So where next?

Every conversation these days is about the next move. Every tidbit of revolves around where we may be in the next six months. Someone is resigning? So what does that mean for us? Is he senior? Or more junior? Does this have any implications?

So-and-so is leaving. So who is replacing him? Is it likely that they will do an internal hire or will they look elsewhere? How about a local hire? Is that more likely?

And it is doing my head in!

The worse thing is that because I am on the periphery of all these conversations - they happen at his work, with his contacts and his emails, and his colleagues - I feel like I am grabbing at straws. Each nugget of information I wonder about, think about and Google.

Vietnam? Hmmmm.

Japan??

Hong Kong??

How about staying put?

Or moving back to our home town?

How about Prague?

Or India?

What do I think about Singapore?

Manila?

Thailand?

Shanghai?

I do an Internet search, think about it, imagine it and plan it and then a few days later things have moved on and I am still stuck back in whichever country was last discussed.

And each day things shift. One day we are staying, the next moving, the next throwing up our hands in despair. It is all just utter speculation.

In some ways I would prefer that he just came home and said "We are moving to X." It would make my life much less stressful although it wouldn't be fair on him as he needs to vent and talk things through just as much as I need to hear them so we do this strange tango where he speaks and I try not to get emotionally involved in what is being said.

Add all of this to the complicating factor of children. Where will they go to school? Which school? Which country? Which hemisphere for God's sake!

When we left Hong Kong they dropped Cantonese and Mandarin and they have now picked up French, German and Latin. What next? Will I try to continue these languages or should they swap again? What if we are back in Asia? Changing horses mid-stream is getting harder as they grow older. They know nothing about Asian government, politics, history, languages now - everything is about European history, Kings and Queens and Victorian times.

How about me? Will I be able to work wherever we move next? Doing what? Writing? Endlessly reinventing a career? Will I go back to academia? Will I have a visa? Will there be a University there? Or will I end up being a club mother again ferrying children to and from school and other activities.

Right now it is just baby steps. I am doing an inventory of the house. Clearing out cupboards and sorting through papers. Culling down really.

And I am taking lots and lots f photos of all the normal things that we do in a day. The school run. The supermarket, the high street in town so that if and when we do get the nod we will at least be ready.

Sigh....