Back - Home?

The first full year as “Transatlantic Nomads”, as a friend who flies back and forth even more often than we do calls her blog (which is definitely worth checking out if you speak German), has passed. After spending the summer in Germany, we are back in P.. A little exhausted. Somehow more glad to be here again than at least I had expected before. And the resume for this first year clearly is: A life in two countries has to be learned.

It was wonderful to see our families in Germany, of course. Flying in from Newark and to be picked up at Cologne airport by the (grand)parents didn’t even feel much different from driving to their house from Berlin like we used to until we moved to the US; both trips take at least nine hours.

After moving on to Berlin, we enjoyed our little apartment just in the same house we used to live in before. The first two weeks on the well-known turf passed quickly and delightfully: Rediscovering old and dear places, getting back to some nice routines like food shopping on the Kollwitzplatz street market on Saturday mornings.

But pretty soon afterwards, we started to feel awkward. First of all, it is impossible to have a two-and-a-half-months vacation – even for Germans who are spoiled in that sense. It took us a while to figure out why, although looking back, the solution seems self-evident: While the lives of most other people – friends, relatives – hadn’t changed much, and most of the old social infrastructure was still there, OUR lives had changed completely, of course. No work. No office to go to in the morning. No school. All the everyday routines were gone, and we had somehow managed to – at least emotionally – ignore this.

That K.’s laptop with all his work stuff on it broke down for good just three days after we had arrived didn’t help. That our German cell phones had gone out of business because we hadn’t used them for too long was another one of many small nuisances that add up to make one feel uncomfortable and, well, not really at home. On top of everything, most of my elder son N.’s friends went on vacation trips with their parents sooner or later because it was their summer holidays, too. Only R., our two-and-a-half-year-old, could go back to his old preschool for two months and was perfectly happy there.

So, here are the lessons learned: We have to travel more in Germany next summer, to make our regular trips real explorations of our home country. We’ll have to book some sort of summer camp for N. (Although, and this is one of the best things achieved in the summer, we went to a most extraordinary kid’s pool next to the Museumsinsel in Berlin Mitte at every single sunny day, so that N. learned how to swim properly!). And the parents need some sort of working projects, too. In general, a whole lot more planning needs to be done beforehand…

Still, many treasured memories were brought back to P. Getting reassured, for example, how important really close friends are – and continue to be after one leaves. I spent many of this trip’s best days and hours with my girlfriends H. and B. whom I have known and loved for more than thirty years in one case and more than twenty years in the other. And even some of the friendships that had only developed over the last six or seven years in Berlin have stayed close in spite of us moving away. So, apart from not forgetting where one’s roots are and making sure the boys continue speak their first language, there are quite a few good reasons to make the strenuous - and expensive - trip every year.

Maybe even coming back after the summer is one of these journeys' big assets. Some small things that felt SO good. To write an email on the evening before the flight back announcing one’s arrival, and to receive an answer from M. within seconds that one has been missed. Or to be greeted as warmly as by our neighbor D. who came outside to hug us in the midst of all our suitcases – and had filled our fridge with good things to eat. Maybe it IS possible to have two places – and kinds – of home, after all.