Don't Let the Door Hit You.....

A few weeks ago I was having dinner with a close friend, talking about our futures. Where we wanted to be living, with whom, if that included children in the next five or so years. I kind of hemmed and hawed about leaving New York, saying what I've been  dealing with for years now...."where the hell else do I go?"
My friend, who loves and knows me so well, looked at me thoughtfully with her pretty golden hazel eyes and asked "Did you give up on London?"

I sighed. "I've been trying for years now. I think it's done. Sometimes you just have to accept that life sucks and most of our dreams don't actually come true."

A moment of silence while this statement landed.

"I tried." I said, suddenly very sad. "I tried so hard."

Which is true. I poured everything I had into finding my way back. It was what I wanted more than anything - to continue the life I was setting up there. Between Dad's illness and the fuckery of the visa office (did I mention? Due to a calculation error of dollars to pounds, I was roughly $8 short of their "minimum finances" in my bank account so I was denied entry. Even explaining that I could easily rectify that mistake and I'd been at home to help out an extremely ill parent. But no. Not good enough for the British government. Nothing says "fuck you" like getting ruined because you were a few quid short.) God forbid a foreigner wants to contribute. I can't even begin to tell you how hard I cried when I realized there really was not going to be any kind of a second chance. The kind of heaving sobs where you end up vomiting because you've been turned inside out - but it carries on for weeks. And you just want to go back, to go home. You want your friends. You want your apartment. And if you can't do that, you want to be left alone. Preferably forever.

So shit happens. Like I said. But thinking about that conversation with my friend, who knew how deeply saddened I still am over the whole thing, I ventured back to the UK Border Agency website after a long absence. What I found there was even more depressing than I had anticipated. Many categories of immigration (8 out of 12) are straight up CLOSED indefinitely. They do not want any more people entering. Unless you are laughable wealthy, and still relatively young, there are very few options.

Immigration is a huge issue in several countries, the United States included. Another dear friend is in a mirror situation to mine - she wants to come to America, but cannot find her way around US Immigration. I just....I hate the fact that it feels like we're stuck where we are born. Options to escape are few and far between.

Short of marriage (to whom??) or becoming the representative of an overseas business (a good dream) I have to once again close the coffin on this thing I have so desperately wanted for so long.
I miss my friends. I miss my other family (MM & Co.) I miss the places and the opportunity and the fact that I felt genuinely like myself.
For now, and possibly forever, it's gone.
This is, I'm sorry to say, growing up.