Dwelling in the grey areas

My family are all into sci fi and fantasy. Oh, and action and super heroes. None of this is my natural bent. And I didn't grow up with brothers, or a dad who was into that kind of thing, so it's been challenging as my boys have grown older, because they clearly come alive when they're talking about these topics. If I've learned anything about parenting teenage boys, it's that seeking to engage with them in areas they're enthusiastic about is really important for maintaining a relationship with them that is beyond being just a basic caretaker. I've got no experience of parenting girls, but I suspect this is also helpful with them too. In our family, my husband's interests generally align with our boys, in terms of fictional genres, so it isn't so challenging for him as it is for me.

I've sat through many, many hours of movies that I would never have chosen. However, I'm now reaping the benefits of that, because I can have a semi-intelligent discussion with the boys on some of these topics!

I've learned, in my own way, to enjoy these movies. I look for the meta-story and themes, and let the details I don't understand just slide by. If I can, I try to pull together intelligent questions to ask the guys later (not during the movie!!!). If you like, I've learned to live with the grey of not understanding many of the details of the movies we've seen.

A cross-cultural worker, Linda, recently asked on her Facebook page about "ambiguity" and what comes to mind when her friends hear that word. My answer was:

Yesterday I had a conversation here in Tokyo with a fellow cross-cultural worker and we talked for quite a while about the "grey" we've learned to live with. Everything from not understanding everything around us in everyday life to spiritual matters (e.g. not being a member of the church we attend here and being a member of a church in our home country that we rarely attend).

These types of "grey" are an integral part of life in a foreign country. There's so much we don't understand about what's going on around us. I remember being stressed by a visitor we hosted from Australia in our early years who constantly asked "why" about what they saw around them. We simply didn't have many answers (and probably still don't).

This is one of 47 pieces of art
one from each prefecture of Japan.
I've included it here because not only is
it actually grey, but it's situated in the
grounds of a controversial shrine.
The Japanese equivalent of the
Australian War memorial. It's contro-
versial because it also enshrines
people convicted as war criminals and
where they are worshipped as deities.
Definitely a grey zone.

Can you see the parallels between these? Just as I've learned to live with not understanding a fair bit in some of the movies I watch with my boys, I've learned to live with not understanding a lot about Japan. I've also learned, in both areas, to focus on the "big picture" rather than get bogged down in the "small details". For example, before I came to Japan many of my friends were fairly similar to me in that they were mostly Australian and from a fairly narrow band of evangelical Christian background. Now I have friends and colleagues across a wide spectrum of nationalities and Christian beliefs and practices.

But living with the grey doesn't mean that I disengage my brain. I'm continuing to seek to understand and learn. And to live with the grey in a graceful manner. Learning when to speak and when to hold back and, as my cross-cultural friend, Linda said, "and trying not to feel overwhelmed by the enormity of it all."

We're preparing to head into a grey area that is going to be misunderstood by a lot of people. We're going to Australia for some holiday time and some "other leave" time. What we're doing is not a traditional home assignment, so we're not visiting groups to talk about Japan or what we do here. We're also not consciously seeking out friends to spend time with, it's too short a time to do much of that, though I'm sure that we will catch up with some close friends, or people who happen across our paths. 

The "other leave" is very murky and hard to explain, but especially relates to helping our sons with thinking about their futures. Those weeks are part of what we're calling "reconnaissance" for the next couple of years. I wrote a bit about that in this post in March. It will also contain things such as medical appointments and regular tests that we're due to have which are easier (or better) to do in Australia. Once we get there that murkiness is going to be even more in our faces as we try to explain (or decide how much we need to explain) to the people we encounter, that we're only in Australia for a limited period this time.

But my focus in these next couple of weeks is mostly preparing to put my work down: either handing on to others, or getting it to a place where I'm able to walk away from it for six weeks. I can't book many more appointments in Australia at this time. And we're praying: that our final piece of accommodation is able to be confirmed and that our Japanese visa extensions arrives before we leave.