I think it hit me tonight. All day I felt a little strange, but I was at work and kept myself busy. After work I fell asleep for a while, and then this evening, I went outside and sat on the steps to just breathe. The air was warm, finally, and it smelled delicious... fresh, black earth being churned up for planting. A few brightly lit tractors were working late, and the hum of the machines was familiar and comforting. Birds chased each other through the trees and I wondered if my surroundings are really as beautiful as they seem to me... or is it just the idea of "home" that could make an old, quiet farm just as appealing to me as a Hawaiian sunset?
Then I remembered that I'm leaving. Soon. I heard, for the first time, a little voice inside crying "I don't want to go! I want to stay!" Uh-ohhh! I let myself feel it for a few minutes and then invited Josef and Brittany to go for a walk. They grabbed sweatshirts and flip-flops and off we went. Josef put his arm around me (which is still quite a reach for him, and I wonder if, in one year, will he be as tall as me?) and Brittany chattered about Prom this weekend, giving us her minute-by-minute primping plans for Saturday. We giggled and kicked clods of dirt left on the road by tractor-traffic and let the night settle around us, inhaling the best air on earth.
The strange feeling deep in my stomach intensifies as I try not to think about how much I'll miss these two. The brother and sister I barely knew a year ago have become two of my best friends. Before I moved back home, they were stuck in my mind the way they were when I moved out 8 years ago--a 5-year-0ld monkey of a boy, and a tiny, quiet 9-year-old button of a girl. In their place, I have discovered a boy, now 12, who is quick-witted and sensitive, with a contagious laugh. A boy who has captured every adult conversation he's heard in his life (which is a lot, being the baby of the family), and stowed away all the big words like fireflies in a jar. He takes them out when we discuss politics, travel, religion... always resulting in sparkling conversation. He is also an accomplished skateboarder, and has a whole sketch book of Dali-esque pencil drawings that make you wonder what goes on in that brain of his! And my sister is suddenly a beautiful 17-year-old... still tiny, but with an enormous personality that had time to flourish without her three older siblings dominating her world. She somehow has time to maintain a packed social calendar and still devote several hours a night to her studies, holed up in her room with a blanket and textbooks--AP US History, Anatomy and Physiology, etc etc. She will sometimes knock on my door with her most interesting findings--"Guess WHAT!" she will shriek. I always think that some juicy high school gossip is about to follow, but then she'll launch into some fascinating factoid about the endocrine system. "Did you KNOW that your adrenal gland works with the hypothalamus to produce corticotropin-releasing hormones...?" I laugh at her and remind her that I nearly failed anatomy in college, but it's a good chance to tell her that she really should go to the University of Iowa and study something medical. (And live in the most fun college town in Iowa!) I am so thankful that I've had the opportunity to re-meet my family. To get to know the people they have become...
I'll miss them. I'll miss reading to Josef before he goes to bed and watching his newest skateboard tricks. I'll miss Brittany text-messaging me from her bedroom down the hall to tell me that my music is too loud when she's trying to sleep. I'll miss my mom's good-night kiss and my dad calling me a gazillion times a day, "just checkin' in!" I'll miss our cats and Cafe Diem and Wheatsfield Grocery and all of the great people I work with at FAH, and eating fresh eggs for breakfast. I'll miss waving at farmers in pick-ups and swerving around potholes, and seeing people I know everywhere.
BUT... I do want to go. I don't want to stay. I just have moments, and I think the next few weeks will be a roller-coaster ride of emotions--little bursts of panic, fear, and uncertainty, as well as anticipation and excitement. The part of me that has my feet firmly planted in who I am and what I want my life to be about, can stand back and see that this is right. So for the next seven days, I'm going to keep breathing in that yummy dirt smell (soon I'll be inhaling lovely Taipei smog). I'll be hanging out with my siblings. I'm going to keep kissing my mom good-night and answering my dad's phone calls with mock exasperation. I'll love every minute of my last day at work tomorrow, and I'll wave at every car that I pass on our gravel road with genuine Midwestern friendliness. I'll get a few more vanilla lattes from Cafe Diem and return all of my library books to the APL.
In 2 weeks I'll be taking my first steps in Taiwan. Behind me is a year of beautiful memories, love, laughter, growth, healing, and the support of my incredible family. Ahead of me, a year of challenge, opportunity, discovery, and adventure. A place between the comfort of knowing and the thrill of not knowing. And I can't think of anywhere else I'd rather be.
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