“Well, guess what? That’s right, the trip is over. We are now at the Lisbon airport. I can’t believe it! I should start by telling you about my date with Mike. Well, it wasn’t at night, and we didn’t go to the movies, but it was much better.
....First, we took a long drive, he showed me his school and other places. It was so beautiful. Then he surprised me by taking me to this nice place with a big lake and a ferry boat. We stayed there for a while. Afterwards, he took me to a mexican restaurant (very romantic) and we ate chicken burritos. It was great, but huge! He seamed to be having a great time, except for some of the times, when he was really quiet. I think we both felt the same. At about 1:30 PM we arrived at the pool and I had to leave. It was hard saying goodbye. I gave him a big strong hug. It was really sad because I nearly cried. This day was both the worst and the best day of my life. I kept thinking about him in the plane, but it’s too late now. He did tell me he would call. I sure hope so...”
He never called. He wrote me three very warm letters - which I have kept all these years like a precious treasure - but that was it...I never heard from him since. But since there are surely passages where I write about this, so I will delay the comments and thought about that.
One thing that caught my particular attention in this passage is the feeling of those few hours spent with Michael having been both the best and worst “in my life”. I smile inside as this funny notion crosses my mind. It’s amazing how your expectations and ideas change as you grow. The way I cried the entire trip, as if the entire world was collapsing around me, this was the ultimate sensation of suffering and pain. I couldn’t care less about what was happening around me or if the world ended at that moment. Needless to say, and not wanting to underestimate the pain of being separated from the person you’re in live with, I learned that compared to so many other ordeals, this sort of suffering is a blessing. The thing about growing up is that the good things become a battle to obtain, while the not so good things start appearing all around us and out of nowhere. Now I know they where always around me, I just didn’t notice them because I was busy dealing with my own adolescent dilemmas. Fortunately, I had the privilege of not having to worry about certain things, many don’t. Nonetheless, growing up makes us aware of things, too aware.
The next journals have nothing very interesting to report. In most of them, I go on and on about how sad I was and how mush I missed Michael and the States, and how much I hated being in Portugal...the expected reaction. The only thing I looked forward to was his letter. Other than that, I was pretty much going through the motions.
Until the day I finally received a letter from Michael. A little more than a month had gone by since the last passage.
....First, we took a long drive, he showed me his school and other places. It was so beautiful. Then he surprised me by taking me to this nice place with a big lake and a ferry boat. We stayed there for a while. Afterwards, he took me to a mexican restaurant (very romantic) and we ate chicken burritos. It was great, but huge! He seamed to be having a great time, except for some of the times, when he was really quiet. I think we both felt the same. At about 1:30 PM we arrived at the pool and I had to leave. It was hard saying goodbye. I gave him a big strong hug. It was really sad because I nearly cried. This day was both the worst and the best day of my life. I kept thinking about him in the plane, but it’s too late now. He did tell me he would call. I sure hope so...”
He never called. He wrote me three very warm letters - which I have kept all these years like a precious treasure - but that was it...I never heard from him since. But since there are surely passages where I write about this, so I will delay the comments and thought about that.
One thing that caught my particular attention in this passage is the feeling of those few hours spent with Michael having been both the best and worst “in my life”. I smile inside as this funny notion crosses my mind. It’s amazing how your expectations and ideas change as you grow. The way I cried the entire trip, as if the entire world was collapsing around me, this was the ultimate sensation of suffering and pain. I couldn’t care less about what was happening around me or if the world ended at that moment. Needless to say, and not wanting to underestimate the pain of being separated from the person you’re in live with, I learned that compared to so many other ordeals, this sort of suffering is a blessing. The thing about growing up is that the good things become a battle to obtain, while the not so good things start appearing all around us and out of nowhere. Now I know they where always around me, I just didn’t notice them because I was busy dealing with my own adolescent dilemmas. Fortunately, I had the privilege of not having to worry about certain things, many don’t. Nonetheless, growing up makes us aware of things, too aware.
The next journals have nothing very interesting to report. In most of them, I go on and on about how sad I was and how mush I missed Michael and the States, and how much I hated being in Portugal...the expected reaction. The only thing I looked forward to was his letter. Other than that, I was pretty much going through the motions.
Until the day I finally received a letter from Michael. A little more than a month had gone by since the last passage.