International Living Postcards– Sunday Edition
Sunday, Nov. 26, 2006
Paris, France
This week, Americans all over the world, no matter where they happen to find themselves, are sitting down with friends and family to feast and give thanks.
This is a uniquely American tradition, one that we export as we wander outside American soil. No other event reminds us more from where we’ve come or helps us appreciate better what we carry with us as a result of our place of birth.
Who are we?…I’ve lately been asking myself and my children. We’re a little mixed up. More than eight years ago, Lief and I, born and bred Americans, transplanted ourselves and our U.S.-born daughter to Ireland…and beyond. To our family since, we’ve added a son of Eire, little Jackson, born in Ireland and now attending school in Paris. Jack speaks English with an Irish accent and French as well as any French child. For him, Waterford is home. America is a place he passes through once a year to visit his grandmother. France is where he happens to be right now.
Kaitlin, his older sister, graduating from high school this spring, calls the States "home"…but isn’t sure she’d like to return there. Her top university picks are in London.
Our long-term plan is to establish bases in places around the world where we like to spend time…four or five of them…and to divide our time among them according to the season–autumn in Argentina, winter in Nicaragua or Panama, springtime in Paris, summer in Istria… We’ve no thought today of returning to the States.
We’re not fleeing the U.S. Rather, we’re seeking new opportunities. This, I remind our children, is, after all, what being an American is all about. Being interested in knowing what’s over the next hill…and curious enough to hike to the top to find out…is as much what makes us American as our entrepreneurial bents and our dislike of being told what to do. By leaving the States to see what we might see, I tell Kaitlin and Jackson, we’re following in the footsteps of the American forefathers we most respect. In fact, I point out, we can’t help but set out in search of new frontiers. That’s what our people do.
This Thanksgiving, we find ourselves in Paris. Thursday, 16 fellows, some Americans abroad like us, others new French friends experiencing Thanksgiving for the first time, gathered in our tiny apartment behind the Musée d’Orsay to dine on roast turkey, bread stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie.
This life as an American abroad isn’t always easy. The logistics, the administration of moving around the way we do can wear you out. Sometimes the hassles can seem to outweigh the benefits. And, sometimes, we wanderers wonder at our seeming lack of roots.
This week, as we washed down our turkey with French wine, I looked around our Thanksgiving table and marveled at the group assembled. A merry band of misfits, coming, going, passing through this city for different reasons, all seeking…something.
And I gave thanks that we…especially that our children…have the benefit of this company. We Americans abroad are no less Americans for the fact of finding ourselves in Paris this Thanksgiving week. We believe, I hope not immodestly, that we’re doing our small part to keep alive the ideas and the ideals that Americans everywhere identify and value as their own…geography notwithstanding.
Kathleen Peddicord
Publisher, International Living
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