This post, unlike others, is more of a declaration of both certain and uncertain events. Tomorrow, by now, I will have arrived in Europe for the first time and unloaded my way-too-heavy suitcase from the baggage carousel in Dublin. From there: Holyhead, North Wales, Stratford, London, Holland, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, Versailles, Burgundy, Lucerne, Florence, Pisa, French Riviera, Nice, then finally, Barcelona. I’m only passing through some during transfers, but I couldn’t have asked for a better adventure. Wish me luck and leave me love. I’ll be trying to post little updates while I’m gone, but for 25 days I will be out of the country, and hopefully enjoying myself too much to visit an Internet cafe. I’ll leave you with a little poem dedicated to the people who’ve made this trip possible. Grandma and Grandpa, I miss you.
An on-the-spot poem for Elayne and Warren.
Wherever you are, I hope you know how thankful I am for all you’ve made possible.
Before my feet hit ground
they used to dangle;
little toes like bells
and I,
so regal on my seat,
would clap my heels together
because there was no place like home
without you in it.
I realized this,
when my feet were no longer mid-air,
toes somersaulting from the trapeze
of a high stool’s crossbar.
They felt heavy,
falling from the bar of the stool
like an angel,
from the gravity or from the thought
of never feeling at home in a life
without you in it.