Suitcase Life

Today our belongings are being packed into an ocean-going container. 315 cubic feet of memories and practical items. We'll see those items in 4-5 weeks. In the meantime, we'll live out of our two suitcases.

This is the last day in our apartment, too. We'll stay the next two nights with my parents in Stone Bank, WI. The step-kids are coming, too. We're going to celebrate an early Thanksgiving.

Then we'll stay in a hotel for two nights before we finally embark on a flight to what SR calls, "the old country."

SR is having quite a bit of trouble with the thought of saying good-bye to the step-kids. This goes without saying, I guess. We're hoping my parents will bring step-daughter to visit in February. In the meantime, we've got the phone and perhaps ex-wife will install a web-cam. This is the only downside we see to the move and it's a big one.

But there's no denying we're excited about a new life. And The Bois provides continuous entertainment and joy. He finally is really crawling (all over the place) and the same day he started to go across the entire apartment he actually stood himself up. So it seems that now that he's overcome his fear of being on the floor, things are going to move really quickly.



I hope to write once more before we leave.

As a side note, my running has been pathetic lately. I have no goal except the Copenhagen Marathon in May. It seems like any time I try to do any sort of speed work in the winter, I get injured. So I'll basically relax on my runs (unless a woman passes me). Then again, it won't be as cold in "the old country." And I'm sure we'll find another target race in the meantime.

Running Song of the Day: Pony by Erin McCarley

Lesbian Wedding Report

Now I can mark this off my list of extremely unusual things to do before I die: attended husband's ex-wife's lesbian wedding.

I was, I guess, surprised when ex-wife asked me to come. Especially because SR couldn't attend. She mentioned that I'd probably like to see the step-kids all dressed up. And I certainly did. Then somehow we arrived at the decision that I'd be the photographer for the wedding. I didn't realize at the time what an integral part of the wedding this would make me.

I should say that they didn't call it a wedding. It was a "blessing ceremony." That title gave the ceremony a nice feeling. Why not celebrate and bless the love between a couple? It's a great idea.

The white dress and tux, worn by ex-wife and her partner respectively, did give one the feeling of being at a wedding, though. As did the ceremony in a church, the reception with dinner and a dj.

I just hope they had the celebration they wanted. But even if everything went as planned (which it seemed like it did), things didn't exactly flow like a normal wedding. Despite the guests' best efforts to seem comfortable with the whole thing, there was some awkwardness. We do live in small town midwest, after all. The speeches were few, short and a little forced. And there were some family members who didn't attend. They had booked a beautiful banquet hall with so much good food, but that made the unexpected small number of attendees even more obvious.

When I think of the discrimination against gay marriage, initially I get angry. Then I just get sad.

All that being said, I had a really good time. I got to meet some of SR's old friends. I had heard him talk about them, so it was so fun to hear their impressions of him. I was not surprised by how sad they were that he wasn't there.

Plus I got to listen to a long conversation between ex-wife's mom and my mom. Suffice it to say it was entertaining.

Overall it was a fun day and it was a treat to play with step-son and step-daughter in all their fanciness. I'm almost cried though when I said goodnight to them. We've only got one more week where we're all together.

Opholdstilladelse

I finally received my Danish "green card." It's printed in my passport.

I have, until now, had trouble believing that this move would actually happen. And then when I learned my passport was lost last week, I thought my suspicions had been confirmed. But now that I have my opholdstilladelse, it's starting to seem real. That and the fact that our apartment is basically empty (or in boxes ready to be loaded onto a large ocean-going container).

I'm not nervous. I'm not sad. I feel like I did before The Bois was born. Like I can hardly wait for a wonderful new phase of life to begin.

Running Song of The Day: Now by Mates of State

Undeserved Credibility at Disney World

Disney World is a happy place. We returned from there nearly 5 days ago and I'm still in a good mood.

I got a lot closer to the step kids and clearly they had the time of their lives. It got to the point where I felt guilty for getting to take these wonderful children to Disney World. As we ate at The Liberty Tree Tavern, I thought "why do I get to be the 'mom' who takes them here?"

Step son is apparently afraid his dad will start eating his food if he leaves is plate.

Yes, The Bois joined us. He was equally amused by the knives on the table as by the characters. And he screamed through the 3-D movies after he was squirted with water. But overall, he was so well behaved.

And I became a mother of three for five days. This gained me a lot of undeserved credibility. I received a lot of smiling "from one mother to another" comments, etc.

We did our best to prevent stress each morning by holding a meditation session on the bus on the way to that day's theme park. "Imagine you are a fish swimming through the warm sea water... "

SR said everyone on the bus was watching us, which I thought was pretty cool. Maybe they got something out of it, too.

And another stress reducer was running with The Bois in the jogging stroller every morning back and forth on a 2 mile stretch of sidewalk outside our All Star Music Resort. At that time, SR took the kids to breakfast and went swimming at the hotel.

One morning SR was telling the kids how much he would miss them after we move to Denmark (as you may remember, step-daughter won't be living with us until this August) and he started to cry. Step-son asked "Why are you crying Papa?" And SR said "I'm not crying Big Guy" and step-son replied in his monotone German-type accent, "Then why is your face red and why do you have water coming out of your eyes?"

Running Song of the Day: Dayan Yalnizligim by Emre Aydin

WDW

We're going to be in Walt Disney World until Friday night. My favorites as a kid were The Carousel of Progress (Magic Kingdom) and the China exhibit (Epcot Center). I'm excited to see what the step-kids will like. I'm also interested to see where my early morning run with baby jogger will take me...

You can expect a full report upon our return. In the meantime, go vote!

Running Song of The Day: Dui Bu Qi Xie Xie by Eason Chan

Trapped in the USA?

My life has been completely consumed with Leaving The Country activities.

I rented a container to ship our not-very-expensive-but-sentimental belongings overseas. The company we went with might be run by a bunch of scam artists, but they gave us the lowest price. So we may or may not see our belongings again.

We're also frantically trying to purchase things that will be much more expensive in Denmark. I bought an enormous collection of clothing for The Bois on Ebay for $40. He already has his favorites:





And I've been having ceremonial good-byes to my favorite running routes. There's something a bit weird about having a harder time saying good by to dirt trails than to friends and co-workers.

But there are also really hard good-byes that you just want to pretend aren't happening:

Here is my dad with his only grandchild, perhaps forgetting for a moment that this little guy is being moved across the world in less than a month.



But SR and I are really looking forward to the move. We're excited about our jobs, the town we'll live in, the races we've found to run (topic for another post!), the free daycare and education, the best bike lanes in the world, the ocean, etc., etc. etc.

So the stress of moving is nothing compared to the stress of me (still!) not having my passport back from the Danish Government with my green card stamp in it. It's pretty hard to move overseas without a passport!

After we deposited around $10,000 in a bank account in Denmark (my security deposit), we were told I'd receive the passport. But it's now been a month and still no passport. And the guy who is in charge of my case hasn't been reachable by phone or email for two weeks. Suffice it to say we're getting nervous.

Running Song of The Day: Allein Allein by Polarkreis 18 (Nephew Remix) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OCdp3cItQI