Forget about me

Well, friends, I’ve been out of touch for a while. I returned to the United States to visit family and friends over Christmas and New Year’s. It was an incredible time with a wedding, snowboarding, visits from old friends and neighbors, and seeing my brother’s university.

As I sit here in Detroit Metro Airport and reflect on the past two weeks, I think about how incredibly blessed I am. My life nowadays is split almost equally between the U.S. and Europe, and I am grateful to have a network of friends and family on both sides of the Atlantic. I think a lot of people in my situation would lament their lack of a home base, but whenever I travel, I am reminded how many home bases I actually have. It’s so comforting to return to places that I know and be received by people that love me. I have my house in Norway and my university back in Oregon, but I also have my previous home in Germany, my close friends scattered across the Midwestern United States and northern Europe, my parents who care about me deeply, and my awesome brother.

My mom once showed me a speaker named Pam Stenzel. Pam grew up with little family to speak of, but she nevertheless has a lot of good things to say about the topic. She equated the word “family” to an acronym and pointed out the letters could stand for “Forget About Me; I Love You.” Forget about me; I love you. The words stuck with me because more than anything else, they capture the self-denial that is so integral in familial love. I have no problem admitting to you that I cry every time I say good-bye to my family, any time I see a close friend fly away or get dropped off at an airport myself. It truly is the people that make my jet-setting life so incredibly worth it.  

And so I watch the people around me in the airport, wondering where they came from, who they left behind, and who they are going to meet. I think about my brother, who survived his first semester of college and is becoming ever more interesting, mature, and unique. I think about my dad, who is incredibly hard-working and never stingy with advice. I think about my mom, who is self-denial personified and still tries to take care of me as much as she can. I miss those three people so badly it makes my heart hurt.

I’m so glad I got to see my family over the holidays. My flight is about to begin boarding, so I should probably sign off. Friends, tonight my heart is heavy, but my spirit is light. When I land on the other side of the Atlantic, I will have another series of adventures to tell you about. I’ll catch up with you then. In the meantime, go hug your mother.

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