New Moon Coaching for Expat Women

“What brought you here?” is the question I’ve been asked more often in my 15 years of life in Colorado, and in my head it always sounds like “What fair wind blows you here?”. The same fair wind as that of many europeans who, over the last two centuries of migration, have arrived in this land of good fortune, proverbial rich uncles, and the legendary American dream.

Having grown up in Italy, near the Ligurian coast, winds are part of the family vocabulary that accompanied me especially in my early years. The names of the winds are mostly an old people’s thing by now. My dad, who in his youth had been a sailor for a short time, would attribute the cause of any change in the weather or a sudden breeze to one wind or another: “The tramontana is blowing,” the wind that comes over the Alps on cold, blustery winter evenings; “Scirocco wind,” when the gusts last for days and days, sometimes carrying the red sand of the African desert; and then libeccio, maestrale, grecale… Beautiful, ancient names, evocative of the long distances the air masses travel to get to us, and then move on. Who knows from which region to the east the wind was born that, one July day, lifted me up and carried me all the way to the center of the United States, at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. Like an east wind blowing westward, beyond the Strait of Gibraltar. I am a Ligurian from the borderlands, raised on a strip of land between eastern Liguria and northern Tuscany. A land that has always been a border through the centuries, both politically—at the junction of various municipalities, duchies, lordships, and maritime republics—and geographically, stretching between the sea and the Apuan Alps, proud mountains scarred by the white wounds of the marble quarries. I still carry with me the feeling of living on the border. The condition of expats is quite unique: neither fish nor fowl, we build a home wherever we are, yet there is always an “elsewhere” living in the corners of our consciousness, peeking out from time to time in a surge of nostalgia.

Which wind blew you to where you are today? Share it in the comments.

Hi! I’m Cristina. As a European woman living in Colorado, I get the struggle of building a meaningful life abroad. I help expat women finding a sense of belonging wherever they are. If you’re curious to learn how I could be of service to you, book a free call clicking the button below.