Life abroad... so romantic. Or is it?

Having just passed our one year anniversary of living in Austria, my perspective has been tilting along with the earth's axis, albeit in its own unique rhythm. I'd say we're just coming out of winter and into a warm, lovely spring, as far as my mood is concerned. One thing I have always valued in life is honesty. Nothing gets my goat more than when parents leave out the challenging portions of their youth through the retelling of stories to their children. If human kind suffers from feelings of inadequacy, then only telling people about the sunny days will make them wonder if the world as they know it is coming to an end every time a bit of a storm gathers overhead. I am speaking metaphorically, though my thoughts are drawn to the first images of hurricane Sandy's devastation in the Eastern portion of my country. They should be waking up in a few hours to see what kind of damage occurred during the night.

The leaves are gathering in the courtyard behind our apartment building, as winter has decided to overtake fall. Two days ago came the chill, followed yesterday by snow, which was hurriedly melted by the pesky rain, and today all that remains are branches getting more naked by the hour. The leaves are falling like snow. And yet, for me, the sun is out. After having traveled for a considerable amount of my life, seeing places like Thailand, Hawaii, Jamaica, Mexico, Canada, the UK and a good deal of Europe, my suspicions are confirmed; traveling is only romantic when you are reading about it or plotting your next journey. The everyday realization that most locals are not  jumping up and down for joy that foreigners, or ausländer, are invading their comfy lives is not so romantic. Somehow discovery is so rare and precious that the few moments spent actually seeing the world in a whole new way are brief in comparison with everyday life. Like when the dark clouds gathered above and around me in Thailand when I was twenty, making me feel as though centuries of opposing religions and cultures were colliding inside of me; or when I stood on a bridge in Prague and looked at the memories reflected in the city's beautifully restored architecture, restored because of past destruction. Images at once of beauty and terror, viewed to the soundtrack of music from street performers.

Life really is made up of those special moments, and we just need to survive the time in between, while keeping our character in tact. Those glimpses come when we least expect them, and we need to have our eyes open. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it best: "Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we will find it not."