Thoughts on our An(NY)versary

Exactly one year ago, the Craddock family landed at JFK. Full of a sense of awe and adventure and excitement. And fear. Yeah. Nervousness, maybe? No – full on fear. We had never, ever done anything like this before and having watched our house get packed into boxes and loaded into a container that would sail across the ocean, there was a sense of permanence; of no turning back. It was exhilarating. And terrifying. Having cleared immigration seemingly unscathed (we didn’t know then to correct the officer when he got our exit dates wrong…) we stepped out of the airport bubble and into the real life of New York. And so our year began.

Don’t worry – I’m not going to give you a full account of the year. But I did feel the need to write to mark the day. And yes, I get that I have not been hugely successful at this blog thing (understatement) but I learned pretty quickly in 2014 that prioritisation is key in every aspect of our lives. For as long as I can remember I have maintained a running commentary of my life inside my own head, for my ears only. It is easy to think that it would be a great idea to share that stream of consciousness with others. And to be fair – I kind of do. Anyone who follows my facebook posts gets a little bit of insight into what is going on there. But to blog it takes some responsibility – to think it through or at least to re-read and edit; to take time to be clear and coherent; to ensure it is interesting enough to keep people coming back; to take care not to forget the audience and turn it into a Dear Diary; to put people off when I just can’t give things a positive spin; to remember there are things that need to be spoken (out loud) before they are written. I gave it a good shot but I don’t think I had ever considered quite how much stress and turmoil comes along with resettling your eagerly expectant and highly ambitious young family into a new world you need them to call theirs. So I went off the radar and actually listened to what more experienced re-locators had been telling us all along: the first year is a bit of a write-off.

Well, write-off or not, it has been a year of learning. Learning new jobs, a new language (oh yes), a new environment, a new lifestyle, a new currency (still converting to GBP), a new set of rules and acceptable behaviours. Learning to let down our defences in a very un-British way and let go of old preconceptions. Also, at times, learning why those preconceptions existed in the first place! We have become city parents – something we would have never dreamed of in the UK. Our kids have transitioned seamlessly from suburban to urban, falling short only in their proper little accents. We have learned to live without a car (although we do miss it), learned to get EVERYTHING delivered, learned to block out the noise from the street, learned to budget like crazy after the rent cheque is cashed like only a New Yorker knows how. And there is still a whole lot more we need to learn. Like how taxes work here, how to find something (anything) to watch on Time Warner Cable, how to navigate the schools admissions process, how to understand medical insurance benefits (I don’t actually expect to ever get there).

But it has also been a year of growth. Growing into our roles as: the full-time working mom at the firm’s flashy HQ; the fully fledged stay-at-home dad of internet fame (see HuffPost & NY Times);  the New York City elementary school student killing his reading assignments when he can be distracted from Star Wars; the urban pre-schooler with an incredible aptitude for his scooter and a slight hint of Russian in his accent (don’t ask).  And a whole load of other stuff. We have missed our friends and family on a daily basis. We have had visitors from home and have been visitors back home. We have opened our doors to wonderful new friends and have had doors opened up to us. We have joined book clubs and dad’s groups, celebrated birthdays and new holidays, hosted Christmas and New Years, and discovered the small neighbourhood in the big city. It may have been a write-off in the grand scheme of things but we played it hard, dug in our heels and we will remember it forever. And we look forward with eager anticipation to year two.