Friday, February 12, 2016

The Night Before

Dear London,

I was telling a friend today about how I cried the last time I left you. How heartbroken I was to feel the plane leave the ground, and how much I've wanted to return ever since.

I will see you very soon. It hardly seems possible, but I'm less than twenty-four hours from the departure of my flight, and the start of what I've been calling London 2016...my grand adventure, a cap on several years of unemployment, partial employment, and financial regrowth.

Will I cry when I land on Sunday? Oh, probably. It may sound silly, but I believe cities have souls, in their way. Not human souls, of course, but an underlying pulse that makes them feel like living, breathing entities. In 1999, that soul kept me sane after a nasty fall semester, and in 2004-2005, it helped me power through the ups and downs of being a young teacher in a very, very different type of school.

I've never regretted my choice to teach in England, or my decision to leave when I did; everything has a way of working out as it's supposed to and my path has brought me to some really great places--and some not-so-great, but that's just life. It's finally leading me back to you, and I'm so giddy with excitement, I can hardly contain myself.

My suitcase is packed, and my iPhone is charging; I've spent the evening bustling about checking my lists and printing out my boarding pass (window seat--I want to greet you properly). My clothes for the journey are laid out, and all I need to do now is sleep, and gear up for the trip.

To you.

It feels, in some ways, like a homecoming, even though California is truly home and I like my life here. It's possible, I suppose, to have more than one home in the world, and aren't I the lucky one to have found that out?

Love,

Meg

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