So this is a slightly different post to what I had planned for this week but I felt inspired by recent events. A little less baby this time and possibly a little bit philosophical so apologies in advance for that:

One of my favourite musicals of all time is Wicked (In the German version I believe it is called Die Hexen von Oz). If you haven’t seen it, you should, but not to ruin anything it is basically the untold story of the Witches of Oz (before Dorothy dropped in) and how the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good came to bare those titles. Ultimately though it is a tale of friendship and that good old lesson of never to judge a book by it’s cover.

The reason I mention it is because, thanks to the life I have led so far, the words of one of the songs always resonate with me: “It well may be that we will never meet again in this lifetime, So, let me say before we part; So much of me is made of what I learned from you. You’ll be with me like a handprint on my heart. And now whatever way our stories end I know you have rewritten mine by being my friend”

– lyrics by Stephen Schwartz (www.wickedthemusical.co.uk)

In essence it is a song about saying goodbye but what I love is that it truly sums up what their friendship meant and how they will remember it.

As someone that spent their dance career working contract to contract I’m used to the feeling of living on borrowed time. Meeting people from all over the world (some of whom became very good friends) I am used to goodbyes. It is never easy but some are harder than others.

Ship life is a crazy world. Something of a parallel universe. It is so intense that a week is like a year. You eat, sleep, drink and breathe with your cabin mates and it is a world where, as a dancer, you can spend a morning rehearsing, an afternoon on shore, an evening of performing and a whole night of drinking with your “work mates” before meeting each other for breakfast the next day when you will have no qualms about doing it all again and every other day for your entire 9 month contract. For better or worse, in sickness and in health, you get to know these people very well and pretty much everyone else onboard too – well the ones that visit the crew bar anyway! You might not like everyone and there is bound to be some you would never be friends with in ‘real-life’ who you may never actually speak to again afterwards but you will still remember them and they will always remain a part of your life because you shared a time with them that others in your life just can’t relate to.

Sometimes we meet people that we really connect with, who we love even. So as I say, saying goodbye is never easy. But that is the life. And the pain of one goodbye won’t put us off signing straight back up for another contract.

Thanks to Facebook, staying in touch and reconnecting with those we met on our travels has never been so easy but it can also be heartbreaking when you search for that person that left the ‘handprint on your heart’ and you can’t find them. It’s a bitter sweet world. Full of romance and adventure. Culture, excitement, parties, hard-work. All within a world that no-one can understand until they have lived it.

And thanks to falling in love with one of those people I connected with I am now living the life of an expat which has also led me to a situation where friendships, in the physical sense atleast, have uncertain expiration dates. I am so lucky to have connected with a fantastic group of ladies and babies thanks to the Vienna Babies Club (www.viennababiesclub.com) but as is normal in the expat world, just like onboard, contracts end, people move on, and once again it’s sad to say goodbye. As we discovered recently.

What both these scenarios have in common is that we meet people during these journeys that will stay with us. Some people that effect us more than we even realise at the time. I often find myself smiling because I remember someone or something that happened on a contract. Every time I hear a Spanish person I think of my conversation with a lovely bar guy called Juan from my first contract. We had the same conversation every night in the crew bar: Como estas? Bien. Y tu? Yo soy cansada. Cansada? Siempre (apologies for the bad Spanish!)

Every time I see a Hard Rock Cafe I think of my Atalante girls.

Every time I see a white dress I remember the Pas de Deux I performed with my dance partner Steve.

Certain songs remind me of shows, crew parties or karaoke in the crew bar. When I first moved to Austria and had to order a cola light instead of a diet coke it reminded me of the time we tried to order a coke in some strange little bar and no matter how we said it we could not get the waiter to understand until our friend came along with his accented English and the guy understood immediately. Every time I order a cola light it makes me smile. And I’m pretty sure I put on a fake accent when I order one just in case!

I have so many wonderful memories of that time all triggered by a photo or a song or a saying or a smell….

I don’t speak to my school, uni or ship friends half as much as I would like, let alone see them, but they are always there. As are the people I grew up with and those I have worked with over the years. Even the strangers I have sat and talked to on trains and aeroplanes. People that helped carry my suitcase, or didn’t as the case may be, past pupils and parents, they have all helped shape who I am in some way.

Everyday a memory comes up and everyday I am shaped into a different person because of what I remember and took from those experiences. How different I would be if I had not met them. If I had not enjoyed ship life so much I never would have ended up on the M/S Astor and never would have met my future husband and the father of my children. So it is sad that I may never see some of those friends again but I am thankful to them for rewriting my story.

And now my experiences have led me here. Living in Vienna, Austria with my husband and 2 children. I miss my former lives a lot but I am so grateful to be sharing my adventures of Motherhood with these other fabulous expats. Some I hope will be here for the long term but others who are already leaving us for the next part of their story. It has been such a pleasure to share the experiences of the first 10 months of our babies lives with each other. All of us have different experiences yet somehow we all have the same. It is very special bond and nice to know I am not alone, not only in Motherhood but in this country that is not my own and not yet quite my home.

I am so sad to already have to say goodbye to some of these people that have helped me so much as I adapt to life as an expat Mama. I know we will still have stories to share in our Facebook group and it’s so good to know we have that space to write feely and be there for each other because having other people go through exactly what you are is the best support system there is. Especially when your baby doesn’t sleep!

I feel so grateful for these ladies and babies and find myself wondering how different my expat life would be, how different a Mother I would be, had I never joined them or had my baby been born a month later. I am a little bit of a believer in everything happens for a reason and so whilst the most recent and most sudden goodbye may not seem to have one yet I hope one day it will.

In the meantime we have to learn to enjoy what we have and appreciate the time we have shared.

As I put my boys to bed this evening I watched each of them sleep for a bit and as always I was overwhelmed by how much I love them and how quickly the time with them has gone. But I could see every past moment in their faces and felt grateful for everything we have shared so far. Life really is short, too short, just like those contracts. It is all over so quickly and before we know it we are saying the hardest goodbyes of all. It’s not always easy to follow a ‘live everyday day like it’s your last’ attitude but I do believe we should learn to take the time to appreciate each moment in life, no matter how insignificant it seems at the time, because as Kurt Vonnegut aptly said “Enjoy the little things in life because one day you’ll look back and realise they were the big things”.

People need to understand that for good or bad their actions have consequences and moments can stay with people for a lifetime. Just as we need to endure our babies falling so we can help teach them how to get up we too have to suffer the downs to benefit from the highs. At the end of it all every moment counts and every person you meet will effect you. So let the bad things make you stronger and learn to soak up the good stuff because in the end “the best things in life are the people we meet, the places we go and the memories we make along the way” (Author unknown). We can’t stop the world from moving and goodbyes are inevitable but the in between is up to us.

Sweet Dreams –

Mama Atzi x