They 100% Lost the Plot

This one gets a bit ... personal.

It started at the creation of the world.

Which is an unconventional place for a Christmas Pageant to begin. But it was Christmas Eve 2016, I was in Vietnam, and nothing about the past couple of months was what I would have called “normal.”

So I settled into my red, plastic stool in the courtyard of the church and sent up a prayer that the rain would hold off for however long it was going to take us to get from “let there be light!” to the little town of Bethlehem.

Hours. It took us hours.

Because this was a tour of eras that even Taylor Swift would have been impressed by. I mean, there was a snake in a garden and Moses parted the Red Sea and young David killed a giant with a slingshot. There was a flood and a burning bush and some stuff in between that I didn’t quite catch.

But then an angel appeared to a young Mary who discreetly shoved a pillow under her dress and crossed the stage on a water buffalo while a star appeared in the East. And just like that, a child is born and a thousand Vietnamese children started filing onto the stage.

You could feel the wonder and joy.

But then they held up the Baby Jesus for all of us to see and he was not dressed in swaddling clothes. Nope. He was wearing a red cap with white fur trim.

And I was like … is that…? … right as the children (who I thought were going to be angels, but now I see were actually elves) started singing Jingle Bells.

And then I thought … this story seems to have lost the plot.

There are times when I absolutely think the same thing about my life.

While I have wanted to live abroad since I spent a summer in Poland during college, the reality of doing that sometimes feels like … is this really where I’m supposed to be right now?

I haven’t felt like that in every place I’ve lived.

In fact, the first year I spent in Vietnam I couldn’t believe how much it felt like exactly where I was supposed to be.

Portugal has also felt very much like “home” for the past 5+ years. But in the past few months I haven’t been able to shake a feeling that my time here is running out. I’ve been chalking it up to the fact that my temporary residence permit is now expired and whether or not the government will renew it (or when that might happen) is completely anyone’s guess. But it may also be that my old friend Restlessness is finally catching up to me.

It makes me wonder about whether the story of my life has wandered into Baby Santa Jesus territory.

And if it has, will the next bit have me headed somewhere new.

Or somewhere old.

Or will I remain hovering in the hokey-pokey waiting for a hopefully kind immigration agent to eventually take a look at my renewal application and make a decision about my future.

And should I wait here with one foot in and one foot out or should I grab Restlessness’s hand and head off for the North Pole to see what there is to see up there?

Living as a foreigner in a country where you’ve only been granted temporary acceptance means living with temporary certainty about pretty much everything.

Which also means that in many ways, you are not the one writing the story of your life.

And not only do you have no idea where the plot is going, it’s hard to know if the plot is going anywhere.

And if this is just a series of short stories instead of a novel with a plot line, you hope the writer is Ann Patchett instead of Mr. Grimm, but sometimes it’s hard to tell.

There has always been a part of me that was pretty much always ready to turn the page. I have never not longed for new chapters. If there was a new country, a new job, a new “sure, why not?” adventure to be had? I was All. In. For most of my life, the unknown has felt like a wide-open sky of blue.

But lately, the unknown has started to feel less like possibility and more like a blind date I wonder if I’m going to regret plucking my eyebrows for.

When you’re living in a country that is not your own, there is so much that isn’t guaranteed. So much that is the opposite of known and certain and … permanent.

Your visa is temporary. Your SIM card is temporary. Your community might be temporary.

You can’t quite see more than a year or two ahead, because at any point some unseen official can stamp yes or no on a piece of paper and redirect your life.

And what I’m realizing this Christmas is that when so much of my life is unstable, the unknown doesn’t feel quite as thrilling to me as it used to.

It’s one thing to not know what’s coming next because you’ve chosen to throw yourself into an adventure. It’s another thing to not know what’s coming next because you literally aren’t allowed to.

Meanwhile, everyone you know is moving steadily along in the plot line. They’re buying houses and getting promotions and booking the same beach house for the same week in August for the vacation they take with their same friends every year.

And you’re over here refreshing an immigration website and wondering whether to buy the good saucepan or if that’s too big a commitment.

(sigh)

It’s easy to start believing that your friends’ stories are the real ones and your story is the odd little side narrative off to the left. That you somehow wandered into Baby Santa Jesus territory and never quite found your way back.

But I can tell you (and myself) this: When I think about that Christmas Eve in Hoi An, what has stayed with me all these years is the long slog through history to get to the birth of the wrong baby.

But what has also stayed with me all these years is the joy of it all.

The way the angel-elves shouted “HEY!” with an accent in the wrong place in Jingle Bells. The way we all clapped along and smiled at all the red hats on tiny heads. The way the whole courtyard was in on this spectacle that had become ever so slightly unhinged.

Nobody there was worried about whether the story had stuck to the outline. We were all just glad to be in it.

I suppose that’s the quiet hope I’m holding onto this year, here in Portugal with my expired residence card and my old friend Restlessness tugging at my sleeve.

I suppose the question isn’t, “Have we lost the plot here?”

But, “Can I trust that this part of my story matters to the plot, even if I don’t know what comes next?”

Because the truth is, we are all somewhere in the middle.

Somewhere between “In the beginning …” and whatever comes after this.

Somewhere the seating is uncomfortable and the timing is odd and the baby is born inexplicably dressed in red felt.

A place where somehow in the midst of the not-knowing and the holy chaos there is still wonder humming under the surface.

And the other truth is that someday this will probably be the chapter we tell people about. The year we were waiting for a resident permit that might never come. The year the future felt blurry. The year we were convinced we had lost the plot, only to find out that we hadn’t.

Just like the year that everything went weird and Mary rode in on a water buffalo and the Baby Jesus showed up to the party in disguise.

And it was strange and confusing and holy.

Which has maybe been the through line all along.

Your only friend who has seen the birth of the Baby Santa Jesus,
Vivian

When you live in a place where there is no snow, you make your own.