One whole year later ...!!!

Feb 28^th 2009, I had been dreading this day for months and finally it was time to bid adieu to Dallas and move to Seattle. The only things I associated Seattle with till then was … Microsoft and Sleepless in Seattle. The place my husband had spent a whole year travelling back and forth every week, a place where one of my best friends had moved to a few years ago. We moved and finally arrived in Seattle with our hearts still hooked on Dallas. It was a sunny day and the ride from the airport to our temporary corporate housing was long. Everybody had said that I would love Seattle at first sight but that really didn’t happen. I was just anxious to see a familiar face and I was happy when our cousins received us.

I had heard about the cloudy skies of Seattle but it didn’t strike me that it would be cloudy all the time and it was not until I saw a really nice and sunny day that I realized how much I missed my sunny, bright Dallas sky that I took for granted and even cribbed about. But when the sun shines … I have to agree that there is no place like Seattle (read my earlier post). So we learnt to enjoy the weather and make hay while the sun shines. However, the sun spells didn’t last too long and I was stuck in my world in Dallas. I missed our friends and our gorgeous home in Dallas. Finding friends was beyond a herculean effort. The only support was family from my husband’s side, Thank God for small graces. They had become our lifelines here without whom I would have pretty much ended up just running back all the way to Texas.

Living at the temporary furnished housing was tricky. I learnt to make do with very basic stuff and it made me realize that I didn’t need the umpteen pots and pans that hid inside my huge kitchen cabinets in Dallas. The other good consequence was I started baking / grilling a lot since I didn’t want our 2 month furnished house to smell like a curry pot when we move out. So healthy food habits also meant some weight loss and healthy living. We spent all our free times searching for a place to live and finally after a huge combing operation we found a tiny little townhome that satisfied most of our criteria … except one major one … SPACE!!!

This whole last year was brimming with events inspite of the almost complete lack of social life. The kids kept me busy. Ishaan started school and that brought a tremendous change in him. He finally has learnt to sit quietly in one place and make a conversation. Rayaan had to learn to cope with his brother being away for half the day and the coping technique he adopted was to sleep it off J. We celebrated the kids birthdays. Ishaan turned THREE …which was awesome because it signaled the end of the terrible twos. And our dear Rayaan celebrated his FIRST ever birthday. We postponed his birthday celebration hoping someone who fly in to attend it … but being almost at the opposite end of the world, it was not easy convincing anyone to fly half way across the country. So we celebrated it in a quiet and special way with just close family. Rayaan went from crawling to walking to running around. He metamorphosed into quite a cute li’l devil after being tired of being labeled an angel who did nothing but stare and smile at people. He has had several vocabulary explosions and its heartwarming to hear him talk.

Summer in Seattle was exciting and definitely worth waiting for, even though it felt like it came and just passed before you could climax. But while it lasted, it was the most beautiful summer of my life. I have never been at such an exciting place during the summer. There were tons of activities to do and countless events to go to. Ishaan started soccer classes and swimming classes and enjoyed hopping to the numerous parks all around town. Rayaan on the other hand watched his brother participate in all the activities and vicariously enjoyed it through his brother’s thrills. Meanwhile he figured out how to start running around and after that there was no stopping or turning back.

The end of summer also sorted of ended all the good stuff. Ishaan changed schools and had to learn to adapt to new friends and teachers. I went through a tumultuous time personally. With not many friends to turn to or nowhere to go I was left holding all my heavy emotional baggage all by myself. I slipped off the weight loss wagon when I most needed to be on it. I owe it to a few friends who kept me afloat just through phone conversations. I also have to thank Salman’s cousins who have become my best friends here. I learnt one important lesson to never take your friends and social life for granted. We were so accustomed to having more friends than we ever needed all our lives and for the first time in our lives I was confined to just the four walls of our home. It’s funny how I have all the time in the world to socialize (now that I didn’t have a day job) but I didn’t know enough people and I didn’t have the freedom to go anywhere because I didn’t have a car anymore and I had two kids to lug around if I had to take public transportation. For the first time in my life … I was desperate to find a friend.

Such was this long year, a mixed one filled with pleasant sights but very few people to share your joys with. Eventually the kids now have a few play mates and their mothers and I try to socialize a bit. We love hanging out with our cousins and enjoying awesome food. I also finally have two girls I can call to hang out with if I ever need to. We also ended up having a few visitors who flew up here half way across the country to meet us and it was so nice to see familiar faces again. I thank everyone who came here this last year from the bottom of our hearts – My parents, My Sister and her friends,My brothers in law Shahan and Sufyan, Kunal, Gaya, Dhiraj and Madhavi and Ashu,Tvesha and Mohan ... (sorry I missed them earlier on)...

That which does not kill you makes you stronger!! It’s true, we all have finally learnt to weather this storm and reconcile to living in a new place. We still don’t have too many acquaintances but we have learnt to live and appreciate each other a lot more.