry I love you anyway, you were the "fun" parent). My Mother taught me that being a strong woman was important. She was my role model from day one and I have admired strong women ever since. I can honestly say that I was shocked to find out that women were not the dominant sex in the rest of the world. In fact, it was my neighbor who pointed this out to me. I still remember the day that he tried to tell me women belonged at home with the babies cleaning and cooking. From that day on we became rivals and I set out to prove to the world that women could in fact dominate the world and were absolutely the superior Sex.

Another unusual reflection from my childhood involves "playing house." It is a natural thing for children to want to mimic the lives of adults or imagine how their lives as adults will be. Playing house is a natural part of childhood. However... being the strong-minded (and admitedly sometimes strange) child that I was, I had very strict rules on how I thought you should play house. I never ever ever played house in the traditional sense. In the elaborate stories I created for my friends and I to act out (I'm sure you are all very surprised to hear that I was a bossy child - shocker) we never had a traditional family unit with a mother, father, kids, dog, the house with the white picket fence etc. Instead I always insisted that we play run away children or even better, I liked to play that I was a single woman (an Aunt maybe) who adopted children. Although I often convinced guys to play with me, I never once wanted to be the mom or wife in the game of house. Can you believe that? Even as a child, I could NOT even pretend to have a husband or pretend to get married. It seriously grossed me out! And I never pretended to be a mother as in having actual children that were supposed to be my own. When I played with my dolls - it was the same thing. Barbie and Ken were always either boyfriend and girlfriend or brother and sister or more likely just plain friends. Actually, usually I was too busy enacting camping scenes in the woods and having them drown in the river and need rescuing to really care too much about the intricacies of their relationship (I was a bit of a Tomboy as a child). So, even as young as 5 years old, I already knew that I couldn't see myself as a mother or as a person who gets married. Or perhaps even at that age I was already doubting myself as the kind of person guys would want to marry.

It will probably come as no surprise then that Peter Pan was my favorite book as a child. I used to make my father read it to me over and over again. Even at an early age I felt a strong identification with Peter Pan and the lost boys who lived in Never Neverland and never wanted to grow up. I remember telling my Father that I was never going to grow up either. But I guess even Peter Pan had to grow up... I mean we all saw the movie Hook right? If you haven't, seriously - watch it. It's great!

The thing is... I'm not exactly ready to trade my international life and my career in tomorrow for a husband and kids - just the thought sends me into a semi-panic attack. But I'm starting to realize that kids, a husband, stability are probably things that I want in the future. I'm also realizing that partying every weekend, working long hours, and jet setting around the world is not exactly conducive behavior for fostering any kind of permanent relationship or settling down and there is absolutely no way to fit children into this lifestyle. I kept thinking I could do it all. But now I'm realizing that maybe it's just not possible. And since I can't run away with the Lost Boys to Never Neverland and hide away in some ageless world full of fun and games and pirates, the clock - oh that scary clock (much like the one that the alligator in Peter Pan swallows - I'm SO getting the deeper message of this book now) continues to tick, and no matter how hard I wish, I'm not getting any younger. So, if I'm really serious about settling down sometime soon, I guess I should start thinking about some making some changes in my life.... But don't worry! NOT YET! Fear not my faithful blog readers. At least for now, I will continue to amuse you with my silly stories of international singledom.

Luckily one of my 4 single friends is coming to visit me in London for the long Easter weekend. So, while my friends are all at home with their babies and husbands and boyfriends, well you know that we'll just be getting drunk!