The Foreign Service Journal, May 2015

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | MAY 2015 41 The problems in being children abroad seemed far more awesome in the 1950s than now. Ever since our daughter, Kit, was born in a small, reasonably immaculate French clinic in Abidjan, my own conception of health conditions in foreign countries has become more realistic. The logistics of raising a family abroad have nevertheless increased in complexity. Where an international or American school or other accredited form of education is not available, the biggest wrench comes when the Foreign Service child must leave the family circle for school, usually in the United States. The British have long since adjusted to this problem as, seem- ingly without a tremor, they send their young ones off as early as the age of 8. For most Americans, there are sleepless nights and many sinking sensations. The problems of school, travel, friends, vacations, jobs, medications and other considerations for Foreign Service children are all real, and the Family Liaison Office has an important role to play. A Daughter Remembers When Dad died suddenly in December 2006, my Foreign Service spouse and I were studying language for a tandem assignment in Asia. We wanted Mom to come with us. That included packing two small plastic bins Dad had compiled of medical and other documents. Mom lived with us for five years, and then spent her last 15 months with my brother Dick and his wife, Mary, at the embassy in Tbilisi. After she died on May 20, 2014, I took a closer look at the bins—especially a brown file folder Dad had labeled “Pat’s Essays and Poems.” The folder included a mix of writings. An essay penned at age 16 on the importance of the Merchant Marine that earned Mom her first foreign trip: England in 1937. A startlingly prescient 1941 college essay suggesting that “the great problem of our times is not how [a nation] becomes strong, but, rather, how to remain strong.” A poem, “To My Plane,” in which she asserts: “your wings make of me a god, stronger than a thousand straining horses, swifter than the wind, and free as hope to rise above war, peace, soil and sea, hate, laughter, love.” A hand-scrawled speech she gave at a school in Serowe, Botswana, in which she lauds “Sesame Street” to underscore the value of early-childhood learning. And this 1982 essay, reflecting on 30 years of being “married” to the Foreign Service. Mom intended to—but never did—submit this essay for possible publication by her alma mater,Wellesley College. Throughout her life, she was an ardent advocate of Wellesley and its mission to provide an excellent liberal arts education for women who will make a difference in the world. She took delight when two other Wellesley grads, Madeleine Albright and Hillary Rodham Clinton, became U.S. Secretary of State.When we lived in Laos from 2011 to 2012, then-Ambassador Karen Stewart, another Wellesley graduate, would come to our home, and she and Momwould dredge up lyrics toWellesley songs. Our parents instilled in their kids such a profound appreciation for the profession of diplomacy that the three of us joined the Service. Mom’s essay portrays the “public” part of public service on which our profession depends; she embraced her role and represented our country with poise and devotion. And, in her time, without remuneration. She loved the Foreign Service life. She made lifelong friends. And she found it “raptly absorbing,” as this essay describes. But distinct advantages for children in Foreign Service life remain: new languages, friends of all nationalities and visits to such far-off places as the lagoons of the Seychelles, the high Atlas, the canals of Friesland and the incomparable Okavango. And there is also the opportunity to live in different cultures, not as a tourist but as a privileged resident. The latter is not something to dwell upon. One can only hope the family, both parents and children, will live up to and enhance the image of the nation that has sent them abroad. As for the Foreign Service wife herself, the diplomatic life can offer infinite rewards: good friends (both foreign and from the embassy “family” itself ), theater, shops, travel and, of course, a variety of excellent cuisines. While a recent symposium has concluded that “the role of the husband depends in no small part upon the wife,” much also depends on her husband’s position on the career ladder and where they reside. —Kit Norland, FSO