The 18-Month Rollercoaster

It was approximately 18 months ago that Ted and I made some decisions that started a jam-packed, rollicking journey that would mark an Interesting Period of our lives. Here's a brief timeline and some of the main events that have happened in this time:

In these past months, I've learned a few things:

~ Boston is ripe with American history -- one can randomly come across some plaque or stone marker indicating what Important Event (such as where Washington first took command of American troops) related to the American Revolution occurred there. However, there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of information regarding First Nations populations here or pre-contact populations (you know, before the Pilgrims with their hats arrived at Plymouth Rock), so  I tried to find out a bit more about the area. Boston (and I think Cambridge) sits on the Massachusett traditional territory, the tribe the state of Massachusetts is named after. I've tried to look up information about this particular tribe, but apparently, while there are small bands living around the state, the people were nearly wiped out during post-colonial contact. Their language (and the word Massachusetts) is a dialect of Algonquin. Here's a map from Wikipedia:

~ Massachusetts has a form of socialized healthcare and has for some time. It's a point of pride, apparently.
~ I've mentioned this one before - the immigration process is a painful exercise in waiting... which I whine about despite coming to the U.S. under good circumstances and carrying a Canadian passport (the point being that this very likely makes it much easier for me than someone carrying another sort of passport or identification).
~ Apparently, one needs a Social Security Number (aka "a social") in order to do a number of things such as: apply for a job, get a driver's license, apply to see if one is eligible to take a social work licensing exam, get a bank account (although, we were able to circumvent this somehow), do volunteer work (they need your social to run a check on you), etc. One cannot get a social until their immigration stuff is done. See above point.
~ A surprising number of people do not know what you mean when asking for a washroom. One should request a bathroom.
~ Boston has a super great food scene. I'm glad I had a full physical, including blood pressure and cholesterol check earlier this year. Who knows what the numbers will be the next time I have a check up.
~ Reconnecting with old friends, even ones you haven't seen or spoken to in years (even since junior high school), is always lovely and fun. You get to hear all the interesting things that have happened with people in those intervening years. It's never boring.
~ Job-hunting, particularly when one is trying to pursue new-ish areas of social work that have long been of interest, is not the time to be squeamish! Many applications were sent out! Many interviews (in person and via phone) were scheduled! Many diplomatic rejection letters/responses came in.... I started the process tentatively at first and eventually found myself perusing job postings and saying to myself, "well, I don't necessarily fit 100% of the preferences or requirements, but I'm going to apply anyway!". And I did. The worst that could happen, I figured? No response or a "no" (something I was getting used to, anyway). I mean, it still sucked. And some days, Ted would come home to find me being overly-dramatic and bemoaning my life (like I said -- dramatic). I'm sure he was always really happy about that.
~ One in-person, super supportive person in your life can change everything. Ted and I have a great support network. Unfortunately, most of this network is currently not in Boston and while emails and such are fantastic, it's just not the same as commiserating with or bouncing ideas off someone in person. So, we've leaned heavily on each other as we navigated some of the milestones we've recently experienced. I'm not certain I would have survived the emotional ups and downs that have occurred without Ted. I'm sure there were times where he wasn't certain he would survive my emotional ups and downs, either. But, I'd like to think the reverse is true as well and while his emotional ups and downs look very different from mine, I'm sure he had them, too. Having that person also gives us the freedom and luxury of BEING dramatic and wallowing in short-lived dumpitudes before getting our act together (sometimes at the prodding of the other person), acknowledging how blessed we are, and plugging along.

Identity

I'm going to start with this: I am a very fortunate and privileged person. I won't even begin to list the ways which exemplifies the truth of this statement; the list would be crazily, ridiculously long. However, borne of this fortune and privilege is the ability to consciously formulate an identity and think about what that means to me and its impacts on how I see myself and subsequently how I project myself to the world.

Ted and I have now been in Boston for a solid 2 weeks. In that time, we've found an apartment in Cambridge, opened a bank account, applied for credit cards, attempted to apply for social security numbers (we can't right now because the American government has been shutdown for a week and the two parties are at a stalemate), and started to shop for furniture and supplies and all those good household items. So far it's been a lot of fun and a good exercise in budgeting as well as 'dreaming big and whittling down'. :) There were a few moments when Ted and I felt pretty certain we heard our parents' voices coming out of our own mouths. The horror. :)

But, I digress. During the entering of the U.S. and the renting of the apartment and the signing of the lease and the opening of the bank account and the application for the credit card, I was reminded over and over of our situation. Ted was being "sponsored" into the U.S. through his work, and by extension, so was I. Thus, I am currently an extension of Ted. Even my entry visa puts me as "Spouse". Ted is the primary signatory on most things as he has the entry visa that confirms he is employed and will therefore have an income. Before we came to Massachusets, I willingly decided to change my last name and changed my passport accordingly. I was now Alexandra D., no longer Alexandra T. It was sort of strange at the time but not a big deal. Had we remained in Vancouver, I think I would have still had a solid sense of who this Alexandra D. person was: a young, hard-working CP social worker with many interests (chief among them: food and wine), financially independent, a home-owner, and newly a wife. I had a healthy and active social life that allowed me in-person, face-to-face access to a solid network of family and friends who are similar and therefore confirmed my sense of who I was. I might have had an easier time figuring out who Alexandra D. is since many other aspects of my life would have remained recognizable. Now, having moved to a city on the opposite coast with a different surname and where I'm noted as technically being a dependent and where we know only a handful of people, my sense of who Alexandra D. is has started to become something more difficult to grasp, which was inevitable, I suppose. The neat thing is that this is a great opportunity to try something quite different from what I was doing before. The truth is, it's sometimes an unnerving feeling and process and I think it's ok to acknowledge that. I'm young and at a new stage in my life. These shifts in my identity were going to happen regardless, but with so many changes happening all at once, I sometimes get overwhelmed.

This post isn't a complaint and I hope it won't be read as such. I make my choices willingly, happily and with great excitement of the possibilities ahead and am also secure in the knowledge that I am in a position to be able to make these choices. But I share the process I'm going through because I also think it can be a normal part of all this.

How many Canadian references can you spot?

So for now, as I take the time to explore my neighbourhood,
I know that part of what makes up who I am is "Canadian".

Best. Snuggie. Ever!

And maybe on some evenings, Batman --because who wouldn't want a chance to be the greatest superhero ever?

Life is Happening!

2013 has been a very busy year so far. We started in Vancouver. And now we're in Boston. New city, new try at the blog.

The short version of the story is: we got engaged, Ted got a post-doc position at M.I.T., we got married a few months later, slept on an air mattress for a few weeks while we packed up our stuff, and got on a plane for Boston a month after that.

We've been in Boston for 4 full days at this point, living out of our suitcases in a hotel, and spending our days looking for a place to live. It's both extremely stressful and extremely liberating having so much up in the air from where we'll be living to whether/where I may find work to how long we'll actually be here for, plus all the other issues in between. The answers to all of those question? No clue, yet.

We'll sort it out in time. In the meantime, Ted and I will just continue vacillating between being super excited with everything that is happening (and so quickly) and being extremely stressed out with everything that is happening (and so quickly).

"Life is a journey, not a destination." I'll drink to that, Ralph Waldo Emerson!