The Trip Home: Part 1

I wanted to write a post about our two weeks of Stateside fun a couple months ago, but with our visitors in June/July, and then with starting my new job at the end of July, time like always got away from me. Also, when reflecting on our time in the States, I wanted to make sure I approached this blog post with some sensitivity. While it is important to express some of the bitter with the sweet, I have no desire to offend anyone’s hospitality. But I will come back to this later.

My mind was a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions as I was sitting on the plane waiting for it to take us to NYC.  We had not been home since the beginning of October 2011, only a 1 ½ months after our wedding. Since we desired to see as much of family and friends as possible, while doing as many things as possible, we had our trip planned out to the hour for every arrival and departure of each town we were visiting.  Thinking about this plan, I tried to meditate not on the craziness of the schedule, but the faces I would see and the wonderful emotions I would have with every face I saw and every physical embrace that was given.  I still could not help worrying though. In this trip of almost 12 days, we planned on visiting three of four corners of PA, attend 2 weddings (being best man in one),  have many lunches and dinners with friends and family, tell countless stories about our lives abroad, listen for hours catching up with everyone, have as many goodbyes as hellos, try to bring back as many items from the States as possible, and…well… drive everywhere!  I had not driven a car since we left the States, so the fact that I would drive across PA multiple times in a week was a little disconcerting.  My biggest worry was finding time to relax, which ended up being a very genuine worry as relaxing had little to do with the trip. But let’s move on to the actual details.

Landing in NYC and going outside with all of our luggage to see hundreds of cars and taxis with large lines of people and crowds, with the smell of cigarette smoke and exhaust, and the insane humidity!... All of this was the start of some lovely reverse-culture shock for me.  I never really experienced any culture-shock in my time abroad, so it seems only fitting that it hit me on the back end.  It is… there is not a good word for it… weird to go from a town with a small amount of cars and never any traffic to the highways of NYC with countless cars and never-ending traffic. We took a taxi to Joel’s apartment in Brooklyn, and of course we had to get a taxi driver who loved to accelerate and then slam on his breaks during the bumper-to-bumper traffic.  I remember focusing on seeing Joel, a home cooked meal, and good beer. Joel and Saman did not disappoint- some wonderful Middle Eastern cuisine, and two of my favorite beers on this planet: La Chouffe and Allagash Curieux. After drinking Guatemalan beer for many months (which I do enjoy by the way, no snobbery here), my taste buds, which transcended the warm feeling to my entire body, were in complete bliss.  Luckily, this was just the beginning of good hops and barley hitting my lips this trip.  Being at Joel and Saman’s place was as perfect a start to the trip as any.  The best counter to the struggles of the mind when re-entering a world of substantially more stuff, stress, and materialism is… friendship, community, and fellowship.  Joel and I had an amazing conversation about life on the rooftop of his building, which peacefully hovered quietly above the chaotic city below.  Skype might be amazing and necessary for our lives, but it can not compare to the intimacy of a in-person conversation with someone that you care about and love. 

The best of friends

After dinner my parents and sister arrived to take us back to Dallas, PA.  Words could not express embracing them.  Anyone who has been away from his or her family knows what I am talking about. The incredible feelings I felt in that moment could not be lessened by attempting to define the experience with words. I think many of you reading this can relate to this, and I will leave it at that.

The following day, Friday, was not exactly a family reunion like I wished it could have been. Rachel and I were heading down to Philly that night to see all of our friends and be in the city we fell in love in, were married in, and spent a large portion of our very important young adult lives in. So instead of spending time with family on Friday, they all went to work and school and Rachel and I started running all of the errands we had to do while we were home. But we did have one enjoyable moment with my sister on Friday. We had the opportunity to be guest speakers in my sister’s Spanish class!  We were able to share about our lives and work in Guatemala, why we love it, the struggles of living abroad, and the challenges of learning the Spanish language. Some kids seemed as interested as if they were watching paint dry, but some were very inquisitive and interested, asking many questions and expressing their interests with visiting or maybe even living in another country in the future. The best part about this was sharing with students a point of view maybe a little different than what they were used to hearing, letting them know that living abroad is a real possibility if that is something they are interested in.

Before heading to Philly, we made a quick stop at Target, or as I think of it now: the overwhelmingly huge store with everything you need and everything you don’t. I will talk about Target later though.

Being in Philadelphia was nothing short of amazing. This trip reminded me of how much I love that city and all of my friends that live there.  Living in and around Philadelphia for almost 9 years creates a great deal of memories, more than can be relived in a day and a half. Despite the short visit, I believed we lived it up as much as possible. It is easy to see now how much I took that city for granted the last couple of years that I lived there.

The best part of visiting Philly was the first thing we did when we arrived: have dinner with friends at Earth Bread + Brewery. Not only is it top 5 in my favorite Philly restaurants, with being a former employee there for 2 years, it was awesome to see how it is still thriving.  With amazing flatbreads, beer, and a multitude of friends to eat with, catch up with, laugh with, and just have general awesome community with, it was the highlight of the first half of the trip home. 

That night was the embodiment of home for me.  It helped to give me clarity about what this trip was all about: being with the people we care about and rekindling the love we have for each other as best as possible. I had grand plans for that night. After eating at Earth Bread, we had every intention of heading into Center City/Old City to visit some of our favorite places in the city for a drink and maybe even do a little dancing. It was going to be a reenactment of everything I love about Philadelphia in one evening. But even though I love taking the regional rail into the city and walking the streets of Philly, that was not what this trip was about. It was about being home with the people we love. After spending a long time at Earth, instead of going out we decided to head back to my friend's apartment to continue our good conversations, and to squeeze out every drop of enjoyment of spending time together as we could. In the end, Philly, while a great city, would be nothing if the people I spent that night with were not there. For those who were there and understand what I am talking about, thank you for the amazing memories of that night and of the many nights over the many years before it.

The best of times with good friends, laughter, beer, flatbread, and sriracha.

I hope you enjoyed part 1 of my retelling of our Stateside adventure. I will post part 2 soon. Thanks for reading!