Why We're Here in We're Still Here...

Lack of composure can make for a lack of eloquence and such may be the case here.

After a night of fevered tossing and turning, my husband fainted in the bathroom as he tried to get ready to go to work that day, concerned that he may not have a job if he dared called out sick.

Psychologically, we had been through the wringer. The pandemic had taken it's toll. I saw the last few moments of my mother's life over a Skype call and then had to contend with a sibling and extended family eager to take advantage of our distance to perform "dutiful relatives" when in life, they did not support my mother, not monetarily and not emotionally. Even then, years after my mother's mother's death, they still sought to score points.

An anchor point in my life was gone. My mother and I clashed more than once, yet when we had distance between us, we were always more at ease with each other. She'd come to our rescue before and we'd come to hers. She did not have strings, though she made a fine point of us being obligated to pay her back on more than one occasion.

When things weren't working and we needed to regroup, we'd been able to stay at my mother's. Not comfortably. Disturbing jealousies and competitiveness, that I could never have imagined and could only recognize at that age, emerged. But it allowed us to secure new jobs after our move back.

It also enabled us to secure an apartment when things became unbearable there. Before that, when my mother had been annoyed with her job and her environment and she needed an escape, I gave her a place to go, with us, and we paid for the portion of rent she'd be out due to the instability of her job in that moment.

I was terrified after my mother died. I stood up to my relatives while I was abroad. They would not dare condescend to me when I knew the truth of their relationship with my mother.

But there was also a plague apparently. What if things fell through while we were abroad?

---

The first year had been difficult. We relied on both of our mothers to send money for groceries frequently as we saved so I could get the certificate required to join my husband in working where we had settled.

After a year of struggle, that first month of two paychecks brought such elation. We filled the fridge and sent money back to our mothers with the promise of more to come. Now we could finally pay them back.

We were finally on track. We'd save our nest egg, away from the high cost of living in the U.S. We'd travel more. Build our remote work and become location independent. I'd rescue my mother from that city. She'd finally have a house in a peaceful location. Retire and live comfortably. And my husband and I would find that place in the world that was ours and no longer be expats.

In the second month, the pandemic hit. Five months after that, my mother died.

---

Contrary to what we'd been indoctrinated to think, the so-called third world country in which we dwelt handled the pandemic with efficiency and aplomb. After a month-long lockdown, with the exception of temperature checks in crowded shopping areas, all returned to normal.

We were in a bubble of normality, watching most of the rest of the world deal with the situation abysmally. Matters didn't really hit the fan until the following year, which resulted in a longer lockdown and the closure of my workplace.

There was a relief to being there. I asked myself if it was wrong to be glad I wasn't in the U.S. My worries centered on any instability that could force us to leave and enter that maelstrom.

My job ended but my husband's was solid. Until it wasn't. Two years after my job dissolved, his turned to mush.

Thus commenced a mad dash to secure another job and maintain our visas. Against all odds, he was able to do it. However, the new position was not entirely what it seemed and their ability to handle governmental requirements appeared limited.

Once again, another hop to a more secure position. But by this point we had eaten into our savings several times, due to lockdowns, and then the job instability.

We were ready to leave. By this point many restrictions and requirements for travel and public life had fallen away. If we left, we knew travel would be quite the same as it was when we first came. We'd managed to avoid experiencing quarantines and invasive testing procedures by just staying put.

We hoped if we stayed a few more months, we'd put together the needed amount to fly out.

---

But then he got sick, and the shock of finding him on the ground in the bathroom, followed by horrendous care at a hospital supposedly known for international standards, had us scrambling to reach out to his mother and his family for help.

His mother sounded assuring and calm. Things would be fine but she thought it was time for us to come back to the U.S. as well.

It was no longer a question of saving. She and his family would get tickets for us and we'd fly back. Then we'd stay at her house until we got back on our feet.

Even in that moment of panic, speaking to my husband's mother from the hospital room in a foreign country, I was leery.

---

Over the past, nearly, two decades, his mother's first response to every moment of struggle my husband had shared with her was that he should come back home. He should pursue education and a career field he had zero interest in and then, as her rationale went, use that to pursue his dreams. A year never went by in which she didn't make this assertion.

Up until she and his brothers were invited to his college graduation from a prestigious school in the field he was interested in. They showed up late and their faces were sour. They made plans for the trip that did not include my husband, yet expected him to follow whatever itinerary they had decided upon.

When he sought to make an adjustment, eager to spend time with them and show them around the city he had made his home, they blew up at him. They had gone out of their way to come to his graduation, so he should make accommodations to what they wanted.

We had meant to surprise them with a double event. His graduation and a city hall wedding. Two for one, making the most of their trip and having a larger celebration.

Their general demeanor and response decided it for me. Their negativity would not mar our successes and the journey we would embark upon. We postponed when we originally planned to get married and when we did, two months later, my mother was witness.

His mother lamented about how sad not being there made her. But she did not take accountability to what led to their exclusion.

Due to experiences I've had, where possible, I will not allow me or mine to be abused and the abuser to believe they will receive our goodwill in response. No matter their sense of entitlement.

Thus it was.

---

The long haul tickets were bought on credit. We purchased domestic tickets with cash. We flew out two months later, stopping in our old city, and grabbing a thing or two from our storage space. Then continuing on to where his mother would pick us up.

Though we asked that a crowd not meet us because we'd be tired from our travels and experiences and needed time to recuperate, his mother arrived with his grandmother and his niece. To gawk and make the ride to her house noisy and uncomfortable. She even brought up my husband pursuing that degree and career field on the ride down.

Funds had not allowed for us to rent our own car, but we had been able to stay in a hotel for one night, giving us some buffer to rest and shower after a full day of travel.

One ordeal was over, but now another had begun.

Entry #2