Dear ECS: Family Time

Dear ECS,

Hey honey, it is the heart of holiday season and we will be spending Christmas here in Addis.  The house smells great and we have a small tree and lights strung up.  It feels like Christmas, but not in the way of the holidays of my youth with the cold, and twinkling lights, and coziness.   This is our third holiday in a warm place in this crazy Foreign Service life, and honestly it is hard to recreate the feeling of my own childhood in a foreign land. 

But recreating my own childhood is not the point.  You love this season, with fun parties and events and most importantly family.  Your mom and I have very intentionally taken a broad definition of family since you were born.  You have dozens of aunts and uncles -- some that share your DNA and many who don't.  As a result, you have gotten to spend lots of time with loved ones, people who we think of as family.

In addition to the numerous loved ones sprinkled around the world, some of whom we have gotten to see recently and some who we keep in touch with over various technology tools, we have had the pleasure of hosting my sister and brother and law, then my parents (aka the babas), and now dear friends from SF (another aunty and uncle) over the last month.  These have been great times, whether playing in our house or compound for hours, or heading down south in Ethiopia to walk in the jungle beneath monkeys. 

Having loved ones visit us is such a joy, we are happy to show the places you like, the places we like, here in Ethiopia.   What I have found in these 4 years of living overseas is that visitors do something sort of magical, they make us see the places we live through new eyes once again.  

The feeling of arrival to Ethiopia and the discovery we felt way back in June of 2017 has mostly gone by the wayside with our routines and schedules and assessment of places we like, or don’t like.  When our family and friends come, the excitement and wonder that they feel in exploring the city and country is deliciously infectious.  For some reason that is beyond me, the renewal we get is much stronger than when your mom and I lived in various places back home. 

Anyway honey, we are so happy to celebrate Christmas and the holidays with you.  The leaps and bounds you have realized this year is astounding, the person who will open presents in a few days in our Addis house is so different than the one that opened presents in our Airbnb in Austria a year ago.  What a joy it is to be along for your growth and progress.

Merry Christmas! 

love,

dad