Glad you enjoyed, and thanks for reading! The first bite's a treat. Beyond that, though, the returns diminish rapidly...so, so, so sweet...but then I go back for another slice??
This was great! Welcome back. Let's hang out at Vogelmorn soon - splits the difference between NZ community hall and queer house party. I love the way you see all this as ritual
Makes me want to to cry, maybe it's the familiarity of observation or nudging the fact that life is being played out in the now, or maybe it's the full moon!? Whatever reason, loved it a lot x
Hi Vik!!! You know exactly this vibe (and so many of the folks in that hall, too.) Every day, ain't it? Just keeps going. Kiwi hours or UK hours or wherever hours. Saturdays with kids are another time-space continuum. A big full moon here in the Wairarapa. too. We miss y'all!! Love to the fam & big hugs from NZ!!
Thanks for the lovely post. Some things, like fairy bread, never change. I always think of Carterton as a generic NZ small town, especially when the daffodils and the sun are out and certainly more affordable than Greytown. Children are always a great gateway into any community. Small towns in NZ often do it hard and often there's a darker side to NZ 'essentialism' that isn't always visible at a football prize giving.
Thanks for reading, Susan! Thanks for your note, too. Fairy bread > lolly cake, every time :) Our children truly have brought us in to NZ in so many ways, as they do! You're right--I'm sugarcoating here. One does hear the darker stories, and the more classic NZ fiction I read, geez, darkness abounds. As a guest here I want to *get it right,* whatever that means...but as a guest I don't think I'm ready to lift every rock? But I don't know. A tricky line to walk, no? Thanks so much for your thoughtful note. Happy spring!
Don’t know if crime is your thing - reading not committing - but have you read Michael Bennett’s Better the Blood and Return to Blood? Brilliant and chilling. Not classics yet but I think they will be.
Weird how you misspelled Marfa USO building. (🤣 I mean that first photo!) The world is a raucous rainbow of variety and yet, AND YET, things can be eerily similar as well.
Jessie!! So good to hear from you! How's Portugal?? Have you found a Marfa USO building there yet? The USO did come to me as I was writing this--had a brief flash of the veterans on the wall--but then I guess I got homesick for enchililadas and went down the rabbithole of difference instead. It IS different here. And totally not. Maybe difference seems more...fun to write about? I dunno. Would love to hear about how expat life treats you & yours. Good luck out there! Abrazos!!
We have just rounded the corner into year 2. The first year here was like most first years. Chaotic, overwhelming, and filled with delight that you actually DID the thing. I have a long lasting vulnerability hangover from being an immigrant and Gatorade is hard to find. 🤣 In our own ways, we’re all coming into our new selves (or our same old selves) this side of the Atlantic. I missioned to visit as many beautiful beaches as I could this summer. Beaches did not disappoint. I love being a beach person now, did desert 🏜️ now beach 🏖️ time.
My comment revels an innate truth about me. I am fascinated by both. Both sides. Both experiences. Both interpretations. The hard and the easy. Is it the Libra in me? 🤷🏼♀️ I don’t know that I even believe in astrology but I’m fascinated with weighing the both/ and of life. 😁 ♎️
'I have a long lasting vulnerability hangover from being an immigrant and Gatorade is hard to find.' This is the finest expat poetry I've read on this website yet. I admire the hell out of y'all for making the leap. Glad to hear things are settling, as settled as settled can be.
And man, Jessie, I been thinking about Both all week. Thank you. It's everything, isn't it? A superpower, to see Both, to have a shot at *being* Both, however incompletely...but there are definitely nights lie in bed wishing I could be Just One again. Whatever the hell that means. Ain't possible. So we go to the beach, hell yeah! Maybe we're all Just One on the beach.
Awe! Shucks thanks. My fleeting thoughts occasionally assemble into some quippy quips.
I am endlessly holding space for both. Even my favorite foods are sweet and salty!
Oh the long for One; from the place of More than One. Why?! Why do we torture ourselves this way. “I love this big More than One life! But how I wish One could have satisfied me”. Again….The Both! Always present for me.
Hi Max! Yes, might've been! Love how calm folks here can be about such things. As it happens one of mine had a playground black eye all last week. And she was fine aye :)
Glad it worked :) That's our fate, isn't it? I do pull the notebook out back home. But being an expat feels like a writerly cheat code sometimes. Don't mind me, I'm not from here, just gotta get something down quick...
The only thing you got wrong in this very entertaining letter is that lolly cake is gross.
Otherwise, loved it!
Glad you enjoyed, and thanks for reading! The first bite's a treat. Beyond that, though, the returns diminish rapidly...so, so, so sweet...but then I go back for another slice??
Yeah, nah…go on then🤣
This was great! Welcome back. Let's hang out at Vogelmorn soon - splits the difference between NZ community hall and queer house party. I love the way you see all this as ritual
Thanks, man! That's **dead on** about Vogelmorn. J and I laughed out loud. Yes let's hang there soon!
Everything's a ritual if you pay enough attention, right? I dunno, I guess just....miss...church
Makes me want to to cry, maybe it's the familiarity of observation or nudging the fact that life is being played out in the now, or maybe it's the full moon!? Whatever reason, loved it a lot x
Hi Vik!!! You know exactly this vibe (and so many of the folks in that hall, too.) Every day, ain't it? Just keeps going. Kiwi hours or UK hours or wherever hours. Saturdays with kids are another time-space continuum. A big full moon here in the Wairarapa. too. We miss y'all!! Love to the fam & big hugs from NZ!!
Thanks for the lovely post. Some things, like fairy bread, never change. I always think of Carterton as a generic NZ small town, especially when the daffodils and the sun are out and certainly more affordable than Greytown. Children are always a great gateway into any community. Small towns in NZ often do it hard and often there's a darker side to NZ 'essentialism' that isn't always visible at a football prize giving.
Thanks for reading, Susan! Thanks for your note, too. Fairy bread > lolly cake, every time :) Our children truly have brought us in to NZ in so many ways, as they do! You're right--I'm sugarcoating here. One does hear the darker stories, and the more classic NZ fiction I read, geez, darkness abounds. As a guest here I want to *get it right,* whatever that means...but as a guest I don't think I'm ready to lift every rock? But I don't know. A tricky line to walk, no? Thanks so much for your thoughtful note. Happy spring!
Don’t know if crime is your thing - reading not committing - but have you read Michael Bennett’s Better the Blood and Return to Blood? Brilliant and chilling. Not classics yet but I think they will be.
I haven't yet! Love a good crime...novel :) Just reserved these at the library. Thanks for the tip!
PS - my kids thought white bread was some kind of forbidden cake that they could only beg for but never have - and those sprinkles were just a bonus.
Thanks for the Wairarapa memories. Nicely written. From a former Mastertonian.
Thanks, Richard!
Weird how you misspelled Marfa USO building. (🤣 I mean that first photo!) The world is a raucous rainbow of variety and yet, AND YET, things can be eerily similar as well.
Jessie!! So good to hear from you! How's Portugal?? Have you found a Marfa USO building there yet? The USO did come to me as I was writing this--had a brief flash of the veterans on the wall--but then I guess I got homesick for enchililadas and went down the rabbithole of difference instead. It IS different here. And totally not. Maybe difference seems more...fun to write about? I dunno. Would love to hear about how expat life treats you & yours. Good luck out there! Abrazos!!
We have just rounded the corner into year 2. The first year here was like most first years. Chaotic, overwhelming, and filled with delight that you actually DID the thing. I have a long lasting vulnerability hangover from being an immigrant and Gatorade is hard to find. 🤣 In our own ways, we’re all coming into our new selves (or our same old selves) this side of the Atlantic. I missioned to visit as many beautiful beaches as I could this summer. Beaches did not disappoint. I love being a beach person now, did desert 🏜️ now beach 🏖️ time.
My comment revels an innate truth about me. I am fascinated by both. Both sides. Both experiences. Both interpretations. The hard and the easy. Is it the Libra in me? 🤷🏼♀️ I don’t know that I even believe in astrology but I’m fascinated with weighing the both/ and of life. 😁 ♎️
'I have a long lasting vulnerability hangover from being an immigrant and Gatorade is hard to find.' This is the finest expat poetry I've read on this website yet. I admire the hell out of y'all for making the leap. Glad to hear things are settling, as settled as settled can be.
And man, Jessie, I been thinking about Both all week. Thank you. It's everything, isn't it? A superpower, to see Both, to have a shot at *being* Both, however incompletely...but there are definitely nights lie in bed wishing I could be Just One again. Whatever the hell that means. Ain't possible. So we go to the beach, hell yeah! Maybe we're all Just One on the beach.
Awe! Shucks thanks. My fleeting thoughts occasionally assemble into some quippy quips.
I am endlessly holding space for both. Even my favorite foods are sweet and salty!
Oh the long for One; from the place of More than One. Why?! Why do we torture ourselves this way. “I love this big More than One life! But how I wish One could have satisfied me”. Again….The Both! Always present for me.
Lovely, Dan. You kicked another one through the posts (see what I did there?)
TOUCHDOWN
Thanks Leah!
Love this one Dan, was it my kid with the head injury? Would have been one of many. And he was fine aye.
Hi Max! Yes, might've been! Love how calm folks here can be about such things. As it happens one of mine had a playground black eye all last week. And she was fine aye :)
Whatever it did for you, it took me there. I felt it. Maybe as writers, we will always be on the outside looking in?
Glad it worked :) That's our fate, isn't it? I do pull the notebook out back home. But being an expat feels like a writerly cheat code sometimes. Don't mind me, I'm not from here, just gotta get something down quick...
Pro’bly a typo, but I really like the “proud couches” = a great image!
A very evocative piece. I’ve had a whiff of this in my visits there, and you’ve captured it here.
Oh hell, it's the coaches who were proud! Fixed. Many chairs, but no couches in Dalefield Hall :)