Nekkid, Clueless and Feelin' Good: January 5, 2001

Friday,
January 5, 2001

Last Day

I'm of two minds today.

On the one hand, I'm finished with TSB Stockholm (well, relatively. I told them I'd be available for English proofreading via email, which seemed to make the Big Kahuna very happy. He also asked me to see if anyone wanted to take a contract in Stockholm and basically be the replacement Melanie for our division. I promised him I'd keep an eye out for potential clones). I pretty much have all of my final tasks wrapped up, and Eva, Anne and I had an absolutely splendid lunch at Siam Restaurang in Gamla Stan (I told them there was no way in hell I was going to eat my last lunch in Kista, and to get in the taxi. They found this amusing). All my office stuff is in boxes awaiting internal mail shipment to Dallas, and I even cleaned the office in preparation for the new contractor who's taking possession of it on Monday. My bank account it closed, I converted all the money into traveler's checks, got my hair cut and packed my bags. Tomorrow will be spent with Patrick and Stacy, and Sunday I'll move into my new temp apartment. I'm cocked, locked and ready to rock.

On the other hand, I'm leaving two wonderful friends (Eva started crying and said she'd miss me, which of course started me crying. Come hell or high water, I AM getting her to Dallas for a contract or a seminar or something), my beloved husband, a comfortable work environment and 25 days of vacation a year. I'll be starting over again in a new city, I'll have to get a house on my own and yet make sure that Lyndon can live there comfortably as well, we need a slew of new furniture, my Quebec diving record STILL hasn't come through so I don't know if I'll be able to take the driving test on Wednesday, and I'm just generally stressed at having to face the unknown yet again.

Of course, the ironic thing about all this is that I've been bitching for the last year about wanting to go back to the States. Now that the tickets are in my hand, I'm bitching about what I'm going to face there.

I'm sorry. I really am happy about all this. I just wish I knew when the hell Lyndon would be able to join me. We found out today that getting a green card is a heck of a lot more complicated than we'd originally thought, and getting him to the States in a position where he can live and work there AND be able to leave on his own stick is turning out to be extremely sticky. If he gets a local job offer from TSB, he can get what's called an L visa which will allow him to live and work in the States for five years. Only problem is, it ties him to TSB for that entire period, which is definitely not in the game plan.

He could come over on a tourist visa and start the green card process there, but then it will take two years for him to get it and he wouldn't be able to work in the meantime. He could stay in Stockholm for four or five months and get a Work Card, which would allow him to work in the States but means he couldn't come over at all until he actually had the card.

Or, if we'd been aware of all this, we could've gone into the US Embassy this afternoon and started the green card process here. It would then take him six months to get it, and he could get a Work Card in six weeks.

Excuse me while I go pound my head against this wall. . .

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