One Year since The Move

Today was the anniversary of The Move to the UK. Not only have we officially lived in England for one year, but I think it's the first time this century that I've gone a full year without setting foot in the States. A new era, indeed!

To celebrate, I want to write a bit about my children, who had lived their whole lives in the States before the Move. Legally, they have dual nationality, British and American. My 11 year old son identifies as British; my 9 year old daughter considers herself American.

The most common question I get from people who don't know my children is what accent do they have? The answer is a hybrid. To British ears, they sound American; to American ears, they sound British. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that certain words and phrases bring out one accent over the other.

To me, they sound like themselves; I can sometimes pick up on the American traces, but usually I don't hear an accent. After a year in the country, I think they've got more British, but I could be wrong. They have definitely picked up more Britishisms: my daughter's very keen on saying 'telly' for 'television.'

Aside from their Dad, it's the food they (and I!) miss most. There's this one peanut sauce we used to buy and we can't get anything close to it here. We're currently on a quest to recreate the sauce ourselves... it's not going well.

But British food is one of our favourite things about moving as well: we've finally got accustomed to having baked beans absolutely any time we want, but this year my daughter discovered the joys of cream teas (which I never once missed while we were in the States, but now the two of us will drop anything for a scone with jam and clotted cream.)

Meanwhile, my son is going through a growth spurt and is a bottomless pit. To my despair, a peanut butter and jam sandwich is still his go-to appetite-fix, but by far, his favourite snack is that staple of a British bakery: a sausage roll.

There was an extra culture shock here, as the kids had spent their whole lives in Suburbia. If we needed just about anything, we could probably get it from our local Target. If we wanted to eat or see a film, there were multiple options. There were museums, theme parks, actual parks, aquariums, zoos, etc, etc. If you went anywhere, you drove, because it was too far to walk and public transport sucked.

Do the kids miss that lifestyle? Yes. But they've embraced the country more than I ever dared to hope. After a lifetime of flat landscapes, they spent the first four months commenting on the view every time we were on a hill. (There are a lot of hills here. We live on a hill.)

Adding sausages to a view

A bare two months into country-living, my daughter confidently strode into a herd of cows to shoo them away from the public footpath. (They were gathered around the kissing gate and the dog was refusing to go through.) When we first moved into the village, they didn't like my suggestion of taking the footpath through the churchyard to get to school. Now they walk past the graves without batting an eye.

That said, they still can't stand the smell of manure on the fields.

There are a hundred little points of difference between their lives then and now, but I'll finish with one that came up recently. They didn't know that swallows migrated. These birds are the standard classroom example for teaching migration in the UK, but in North America, the monarch butterfly is the face of migration. (Most of the children in my kids' class have probably never heard of monarch butterflies.)

A little thing, but they'll run into these little things countless times through their lives. My childhood was split between the two countries, and my knowledge of both is swiss-cheesed with little holes I don't notice until they come up. My children are going to have that experience too, and perhaps what I'm proudest of is how calmly and practically they handle each as it comes up.

My kids. They're awesome.

Learning Not to Drive

Well, we've reached this mark. My driving licence expires today.

I always knew that I would only have one year to pass my test when we moved back to the UK. (I was a late driver, and I had not passed my UK test at the time that we moved to the US. I did get my US licence, but legally, I can't drive on that for more than a year.)

I had a bit of trouble getting my provisional licence reissued, since I was honest and noted on the form that I had fainted ten years ago, which triggered months of medical red tape. Turns out I have low blood pressure, but then again... it's been ten years since I fainted.

Throughout all of that, I kept telling myself that I still had plenty of time. I figured that I could comfortably sort out driving in the spring. In the UK you have to pass a theory and a practical test; you can't schedule the practical test until you've passed the theory.

Once I got my provisional licence, I scheduled my theory test for April 1st. I was confident I'd pass at least the theory first time, and even if I had an ADD blip and do something that's an automatic fail, I could take the practical a few times before summer rolled around. Nothing to panic about.

I did not account for a worldwide pandemic.

Coronavirus vs. my Driving Licence

I usually try not to view things this way, but mine probably is a unique situation in the UK. I expect that in these times, the DVLA would be willing to give a six month extension to drive on a foreign licence... BUT my Virginia licence literally expires today. My particular status in the US meant I had to renew my licence every year. No matter how understanding the DVLA feels, I can't drive on an expired licence.

Virginia has been extending the duration of their driving licences due to the pandemic... BUT because I'm no longer resident in VA, I can't apply for an extension. (Could I fudge it with my brother's address? Quite possibly. But any situation that requires me to show a valid driving licence will be made much much worse if I acquired it under false pretences. Not worth it!)

So yeah. That took some explaining with my insurance provider last week, but now my premiums have gone up and we are a driver-less household!  In rural Cornwall. In the middle of a pandemic.

Thankfully, one of my criteria when finding a place to live was that the kids should have some independence, i.e. that they shouldn't be dependent on me to drive them places. We could have ended up in a lone cottage down a country road. Instead, we can still walk to school, we can walk to the corner shop and we're on a decent bus route—a luxury in Cornwall, where many villages only get buses on certain days.

Our bus runs every two hours: learning to use it will be good practice for all of us. It's been fifteen years since I took a bus regularly. They have apps now!

The other relief is the UK's new support bubble policy for single / single-parent households, which means I can have a designated person to sit in the car with me. We're probably going to bubble up with my boyfriend, who won't be available very often but who will happily take us out on day trips to reduce the cabin fever, which is what we'll need. We can use a bus for errands; adventure sites generally aren't on bus routes.

DIY Driving Lessons

My latest date for my theory test (it's been cancelled five times so far!) is the 14th July. If it goes ahead, I'm not sure when I can take my practical or how I can get lessons. I've been in contact with my instructor, but they're still on lockdown without guidance on what they should do when they reopen. He has assured me that he'll do what he can.

In the meantime, I'm going the self-taught route. Many people might do this through trial and error in practice, but me being me, this has meant a lot of googling and research. The show-me / tell-me questions are online, and they've prompted me to become very familiar with my vehicle handbook... but I still had to get a neighbour to show me how to open the bonnet of a car I've had for almost a year.

A YouTube video gave me a UK-test-approved parallel parking technique, which was easier than I expected, though I've not had the nerve to do it 'for real'. I did reverse park flawlessly on a shopping trip to Morrisons recently, and this is one of the greatest accomplishments of my adult life. (I can't really put it up above the kids, but it's got to be in the top 5!)

I can't practice independently now, but my boyfriend has been informed that manoeuvring rehearsals will be part of our meetups until further notice.

Learning to drive in a pandemic is currently under control. Becoming a driverless household is still going to be a challenge, if one that I'm much less afraid of than I would have been before we endured quarantine back in April. If we can survive not leaving the house for two weeks, we can survive a month or so of not leaving the village. For us, a new phase of lockdown has begun. Let's do this.

Father's Day

I'm finding Father's Day really hard this year. For the last couple of Father's Days, the kids have just gone off with their Dad for the day and I've managed to avoid thinking about it too much. Obviously, this year that wasn't an option.

I do take responsibility for the kids living across the ocean from their father. Practically speaking there were no other realistic options for me, but it was still my decision to move back to the UK, so I place a high priority on their relationship and bridging that gap. Clearly, this is not going to be an easy day for him either.

This year, the kids made a video to send to their Dad. They've been making videos for school lately, so this was a good way for them to get creative on their own project, but I was brainstorming ideas with them and helping them figure out some technical aspects.

We ran into that typical parent-child collaborative issue where I had these ambitious ideas and they were reluctant to take on that much work and then I felt they weren't putting the effort in... and that led to me completely losing my temper with them yesterday morning. It was a nasty moment in which I realised that I was actually really stressed about this video. Why? Because I was afraid their father would blame me if it wasn't good enough.

It's a depressing truth that a huge proportion of my self-worth is still tied up in what their father thinks of me. The fact that I don't know what their father thinks of me (because we deliberately talk as little as possible) does nothing to alleviate my general paranoia.

While this remains a problem with no obvious solution for me, I shouldn't take it out on the kids, and when my stress was taking all the fun out of their father's day video for them, I was defeating the entire purpose of doing it in the first place. So I sent myself to my room telling them I wasn't allowed out until I had calmed down.

They did get the video done eventually, and while I have no idea what their father thought, they thought it was hysterical and got a real kick out of their own work. So I'm taking that as a success on that level and trying to convince myself that that's the only level I need to worry about.

Other than that, family-oriented holidays always trigger the bereavement feelings. In retrospect, I probably should have planned something for today to take my mind off it. But I didn't, and now I'm in a circular grief/funk cycle, so instead I'll spend the day doing inefficient distraction activities and letting the kids get away with murder. Whatever works!

One of my distraction activities will be writing another blog post. A more proactive one, now that I've articulated my current mood.

Lockdown in review

Lockdown has largely lifted for us this week, when we started back at school. (My son is Year 6, one the year groups that the schools have reopened for. They've hired me as a supply teaching assistant in the afternoons, which makes me a key worker so my daughter gets a place while I'm working.)

It's the first time in almost three months that we've been allowed to mingle (at a distance of 2 metres) with other households. What's been our experience of that three months?

Aside from lounging around in the back garden....

Homeschooling
This is the one part of our planned lockdown routine we actually stuck with, and I'm so glad we agreed on the schedule at the start.

Being from a small school benefited us: both kids were in the same class. Added to that, my son's always been an independent worker, who was accustomed to getting through a lot of homework thanks to his previous school in the States. So for English and their 'topic work', he mostly set the tone and they worked together. They had separate work for maths, which my daughter had a habit of panicking over, so most of what I've had to do is to get her calm and confident... It's been mixed results.

Their teacher has been great. He's not back in school yet, so really they're still distance learning, but he's always been really on the ball with talking to them via their homeschooling app. My daughter in particular has posted all kinds of random stuff, just to share with him, and he's been fantastic about responding and showing interest in what they're getting up to.

The third wave...

The butterflies have remained an ongoing science project for us ever since the days of Biff. We had a second generation turn into butterflies this week, and that's going to be the end of that... It's been an epic saga, both fascinating and exhausting, and we feel quite ready to be done with it.

Shopping
Our first lockdown visit to Tesco was frankly terrifying: it's only supposed to be one member of the household going inside, though as a single mother, I'm allowed to bring my kids in. However, that made it impossibly awkward, so we made the call that the kids would stay at home alone for future shopping trips.

It's still exhausting and stressful. ADD doesn't like multi-tasking, so I struggle to look for the items I want and simultaneously keep an eye on how far I am from other people. I only go once every two weeks, and in between we top up on things we're running low on at our corner shop. (Our corner shop is wonderful, but we can't quite give up the Tesco shop altogether.)

Plan B: supplement with wild foraging! Making wild garlic pesto.

Over the past few weeks, I've been trying to wear a face covering while in a shop, but it's not ideal. Half the time I forget it, and even when I do remember, all we have are Survivor buffs and they're very imperfect. We need to look into getting some proper washable face masks. These aren't compulsory, but I think they should be.

Socialising
One of the things I meant to do was to get a sort of rota going with friends where we have nights to chat with different people, maybe set up some activities... Best of intentions, and then I did my thing where I sort of withdraw into myself and talk to fewer people when I need to talk to more. I'm bad at reaching out to people, and then even if I do, I get hesitant and don't want to push for an event. And then I get anxious because I haven't interacted with them for awhile and therefore I'm not entitled to interact with them now because I'm not a True Friend.

So huge fail. To the point that I even went quiet on here and most social media. I did keep up on Facebook for the most part and my parents and I message regularly, plus I've walked their dog a few times as an excuse for doing a doorstep check in on them.

I'll keep meaning to reach out to people... At some point I might actually get round to doing it.

Relationship
 The nice thing about relationships is they're built on a very definite social agreement that yes I am entitled to my boyfriend's time and attention, although we're both pretty quiet people. I've kept in touch with him throughout, mostly via whatsapp chatting, with the odd phone call.

With lockdown relaxing over the past couple of weeks we can finally go on dates again... provided we stay 2 metres apart at all times. Oh, and my kids have to come too. Still, our relationship is based on getting each other out and about in the local geography, and that's perfectly doable without breaking current guidance. That's done me a world of good.

Getting hot and heavy on our last date

Housework
Don't ask.

I never handle this well when the kids are home... best of intentions, and it just degenerates to the point that I can't functionally see the mess anymore, but the clutter still gets me down. The kids, being kids, grumble and stall when I want to tidy up. Even when they do help, they often need so much direction, that it's twice as much work as doing it myself... and if I don't ask them for help, they'll inevitably end up asking for my attention over something: Look at this! Can I do this? My sibling is breaking a rule!

I get into a state where my head is 'full' and I can't hold a focus on anything... Generally, my attempts at housework succeed in doing the first chore properly and then a lot of other little bits and pieces get done without anything substantial getting finished.Then I fog out and spend the next few hours trying to unwind so my head can drain itself.... which only works if the kids, by some miracle, stay self-occupied and quiet.

I really really miss ADD medication. Unfortunately, I had just reached the top of the list to get an appointment with an ADD clinic when lockdown hit.

Career
I've applied for an Early Years Teacher Training course, which was supposed to entail an interview followed by a literacy / numeracy exam. The interview got switched to Zoom. I'd not used Zoom before myself, but I had the app downloaded as my son had done a call with his year group one time. What I didn't realise was that he had set the account in his name, which confused my interviewer greatly.

For the exam, they ended up emailing me the test papers. I had to print them off, take them under exam conditions (or as close as possible), scan my answers and return them. Handling the IT of it all didn't give me much trouble, but it turns out I'm wildly out of practice at taking exams. I lost all track of time and went fifteen minutes over without even getting to the last couple of questions... rookie mistake! I submitted anyway, with a note of explanation, and we'll see what happens.

A potentially bigger concern is what will happen with nurseries going forward. Technically, early years staff should be in more demand than ever as the children have to be kept in smaller groups under the latest government advice. Unfortunately, that isn't financially viable for most early years centres and many nurseries may end up having to close, unless the government rescues them. I'll need a placement at a nursery next year if I want to do this course, and I'm a little worried that there just won't be one available.

We chalked a "Thank-you NHS!" rainbow in the car park of our flats.

Driving
Speaking of tests, remember I don't actually have a UK driving licence? I was supposed to take a theory test on 1st April. Due to the pandemic, it's been cancelled and rescheduled four times--last time, it was with less than 24 hours notice. I did try applying for an emergency test as I count as a critical care worker, but they're only doing those for healthcare workers right now.

My main problem is that my US driving licence is about to expire. Technically, I can still drive so long as somebody with a full licence is in the passenger seat... but I'm the only driver of my household, and right now, I can't just borrow a friend to pop out to Tesco. (There's a new support bubble rule being implemented, so maybe I can find another household to team up with? I don't know the social etiquette for asking that!)

So we're going to get to know the local public transport (it isn't great in Cornwall, but luckily we do live on a bus route,) and I'll try and study up as much as I can—the last time I met up with my boyfriend, I made him stand in the road and watch while I parallel parked behind his car. (Made it on the second attempt, though I think my wheels touched the kerb.)


Veterinary Appointment
We've managed to avoid any requirement for a doctor or dentist, but the cats were due for their vaccinations in May. Our vets had a set up where we park in the car park and call to say we've arrived. The vet then comes to the car, checks over what's needed and takes the pet inside if required while the owner waits in their car.

Obviously, vaccinations required taking them inside, so I warned him about Meg. He got the shot done, but I've no idea how he managed, considering she's usually a two person job. The cats actually seemed less stressed this way, though unfortunately they were required to have a flu shot which they'd never had in the States... and that meant we had to come back three weeks later for a booster.

Haircuts
I have often been thankful for having low maintenance hair, but never more than over the past three months. Oh, my hair is in dire need of a trim to tidy up the split ends, as is my daughter's, but otherwise we're fine—luckily, I've been cutting my own fringe for years.

My son was a different matter, and although I had managed to get him a cut right before lockdown started, we eventually bit the bullet and got ourselves some hair clippers. There, like so many others, we discovered that the longest setting on the clippers is a lot shorter than we envisioned. The haircut was a pretty traumatic experience, and I'm relieved that my son took it pretty stoically, despite a fleeting moment of horror when he first looked in the mirror. And he didn't want to leave the house for a couple of days...

We'll have to do it again in the next week or so, though this time I can at least just leave the top alone.

Welcome to my salon....

That's our montage of lockdown life. I'm not really expecting a steady decrease of restrictions how. Our government is so vague and inconsistent about everything that I'm anticipating a second rise in the infection rate and a second lockdown. Even if I'm wrong, we need a huge overhaul in the infrastructure of, well, everything, if the country's going to be able to function over the next year.

Keeping afloat!