Goodbye before I’ve gone
NS June 7th, 2009
I’ve been staring at this screen for half an hour, my fingers poised above the keyboard, but nothing comes. I’ve got a list of things to blog about but lack the willpower to muster up the energy and thought that they would require.
All is quiet. The Noble Husband is out, the children are asleep. I’ve turned off the radio and the tv. The white clock is tick-tick-ticking on the mantle. I should be reading, or working on my book, or cleaning. But all I can think about is Chicago and our arrival there in 11 days. My thoughts are consumed by the planning of our trip, the details and nuances of international travel. What will we take on the flight to keep the kids entertained? Where are our suitcases and will we be able to fit everything? When should I go get the traveler’s cheques? I’m a professional listmaker and consummate organiser who has traveled aplenty. I’ve done this a thousand times but for some reason it feels different, more important this time. My heartstrings are pulling me back to my homeland and at the moment the string feels so tight that I could snap in two from the pressure.
It’s been more than two years since I’ve been back. That’s the longest I’ve ever been gone. There are so many things I’m looking forward to while there, including the usual (spending time with family and friends, going to favourite places, enjoying the weather and eating favourite foods) and the special (introducing my son to my father for the first time; a family reunion at a lakeside cabin; my 30th birthday). But as the trip draws closer and I get more dizzyingly excited about the wonderful time I’m going to have, an impending sense of gloom descends as I consider this unfortunate truth: every day that brings me closer to seeing my family is another day closer to having to say goodbye again. I know that’s a horribly pessimistic way to look at it but enough trips and enough heartache have taught me to prepare myself for the flip side of “going home.”
I imagine the contentment and joy I will feel as I look at my entire family assembled together in one place, interacting in the flesh instead of over telephone lines and via webcams on computer screens, and know that the sorrow I will feel upon leaving it behind again will crush me like the weight of a thousand stones. I will carry those stones of sadness all the way back across the ocean where they will sit in my heart until the next trip is made. I’m afraid that when it comes times to board the plane that I will not have the strength to see my mother’s tears or my father’s jaw clench as he folds me into a hug. I will want to cling to them like I was a child again myself, ask them to protect me and love me and carry me home because I’m too tired to put one foot in front of the other.
My children will wave and look over their shoulders at their grandparents, who they communicate with mainly through wires and gadgets, and not know when they’ll see them again. My heart will break when The Noble Child wakes up the first morning back here in London and asks where her Nana and Boppy are. She will sit with me on the bed while I unpack and be puzzled when I turn my back and begin to shake in silent convulsions.
Later, I will sob into my husband’s chest and pound my fist into a pillow, mourning our return like a loss. I will resent him a little bit, be frustrated by the nature of our citizenry. I will find the food tastes horrible, nothing works as it should and the weather miserable, no matter the temperature. I will say I’m moving back, that I can’t stand this country anymore, and I will talk about making plans to do just that. The stones will get heavier as my sorrow deepens and I struggle with the reality of living on another continent.
And then things will get back to normal. Our tans will fade, the photos will be stored into albums on the computer and we won’t talk about what we did and who we saw all the time anymore. We’ll return to school and work and life (the others a little easier than I will find it) and start figuring out when we can see them again. I will heal my heart from the bruising it endured under the weight of those stones and then I will start casting them off, one by one, to make room for the love and joy that my little family here, my nucleus, instill in me daily. I will choose to forget the goodbye and focus on the hello, the happiness of being together.
Life goes on because it always does, but it’s a life with a piece of me missing.
