ONE YEAR OF LIFE IN EAST AFRICA

I knew this day would come, but I didn’t know how soon. It’s actually crazy to think that it was one year ago as of yesterday that we stepped off a plane with ten pieces of luggage at the Entebbe airport. I had little clue as to what was to come. I was terrified. I had been stripped of identity and comfort and “place.” And here I am, one year later, celebrating a true milestone.

This home in Uganda has really become home. Our house provides all the comforts that we need. Trees tower in the huge yard around the house. The back porch and hammock have become quiet places where I rest. Enjoying long, lingering walks with my dog, working harder than I ever have before on new projects and designs with amazingly talented Ugandans, traveling and adventuring to new and unexpected places at every turn … these are the things that have become my new normal. And incredible new friends have entered my life, who have become welcome companions in the journey.

I feel so blessed that alongside my husband, I’ve been given the opportunity to live abroad. But I’d be lying if I said that it isn’t hard every single day, and I can’t tell you how many nights I climb into bed exhausted, homesick, frustrated with the culture and challenges that are so foreign. Yet, I wouldn’t change a thing. The person I feel myself becoming — with a worldview, with patience, with eagerness and openness, living in the present, growing, always learning — is the person I’ve meant to be all along. And it’s only year one.