Sometimes I Feel Like I Exist As Two Different People

Once a New Yorker, always a New Yorker… at least in part. As I start this blog post, I’m sitting on the plane heading back to London after a quick visit home. It’s brought up a lot of feelings for me, as being home often does. I love living in London but sometimes I feel like I exist as two different people. Pre-move Ghenet and post. There’s a real sense of detachment to parts of my life that I never have a reason to discuss on a regular basis. Perhaps this is something unique to those who’ve moved to another country. Perhaps not. Either way, I have a lot of thoughts on the subject. I don’t know how well I’ll be able to articulate what I mean, but I’m going to try.

As I walked the streets of New York City, eating pizza, laughing with friends and peering through the viewfinder of my camera, I felt a sense of ease that I hadn’t in a while. It isn’t that I’m constantly on edge, but there is a difference when I’m with people who have known me my whole life, who know this other version of me, and who get me culturally.

I don’t have to explain things, or point out the cultural differences between the British and Americans. Sure, I get asked questions about living in the UK but by and large, I can just… be. Exactly as I am, no explanation necessary. Usually, I get asked questions about how things are done in America, my accent gets pointed out, or someone says something I don’t understand and I have to ask for clarification. That perpetual othering happens on a regular basis – never maliciously meant, but always felt in some small way…

MY BEING DIFFERENT ALWAYS ENDS UP BEING PART OF THE CONVERSATION.

Sometimes I find it a little bit exhausting. So, it’s nice to be around people who knew me before I moved, and who understand my cultural frame of reference. Something so basic is actually really defining for so many people. Friends in the UK make a joke about a show they used to watch or a song they used to love, and I’ve never heard of it. Or I talk about something, and no one know what I’m even on about.

That doesn’t happen so much when I spend time with friends from home. Friends I used to work with, friends I went to university with, friends I shared my life with… It’s nice to see them and share memories as a way of reminding myself these things happened. Moments in my life rarely get any acknowledgement purely because they don’t come up. These things don’t exist in the place I call home, so I tuck them away in a box, never to be looked at.

It’s like a secret version of me that I can only let out when I’m with someone who understands.

I do feel detached from my pre-2014 life, that when it comes up suddenly and unexpectedly it feels like a shock! There was that time that I walked past someone on the streets of London who wearing a sweatshirt from my small and pretty obscure university. Here was someone who had walked the red brick walkways of Elon, this place that existed in my alternate life! I stopped her and asked if she went there. Consider my surprise when she said no, she didn’t… that she’d bought the sweatshirt online from a vintage shop. I was shocked to say the least!

I was shocked, not just because my two lives had collided in such an unexpected way but also because there was no one in my immediate vicinity who could really understand how absolutely f*cking crazy it was that this had happened.

I texted my best friend from back home – we met at that very university when we were 18. Still, with the time difference and all, I had to wait until I knew she’d even be awake to see my message. And despite telling a few friends in London the same story, they didn’t quite get it. They thought it was funny, sure. But they didn’t have that shared experience. All the people I have those shared experiences with? They’re 4000 miles away.

My trips to New York aren’t really about seeing the city.

THEY’RE ABOUT REACQUAINTING MYSELF WITH THIS OTHER VERSION OF ME.

Walking the streets I grew up in. Getting fresh bagels from my favourite spot down the street. Visiting my favourite bookstore. Exploring the little corners where the roots of my life began. Though I’ve grown and changed a lot since I was that person, it’s nice to be reminded. It also feels like a nice way to honour that growth. Revisiting my personal monuments to remind myself what they meant to me then.

I have those places in London too, but it’s a little different. I’ve loved building my life the way I have but it’s only been 6 years. There’s a whole 27 other years of my life that I lived and had a life somewhere else, ya know?

I don’t talk about this very often because how do I really explain what I’m feeling? Those feelings never really go away either; it’s just easier to cope with in some moments more than others. I’m always acutely aware of these different parts of my life and how I’ve sort of… compartmentalized them.

I love the life I’ve built for myself in London; this is just another part of it. That’s why it’s been so important to me to create new family traditions with my husband, as we create our own family. Because I want to bring that version of myself across the ocean too and share it where I can. We’ve created a few different traditions to do during the holiday season and it’s so nice, but there’s always something about going home, isn’t there?