If we're going to do this we need to get one thing clear

Also if you hate me you're going to love this post

Let’s talk about jealousy.

For example, I currently want to smash anybody who has written more than one book.

To the best of my knowledge they have not written a second book specifically to target my identity as a writer, but I hate them nonetheless.

I believe this is what we call “mature functioning in the world.”

When somebody shares that they summited Mt. Everest, however, I think to myself, that is very cool for you. I am happy your dreams are coming true. And I mean it, because I had rather shove bamboo under my own fingernails than scale an icy mountain alongside the frozen remains of my predecessors.

The idea of a high-powered corporate job makes me want to hide in the Mt. Everest cave I’d surely die in. I am not jealous of 7-figure salaries while working 90 hours a week and taking cocaine on the weekends. I might be a little jealous of the cocaine. I’ve always thought it would be fun to be one of those people who can do hard drugs twice a year with coworkers.

Anyway, I can only assume there are people fed up with their lives, sick of American bullshit, dreaming of doing what my family did, and thus hate me out of pure unbridled envy. It’s simply a matter of math. Of my readers, some of them definitely google European immigration laws 3-4 times a year and, on a particularly rough day, explore buying a village in Slovenia for 40 euros and a mule.

And according to my complex mathematical computations, some portion of these people must be as spiritually elevated as I am and thus unfollowed me out of envy/rage, but, for reasons unknown, stop by my Instagram anyway, my feed becoming that line of cocaine on New Year’s Eve you instantly regret. And by instantly regret I mean 3 days later when you’re still doing it at some guy named Charlie’s house and you lost your shoes. Let’s stop talking about cocaine. There’s a reason I’m sober.

This piece of writing is my personal gift to them.

I can feel what my move must have felt like: Wow, something exciting, vibrant, alive! The stuff of movies! We did the thing everyone said they’d do “if he got elected,” but nobody actually did. It’s new. It’s a little wild. Our lives on the outside must seem interesting, and if you’re anything like I was, living my same old life in the same old California town I’d been living in for 20 years, surrounded by the same damn people and growing more and more disillusioned by the moment as America did what it does best — namely suck every last drop of life out of its non-rich people — the idea of giving it all up, selling it all, and running to the land of espresso, trains, and healthcare sounds really fucking wonderful.

It’s every liberal’s wet dream, is it not?

It was definitely mine, and it was in part what brought me here. Why hide it? I saw my husband and I vacationing in Italy. I saw my kids riding bikes in perfect safety and forgetting how to hide under a desk at school because a sad white guy may try to murder them. I imagined the history around every corner, living in the “medieval center” of a place that has a medieval center. Learning another language, exploring countries since they’re all crammed next to each other over here.

After 5 years in The Netherlands I can tell you every single one of those dreams has become reality. One day this May, Mac and I woke up in The Netherlands and by noon were in Italy. We drove from Turin to the Italian Riviera and spent a week there. I’ve boated on Lake Como, looked out over the hills of Tuscany, and stayed in an ancient monastery in Spain. I watched a harvest moon rise over the hills from a 10^th century castle in the Spanish Pyrenees and sat in healing thermal waters under the soaring mountains of the French Pyrenees. I’ve cried at Normandy, gone vintage clothes shopping with my daughters in Paris, and every Christmas I watch my kids ice skate around a Christmas market in Cologne, Germany.

I pass by a building marked 1625 every day on my way to the grocery store. I’ve had weekly therapy for 2.5 years and never paid a dime. I don’t have a driver’s license; I ride my bike and take public transportation. My children have free healthcare. Their schools are well-funded, safe, and effective. I can count on two hands the number of homeless, addicted, mentally ill folks I’ve seen in the streets in the entire 5 years I’ve lived here. The trains are always on time. The buses are immaculate. The kids are the happiest in the world.

I, however, have never been so lonely in my life.

I am two degrees adjacent to “absolutely fucking miserable.”

And now you see how this is a revenge post I’m writing on behalf of people who hate me.

You win, okay? YOU WIN.

I admit it. I hate it here. Do I though? Damn.

Do I regret this move? Will I never regret this move? Your guess is as good as mine, friends!

It took me years to admit this ambivalence.

You can’t just sell everything you have, uproot your family, miss your father’s last 3 years on earth, rip grandkids out of the arms of their grandparents, give up your best friend, the California mountains and Pacific Ocean, spend every penny you have and post 10k joyful Facebook posts about cobblestone just to arrive and be like “Ya know what? This place sucks.”

Instead, you dodge certain emotions like one of those agility dogs running through cones, focus like a Border Collie on all the new stuff, convince yourself by any means necessary that this place is nice, you’re happy, you’re happy, you’ll be happy, YOU WILL SOMEDAY BE FUCKING HAPPY YOU MUST BE HAPPY LOOK HOW NICE THIS PLACE IS.

And the truth is it worked for a while. The awe and rage I felt my first year or so sustained me. I couldn’t believe people had been living like this all along and the USA is what it is. That this is actually the normal way to live among developed nations — and Americans have been sold an incredible lie. I knew this before I moved here, but I did not know the extent of it.

But I’m sort of used to it now. I’m used to hearing Americans say super reasonable things like “We should arm teachers,” or, “I’m glad I’m 78 and still working. It’s not the job of the government to take care of me!”

And I am used to the fact that I do not live in a country where I hear sentences like that. I am used to living in a society that reflects a very different mentality. Namely, that every human being is endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable rights…

Wait. Where have I heard that before?

I felt, above all, an overwhelming gratitude. And I still do.

What I didn’t realize, though, is that eventually a person gets used to living a secure life in a sane place and then starts feeling other things.

The feelings I avoided made their way into my consciousness more and more forcefully until one day a thought moved into my brain, set up a tent, built a fire, and settled in: What good is all of this if it isn’t home?

What if everything that makes life worth living is back in the country I left?

The family. The soul friends. The ground you know. The mountains, rivers, and trees that define your life. Your history. The places you go to recenter yourself. The people you visit to feel alive again, whole again. The parents you love in their last 10 or 15 years. Your brother, nieces and nephews. A culture you understand. The chats you have with strangers because you know them and they know you on a basic, cultural level. The food, traditions, holidays. The goddamn sense of belonging.

What does it mean to remain forever an outsider? To give up your own days so your kids can grow up in a saner, safer country? Am I capable of that? Do I just dry up and die here? IS THIS WHAT OUR ANCESTORS DID WHEN THEY LEFT THEIR COUNTRIES AND EMIGRATED TO AMERICA?

Jesus.

It’s like being in a very, very nice hotel room. Extremely comfortable, not yours.

Never gonna be yours. And this may not ever change.

And now I’m stuck: Can’t go back (how can I give up an objectively higher quality of life?) and I can’t stay. No really. I can’t stay. Let’s just say The Netherlands and I are not a long-term fit. This will be a longer discussion in a different essay, but for now, I’ll say this: There is so much I respect about this country, so many parts of it I admire, and always will, but it isn’t a place I want to spend my life. It’s a true “It’s not you, it’s me” situation.

Actually it may be them. I’ll have to get back to you.

They sure as hell know how to put together a society. They are the unequivocal masters at raising kids and I will die on that hill. Apparently I’m dying on a lot of hills lately.

But the cultural “vibe,” here, for me, is not a match. I’m more of a southern Europe type of person.

WHAT KIND OF OUT OF TOUCH SHITHEAD TALKS OF VIBES AND SOUTHERN EUROPE I HATE MYSELF.

But I’m pressing on.

Yes, I know that in Spain you’re lucky if 30% of your current moment is responding to your efforts in any way whatsoever. I usually sum the country up in two phrases: “No funciona,” and “No pasa nada.”

It doesn’t work. It doesn’t matter. Or, literally: “Nothing is happening.”

In The Netherlands everything works except my will to live.

Not to be dramatic. But seriously.

In Spain nothing works yet I feel much more at home. Wait, is that why I feel more at home?

Apparently it’s possible that you move to a country and learn that culturally, you are not a fit. I am entirely sure that every human with six brain cells knows this.

Did I know it when I moved here? No.

I assumed I would assimilate and acclimate and figure it out and over time, vibe with everybody because I’m friendly and mean well!

What I did not anticipate is that sometimes, what’s required of you to “acclimate” is not who you are, nor is it who you want to be.

This country has been so good to us in so many ways. I will miss it the second I leave it, and be so fucking happy to be out of it.

Welcome to my nuanced nightmare.

Oh settle down I know it’s not a “nightmare,” but it is a bit disappointing to have blown up your life only to replace it with a permanent state of "I THINK I MAY HATE THIS,” and no apparent way to figure out.

Look, it’s not just the weather, or the fact that people regularly starve my kids at their houses because “it’s not eating time,” or that people don’t dance at concerts. (I find this profoundly disturbing. They really don’t dance.)

Where I feel most alienated is in relation to the rigidity, conformity, and coldness of so much of what’s around me. I didn’t see it at first, and once I did, I didn’t trust my perception. I come from a country that allows people to shoot kindergarteners. What right do I have to hold opinions on hallowed Europeans?

But then I started meeting immigrants, expats, and Dutch people who also feel this way and they taught me the phrase “typical Dutch,” confirming for me that sometimes, yes, they are in fact the assholes, and just because I am an American does not mean I am by definition wrong at every moment at every turn.

I shall now insert the obligatory NOT ALL DUTCH PEOPLE caveat. I could also list the many, many times we’ve been shown generosity of time and spirit by Dutch folks.

I am also aware that I understand so much of this in this way because I am an American, and I have lived in one area of this country, and I have met people who’ve moved here from other countries and really like it here, want to be here forever. For whatever reason, Mac and I are not those people.

I could give dozens (hundreds? thousands?) of specific examples of what I’m talking about, but I’ve found that sharing particulars of human behavior on the internet is like shining a spotlight in a pitch-black room then demanding nobody look at it. It’s all anyone sees. And then, we dissect. Oh, the dissection. Who is right and who is wrong? How many different ways can we see this? How do we ever determine who’s the dick here?

(There’s a good chance it’s me.)

I can actually hear my point flying over heads of the nuance-free masses. There is no way to offer sufficient context. It simply degrades into shit-slinging and uninformed and very weird nitpicking.

I am constantly trying to “not be too American,” to not see things wholly through a lens of my own cultural conditioning, but also, there are parts of Americanness that exist in many other countries, and it’s not “wrong.” It’s just different.

Also, I suspect many of the aspects of Dutch culture that make me want to sink into an icy Everest crevasse - rigidity, conformity, “rules over people” mentalities - is exactly what makes it function so well as a country!

How’s that for some bullshit.

When people are willing to conform, not center themselves, they inherently see themselves as part of a larger whole and are thus willing to create and support a society that benefits that whole.

Where does that leave America with its rugged individualism?

We have a lot to talk about, friends. And we will.

CAN’T WE HAVE SOME BALANCE?

The weather is an abject nightmare. The food is questionable at best. There are no mountains or wilderness. The days are structured and rigid. Everything has a system.

I feel claustrophobic and stifled, like I’m in the prettiest little snow-globe while running out of air.

After 5 years, I have one Dutch friend.

I look around every day and cannot believe how lucky I am to live here. I look around every day and wonder how my life could be so isolated, lonely, and empty.

I have not yet figured out how to make sense of all this, and I cannot offer anything else.

So what the hell is my point? Simply that if we’re going to make it here together talking about my life abroad, I need you to understand that I do not live in a dream fairy world. I do not live in a promised land. I do not live a problem-free, utopian existence.

People really treat me like I do. I’ve had readers actually argue with me when I tell them I don’t like it here. “Yes you do!” They wail in the Facebook comment section — or you better because bitch I am projecting my dreams onto you and I need you to participate in my delusion.

Look, I live a life that looks stunningly romantic and fascinating on the outside but comes at the cost of everything that makes me feel like a person who can enjoy it.

Jesus, Janelle, that was harsh. Do I mean that?

I think I do. Do I?

Social media makes it all worse. It’s like I’m constantly telling half of the story, like I’m always lying, just a little, by omission.

I can never convey to you that yes, I am sitting on a terrace eating breakfast with my husband on the Italian riviera, and that blows my mind as much as anybody’s, and it is the stuff of dreams, but we are alone there, and that sense will never leave us.

I have never been so lonely in my life and I did this to myself.

I am not actually part of that terrace or village or sea or country. I am an outsider, a traveler. Stopping by to admire.

Even in my own house. Even in my own town. In every moment of my life. Hotel room.

There was a time when I felt so envious of the Dutchies running around this country as people who have grown up here: They get all of this functioning country and a sense of belonging. This is their home! Lucky bastards.

And my kids will have that too. But me? Well, let’s move on.

So, will I go back to the United States?

Of course not - what the hell’s wrong with you to ask me such a thing.

Why? Because our lives did not work in the US and they do work here.

They are exponentially better in every economic and logistical way. We are more financially stable than we’ve ever been and we only work 9-10 months of the year. Please read that again.

Our kids are thriving and all of us have affordable, prompt, modern healthcare, including mental and dental. And yep, we pay higher taxes (around 32%), and we still have more money and financial stability than we’ve ever had in our lives.

But most importantly, I do not feel a sense of impending doom anymore. I am not constantly wondering when the other shoe will drop. I feel a sense of deep okayness.

And that is why I will not go back in the foreseeable future. Because I will not give up this sense of sanity, safety, and, yep, freedom. We are so much freer here. I’ll tell you about it sometime.

I will not give up my god-given inalienable rights.

It’s that simple, and that complex.

I am not asking for sympathy. Lol. I am not even asking you to agree with my assessments.

What I’m asking for, as always, is nuance. I’m asking for some groundwork of understanding that the only people who think moving permanently to another country is without real and profound losses are the people who haven’t done it.

I don’t mean that in a critical way; I mean it as in, it's impossible to imagine until you’ve done it. I didn’t even know I cared about half the shit I now mourn as deep and abiding losses.

Sure, I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed but guys let me tell you the way I’ve learned that yes, externalities are a huge part of life, and if we don’t have basic needs met, they are in fact life or death – but never are they the full experience of BEING alive. Of being a person on this earth with a full self.

We need not only our basic needs met but we need connection, community, a sense of place and belonging. These are not frivolous additions to life. They are vital to it.

I didn’t know how much I needed deep human connection on occasion. I didn’t know how much I needed to get outside in the wilderness, the mountains, rivers and wild spaces. I didn’t know how much I needed good food and sunshine. I didn’t know how much I needed easy warmth and humor. I didn’t know how much I needed community, belonging, and friends.

Feel better now? Neither do I.

And honestly, what do I know? I’m just one person telling the story of one move to another country.

My own dreams of “life abroad” have been shattered and recreated in ways I never expected. I want to share both with you, but first I need to shatter your illusions and crush your dreams, just as I’d like to do to everyone who’s written a second book. I’m sorry. I meant to keep that inside.

Let’s do this, but let’s do it in reality.

I moved here, my life got exponentially better, and deeply, profoundly worse. I am now stuck, not stuck, sort of stuck, but definitely changed irrevocably. I cannot go back and I cannot stay. If I go back to the States I will yearn for the smooth embrace of a safe and sane country and, uh, a life that works. If I stay here, well, please, god, no.

Only thing to do is move to Spain, right?

ARE YOU SUGGESTING WE START OVER AGAIN IN A NEW COUNTRY WHAT IF IT SUCKS WHAT IF MY SOUL IS THE PROBLEM WHAT IF WHEREVER YOU GO THERE YOU ARE AND I AM JUST A BORDER COLLIE DODGING THE INEVITABLE COFFIN OF MY LIFE

And with that, please, tell me immediately how you climbed Everest.

Don’t our faces say it all here? Maybe. Photo of Mac and I in Spain by Deborah Rhea.