Family Sabbatical: Returning home

The first morning home the kids were ecstatic to rediscover the house and its contents. Baby-O hit the pretend food and kitchen hard. J was a sport and played along, it all seemed normal until. . . he asked me if I wanted homemade wine- Red or White? Would I like a vegetables and salad to start? He announced that my plate of bread and cheese had arrived. Would I care for mild or strong fish as my main course? Would I be having  coffee with my dessert? 

I knew we would never be the same.

If you need the short version of how we've tried to integrate the trip upon re-entry in the first 5 days, here it is.

1. Have wine with lunch. (Ok if it's absolutely not possible at least with dinner)

2. Cook Paella and homemade Spanish soups and use half a bottle of olive oil in two days.

3. Do Moroccan Hammam as best you can (more on this but it's an ancient bathing/scrubbing/oiling)

4. Linger over meals, as in twice as long as you used to at the same table. 

5. Get up an hour early to 'hang out' as the kids say together as a family.

6. Go to bed an hour earlier.

7. Realize how much you miss people when you see them for only scant hours a day. Tell them.

Wellbeing is attained by little and little, and nevertheless is no little thing itself.
Citium Zeno



A Greek man named Zeno said that. He invented the Stoic school of philosophy. You've probably heard of being 'stoic,' what you might not know is that 'stoa' is the Greek word for porch. In fact, Zeno invented this way of thinking on a front porch where he and the earliest followers used to gather. Stoicism was (and for some, is) a guidebook for living your life that was very popular during the Roman era; we saw so many Roman ruins that I wanted to think about how these people may have organized their time and thinking and wondered if it could help with our re-entry. Today we tend to think of Stoicism as harsh and tough but in fact, it had a lot of beauty and sense to it. 


One Stoic way of thinking that really comes alive when traveling is their belief that one should detach from anything that is outside of one's control. The only road to success? Practice. The ultimate goal?  Remember Seneca from Cordoba? He put it like this- "peace for all times" or put conversely, freedom from suffering. 


Today is our 5th day back.


We'd gone from this:





To this:

Peace for all times is a bit distant with slush on the ground and jet lag on the horizon.

Jet lag reminds me of the story of Creation. 'And on the 4th night, the toddler slept again.' The older kids had no problem returning to this time schedule, Baby-O not so much. Suddenly on the fourth night she slept pretty well back to normal.

Seeing friends and sleeping in our own beds has been heaven. Returning to the loneliness of a car-centric, work-heavy culture has been hell (hell is an overstatement, more like sad). This isn't meant to be a litany of complaints rather, observations that jump out after being gone to places that organize their days so differently.

The biggest shock?

Not a soul in sight. 


After having to master weaving on sidewalks to avoid collisions, it is eery to not see a soul. Sure, the weather doesn't help but Oxford, England was colder (!) and we had to dodge bikes and people to make it five feet.

So many 'devices' in use. I feel like I'm surrounded by zombies.

Photo by D. Sharon Pruitt

I walked the 9 blocks it takes to get to my parents' house and saw one man. I was about to arrive when I heard a voice. Chastising my cynicism I got ready to wave when I saw a lone figure approaching. He walked right in front of me conversing loudly. . .with his ear bud.

Although our State recently passed a law banning cell phone use while driving, I stopped counting how many people have driven by me staring blankly as they speak into their cellphones; the number got too scary. Although certainly Iphone 4's were in plain sight in Spain and England  (not so much in Portugal and Morocco) it was exceedingly rare to see people using them in public, more so in Oxford  but still, not even close.

So much fast-food. So little cheap fresh food.  

flickr/CreativeCommons

We've returned with a real appreciation that organic or fresh, local is not within reach for everyone in the U.S. Hardly. Local, fresh food is really, really expensive.  We didn't realize we weren't seeing fast-food during the trip until Gigi reminded us of this fact halfway through the trip. (It's just a wild guess but I'd bet the ratio of mom and pop places to chain stores in all the countries we visited was something like 50:1)

I've had to tell J to put a lid on it because I overheard him telling so many people the following, "The food at the airports in Spain and England is better than what we eat here." It's true but not so politically or socially correct to be blasting about.

It left me feeling like this:

What to do?
I leaned towards the Stoics and thought about what I control. . .my own kitchen was the best place to start.

I made one of our favorite Spanish soups the first day along with a vegetable we ate copious amounts of in Spain- a stew of garbanzos, fish and spinach along with mushrooms marinated in herbs, lemon juice and olive oil.

(I know someday soon the kids will remember where to place the silverware and this scene will be lost forever. . .)




Rick made incredible pancakes two days in a row out of semolina, garbanzo flour and regular flour. The third day we made waffles with the same flours. We lingered. I noticed that so far, all of us are eating a lot more slowly than the last time we sat at the same table. Will it last?

photo by Erika Pizzato

On a roll and now feeling the memory of our trip slipping through my fingers as everything here began to seem so familiar (like being able to flush toilet paper, buy gallons of milk, and sleep on a SOFT bed) I made Paella on Sunday. (Don Jose from Hotel Monte Victoria has done it every Sunday for his whole family- 18 people now, forever. . .)


It wasn't as hard as it sounds. By now I had gone through half of a bottle of olive oil. . .in two days. Our authentic paella pan from Mac and Gayle's is on its way. . .I overflowed into another massive pan.

Yesterday as an after-school snack I made Picadillo, a Spanish soup with chicken, ham (I got local prosciutto and fried it to try to make up for the lack of jamon serrano), angel-hair pasta in a rich broth topped by home-made croutons  (yum! They are soooo easy.) and chopped up hard-boiled eggs. It sounds like a strange combination but it is served ubiquitously in Spain for good reason. I will post the school menu of what Spanish children get for lunch- the short version is that they are 4-5 course meals.

(disclaimer: Rick and I were vegetarians for 15 years, we're exploring where we stand now :)









For now, the kids are delighting in recounting their adventures and thrilled they remember how to tie a turban. J's teacher has said he can bring something in each day this week. He's given a 'talk' each day, we're grateful that he can share his memories in this way.




One should count each day a separate life. 
That's another thing that Seneca said. 




We're trying to do that. All I know is that the kids are pounding us to design our next adventure. . .now.