The girl from the north : 1 year

It's already been a year since I returned to France. A year that I've been living this ‘expatriation at home’ pretty much in silence... A year that I've been trying to define a lifestyle halfway between the one I was and the one I am. A year that I've been clinging on to, impatient with the strong desire to connect with others, to talk about my story, to exchange views on subjects as profound as the individuation process that expatriation provokes.

For several months I've been adapting, quietly blending in and sometimes forgetting myself. For several months I've been hiding, shutting myself down for fear of reinforcing my feeling of being even more misunderstood. Almost ashamed of the rollercoaster ride I'm on again, alone. In fact, I've been fighting a silent battle with myself for several months now, and today I feel like summoning up the courage to share with you, in all sincerity, another facet of this "return to France". Because coming back to where you grew up, is also part of travelling. And it's hard to build yourself up in a foreign land, but it's perhaps even harder to build yourself up again in a land that's so familiar.

A year ago, it was France I was thinking of when I said I was homesick. I wanted to see my northern plains again, my northern beaches, my northern people. I wanted to rediscover the food, the kindness and the human warmth of this region. I wanted to find some stability, some surroundings. I wanted my friends and family back. I wanted to settle down and move on, a bit more adult-like this time. I wanted to get back to dancing to the rhythm of the 80s. To get back to those "aperitifs" on the french-like patios. To find back the proximity of such a diverse Europe. To admire the architecture of ancient cities. To wander in the streets just for the pleasure of my eyes.

But today I'm homesick. Not just from one home, but all the homes I had. If the mountains of Norway or Nelson oppressed me and I dreamt of returning to my northern plains, today it's my direct link to nature that I miss. It's the spur-of-the-moment adventure that costs 0 euros where you take your tent and duvet and go camping with your friends in the middle of nowhere. It's the exhilaration of evenings around the fire, toasting marshmallows and telling stories. It's the simplicity of impromptu dinners with people from all over the world, remaking the world. It's Mount Maunganui at sunrise and van adventures with Cachou's face first thing in the morning. It's the sound of guitars and banjos in the local bar. It's the sound of the English language. It's the less stressful culture of living abroad, accountable to almost no-one. It's the freedom of your own time, without all the rules, both spoken and unspoken, imposed by the culture you come from. It's the absence of responsibility. It's the open-mindedness of the people I meet along the way. It's the relationship with the land. It's the absence of the ‘metro, work, sleep’ routine. It's people's curiosity about the stranger I was in their eyes.

And then there's the ache of my friends. All now scattered to the four corners of the globe, Europe and France. The return of my loneliness, a feeling I thought I had tamed abroad. The lack of people with whom to share those feelings so typical of expatriates. The feeling of being out of step, of culture shock, which only those who have left and returned can understand. The incoherence of a world, a culture, a society that continues to move forward, banging its head against walls, whereas we know. We know that there are other ways. Other patterns. That life can be something else. Something simpler but truer. And that it's always possible to reinvent everything. To reinvent ourselves.

I miss pieces of myself. Of this version of myself that I was abroad, that it seems impossible to be here. When you go so far away, you detach yourself from all the French Uses and Customs. The ‘bien être’, the ‘bien paraître’, the ‘bien dire’ that are so typical of our country. You build yourself differently. Halfway between your own traditions and those of the country you're visiting or living in. You don't have to do much. And you really ask yourself what's important to you. You try things. You discover yourself differently. Over time, you find yourself and assert yourself. It's a freedom I think you can only find elsewhere. Where no one knows you. Where no one projects expectations, principles or traditions onto you. And that is something I miss a lot today.

In systemic therapies, people are often compared to the metaphor of a flower. If a flower doesn't grow in a particular environment, it's not the flower you're trying to change, but the environment. Sometimes all it needs is a place with a little more sun for it to bloom. But if you export a tropical plant to the North Pole, it will wither away. That seems to me to be the whole issue of expatriation and return. As an expatriate, I used a different type of fertiliser on my flower, which seemed to make it grow for a while until it stopped growing. When I wanted to go back, I wanted to put down roots again, exactly where I came from. But now that I'm in the right soil, I still have to find the right environmental balance. And that takes time.

It's said that it takes an average of 2 or even 3 years to establish yourself in a new place, to find your bearings, rebuild a network, a circle of friends, to feel at home here too. So I guess It's not "It's already been a year", but "it's only been a year". While I may have returned physically, I believe my mind is still on its way back...

Love.

Coco.