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I didn’t believe him. I feel like he would say something like that just to be nice. He’s so intelligent, yet so often, the guy who doesn’t get it. I was saying we have a problem, and he responded like it was a casual compliment with the equivalent of back atcha.

I believed it wasn’t about the destination but the journey. Now I believe that it’s neither of those things. It’s about the connections you make and grow along the way. 

No sooner had I dived into the text than the whole cabin went dark for bedtime. I felt like a parakeet with a blanket thrown over my cage. Suddenly the generosity with the booze made a lot more sense. The crew was sedating us.

Yeah, we’re coworkers, but most importantly, he is the person I tell everything to, especially the things I don’t want to tell anyone.

I’m a fighter, a problem solver, and stubborn, I mean persistent, persistent AF. None of that was helping me here. My willingness to do anything was useless when there was nothing to do. 

There are different levels of separation. Sometimes it feels like only miles between us, but by the end of his busy summers, it feels like we’re standing on different planets. I begin to wonder if I’d made him up entirely.

One foot in front of the other has gotten me through assorted crises and chaos. It got me the world’s slowest associate’s degree and into a fancy university with many study-abroad opportunities. I set my sights on a five-week program in Mexico City.

I took one class a semester for eight years to get my associate’s degree. It was painfully slow, but in the end, it actually worked. I was ready to transfer to a university when my youngest turned eighteen.

So I returned to the dreams I’d had before I started dreaming of being kissed passionately. If I couldn’t have love, I would have the world.

I asked for money for pastries and lattes, which I did, in fact, spend many of my euros on. More than the breathing room that spending money grants, I felt rooted for and supported, like my journey was being shared.

Journaling is how I process my life. From my perspective, every word is completely true. Memories are never completely true. This should all be taken with a few grains of salt, and maybe a bit of tequila, too.