• been to Brussels for the first time
• had my parents arrive
• visited the Cevennes, Aigues-Mortes, and Narbonne
• helped prepare a wedding
• done a lot of driving on country roads in Aveyron
• attended said wedding
• botched my piano piece during the wedding, but played the flute well
• visited Cordes sur Ciel
• helped my parents get home on the first day of the air controllers' strike (included explaining how to get from Orly to Charles de Gaulle)
I'll try to write some posts on some of those events.
I hadn't seen my parents in a year and a half and while I was glad to see them, it was also a difficult visit for B and me.
On a practical/physical level, I'm not used to the constraints of my parents being 60. I have lots of memories of visiting cities and walking all day in all kinds of weather. Now I have to make sure our activities include some time sitting down, that we have enough water and/or snacks, that we stop for bathroom breaks and that they get enough sleep. I felt confused or maybe shocked by the differences between the parents who came to visit and those I remember from living at home.
On a nostalgia level, I had a hard time with my parents' constant amazement at the simplest things ("Look at these re-usable bags at Carrefour! I'm buying 2 to take home as souvenirs!") because my parents lived in Germany during the 80's and have traveled a lot and I expect them to be over the 'novelty' phase. Instead, it almost seemed their first visit to France. B had a hard time with their frequent comparisons to their life in Germany: "So I see the workers have green pants. In Germany they wear blue." They're both experts and novices at visiting France and Europe and it's difficult being around someone who says they've done it all before and then asks if the tourist destination will have any restaurants.
Lastly, the visit was difficult for me because it was a reminder of the many ways I've taken a different path than my parents. Financial decisions they've made seem to defy our logic. My dad can't find his shaver or his socks without my mom, whereas I expect B to function just as well when I'm not there as when I am. Our priorities have diverged.
I'm sure my parents are going away with an impression that I'm angry and impatient and mad at the world, which is really unfortunate because that's not how I am. It just seems that spending lots of time with them brings that out it me. In some ways I feel like we've become stuck in a teenager-parent relationship 10 years late.
Publish Post
Here's to hoping our State-side visit in September will be a little better.
5 comments:
Wow, I felt EXACTLY the same thing when my family came to visit in Hong Kong a few months back.. Annoyed and exasperated at their wide-eyed reactions and bizarre comparisons...
The over 60 thing is what got me with my mom too. Things would take like, an hour longer than I expected because we had to go slower than I'd planned.
I think what's hard about having parents visit is the dependency, how much help they need getting around, ordering, buying things. I don't think it would have been as hard for me if I lived in an English speaking country. I think your visit home will be fine, you'll be more independant than you were during their visit.
I was just as annoyed as you were when my parents visited. It was like leading two kids around and doing everything for them because they were completely helpless and too afraid to speak to anyone, even in English. I'm glad they came to France, but next time I hope they do a guided tour so I don't have to be the tour guide!
For me, I almost felt embarrassed. It was as though I saw my mother revert back to her 12 year old self, or something! Seeing her NOT in control was very bizarre and freaky for me. Also, realizing that after all these years of travelling together and meeting me in various places, that her age was starting to be a factor- she was just so slow-moving and tired all the time. It made me feel sad.
I think that having visitors is stressful regardless, but all the more so when all you've prepared and envisioned for their trip goes awry/turns out differently due to these sorts of contraints (age, familiarity, physical condition)...
I've definitely missed the whole gradually aging process for my parents. Whereas for my in-laws I've gotten used to their age related constraints, for my parents my vision of them stopped changing about 7 years ago (when I stopped living at home for more than 2-3 months a year).
I think my parents also suffer from the "Peter Mayle syndrome" in that they read the books and now that I live in France think it would be easy to move to Southern France. Talk about nightmare. I've tried to dissuade them gently by bringing up things like the driver license problem and that they don't speak French to take the tests, but they seem to brush it aside. It's much more a dream than any kind of real retirement plan, but I still worry about having to babysit my parents if they ever did really move to France.
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