Not likely - that's just me pinching myself to make sure it's all true.
A friend whose expat life turned out less well than ours insisted we would get "home"sick after 7 years ( later changed to 10 years , then 12 but never mind). In fact this year has indeed seemed like something of a turning point but in quite the reverse way. I do get homesick but it is when we are away from here and it is in England that I feel like a fish out of water.
We are lucky to have lots of English friends and family who visit us ( mostly in the summer months) and we have always enjoyed showing them the sites and to some extent being in holiday mode. In the early years for 4 months over the summer found we spoke very little French as our clubs were all closed for the summer and we were in entertaining mode. 2017 it was very different. We still had lots of visitors but we now have so much going on in our lives all year round that our visitors found themselves being included and finding out more about why we feel at home here. Now our lots of French friends and English friends know each other and have even played music together. We even had our first parties at Segala, bringing back memories of garden parties and bonfire nights - It was a really great summer.
2017 has been a momentous year in many ways. Not without sadness and loss of friends who did not see it's end, politically a Trump/Brexit nightmare, but on a personal level we have become French citizens, become grandparents with our son's adoption of his partner's children and our daughter has become engaged to her partner of 17 years.
We have just ended the year with a pre Christmas reunion with English friends,
Christmas with our family
and New Year's eve spent with our closest French friends setting the scene for another year of fun, family, friendship and joie de vivre. How lucky are we!
Happy New Year
Aiçi sén pla
