On leaning into change

And some exciting personal news.

“Now you must go out into your heart
as onto a vast plain.”

— Rainer Maria Rilke

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Dear friends,

Since we moved from Uruguay to Belgium this summer, Jose and I have been trying to embrace all the changes that such a shift can bring.

As I wrote about in “The Dutch Word for Gift,” we’ve embraced the new language we’re immersed in here in Antwerp. We’ve learned (the hard way) not to walk in the bike lanes, lest we incur the wrath of an oncoming cyclist. We’ve even embraced Belgium’s surprisingly wet weather, investing in proper raincoats and umbrellas for the first time in our lives.

But perhaps the biggest change of all that I’m embracing right now is the tiny new human growing inside me.

When we started trying to get pregnant again, Belgium was just a possibility, hovering above a distant horizon.

Our hope was to have a second child in Uruguay — where we were surrounded by friends and family, and were familiar with our hospital and healthcare system — before moving our own little family to another continent.

But then Jose’s dream architecture studio in Antwerp announced they were hiring, and we thought, why not apply? If anything, it would be good motivation to update his portfolio (never a small feat) and have it ready for the next time they had job openings.

Except — there wouldn’t need to be a next time.

He heard back from them a few weeks later, and it was somewhere between his first and second interview that I found out I was pregnant. It wasn’t precisely our plan to undertake both an international move and a new pregnancy at the same time, but we decided to trust the universe and the infinite mysteries of its timing.

To Belgium, with a baby on the way, we would go.

As you might’ve noticed in the intro, my original idea for this essay was to call it, “On embracing change.”

But as I started writing, I began to feel that embrace wasn’t a strong enough word for what this year has asked of us. And as I thought about an alternative, I remembered a moment that took place a few years ago.

It was Christmas 2020, and Jose and I went away with his family to a beautiful house in the countryside of Uruguay. It was a quiet landscape, where fields of grazing horses meet a hill range called the Sierra de las Ánimas.

One day, our whole group went for a horseback ride.

Jose’s two little cousins were with us, each one riding with a different parent, and so the excursion began as a rather calm and tranquil affair — which was just fine by me.

When I’m on a horse, I do not canter, and I certainly do not gallop. I like to amble along at a nice and steady pace, which was exactly what we did that day.

We took our time, often making our way in single file down small, forested gullies and across narrow streams.

We ducked our heads when branches hung low over the path, and we laughed whenever a horse broke into a trot. All the horses behind it would inevitably do the same, before they settled back into a leisurely rhythm.

At the very end of the ride, the land leveled out, and the dense cover of bushes and trees we’d been winding through gave way to a vast and open field.

Jose’s sister was at the very front of our pack, and she is far more comfortable on horseback than I am. When she is on a horse, she very much likes to gallop, and that’s exactly what she began to do the minute we emerged onto the field.

I watched her with a growing sense of dread, because I knew that it was only a matter of time before all the other horses behind her began to follow suit, ready to stretch their legs and enjoy a sprint back to the stable.

When my horse took off, breaking into a pace that most definitely could not be described as nice and steady, my first instinct was to try and slow it down.

To pull on the reins.

To do whatever it took to make it stop.

But I also knew that if I were to do that, I would end up on the ground.

Then, in the very next instant, I heard a little voice whisper a different approach in my ear. And the voice said two words:

And so I did.

I leaned in close, until I could feel the horse’s mane brushing against my face. I pressed my legs against its sides, gripped the reins tight, and I made myself breathe — long, deliberate breaths that kept me in place, that kept me safe.

And before I knew it, we had reached the stable and my horse began to slow down all on its own.

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In so many ways, it feels like I’m back on that horse right now, and once again, all that’s being asked of me is to lean in.

There are some days when I’m sure that Jose and I are about to be thrown off this wild ride. That finding a new apartment, a new hospital, and a new team of doctors, all while navigating a new country, is more than we can handle.

But there are other days when I know that we’ve done the right thing. That despite the unexpected pace of it all, we’re setting ourselves up for the next chapter of our life together — in a place we’re excited to be, doing work we love doing, with the family we’re grateful to be building.

I can’t wait to bring you more stories from Belgium — especially once Elena’s little sister arrives this Christmas — but for now, I wanted to share with you the biggest journey we’ve been on this year.

The year I will forever remember as the year we leaned into change.

Embracing a rainy start to Jose’s birthday, on a daytrip to Ghent in July ☔