Winding Down

I am now in my 23rd month in Jakarta and it is time to start winding down and preparing to head off for my next assignment. That means not only doing my day job, but also making sure that I have all my stuff ready to be packed, all my records in hand, bills paid, training plans in order, Home Leave arranged, and plane tickets booked to return to the states. It's also time to reflect on all that I have learned and all that I have gone through.

The memory of my first moment on the ground in Jakarta is indelibly burned into my nose and my brain. The feel of the damp air, the moist heat of tropical humidity, and the smell of cloves and jet fuel. Walking into my first apartment and seeing the tiny little Christmas tree my sponsor had bought so my my girls could have a tree. The first day that I walked across eight lanes of the worst, most polluted traffic I had ever seen in order to get to work. The torrential downpour that soaked me through as I walked home. The first, tentative words I would try and use with the taxi drivers to try and get somewhere. My girls learning a new culture and starting in new schools in an alien world.

Learning my job as a First Tour Officer while having to run a major operation in the embassy, hiring, firing, reprimanding, and generally handling most or all of the day-to-day decisions that go into the personnel operations in a Mission as large as Indonesia. Meeting new people, working with people I only get to meet over the phone. It is truly amazing to me, all the things that go into running an embassy, and I ended up involved in a lot of them. Decisions on travel, assignments, pay, health care, and policies that will affect the Mission for years to come.

Along the way there was my separation and the end to 20 years of marriage, coupled with an opportunity to spend six months with my oldest daughter, just her and I. An amazing time that I will treasure forever. The pain of being away from my twins, and then the eventual return of my oldest to the states to live with her mother. From there, the beginning of a new relationship filled with joy.

And then there are the feelings of loneliness,of being away from family and friends. After 13 years in Oregon, I had made many lasting friendships and now I had to learn how to maintain them while on the other side of the world. Other friendships became challenging, mostly because of the divorce and new relationship, but I am confident that all will smooth itself out and go back to a new version of normal that will be better and stronger than ever before.

These past two years have been filled with nothing but change and challenge, and I am the strongest I have ever been. I have grown, been beaten up, fallen down, gotten back up, and continued to step forward into this bright future. In a few short weeks I will get on a plane to travel back across the Pacific for the last time for at least a few years, and I am looking forward to all that is in front of me.

I move forward with confidence and joy, knowing all is well in my future.