This one is from the archives: written in 2011 when we had our first baby and had just moved overseas for the first time. We were living in a hotel waiting to find out where our employer would assign and house us.

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For some time now, my mind has been swirling. Undoing a life without children. Undoing life in Chicago. Undoing our life in Louisville. Undoing my life at work. Undoing a life of any stuff at all. Undoing my life in the USA. Undoing our life as we knew it. Undoing my life as I knew it.

Not for a one month vacation. Not for a three-month cultural experience. Not for a defined new life in another US city. All that we know for sure, is that we are here today, and maybe for at least some months. Hopefully two years, or more.

If you think about what I mean by “here”, we literally live breath to breath. There is NO certainty in that.

Now, my brain is circling, waiting to land on the new. What is “the new?” All I know right now, is what it is not:

• Not based on my physical location
• Not based on my job
• Not based on my car and how not flashy it is
• Not based on what iTunes music I play on my (charmingly) old iPhone
• Not based on meager scraps thrown to charity
• Not based on even being a mom or wife
• Not based on my political party or “did I vote last time?”
• Not based on my food choices
• Not based on not having a Kitchen Aid Mixer
• Not based on what brand of shoes I wear
• Not based on how much money we don’t spend
• Not based on how many student loans we (still) have

You could call this an identity crisis. To some extent, I suspected something like this might happen with all the undoing and not’s.

I’m feeling a tug, a pull to something totally new. A new way of living, doing, being. I don’t think we’ll know what for a while. But, this is exciting and terrifying all at the same time. If I really think about it…more terrifying.

But in a really good way.