My wife of 20+ years is an immigrant, which shows that the liberals were partially correct: There are some things that native-born Americans just aren’t willing to do (apparently).
Like, for instance, marrying me.
She’s a Dutch citizen and speaks five languages fluently, but unfortunately one of them is English. (This leads to a lot of arguments.) Her entire family speaks multiple languages, so when they chat on the phone, I can hear her flipping through Dutch, French, German, and Spanish — and every now and then, an English word.
I have no idea what they’re saying, but different languages have different cadences. So to me, it sounds like this:
[French words] [German words] [Dutch Words]… hotdog.
But since her father was a Dutch diplomat who dreamed of becoming the next Gauguin, she spent most of her childhood in Tahiti, which is owned by France. Culturally, she identifies with French Polynesia more than anything else. She came from a family of globetrotters and attended school in Tahiti, Holland, England, Australia, and Hawaii.
Meanwhile, I’m as American as Levi jeans and Mad magazine. Born here and lived here all my life. When we first met, I hadn’t even been to Europe, let alone attended college on multiple continents. And other than high school-level Spanish, all I know is English.
So clearly, there was gonna be a culture clash.
I learned a lot from her. For example, it’s very important to buy cheese in big blocks and round packages. (Growing up, all my cheese slices were individually wrapped in plastic by the nice folks at Kraft.) Cheese is super important to Europeans, you see.
Mayonnaise, too. They put that gunk on everything.
I’ve been just as generous in return, sharing my culture’s greatest innovations with her. Until we met, she had never tried a Buffalo wing. (Poor thing.) And she was blown away by hot sauce! Now, she loves it.
I tried to explain American sports to her, but some of her questions threw me for a loop:
Me: See the guy running with the football? He’s the running back.
Her: Why do they call him a running back if he’s running forward?
Me: I… don’t know.
Early in our relationship, I was flipping through channels and landed on the WWE:
Me: That’s Ric Flair! They call him the Nature Boy. He was my favorite wrestler when I was a kid.
Her: [Watches for a few minutes] Do they call him the Nature Boy because he pretends he’s a cow?
Me: What?
It took me at least half-a-minute to figure out what she meant. Finally, it hit me:
Me: No, no — he’s saying WOOOO. Not MOOOO.
Her: But what does “wooo” have to do with nature?
Me: I… don’t know.
Her: See, a cow would be better.
Because she was raised with such an international, transient perspective, she never really felt a strong connection to any one country. Citizenship wasn’t a source of pride or a sense of belonging; it was just a bunch of words on her passport. She thought of it like we think about our Social Security number: it’s data and it’s important, but other than that, who cares?
Countries were just places to visit. (For a little while, at least.)
It was really difficult to explain to her how much being an American meant to me: the pride and passion of the red, white, and blue — our past, our promise, and our potential. This is who I am. Being a citizen of anywhere else is unfathomable.
Today, after living in the United States of America for 25 years, she thinks differently. She’s become one of the most patriotic people I know.
Back in October, when we watched our oldest son’s Army Cavalry graduation, tears were swelling in her eyes. And not just because she was proud of our boy:
It’s because she’s proud of the country he’s defending, too.
So, if you wanna marry an immigrant, here’s my advice:
- Be open-minded about trying new food. (Especially cheese.)
- Don’t think of the cultural differences as barriers. Instead, use them as bridges — and they just might take you somewhere AMAZING.
- When she’s chatting on the phone in different languages and you hear your name mentioned more than normal, you might wanna double-check the calendar and make sure you didn’t forget about an anniversary, or something.
- Love each other with all your heart and hope for the best.
I give it five stars. Totally recommend.
