Lack of Writer's Block

Is there a term for lack of writer’s block? For the last year there’s been so many good posts sitting and waiting in my queue, only to be deleted. I have a serious fear of publishing something that can cause issues while we are overseas. It goes without saying, everything I write on my blog is my own opinion (which I am not short of) and not the views of the U.S. Government. But, it is nerve wracking and makes me second guess my writing when I really start in on my opinionated pieces. Algeria is an interesting location with traditional values, fear of dramatic change, and deep suspicion of outsiders. With limited freedom of press, it makes me nervous to step over that invisible line and I find myself censoring my own writing which is very unlike me. After a year living here, I observe daily that my personal views and deep rooted values are a bit different than the majority here. That’s witnessed first hand with the glares and grimaces as I wear my bright colored pink blazer, and rainbow earrings out and about (but that will never change me). Algerian people are resilient and have experienced a lot during their independence as a country. The youth are living in between cultures; trying to maintain the traditions yet so eagerly jump at the opportunity to have a conversation on life in America. American music is popular, Netflix is a favorite past time, and I’m often asked about America and what it’s like. Honestly, it’s wild to hear the call to prayer while walking outside and Tupac blasting on the radio of car passing by at the same time.

So let’s catch up! This year has been…a doosey. We’ll start with the “rough” and get that out of the way. Sadly, we lost our beloved Kingston in October. I don’t have it in me to do an entire post because it still stings, but the long and short of it is that we arrived to Algiers with him having stomach issues, and it progressed drastically, and quick. It was an intense and absolutely grueling 8 weeks of him suffering because euthanasia is forbidden here. Honestly, that’s all I am going to write about that because I want to remember him healthy, strong, and being the best dog I ever had. He was put to sleep restfully, and is buried at the Embassy where he will forever be a diplo-dog.

Living abroad has been a learning curve for all of us. Everything is a bit more complicated than I prefer and am used to. After living here for a year, you would think I would be used to the 4 market, shopping routine, but I’m not. The relaxed attitude of fixing something with duct tape, 4 days later, is hard to understand for my fast paced, NJ mindset. I find myself constantly giving myself mini zen sessions, “drop your shoulders, relax your jaw, breath through your nose…WTF! Ok, start again…”. Daily life has taught me what I miss most about the simplicity of America, and also what I don’t need to survive. Maybe it’s psychological, but sometimes the slow pace and working without all the amenities makes life simple. My kids aren’t asking for the latest and greatest of anything because they don’t know it exists. There’s no overspending at Target, because I can only browse undisturbed online so long. But it doesn’t change my opinion that I REALLY miss delivery Thai food, and microwaveable steamed veggies.

Month 2 of living in Algeria we had an apartment fire. I should preface this with Audrey had a concussion from falling on the marble floor the same day, and was being driven home by Jamari from our health unit. So stress was high already. Our fantastic nanny, Samia was waiting for her and looking out the door. She saw flames from the peep hole. She grabbed Maxwell, ran to the bathroom, soaked a towel in water and wrapped him in it, and knew the only way out of the 3rd floor walk-up was through the flames so she walked through the flames to escape. Can we all take a second and re-read that she walked through flames with my child to save him? An absolute hero. As running out of the building, Jamari was pulling into the driveway and extinguished the fire with a colleague he was with. It was intense and terrifying. Even with the training Jamari and his colleague have, it’s different when you know it is your own home. In true Jamari fashion, I learned about said fire with a text to my cell with 3 emojis, no words (a man running, a fire, a house). If you’re ever looking to place a game of Scattergories, Jamari is your man! The Embassy moved us to temporary housing, and we were able to move back to our home a week later after they deep cleaned every inch and surface. Samia received a well deserved award from our Ambassador and there wasn’t a dry eye in the room when they described her heroism.

Audrey began and graduated kindergarten without any major incidents and zero trips to the principal! She is now into her first week of first grade and blossoming into a Mini Maureen daily. (I have never been more proud, or frustrated at the same time.) Maxwell will be attending Pre-K hopefully in a few weeks, and is excelling in his speech where he flows between English and French. They each celebrated summer birthdays, with Audrey now being 6 and Maxwell being 4. Audrey had her requested mermaid themed pool party, and Maxwell received his requested Marine and Seabee attended pizza party.

Life at post will need to be it’s own post but I can summarize that the people at post make this life worth it! It sounds cliche, but it is so true. My children have grown attached to the young Marines who work in our Embassy. My colleagues at work (YES! I work again!) make my days fly by and give me the best laughs. We spend our holidays and weekends with friends at post. I spend a lot of time volunteering for the commissary (which I also manage), and our bar which is an anomaly in Algeria where I bartend with a friend. It’s definitely a “it is what you make it” kind of place, so I work really hard to make it uplifting and fun.

Lastly, we have been jet setting while living here which has been a huge mood booster for my depression. We have been to France 3x, Mexico, Los Angeles, DC, Portugal, and head to Italy next week. In my best Daniel Tiger jingle I tell Jamari, “When I feel so mad that I want to roar…I buy a plane ticket…and jump aboard”. It’s been really cool to take the kids along on these adventures and watch them explore, try new foods, hear new languages, and listen to Maxwell out speak all of us in French. Audrey will tell you she prefers Bordeaux to Lisbon, but not over Nice. A huge reason we travel out of country so often is to continue to instill to Audrey and Maxwell that our family is in fact, normal. You don’t see mixed families in Algiers, and we are often stared at and get our picture taken out of curiosity. It’s critical for Audrey especially to see that when we travel there are all different kinds of families.

Whew! I did it! I wrote my first blog post in a year. Hopefully this inspires me to continue publishing and stop deleting the posts I write. We’re here for another year and have many more adventures ahead so I promise I will share more.

Snow For Days

Growing up in New Jersey I remember waking up at 5 am when there was snow outside, to sit in the living room watching the names of schools that were closed for the day scroll across the bottom of the local news channel alphabetically. If you missed your school, you’d have to wait another 20 minutes praying for it to come up. Depending on where we live in the world for assignments, my children may never know what a “snow day” is. We received an unusual amount of snow for Virginia this week and it was lovely. The first snow fall brought us 11 inches of fluffy white powder to pounce around in and enjoy.

In the fake parenting course I am constantly creating in my head, I will be sure to include an entire chapter on preparing children to go out in the snow. It takes preparation, planning, and much patience to take two children out into the frozen tundra of my front yard, especially when I was completely unprepared with snow gear and had to dig through our unpacked boxes to find mismatched snow items. Audrey wore pink glitter combat boots and snow pants that went to her ankle, while Maxwell wore 3 pairs of sweatpants, too small snow boots, and gloves 3 sizes too large. After sweating while running around and getting everyone ready to step out the door we were ready! After a solid 6 minutes outside Audrey declared that it was boring without Jamari and she wanted to go inside. Wrong. It took me 27 minutes to get ready to go outside, we were spending at least 28 minutes outside having the time of our lives before going back in. We had a snow ball fight, took a snow scavenger hunt walk, cleaned the snow off the car, made snow cones, and tried to create a snow man. We couldn’t find a sled so we rolled down the hill instead. After our 30 minute jaunt outside we came back in to enjoy hot cocoa. I wouldn’t change the struggle of snow suits and toddlers multiple times a day for anything, it was so much fun to watch them roll around and enjoy the snow.

Next year we won’t get to experience snow without traveling for it, so I wanted to be sure to create all the memories we could in case we don’t have snow again this season. I remember snow days and the joy that they brought as a child. I hope my kiddos will look at the photos and remember the same joy.

I’m Back…

It has been a long nine intentional months since my last post. After my last blog entry on racial discrimination our family was receiving, I was cautious to blog again. It was a concern to not have content to the caliber of the last post, but also fear of going viral again. While it was entertaining to watch my site analytics skyrocket overnight, a lot of unexpected interviews, attention, and hate came from that post. So, I took a well needed hiatus and missed the opportunity to blog on a lot of interesting topics and events; but I’m back! Blogging is my outlet and hobby which allows me to decompress and vent. I missed the opportunity to write out my feelings on various hot topics, and sharing events our family experienced, but needed to take a step back from the viral experience to decide if I wanted to keep sharing.

Let’s do a quick recap of the last nine months:

  • We learned we are moving to Algeria in June 2022 and will be moving to VA to learn French in June 2021.

  • My Mom was diagnosed, fought, and beat breast cancer.

  • We had visits from Bamma, Nana, Abby, and Barrie.

  • We tragically lost Jamari’s uncle Will, to Covid.

  • We bought an investment property in Kansas City. (Anyone want to move to KC and rent from us?)

  • Audrey began preschool and is thriving in the absolute best school for her. I’m so sad to be taking her out to move soon.

  • Maxwell is walking, talking, and climbing on everything in sight.

  • I spent 35 hours getting a full back tattoo, which won an award at a tattoo convention.

  • We took our first family vacation to North Carolina for Christmas to visit O’ma and O’pa.

  • We visited family in St. Louis.

  • I took a solo trip to visit my Mom after her surgery for 3 days which was glorious; and then another trip back to visit with the kids which was chaos.

  • Depression remains a very real and present battle for me.

  • Jamari and I were both vaccinated for Covid.

I am sure I am missing some things, but this about sums up my blogging break. I have missed blogging my feelings on certain news topics and events, but I am certain there will be more opportunities. It’s good to be back!

Welcome Home, Kansas City!

We’ve arrived!! Last Monday we began our journey to Kansas City. Jamari took the long 23.5 hour road trip with Kingston and I headed to LA to visit with family and stay with the kids closer to the airport for two days. On Wednesday, the kids and I flew to Kansas City. Flying with two children, under the age of three, during a pandemic, with as many possessions we can fit into suitcases, solo, was honestly not as bad as I anticipated. I packed and repacked my suitcases, carry on, and diaper bag six times before leaving for the airport to help myself be as organized as possible. I’ll write another post about traveling solo and tips and tricks I developed and was given.


We boarded our flight after being delayed for 2.5 hours and only having ONE meltdown (Audrey) in the airport because none of the restaurants were open. The kids were exhausted because we didn’t get on the flight until 8:30 and bedtime is 7pm. Maxwell was sound asleep before the flight even left the ground, and Audrey was sleepy enough to be easily distracted with shows on her iPad for the majority of the flight. This was Maxwell’s first flight and Audrey’s 11th, but her first where she understood what was happening, and she was mesmerized. We arrived into Kansas City with no issues and I was pleasantly surprised how well both kids did with the flight, Jamari greeted us, collected all my cargo (2 car seats, a double stroller, 3 suitcases, a diaper bag, and a carry-on). We arrived at our new home at 2:30am, did a quick walk through of our home, and everyone went to sleep truly exhausted.

Since Wednesday, we have been incredibly busy. Our belongings were delivered on Friday, Ms. Abby (babysitter extraordinaire ) flew in on Friday to assist with the move and watching the kids while we unpacked and organized, and Jamari flew back to CA to sell a car and tie up loose ends while Abby and I did touristy things with the kids. Kansas City looks and feels so different from California, that it’s a bit of a shock. The humidity is oppressive. Living in the Middle East and then California for the better part of five years has this NJ girl forgetting what humidity feels like…hell. The bugs are big, the heat is in your face, and they definitely drive slower than I am used to, but I think we will really enjoy our time here. I love the area we live in, and every store I could possibly imagine is within 10 minutes of my house. We went to one of the top BBQ restaurants, Joe’s BBQ; which happens to share floor space with a gas station (shrug) to try Kansas City BBQ and was not disappointed. With over 9000 reviews and 5 stars I guess filling your car with gas and eating BBQ has it’s benefits. Abby and I visited the zoo with the kids and lasted a solid 45 minutes with the heat and humidity but managed to see tigers and red pandas. We went to the River Market which has a huge farmers market and international grocers and tried the best homemade ice cream KC has to offer at Betty Raes and were pretty impressed. Jamari and I snuck away for a date night which was really nice to decompress and be able to talk. We’ve done a few Target drive up orders, and visited the local grocery store to stock our house and unpacked and organized most of the rooms.

And before I knew it, it’s been six days in our new home. I have a large bucket list of things I would like to do while we are here for the next year. Moving can be stressful and very overwhelming, especially with kids. I didn’t know what to expect because this was our first move as a family, but everything went better than I anticipated and we’re all together again. Moving frequently is definitely not for everyone, and can cause even the most seasoned individuals in this lifestyle to get overwhelmed; but there is a part of the change that I crave. I love setting up our new space, I love finding new favorite places, I love exploring new cities and meeting new people, and I love getting visitors at my new homes…so book your tickets, flights are at an all time low.