Sing Your Way Home

There's a great song by the Talking Heads called "This must be the place (naive melody)" that was also an amazing, poignant cover by Shawn Colvin. I've been thinking about this song a lot because I'm feeling sentimental about home and family. Home is where I want to be Pick me up and turn me round I feel numb - burn with a weak heart (So I) guess I must be having fun The less we say about it the better Make it up as we go along Feet on the ground Head in the sky It's ok I know nothing's wrong . . nothing Hi yo I got plenty of time Hi yo you got light in your eyes And you're standing here beside me I love the passing of time Never for money Always for love Cover up + say goodnight . . . say goodnight Home - is where I want to be But I guess I'm already there I come home - -she lifted up her wings Guess that this must be the place I can't tell one from another Did I find you, or you find me? There was a time Before we were born If someone asks, this where I'll be . . . where I'll be I am going to America today (TODAY!) [Thanks Neil Diamond]. I feel like I am cheating--that there is an unwritten rule that I'm not allowed to go to the US between August and June. Still, the doctor's office calls and I have three appointments with specialists (there is no endocrinologist to speak of in Moscow). When I checked in online for Delta, I had to mark my country of residence. I hesitated for a second but realized that yes, we pay Russian taxes so I live in Russia. But is this home? (Queue another song from the Broadway musical "Beauty and the Beast": Is this home? Is this where I should learn to be happy?). I came to the profound, but unsurprising conclusion that home is my family. When Allyson and Rachel are in Thailand, part of my home will be in Thailand. When Parry is traveling to Nizhny-Novgorod next week, part of me will be hanging out on a Russian train. I'm going home to America to be with my daughter, my sister, my parents, my in-laws so it doesn't matter whether they live in the SL east bench or Provo. Not having a home to claim is vaguely disconcerting. I don't consider this overpriced "cottage" in Rosinka, home, but I don't have a house in the US to call my own either. There are moments when I look around Moscow and I can't imagine the day I'll being leaving for good, but when I land in Atlanta or New York, I don't know quite where I fit either. I want to smack my fellow Americans and warn them that they are trading their inheritance for a mess of pottage when it comes to how to recover from this economic downturn. Unlimited fast food and NFL All Access cable isn't worth it. And yet I love them in all their idealistic, patriotic glory. When I was at school yesterday, I talked to a lovely woman I know from my Russian class. She's from Ecuador. She told me to enjoy my vacation to which I responded, "You that moment when you get off the plane and you look around and you understand everything?" She nodded and replied, "It's the best isn't it?" I nodded. Maybe home is where your family is because they are the ones that understand you best in the world. You know you're an expat when....you clean out your purse and find trash in five languages and lip balms from four countries.