woot, as the americans might say.

I'm writing again and OH it feels good. I've been barking up the wrong book for a while now, but I've now started afresh and I'm excited. Nervous, because writing gnaws at me and doesn't let go, but excited.

Oh dear.

I'm totally becoming an American. Americans get 'excited' about everything. It's kind of exhausting.

But this I am excited about, and legitimately so. And only about 55,000 words to go until I have a novel.

Aaaaaand in rushes the dread.

I'm setting myself the goal of 4000 words a week. That's not a ton, but with working full time and being as lazy as I am, I think I'll be lucky if I can meet it.

Watch this space.

This too must pass

Homesickness is a moving target. I get to grips with one form and other one pops up.

The current form is more problematic than the others. Before it's always been an acute feeling of missing. Longing for family or friends or foodstuffs. Missing fields full of cows and small cars and winding roads. My current problem is this:

I'm surrounded by Americans.

They're everywhere. Speaking American, thinking American, eating American food and watching American television. There's even one sleeping in my bed. Heck, even my bloody cat is American. Now that's depressing.

One day I may have American children. I can't quite bring myself to contemplate that as an idea.

I'm not sure when this happened. I mean, obviously it's always been so. I'm in America after all. But recently I've been painfully aware of it in a way I wasn't before.

I'm hoping this feeling will pass. It kind of has to.

In other related news, this week I was introduced to someone as follows:

"I'd like you to meet Hannah, Jeremy's wife. Now, wait until you hear her talk. Hannah, say something."

This feeling will pass, right?

I'll say Tom-ah-to if I bloody want to.

When I moved over here I had to quickly accept that I will forever be a novelty. In a way that (as far as I can tell) isn’t true of other cultures, other accents, Britishness in America is seen as uniquely quaint and, for some reason I’ve yet to understand, totally fair game. There’s mimicry, which is widespread, there’s the curling flicker of a smile when I talk that lets me know they’re only half listening to what I’m actually saying and mostly listening to how I say it, there’s the look of blank confusion that normally goes unaddressed and in that moment I realize that some turn of phrase or word I’ve used has completely passed them by. And then there’s correction:

“It’s not Basil, it’s Baysil.”

“Pavement? You mean sidewalk.”

“Um, we say Tomayto?”

"HA! Oreg-ah-no? it's oregano"

There are certain people around whom I avoid saying certain words because I know it'll result in correction and I'll result in bristling good humour. Ha ha ha, how funny that you think my pronunciation of things is wrong. How amusing. 

Am I sounding bitter? 

The truth is, pretty much every American I know has done this to me at some point or another. People I have known for years still do it. It's also entirely possible that we British (you British I should say, in this instance I am not included) do it to the Americans in our (your) midst. I have but one thing to tell you. 

Stop. 

It happens often enough that I have to drop my ts and ask for budder or warder when people fail to understand butter or water. Recently I even had to spell out children on the phone... c-h-i-l (etc) when a volunteer really couldn't pick up the word I was saying. I actively avoid calling customer service because it's almost always laborious and painful. My days are littered with misunderstandings, repeats and rephrases. So when people I know correct my speech when they already understand what I'm saying, I mostly want to strangle them. 

And then there's the "Alright Guvnors..."

Enough. No More. It was never good and it's certainly no good anymore.