End of the Year

I once read a study of premeds in realtionships taking the MCATs. The study was interesting because long before they were to take the test the stress in the relationship increased, but as the MCAT approached the stress in their relationship decreased. Our professor’s analysis was that the stress decreased because both of the partners realized that it was the MCAT that was stressing them out, whereas months before the couple didn’t realize that it was the MCAT that was causing stress. The stresser wasn’t close enough for them to properly identify it.

In the two months before my family arrived I was crawling up the walls. There were so many things that I hadn’t planned ahead for, or so it seemed to me. Car rentals and hotel reservations are difficult without an internet connection, as if that would even help you in Mozambique. It didn’t help that school was out for summer, and that my computer broke (again yay!) leaving me with precious few distractions. I was travelling with my friends to kill time, and hardly enjoyed myself the entire time. I couldn’t tell if I was excited to see my parents or if I dreaded it.

Days before my house was in disarray, the hotel reservations weren’t finalized and I got sick.

I arrived in Maputo to pick up my parents and Zeus had conspired against us. They were delayed in London, with no idea of when they might escape that cursed isle. But I had fallen into some luck. A family working for the State Department had an open invitation to Peace Corps volunteers to stay in their wonderful, massive, air conditioned, well-stocked home. They offered to let me borrow their car, we watched Back to the Future (I had never seen it) on their TV, they fed me and took care of me. Their teenage daughters are well adjusted, their home is well kept, and they live a happy, adventurous life abroad together--not unlike one I may choose for myself.

Tara (the mother of the house) drove me to the airport. I was talking to my brother while I waited for mom and dad at the gate. Waiting for them to appear at any second I couldn’t stop trying to remember what they looked like. It was on the tip of my mind, but I couldn’t call it into precise detail. When I saw my dad his image filled my mind with a familiarity impossibly old. And my mom cried. And I held it in. I thought initially that I had done it for embarassment, but I think the emotions were too big to be delt any justice in an airport, over just one hug, after so long.