Long-Term Planning

This past week, as we contemplated not only the state of the US economy, but also our own plans and dreams for the future, P-daddy (my husband) and I sat down to talk about where we wanna be when. Do we want to stay here forever? Do we want the same jobs we have now for the foreseeable future? Where do we want to live if not here? What do we want to do if not what we are doing now?

The discussion culminated in us both agreeing that living outside of the US would be a good thing. I lived for 4 years in Guatemala, P-daddy was born in Vietnam and didn't move to the US until he was almost 10, and we've both traveled extensively, so this was not a decision out of left field. Reaching the decision to live outside of the US was relatively quick and easy (hey baby, what do you think of retirement in another country? Sounds good, let's do it). A little more time was taken up with discussion of where and when. For both of these questions, there were multiple factors to consider. Our two-year-old terror dear sweetheart (I'll call him Pooh) is the biggest one.

As a researcher in second language acquisition, as well as a long-time middle school teacher, I realize that being thrown into any new situation at puberty can be difficult. Add to that confusion a community in which the language of use is unknown, and it could create quite the difficult child. So, we agreed I insisted that either we move by the time Pooh turns 10, or we start teaching him the appropriate language now. Ultimately, both may happen.

We've been discussing a number of issues, which I plan to detail as we go along. Obviously, we are only in the planning stages, but we both really want to make this work, and there are a lot of things to prepare! We'd love to have you join us, comment, critique, and make all kinds of suggestions as we prepare ourselves to become expats!