The same as any good pyramid scheme, you always have to be enrolling people at the bottom. The same as Social Security, it’s a mass of good people all paying for somebody else. Nickel-and-diming these Good Samaritans is just my own personal social safety net.

‘Ponzi Scheme’ isn’t the right phrase, but it’s the first that comes to mind.

                                                                                                                      -Choke, pg. 79

First, I should sum up the last three months.

Emily and I returned to the States on June 29. Since then we’ve gotten married, moved into a new apartment, and experienced soul-crushing depression. The reality is that we’re two spoiled brats. We have a gorgeous FREE apartment, Emily is getting a Master’s degree basically for FREE, and we’re able to pay the scant bills we incur. I’m back working in the Writing Center and teaching English at a technical college whilst searching for a full-time job. Emily is the graduate assistant for the entire downtown university housing authority. Both of these, while not exactly glamorous or lucrative, are great opportunities that we are thankful to have.

So why are we obsessing over a possibly childish fancy of moving across the globe? Why can’t we just be happy here? Let me count the ways. Firstly, there are few locales that contrast as sharply to Oxford as Columbus, Georgia. It’s not necessary for me to disparage this place any more. Suffice it to say that we are NOT in New York, we are NOT near the beach, we are NOT in a cultural melting pot. We are NOT where we want to be. The fact that this is a two year post does little to numb the constant awareness of these facts, and I find it impossible to avoid fantasizing about our escape.

There is another, slightly more ominous, reason for our restiveness. It was at the eight-week mark when we really got antsy, which just happens to be about the longest stretch of time we have stayed in one place over the last year. Sadly, this has defined our cultural attention span – a meager two months before we feel entitled to a new adventure. And unlike Europe, where exotic locales are one very cheap easyJet ticket away, we are not afforded the luxury of such freedom.

Were it only these two niggling problems, we could easily bide our time, plan accordingly, and move to a more suitable city when the time came. However, there is a bigger problem. Deep down, in our cores, we just do not feel attached to America any more. Returning home has honestly been a very Gulliverian experience. We cull together our trinkets and memories like we are freezing and they have some traces of residual heat that we can absorb. We pay exorbitant prices for Jammie Dodgers and Digestive biscuits to numb our overwhelming sense of loss.

Why do we love England so much? Speaking for myself, I can honestly say that I have never felt as content as I did in England, which is not a frivolous emotion for me. Contentment has always seemed continually out of my grasp; my usual emotional state of idleness trends toward the anxiously apathetic end of the spectrum. England had a curative order that I have now lost. Contrary to the numerous warnings I heard prior to leaving, both from arm-chair sociologists and the agents of our international program, I did not feel like I was in an alien society. Quite the opposite, actually; the world made sense there. There is a sense of process and purpose of which I think our endless pursuit of “individualism” has robbed us. It is sadly the utmost irony that I had to leave my homeland in order to truly feel like a member of a society.

And it would be very easy to attribute this feeling to our intensely microcosmic experience in Oxford. Make no mistake – Oxford is NOT England. In a way, we lived a distinctly English life that most English never have the chance to experience. Oxbridge lifestyle is not the norm, and I am fully aware of that. However, that is why we intend to carry out our otherwise foolish endeavor. For this is not the result of a ridiculous one-week vacation conversion, of myopic middle-class Americans who take pictures of the Arc de Triomphe and drink café au lait for a few days and decide they must have been Parisians in their former lives. No, in nine months we experienced a fair bit more. We walked for miles in freezing rain, we schlepped our groceries home, we experienced the riots. And we miss every minute.

Lego Technic Super-8 Movie Projector from Friedemann Wachsmuth on Vimeo.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/world/middleeast/15prince.html

It’s Saturday. I got up at 7 this morning to put the finishing touches on my Marvell essay due today (yes, I have tutorials on Saturday this term, a little painful). It’s a true English morning – solid dark grey cloud cover that would be sinister at home, but here is just the flamboyant sky’s attempt at severity. There is a constant patter of rain, though I have noticed the rain is heavier in the Springtime compared to the Fall/Winter ‘spit’.

The water doesn’t get the finches down, though. They’re chirping away for better or worse. I’m in the dining room sipping my fancy sounding Lavazza coffee. I finished my essay, now I’m listening to some anonymous classical music on BBC Radio 3. My musical analysis: distinctly Saturday morning tooting horns. A Panera soundtrack, if you will.

I could certainly be faulted on the fact that my favorite travel/living abroad moments are the ones in which I’m doing nothing. But it’s that way everywhere I go. But, it’s kind of like passion versus love; the passion of foreign attractions and sights is great for a while, but it can’t really be sustained. The true measure of a foreign locale is how good the doing nothing is.

This is pretty good. Yep. I could do nothing in England.

Yes, the umbrella, the rain coat, the hat. These are the ubiquitous holdings of every English denizen. Often deemed bits of foppery by Americans, little badges of honour denoting absolute Englishness like an American flag lapel pin, I now know that living here really does require these things, and you become quite attached to them. Emily and I have amassed a small umbrella collection in our time here. Cheap minis bought on the street in Canterbury (mine stays permanently housed in the right pocket of my coat, along with my gloves), slightly larger collapsible versions peppered throughout our bags and reusables, and our beloved full-size that we bought second-hand at the Gloucester Green market for £3.

But, on our return from Budapest, we must have made a wrong turn somewhere. Maybe over Brussels the pilot nodded off, nudged the controls leftward, and now we are somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. Whatever the circumstances, we seem to have stumbled upon some sort of edenic paradise where green foliage greet you like sunbursts, trees and shrubs are encrusted with delicate flowers, and the air is charged with such vibrancy that it has nearly erased any memory of that dark, dingy winter. The once-glorious Georgian Spring now pales in comparison.

The indoors are no longer our refuge. Our first week back has been a string of long days basking in the back yard. I feel transported to Summer vacation, when every day feels like a holiday. Even the royal wedding, an event I care no more about than reruns of Friends, seemed like the perfect excuse for a garden party. Of course, in English fashion, it did manage to rain. But even that was different. Sitting at a coffee shop in Summertown with some friends, I was shocked to see the first real rainstorm since leaving America. The rain drops actually pelted, rather than spit.

For the past six months I’ve wondered how they do it – how they can survive winter after winter, gray after gray, and still be cheerful. But now I see, it is Spring’s fault.