My most popular post is back! I wanted to share it because I have more subscribers, and because I’m proud of the revisions. Enjoy!
One afternoon, as I’m sifting through old boxes, I find an old journal: “Bahrain Days.” The date “August 20, 2003” appears in neat print on the first page. I recognize my handwriting, yet flipping through the pages, I hardly recognize the young woman who relocated to Manama, Bahrain, almost 20 years earlier. I spend the next few days devouring the entries like a thriller, as if I don’t know how it will end. Haven’t I lived through this?
I was an international teacher in 2003; although what really mattered to me then was the “international aspect”—the “teacher” was the ticket, the entry to adventure. I thought this freedom was somewhere outside the boundaries of my Kansas upbringing, and a new, cool, complex version of myself would emerge simply by leaving. Of course, I didn’t know what I wanted, because I didn’t have the depth or the words to say I just didn’t want to be me. I expected the unknown places to reshape me, to smooth my edges like a river stone.
As I read, I find a picture from Liam and Vedika’s wedding in Goa. In this portrait, my younger self laughs, hands raised, frozen in conversation. Henna tattoos wrap around my wrists, their dark stain circling my fingers; the elegance of the patterns entrances me, and the design seeps into my heart.
Henna does not last; it fades away, like the impermanence of all things. But staring at the image, and now at my hand, I realize that the impression is still there, long after the pattern has disappeared.
My history loops in the same way; some lessons fade, some stay and haunt me. Every place shows me a different aspect of myself and indoctrinates me over and over again until I am finally ready to learn.
Some lessons, though, never fade. Life brands them so deeply and so early that they become the first pattern, the blueprint for all the others that follow.
I am standing in the doorway of the Greyhound station, five years old, trying to be the opposite of my sister. Our foster parents nickname us Salt and Pepper: she is blonde, emotional, essential; she improves the flavor of everything, and I am dark-haired, waiting quietly on the table to be doled out. Salt and pepper come together, but everyone knows salt is the real star.
And so is my sister that day, screaming and clinging to my mother’s leg, and me standing still and quiet. I know we have to go, and she has to scream, and I have to wait. I have to be the balance, the bridge to the inevitable leaving.
The rumble of the bus engine and the acrid smell of exhaust make my eyes water, or maybe I am crying, too. I stand in the doorway, the bus to my back; my sister, a lump on Mom’s leg, inside the station. My eyes rise beyond the scene, drawn to hazy rays of light falling through the windows, to dust glittering in the air. Does the light do that? Change dust to glitter?
The bus bellows; my chest tightens as the yawning door threatens to swallow me whole. And my sister is suddenly there beside me, holding the social worker’s hand. I remain frozen in place, afraid to stay and afraid to go.
The bus is a door to a new land, I think, and I climb into the land of leaving, a new territory.
We walk down the aisle. The tall seats hide the passengers; I can just see the tops of their heads as they look outside or talk, saying nothing, really, because we are all caught up in the irresistible energy of escape. I climb into my seat and lean into the window on my knees. I know I will see my mom again; she is inevitable, like summer, and this same bus that is taking me away can bring me back. For now, I hold my sister’s hand, but watch the world whiz by, because watching the road ahead is easier than thinking about what has disappeared behind us.
Perhaps you see this story as one about the girl and her abandonment, trauma, and brokenness. And maybe it is, partly. But what if the bus station isn’t just about loss? What if it is also a promise? The bus takes me away, yes. But it also takes me somewhere.
Growing up in Kansas, I didn’t think about its wide-open spaces as an opportunity so much as a void, one that could easily swamp me into a life of longing. So I went to Ecuador when I turned twenty-five, became a nomad, saved experiences like currency: the morning sight of Cotopaxi, the sing-song cries of women selling humitas, hu-miiii-taaas in the street, those impossible blue feet of boobies on black volcanic sand, and whole families walking hand-in-hand and riding on top of buses beside chickens.
Those moments felt precious, like some treasure that, by instinct, I stored without knowing its value. But instinct also pointed me to the darker moments, the precarious back alleys the tour books warn you about. Shame demanded that I erase them. But reflection, I’ve learned, is like fire: it burns away regret and leaves truth.
So, I sit with my journal, the faded cover holding handwritten confessions. These pages are either a blur of mistakes I shove back into a box, or a portal to reclaim my complete story: the beauty, the recklessness, the moments of transformation. I know which one I choose.
Thank you for reading! I will be releasing a few more of my revised chapters in the run-up to publication.