The end is near(?)

So, it seems as if my time in Russia, my extended-based-in-Russia period, is coming to a close.  I say 'seems' because it is something that I am finally able to grasp, to perceive, process, and act in accordance to.
  June 1st - the first day of my last month living here, in this Uralian Province...where so many, many things have come to pass.
  June 21st, I believe, I'll start treking west, take a short trip to Murmansk (in the Arctic), and then fly out of Moscow on June 27th (visa expires June 28th)....stop off in London for a short while and then fly back to the states, just in time to celebrate my nation's anniversary!  (I cleverly planned this so that I might attribute the fireworks to my grand return).
   Living as an expat is an incredibly different experience, I imagine, than living as an immigrant, traveller, or tourist.  There is something deeply unstable about the expat existence, something that I noted in Hong Kong during my last visit, and something that I, of course, have noted in myself since re-locating nearly two years ago.
  The expat has no home, and belongs to no culture.  The expat speaks (or at least often speaks) another language - but in the learning of this (these) new languages, the expat's own native language begins to deteriorate.  The expat becomes a member, of sorts, of the new society he inhabits, but the precarious situation the expat is placed in is one of both giving (providing something 'new' to the 'indigenous people') and of taking (as the expat has come to 'get' something he cannot get at home).  This is markedly different from the standard 'give and take' that happens in 'normal life'.
   The expat returns to his native country to be told how much he has changed.  This is first taken as a compliment - the expat is proud of his ability to adapt to the new culture...but this shortly thereafter becomes disconcerting, as the expat comes to realize that if he (in my situation, for example) is now a Russianized American version of his former self...what does that mean?  Perhaps those of you reading this in foreign countries with large expat community will feel entirely different...as being an expat in Hong Kong, for instance, immediately places you within a well developed and easily located 'expat community'.  In the middle of Russia, however, my experience has differed a bit...I suppose the question I'm grappling with is - aside from outsiders' opinions as to my Russianness or Americanness...which culture do I identify with more, now, which people do I want to be around, which foods do I want to eat, and which language do I want to speak.  Do/would any of these preferences adequately reflect (I think no) the changes that have occured?   Will I miss Russia more, after leaving, than I missed America, after leaving?  And is that even a fair question as somewhere, in the back of my mind, America was always a place I'd return to - to raise the family and watch my father grow old and etc...whereas I knew Russia was temporary - indefinite, but temporary.  Leaving Russia, and 'returning'.  I have no idea when, or if, I'll return.
  Questions about art and art making later to come...just dealing with where I am, geographically (and my relationship to that), and where I think I might want to be.