Along with this oddness thing, it’s hard to know how to respond when we run into people and questions are being asked or they didn’t realize we were coming back. “Are you excited to be back?” we get quite often. We are filled with such mixed emotions. Coming back to the United States was bitter sweet and I kind of like milk chocolate better. As the day approached Brian and I were excited to be moving back, but a funny thing happened as we landed/drove into the United States we were hit with this pit of pain of what we left behind. Okay so I started crying at the airport! We have enjoyed seeing family and friends right now, but we didn’t have to come back to the United States because we couldn’t stand it in Mexico. It wasn’t because it was “too hard”. The kids had adjusted fine in Mexico. In fact Joelle cried a lot the last two weeks we were there because she did not want to leave. She still thinks of herself as Mexican. We chose to come back because let’s just say we had a completely different philosophy of education as the school. We really had no other job lined up in Mexico. No feeling that there was something else for us to do there.
I (Joy) also had a secondary reason for coming home. During this time in Mexico I realized how young my children still are and how much they still need me. (I would include my hubby in here as well. He is my 4th child or maybe my first.) Majority of my students I taught I would say had terrible relationships with their parents and it showed in their actions at school. I got a chance to see how several of them interacted with their parents. The biggest thing I learned was I did not want to lose my children. I had more than one conference with a mom crying about how she didn’t know what to do. She felt she had lost her son or daughter.
On the other hand, there were a couple of students that where brilliant radiant exceptions. Two sisters were one of those. I had one in 6th grade and the other in 8th grade. These two young women were beautiful both on the inside and the outside and because of that also our babysitter the last month and a half. One day I saw one of them with her arms around her mom waiting for her little brother. I could tell that she and her sister where extremely close to their mom. Later that day I asked her, “Why do you think you are so close to your mom?” She said, “My mom has always been my best friend. I tell her everything. I always have. Both me and my sister are close to my mom.” I talked to their mom a few weeks later and you can tell she had been purposeful with her daughters from a young age. She still stayed home and took her role as a mother seriously.
One of those culture shock realization things that hit me as I came back to the United States was our priorities. In Mexico it is expected if you have a job you should give a job. You should have someone to come in and clean or cut your grass or something. Granted it’s much easier than it is here because you don’t pay social security and people don’t expect as much money. We had someone come in and clean for 150 pesos which is about the equivalent of $12. (Let me also say that people felt we were spoiling her and she was very happy to have the job and I think still made more than I did an hour). All this to say is that made me think of how expensive it is to have someone come and clean your house here in the USA. When it’s advertised $35 off your first cleaning you know it’s got to be pricy. I remember when I was a nanny in Chicago. The person that came in and cleaned the house once a week made more than I did and worked several hours less. We are in a culture today that doesn’t value their most important asset. (Unless…you have the cleaning lady so you can spend more time with your kids.)
Realizing how much my family still needs me and how hard it is to be completely there with a "job" was one of many big lessons I learned down south. Sure I knew it was “important” before, but now I have been given a new vision, refreshment and exuberance for it. I'm ready to be a "stay at home" mom once again.
