Blankets in July & Other Side Effects of Being an Adult Abroad

Rain in July? Of course. Nothing says “summer in Switzerland” quite like grey skies, a damp to-do list, and me under a blanket wondering what version of adulthood I accidentally subscribed to.

This isn’t the glamorous expat fantasy — no Aperol on balconies(because I have no balcony), no linen dresses fluttering in warm breezes.
Just a window flung open for fresh air, low energy, and the faint smell of wet concrete and mild existential crisis.

It’s a rainy summer evening — the kind that feels more like October than July.
The kind where the air smells like wet pavement, missed deadlines, and things unsaid.
The kind of day that insists you stop, even if all you’ve done is scroll and sigh and send out two job applications that barely scratched the surface of your ambition.

I couldn’t be bothered to cook.
Not even to order food.
So I did what felt equal parts dramatic and absolutely necessary: I curled up under a blanket — in July — and surrendered.

And for a while, I let myself sink into someone else’s life.
Specifically, the secret ones belonging to Mormon wives on reality TV.

It wasn’t aspirational.
It was relief.

Because sometimes, when your own life feels stalled out and colorless, watching someone else’s chaos unfold in high definition is oddly reassuring. Like, sure, I’m spiraling, but at least I’m not doing it in Utah with four kids and a dramatic husband with a spiritual crisis.

Some days, down days, feel like a waste.
But maybe they’re not.
Maybe they’re just pauses.
Not glamorous, not productive, not "main character energy" — but honest.

I sent out two job applications today. That’s it.
And yes, I could beat myself up for not doing more, or I could quietly celebrate that I did something.
Anything.

In moments like this — rainy, restless, low-effort days — I start to crave a different kind of comfort.
The kind you only find in fiction.

You know the scene: it’s the ‘90s, the lighting is warm, and your friends just show up unannounced. Someone’s got pizza. Someone else flops on your couch like it’s theirs. There’s no planning. No pressure. Just presence.

But that’s not real life.

In real life, everyone texts before they call.
Plans are made two weeks in advance and are cancelled the night before.
And as someone who prides themselves on being a good host, the idea of someone walking through my door to find me in sweatpants with no food, no wine, and no emotional bandwidth? Terrifying.

Still… part of me wishes they would.
Part of me wants someone to walk in anyway, to sit beside me in silence, to bring nothing but time and a little chaos of their own.

And it’s in moments like this, when the rain is soft and the silence is loud, that it’s hard to live so far away from my family.

My mom.
My cousins.
My chaos, my comfort, my constants.
They’re all in Italy.
Just a six-hour drive away — which sounds close until you remember I don’t have a license, a car, or the mental energy to take a train that involves three transfers and a bus that only runs on Tuesdays.

I see them once, maybe twice a year.
And I tell myself that has to be enough.
I chose this life. I moved away to build something. To be someone.
And most days, I believe in that choice.

But on days like this?

I want to be on my mom’s couch, watching Trash TV, being fed without being asked questions.

I miss going out for cheap sushi with my cousins — ordering way too much, catching up on everything they’ve done, everything they want to do.
I miss the dreamy conversations about future fantasy weddings we haven’t planned and babies we haven’t had.
What kind of mothers we think we’d be.
Which cities we want to live in.
What kind of lives we might still create.

It wasn’t just food. It was a ritual.
The gentle checking-in. The mutual daydreaming.
The kind of ordinary closeness that keeps you tethered to yourself.

I miss my family dearly.
But it’s also nice to look forward — to believe that closeness can stretch across borders, across seasons, across time zones, and years and half-finished text messages.

And I guess I’m not alone.

There must be so many of us in this city — walking through our beautiful, complicated, chosen lives, quietly missing people we used to see without planning.
We chose this.
We chose the distance. The independence. The opportunity.
But that doesn’t mean it’s always easy.

Some nights, all you can do is open the window, let the rain in, and trust that missing them is proof you still carry them — even here, even now, even under a blanket in July.