What you need is sustained outrage...There's far too much respect given to authority.
-Molly Ivins

Vicki has been happily bouncing around the house the last week, singing. “Only x more days” has been the mantra as we count down our time here. With 40 C. heat on the back porch it does not seem like December at all. Only 18 days until Solstice.

A year ago this last week we said goodbye to our house and moved on. Last year’s December we were headed to New York City, then Florida, and finally here. That was a long time ago. I look back at the repetitive, routine of working in Cedar Rapids for 15 years, and events and faces all run together in my memory. In contrast, this year has been long, with so many new experiences burned as waypoints on the path

When people ask why we are “going back,” I say, “This was my ‘gap year’, just taken a bit late…”

Then they wonder, “How did you like your time here?”

I answer. Interesting. Eventful. Challenging. Satisfying. Frustrating. Revealing. Unanticipated. Heartbreaking. Beautiful. Horrible heat. Vast. Intense. …

I could go on and on with adjectives. How does one begin to describe a Continent? I know only one little corner, one Western edge of this land. People tell me “Not all of Australia is like this...” and I’m sure that is true. It’s a big place and complicated, so I naturally have mixed feelings about this country. I never could have anticipated all this year has been. It reminds me of the story of the trip to Italy, turning into Holland.

Sometimes the racist, boozy, provincial, blokey, unaccountability of it all makes me want to scream. Compared to Australia, New Zealand is the goody two-shoes kid; sensible, practical, always pulling up her socks and coming in out of the rain. While the Ozzies are the naughty little brother, skinned knees, covered in mud and a lost look, and sometimes a bruised eye. Compared to his sister, this is a country that needs your love, and patience, until it gets its act together. But I’m comfortable with Australians, who have much in common with us Americans—believing in Fair Dinkum, a Fair Go, and exhalting the “battler”. I believe in them. I know they can do it. Both our peoples have to reconcile our values and beliefs with the truth on the ground.

There are things I don’t miss about the U.S. I don’t miss parents abusing their kids at Wal-Mart, the pervasive materialism, the degradation of the natural world, too many lawyers, demanding consumerism, racism, the death of the spirit. But after this year, I also see my country with new eyes. Those lawyers keep the cows off the roads, and defend civil rights. Commerce makes it possible for every kid to be able to afford crayons. And competition leads us to expect customer service and quality. Americans report they attend church at an astounding 47% rate (but lie about it at a rate of 2:1). I wonder if this reflects some sort of spiritual yearning? And while America still has a lot of racism, we have come a long way since I was a kid. And we can and do talk about it.

So I am homesick for all of it, the good and the bad. I miss my country. I have been an expatriate long enough to feel the yearning to be someplace familiar. Like the sea turtles, imprinted to return to their natal beach, feel the tug of the Earth's magnetic field, pointing them back where they originated, I am pulled North.

Suffice it to say that I came for a geographic cure, and the teaching job, which had many joys and was about what I expected. The RCS faculty, the local doctors and the people at DAHS have been great and I cherish these friendships. The Kimberley I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams. I’ve tried to describe it, but like the Grand Canyon, you have to sit on the rim to get it.

Vicki and I accomplished many things. To judge the value of those accomplishments on some arbitrary scale means little. I think we both feel satisfied with what we did, which in the end is all that matters.

When we began, we were undergoing a sea-change. It’s still happening, but I think we are starting to grab glimpses of the result. Visions of walking through snow again, of evergreens. Christmas is coming, and it will be good to join that season of new birth within the depths of winter.

And I have decided I would like to mark this year by making a change in name, to mark the change in me. I began this blog posting as “Charles”. Because in Australia the name “Chuck” has humorous connotations, this year, I’ve used Charles as my given name everywhere. I am Dr. Charles Zee at DAHS, and Charles at the RCS. At the RCS end of year dinner, the Professor referred to me as “Chuck” and it just didn’t seem to fit me anymore. Vicki says maybe it's because I’ve finally matured (and she can call me anything she wants). But I like "Charles", so I’m going to ask other people to call me that from here on out. (“Dr Z” would be ok, too.)

A week or so ago, I dreamt that the night before our flight, it rained and rained, and all the Fitzroy River plain was 2 meters deep, a vast brown lake. Dead cows and bloated roos floated by; the boabs, green-leaved and yellow-flowered, protruded from a vast still waters. Our 4 Wheel Drive was halted where the road disappeared into the muddy murk. Oh, we were so sad and so upset.

And then I remembered. No worries. “We are not in Kansas anymore”. We need only click our heels three times. Because we are ready to go home.

# posted by Charles @ 8:31 PM