How (Not) to Move to France
An American's journey
I’ve been interested in French language and culture since my first trip abroad, a family vacation to France in 2007. This led me to study French while in college a few years later and I’ve been a francophile ever since. However, the idea of moving to France only seriously entered my imagination in the early months of 2023. Through some online research, I learned that I was eligible for a long-stay residence permit in France. At the time, I had recently moved back to the US after several years living in Scotland. My return was primarily out of necessity as my visa in the UK had drawn to an end, if the law had allowed I probably would have remained otherwise. So a few months teaching in Hawai’i over the summer and then a few months in my hometown of Seattle, Washington left me in search of options to get back to Europe.
France was it, and I was rather impatient. I didn’t want to wait and go through the whole visa application process, which could take months, so in January 2023 I booked an Airbnb in Nantes for three months with a plan to use it as a trial run, returning to the US and applying for my visa if the trial was a success. But I only made it as far as Scotland on my first go around. I spent time with friends and then abandoned my plan, returning to the US after a few short weeks.
One might want to know the rationale behind my decision…. Simply put, it wasn’t until I was on the verge of flying to France that the reality set in. I was going to a place I didn’t know, full of people I didn’t know who spoke a language I didn’t know very well. While I had visited France for vacation several times following my 2007 family trip, I had never been to Nantes - only had it suggested by a friend who I thought was French but actually is Dutch.
It requires a good amount of insanity to go through with such an affair and hats off to the brave (or insane) folks who do it. For me, I realized I needed more of a plan.
A few more months back in Seattle left me itching for adventure and so I set out on my second attempt at living in France the following summer. This time I was no more prepared than before, but I actually made it to France. First I spent several weeks in Leipzig, Germany, which I did not enjoy - the isolation and inability to communicate were harsh. Next I went to Paris, which was a welcome cultural relief - I prefer the French way of life to the German - and getting by with English was easy in such a big tourist city.
The social isolation can’t be overstated. Even in Paris, bustling with people and hundreds of events on every night, I didn’t really know why I was there and ended up cocooned in my studio consuming more wine than was healthy.
Big city life is not for me, that’s why I chose Leipzig over Berlin in Germany and made my way to Saint-Malo after a month in Paris. I was relieved to be by the sea and free from crowded metro rides to get place to place. I had also decided to stop drinking and connected with a recovery fellowship that helped me stop avoiding the truth.
The truth was that I found reality unbearable for a variety of reasons (which I have rattled on about in much of my past writing) and so much like drinking, the idea of living in France fooled me into believing there was a way out. A silent, peaceful refuge from the chaos of the world. In some ways it was right, Saint-Malo is a fairly peaceful refuge. At the end of the day however, I’ve learned that I don’t need to drink or move abroad to find peace. Which is welcome news, since the consequences to both my physical and mental health were quite dangerous.
And yet that’s not the end of this story. In the autumn of 2023, I returned to the US to be close to family and no longer had such a strong desire to live abroad. I even rented an apartment this time around. I was learning to find peace through spiritual practices and community rather than poorly-planned relocations and drinking. The idea of moving to France remained on the periphery of my mind, especially since I was now connected with a recovery community there. But over a year later I surprised myself by signing a new rental lease and remaining put. I still enjoyed traveling, including several visits to France, but now I had a home to come back to, in a familiar place close to family and friends.
But political tensions of 2024 got to me and I made the mistake of giving in to fear. I wasn’t afraid that the fascist MAGA party would win the election, I was afraid they would lose and violently overthrow the government. When November came, I hopped on a ship bound for Europe and watched the election results via satellite TV. While it wasn’t the outcome I wanted, I was glad that it was at least peaceful. The American people had voted in favor of fascism, I suppose Hitler rose to power lawfully (albeit undemocratically) too.
The racist and economically incompetent agenda of MAGA led me to fear a rapid decline of the USA from leader of the free world to a corrupt and bankrupt third world dictatorship. Driven by this fear, I did what I had not done in my previous attempts at moving to France and actually applied for my residence permit after returning from my election-time travels.
My permit was approved in just two weeks, a surprisingly simple process. I had a plane ticket dated January 19th and an Airbnb in Normandy booked for three months. But much like my first attempt at moving, when it came time to pack up (and mostly discard) everything in the home I had pieced together over the past 16 months, I wasn’t willing to accept that reality. I wasn’t willing to leave my family, friends and home despite the future my country looking quite bleak.
I also found it a bit hard to accept that I was giving up my work with migrants who had come to the US fleeing war and persecution. Compared to where they had come from, even with the new administration, the US was a safe haven. And here I was, not fleeing violence or even searching for economic opportunities, but refusing to accept the dominant political ideology of my country. So I called off my move and stayed put, opting for a holiday in France over the inauguration period instead.
The first months of the new administration have been about what I expected: economic decline and unlawful deportations. In a matter of weeks the country could go bankrupt and the best bet to avoid that is a budget reconciliation bill that will accelerate spending even further beyond revenue to continue growing our national debt, helping us discover the real debt ceiling, the point at which no one in their right mind wants to lend our government money anymore. Not to mention taking away health care and food from millions of low-income Americans.
In April, after attending a friend’s wedding in England, I decided to spend a few weeks in France, once again toying with the idea of moving. The US administration had just announced a set of tariffs that crashed the stock market and I wondered if this was the point at which I should make my move. Yet when I settled into a flat in the countryside near Paris, I was overcome by the all-to-familiar loneliness and isolation of living in a foreign place and culture. The tariffs were soon rescinded, the market recovered and I returned home.
So I’m left knowing there is a point at which time moving to France, or another sane country, will be the right thing for me to do, but not knowing what the criteria to determine that point really are. In the meantime, I’ve learned that home and family mean a lot more to me than politics and I’m willing to live under the rule of a hate-filled, corrupt and incompetent administration for now.
Over the past two years that I have been back and forth on moving to France I’ve met many other Americans thinking about making similar moves. This has led me to see that my experience is far from unique. All too often, I hear from people who get caught up with some romantic imaginings while not thinking of the practicalities. What will you do when you get there? How will you connect with people? Will you learn French? And what about all the people you care about, how will it be when you’re further away from them? Will you pay tens of thousands of dollars to move your things or leave them behind? There are many who don’t ponder these questions and leap with blind faith, some even land on their feet. Others do have a plan and have weighed the pros and cons, moving forward rationally. And then there are those like me who have, one way or another, come to a rational conclusion not to make the move. Whatever you do, I encourage rationality.
As the MAGAs in charge attempt to engineer historical fantasy while ruining the lives of millions, those of us who disagree and remain here may not be able to stop them, but if we are only suffering mere ideological blows, then we can at least try to help our neighbors who are suffering far worse. That’s really what a government is after all, people working together to help each other, not what’s going on in DC these days, that’s something else.