Leaving on September 24, 2010

The four days before I left I spent in my room packing. The four nights before I left, I tossed in bed, fretting that I had not packed correctly. The night before I left, I did not sleep, tossing instead, watching the sky lighten through the blinds, fretting that I did not pack what I would need, eventually sleeping a few broken hours.

At 7:00am I took my little sister to the bus stop, hugged her, kissed her, told her I loved her and would miss her; then I watched her get on the bus and be carried away, praying that I would trust God’s hands to protect her because mine are not big enough to stretch across the ocean.

At 9:30am I loaded my bags into the van, hoping I had packed what I would need in the months to come. From behind me my Dad ask why exactly I was going to England. I turned around, hugged him, and stood in his gripping embrace a long time as though if he held on long enough then I could not fly away, and if I did fly, then he could attach his body to mine to protect me against the world I was venturing into that was far away from him. “I love you, Rosie.” He said, kissing the top of my head and laying his just shaved cheek against where his lips had been. I knew that prayers to St. Michael and the Virgin Mary and his guardian angel and St. Joseph and God were streaming through his mind, wrapping around my head like a crown of daisies. Silently, I joined him, praying for his and Mom’s peace of mind, knowing that no such peace could exist for as long as I was so far away. “I love you, Dad. I’m going to miss you.” “I’m going to miss you, too, Rosie,” he said with a sigh.

Sighing again, he let me go. I kissed him on the cheek, and climbed into the van. My Mom started the engine, and we drove away. At the end of the street, I turned around and saw him standing in the driveway in the same place we had left him.

“No tattoos. No piercings. You will be living with boys and girls. I know that temptation exists. Be careful. People will try to take advantage of you. When I was your age, Busia would tell me the same thing, and I would think that the world isn’t really like that, that people were good. Well, many people are good, but at my age I’ve seen how the world works; I’ve been on the other end of it. And many people will steamroll right over you to get what they want, because they have an agenda and they are going to follow through. They don’t care if you get ripped off in the process. And the people who make the world how they want it are those with a plan. Be careful. Please be careful. Be safe. Be aware.”

“Mom. I will be okay.” I said as she stopped the van in front of the airport. “Really, Mom, I will be just fine.”

My Mom does not hug. I love hugs and annoy her with my constant attacks. Keeping her elbows at her side, she kind of squeezes me and then taps my back until I let go. If I hold on longer than three taps, then she pushes me away, saying, “Okay, come on,” so she can go do the next thing. Because she is a doer. The weeks before I left, she left me lists every day of stuff that I needed to do before I departed. She took me shopping for shoes and long-sleeved shirts. She checked my packing and called the bank even after I had called them three times, because that is how she loves—through doing. But standing outside the airport, after many of my needy hugs and after many kisses and “I love you’s” and “I will miss you’s” and even a picture together in front of the Continental Airlines sign, I hugged her, and instead of kind of squeezing, she just let me hold on with her hands resting against my back, and she didn’t even start tapping until three seconds later. Pulling away, she raised her thumb and drew a cross on my forehead, saying “God bless you." I raised my thumb and did the same to her. Then with two suitcases, an overstuffed backpack, and a messenger bag, I walked into the airport.