GL messaged me when he arrived back in DC.  I wrote him back that I couldn’t stop the tears, but my IPhone kept auto-correcting to years. It made me smile ruefully; I couldn’t stop either tears or years. And that seems to be the story of my life since I married and moved to Switzerland. The fabric of my life is joyful, but each separation is heart-rending. It tears this happy whole of my life into far-flung components and it takes me a moment to weave it all back together again, allowing, once again, the elasticity of love to bind us together across the ocean.

It started yesterday, just a flash of that familiar gnawing, nagging feeling of dread. It’s what happens before every departure, whether it’s my children leaving me, or it’s me leaving my family. My son, GL, returned to his last semester at college in the States, where he will probably remain after graduation. His next planned visit will be next Christmas. He left early this morning and I am here this evening looking tearily first at his empty room, and then, across the hall, at his slippers which he has left tucked neatly underneath the table in front of the sofa. It’s the sight of his empty slippers which grabs my heart – like awaiting a phantom presence. I’ll be fine tomorrow. It’s like a molecular composition; a component of my being is pulled out, torn away, and I have to recompose myself into a whole. I have plenty of practice, 31 years of it. In the very beginning of this story of separation, which feels like the story of my life, it was the division of my life with my twin which tore me asunder. Tore us both. 31 years of recomposing myself; 31 years of building a life here in Switzerland.

My husband Giancarlo and I got married 31 years ago today; those years went by in such a blend of events and emotions that I feel like we hurtled through time. It doesn’t seem possible that that many years have gone by. Our two children – the blessings of our life- are the anchoring points of that blitz through time. That we stayed the course is amazing. An American girl meets a Swiss man one evening in Washington, D.C., and that was it- instant, enduring connection. Falling in love,  my heart was taken. I have reason to be thinking back to our first months of marriage, which for me meant life in a new country, because my wonderful, beautiful Goddaughter fell in love deeply and completely with a man who reminds me a bit of Giancarlo and she moved to a new city yesterday to be with him. What I want to write her is this: there will be times when you will want to leave, when you will think, I don’t want to be with this man anymore. There will be lows where you will think the only way out is out. But stay the course, live through the lows as you will emerge with a stronger union. Remember the passion, remember the love,remember that breath-taking appreciation of all of his best qualities,  remember that magnetic, chemical pull that drew you to that man, and have faith that those are the ties that bind.

LOVE

On this last day of the holiday season, I think back to the day which starts the season for Swiss children – San Nicolao. In the Middle Ages, St. Nicholas was the Bishop of Myra and became known for his acts of generosity and piety. Legend has it that he gave 3 poor children red apples which where transformed into gold; centuries later his holy day, December 6, has become the traditional day for St. Nicholas to visit children all over Switzerland, bringing gifts of sweets and fruit. My first Christmas here in Switzerland was spent in Berne, my home for my first three years in this country. In the Swiss-German part of Switzerland December 6 is the day of ‘Samichlaus’, and parents enlist the aid of their male friends to dress up as Samichlaus so that their children can have a personal visit from St. Nick. My husband Giancarlo played just such a role for the two children of good friends; the little boy in the photo is his godson.

I found the whole idea enchanting. And it’s not just a jolly little visit – the children all know that St. Nick will know if they have been naughty or nice. They just don’t know that it’s their parents who have provided Santa with a list, so that he can look into their eyes and say ‘I hear that you have been fighting with your brother’ or ‘I hear that you have been cleaning up your toys nicely’. The book that Samichlaus is looking at is a volume of the Encylopedia Britannica with the list stuck to one of the pages. In the photos, you can see the children looking up a bit anxiously to Samichlaus. But of course it always ends happily, with Samichlaus pulling out sweets from his bag for the children. In the German part of Switzerland, grocery stores are full of chocolate laden branches which are given to the children. Naturally I was keen to participate so I hand sewed special chocolate treats to branches that I had collected in the nearby woods, embellishing it even more by using different colored embroidery thread. Another traditional St. Nick sweet that it seems every household buys are the Grittibanz, or Pupazzi, little dough men with raisins for eyes, some holding little pipes or shovels.