almost home

These last few weeks have really been a testament to how I've been living my life for the past year, the past few years, the whole of my twenties actually.

I stayed in 6 different apartments in the past month (including 3 in the past week), slept in 6 different beds including one in a baby's room, and carried my suitcase in and out of the office so many times my coworkers are very confused. They keep thinking I'm going on a trip, I keep explaining I'm only going from one guest-room to the other. At least it's an upgrade from the couch.

And when I think about it, this is exactly how I've lived my life throughout my twenties. In eight years, I lived in 11 apartments in 3 countries, had 5 different jobs, 2 "serious" relationships (and 2 shitty breakups). So basically the only thing that defines me for sure is that I am all over the place. Literally. And for the longest time, that's just the way I liked it. I like the idea of being that free. Of never knowing where I might end up.

But lately, I've been craving a home.

And by home, I don't mean my father's house, where I shared a bedroom with my little sister no longer than 3 months ago. There comes a point in your life where you feel the need to have your own space. My own home, one that I pay with my hard-working earned money, with furniture that I own and most importantly: a bed that's mine. Adulthood, I guess you call it.

I'm almost there. The past ten days were hell; it was all paperwork, loans, checks, contracts, agents, electricity and water, credit cards, appliances. All words I was pretty unfamiliar with until now. I went to see an apartment and I forgot to check if it had a built-in wardrobe or a bathroom cabinet or even AC for that matter. I just liked it because it was bigger than everything else I saw.

I had a brief moment of anger when the agent told me "you're married, yes?" like he just looking for confirmation and when I said I wasn't, he said he needed to take it up with the landlord because he doesn't usually "accept" unmarried women. A brief moment of anger.

Then I had many, many moments of anxiety, signing on all these forms and all these checks. Still anxious right now just thinking about it. And I felt completely overwhelmed at Ikea for four hours, and all I did was buy a bed-frame and a mattress. But then I had a moment of pride pushing that huge cart around all by myself. All by myself! Not in a tragic, "all by myself" Bridget Jones moment on the couch with a brush (although I foresee myself having that moment quite often in the next year...). More like I'm doing it all by myself like a big girl and despite the anger, anxieties and overwhelming everything, mostly I'm left with pride and excitement. Because I'm almost there. Just a few more days, and I'll be home.

everything is okay

Monday morning no longer feels like it has for the past 29 years. It's not the first day of the week anymore; it doesn't hold that same power, the pressure, that sense of dread. It's just a day of the week now. Here, I start my week on a Sunday.

I woke up this morning and decided that everything is okay. Everything is okay, everything will be okay. I just need to let go. For the longest time, I've tried to control everything. Even things I can't control, I try to plan for. I make lists --that's how I feel better about things. To be prepared and avoid surprises. I guess this is what became of me after a series of unexpected events that came and punched me in the face, so, surprise surprise, my reaction is to be controlling. Was to be. I'm letting go now.

Actually, the truth is, the unexpected events probably exacerbated my anxieties but I'd always been naturally anxious. Even as a little girl, I always asked the "what if?" questions. I remember my mother pointing this out to me one day when we were on the Corniche, the beach walk in my hometown of Beirut. My baby brother was running around, and I kept worrying he'd fall over the edge. "What if he trips?" I asked. "What if he's holding onto the barrier and it breaks?" "What if he passes under the barrier because he's so small?"

"Why do you always have to think of all the bad possible things that could happen?" my mother asked me. "Relax. You don't need to worry. I'm here, let me worry about it, ok?"

Ok. If she was going to worry about it, then maybe I didn't have to. And I think it worked for a while. But then she died. And there was no one left to worry about all the things that needed to be worried about; no one but me. And I could not be unprepared again. I couldn't just let things happen to me, without accounting for every possibility.

But then something strange happened: unexpected things kept on happening; despite my lists, despite my whatifs, despite my preparations. Sometimes they were good unexpected things, sometimes they weren't so good.  But they happened anyway.

And now... well now, I've realized that even though I do all my worrying, go through all my anxieties, make all my lists --nothing is going as planned. I am absolutely not where I expected to be. And maybe that's okay.

Monday morning is still Monday morning; it has the same name, it still comes at the same time and in the same order. It just acts as a Tuesday now. And the world hasn't collapsed. And everything is okay.

expectations redefined

From the very beginning of this blog (Beirut Rhapsodies) from the very first post I wrote, I chose a topic: I chose to talk about a generation of women entering the 21st and the trying to make sense of our place in this new world, whether it be in career, family, love and all three. As I put it back then, over four years ago: "It's the story about women in their twenties, struggling to find their balance." I wanted to write a novel, but didn't know what about. I started the blog just to get back into writing mode.

So it's funny to realize that years later, I am in fact writing a book about exactly that: women in their twenties, through different generations and different periods of time. I guess somehow I was already onto to something without even realizing it.

The reason I mention this, is because of what I want to talk about today. A conversation I have had again and again, with so many girls around me, and I really believe that it's the essence of understanding relationships in our time. Expectations need to be redefined.

It feels unimaginable, impossible even, that we should expect to have the same kinds of relationships that they had 60 years ago, or even 30 years ago. Yet we do.

Technology alone has redefined the way we communicate, the way one might connect with someone. Take long distance relationships for example. For my grandparents, their courtship was a time of letters exchanged between Beirut and Cairo. My grandmother would send a letter, and then she would count: if it took 8 days to reach Cairo, and if he wrote back that very same day and sent the letter the next, then she would receive her answer 17 days later at the earliest. I have friends in long distance relationships right now, and they can't go 17 hours without speaking to each other through at least one of the dozen available apps.

Imagine waiting 17 days for someone to reply to your love letter. We can't imagine it. When we see the "last seen" stamp on Whatsapp (or the wonderful new addition of the blue ticks), we can't even wait 17 minutes. The other day my friend P. panicked because her boyfriend was "last seen" at 8pm and it was 11pm and she didn't understand how he could go three hours without checking his Whatsapp (what the hell was he doing?)... turns out he was sleeping.

And that's just one example. We've lost so many fundamental pillars to our inter-human connections --patience, privacy, freedom... Yesterday, T. told me her boyfriend sometimes goes an entire day without calling her, because he needs his space and she just doesn't get it. Now if T. lived in 1949 like my grandmother, getting one phone call a month would be magic. Not the norm. Not the minimum requirement. But maybe not all of us are wired to keep up with the demands of technology. Maybe some of us need to disappear for a day, or two, because that's how we were wired to start with. And if we'd just readjust our expectations --if we were able to understand that people weren't created to keep up and (dis)function in perfect tune with technology-- we'd all be so much happier, wouldn't we?