Tradition

What’s a cultural tradition from your country that you love?

Have I mentioned my pursuit of my mother tongue? That I missed being able to retrieve the language I once knew.

This is not to suggest that I am not at home in New York with English as my language of choice.

I just want to be able to speak Serbo -Croatian.

To communicate at least as well as the Stranci who have moved to live in Serbia.

The foreigners who chose a village in Serbia over Rio or Sydney didn’t make their decision lightly.

They did it because of the cultural traditions they found there.

They found more community, a life that was slower and a place where connection truly mattered.

They enjoyed the lifestyle, the pace and being invited to coffee.

Most of them also stayed because they found love in Serbia.

They identify self-sufficiency as a stand-in for selfishness. It is an idol that leads to self-centeredness.

Cultural traditions that transform life to living the life. I look from afar with envy and the regrets of being plucked into a diaspora.

My American life, fully assimilated, is experiencing a split personality, feet in two cultures. Am I having a  late- life crisis? Or just reconnecting with my origin story?