Warning: Long read.
Finally back from our two week trip to the US. It was incredibly surreal. Once in El Paso we rented a car and for the first week I was my mom's and aunt's chauffer. We drove down to Presidio and crossed over to my mom's hometown of Ojinaga. I'd been there before, but this trip was different. Guess I could appreciate my mom's nostalgia since I too was experiencing a bit of it. Our entire childhoods we would make this drive so that in itself felt like going back in time. She showed me around, technically again, and we saw the house where she was born and grew up which is now a notary public and a bank lol.
On our drive back we were hit by a pretty bad dust storm, I drove in almost zero visibility for about 5 minutes then it cleared up but I guess we were just in the eye of the storm because while it was clear on the highway, the horizon and to either side all we could see was a wall of dust. I was amused at how old hat it felt and chuckled remembering how I was freaking out when I drove during very light snowfall, because it looked like I was driving in hyperspace, but this was like... Meh. I've driven in severe storms, severe dust/sand storms, pitch darkness, etc, so even this felt nostalgic. After the storm we still had severe winds to the point where my wrists, forearms, and shoulders were sore from holding the car in place while being hit with wave after wave of wind gusts. My mom and aunt stayed behind in El Paso as my aunt flew back to San Antonio and had a very emotional goodbye as it is likely the last time they'll ever see each other given my mom is 80 and my aunt is 87. I made my way to Tucson.
The drive into Tucson was even more emotional than all the driving up to that point. As soon as I saw the sign of Tucson City Limits and started recognizing the road exits coming up I was FLOODED with memories. I felt as though I was in some sci-fi body/consciousness switching show and all these old memories were fighting to make it to the surface. I spent the next 24 hours in a euphoric state. I hung out with a few friends and was sad I couldn't see more, but I did have a couple of things I needed to do while I was there. I renewed my driver's license, put in a job application for summer work and finally sat down to grade everything my students turned in.
It was really emotional to meet up with old friends, three of them explicitly referred to me as family and the others welcomed me as if I were family. I am NOT the hugging type of person when greeting people, I hugged EVERYBODY lol. Including my friend's husbands who I had never met previously hahaha. I met up with an ex, met her current boyfriend and new son. Her BF and I were already FB friends, but we finally got to strike up a conversation, after a few minutes she said, "I knew you two would get along." I could tell that was important to her. I then met up with a friend who, so far, has been the only one to visit me in Mexico. Met her new husband with whom I IMMEDIATELY hit it off as he is a Metalhead, soccer fan (I'm not, but as a Mexican I'm culturally obligated to know the basics) and a video game nerd, specifically Fallout. As we're geeking out she said, "I knew you two would get along." It was touching to see how important it was for them for me to mesh with their respective partners. While my next friend didn't explicitly say it, she did refer to me as her "older brother," and we reminisced on the time she stayed with my mom and I for a few months while she got back up on her feet. That was back when she was 18, she is now in her early 30s. She and her husband are going through an emotional period as she recently had a failed pregnancy. Finally I met up with another friend who told me that thanks to that ne time I took her to the opera she got her own subscription to broadway shows coming to town and is now a huge theater fan. She then caught me up on all the goings on of her and her family.
I was also able to meet up with a friend from college who I would always hang out with at the same Denny's and talk about J.D Salinger, politics, Seinfeld and comic books. We had a good laugh remembering when on separate occasions our respective girlfriends at the time said they would no longer hang out with us, because All we talked about was Garfield and Seinfeld." After a laugh we started taking turns, "And Peanuts," "And Calvin and Hobbs," "And Frasier." More laughs.
Finally the friend I stayed with and who sadly, do to him working nights and me waking up at like... 7 am, didn't get to hang out with as much as I'd like. We had a couple of movie nights, and were able to have chats on his back patio while having a beer and a cigarette. The first time I actually had cigarettes in 7 years. I know it's bad, but the memory couldn't be completed without doing that. At one point he said, "I really missed this."
It felt so good to go back "home," and be able to see some friends and can't wait to go back and hang out with those I didn't have the time to see this time around. I was also very happy to see they are all doing well. There was that common thread with all of them, slowing down, reducing/eliminating stress from their lives, enjoying life, their work, their families, while still having plans for the future.
It was a huge relief to finally get this monkey off my back and have everything on the up and up in both countries. I'm very happy with my life at the moment, work here is great, being able to go back to the U.S whenever with the possibility of summer employment is great, in short all is well personally and professionally. The only current question mark is my health, still have appointments to follow up with regarding my surgery, but I'll know more towards the end of May.
