A new life, wife and country: My Move To The USA

July 30, 2014 • Leave a Comment

A new life, wife and country: I've gone and moved to the USA.

So that's it. I've swapped London for Los Angeles, rain for sunshine, and more importantly I finally get to be with my true love Kelsey. Aaaah, the blissful relief and joy of it all!

I've left behind my beloved friends and family, given up my home in London (surely the finest city in the world), and i've abandoned some truly great and loyal business clients. Sorry guys. My new life is calling. Everything changes. No looking back now. Excited and energised and only a tiny bit terrified, i'm now living and dreaming and working in California. Fo' real.

Time for one last family portrait before leaving the UK

After six months of waiting for Uncle Sam to rubber stamp my visa the thing appeared one day and I had to start preparing for the jump. This all moved very fast, forging a maelstrom experience for which I pretended to be ready. Its like leaving home all over again, or going on a trip and remembering to turn off the gas, except where turning off the gas is in fact a huge list of responsibilities and your house blowing up may be a more desirable outcome than, say, missing your flight or forgetting to pay your tax bill or getting turned away at the border. I was bound to mess something up.

I had just enough time for a goodbye family party and something resembling a stag-do with friends in a field in Wales before packing my bags and saying 'tararrabit' to Blighty. A truly emotional sequence of events which mixed uneasily with excitement as I prepared to marry into America.

One of three vacuum-sealed suitcases carrying my life in belongings

Its an odd experience condensing your life into three bags, but also a remarkably cathartic one. Its an opportunity to shed some old skin: it takes some tough decisions about what is important and what is just ultimately taking up space. Those large glossy photo books are too heavy, donate to friends. Throw away those golf balls, America should have some. Sell the computer, the airline will surely smash it. Why did I keep the socks with holes in the first place? And since when did I own a wetsuit?

Then off I went to Gatwick airport with my 96kg of premium belongings, paid extra for a first class seat so as to avoid the eye-watering excess baggage charges, and patiently waited for that huge metal bird to take me to my new home. On the plane I got all emotional reading leaving cards from family and well-wishing notes from friends whilst patiently waiting for California to come into view some 11 hours later.

Finally at the other end, Kelsey greeted me at the airport with the best kiss in the world and off we went to live happily ever after. In the Valley.

Two days later we were married on a beach in Orange County, our humble matrimony upon the sand witnessed by her lovely family.

My new American family

Me attempting to pose on the beach on our wedding day... do I look nervous? I'm not nervous. Ok I'm nervous.

My beautiful bride Kelsey celebrates with bubbles and a totally rad outfit

So this is it. Happily married, a legal alien, my new life in America begins. I have the daunting task of building new business in this profoundly fascinating country. Here goes it!

Keywords: 2014, Angeles, London, Los, UK, USA, emigration, marriage, visa, wedding, wife

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