The list

"Got the list. Might be late." was the text I got earlier this afternoon. Deep breath on my part, as the arrival of the list in Mike's hands is only the first step in a waiting game that plagues the lives of foreign service officers and their families every two to three years. This list contains the jobs available for bidding for our next posting. We've got another year here, but it's never too soon to start packing or purging or preparing in one way or another, and fortunately, the DOS needs all that time to figure out not just where people are going but to get them and their stuff there in a reasonable fashion. This initial version of the list is a bit cruel, as perhaps as many as half of the posts (virtually all of the ones in developed countries with good food, good health care, good education, etc.) will disappear in another week or so, taken by those officers coming out of Iraq and Pakistan and other posts that are considered high hardship places. Then it will be up to us to figure out which of the remaining places work best for Mike's career, our family, the dog, etc. It's a complicated calculus that one could waste hours of one's life worrying about, but it might be smarter to simply say, well, there's a bunch of places that we really don't want to go to and here are a bunch that we're willing to try on for size. Health care matters a lot when you've got small children but maybe education is not so crucial at this point. Would be nice if there's decent food available locally, as I don't care to feed two small children and myself imported mac and cheese for two years. Not sure if we want another Spanish speaking post or if we should head into some new linguistic adventure. I am just going to accept the fact that we will inevitably end up somewhere harder to live than Guadalajara, and I can also embrace the fact that somewhere new and novel rather than a country you are already acquainted with holds a certain attraction, even if it will be more challenging.