5:45am, 24 June 06, Cincinnati airport

Just checked in my bags, which were mercifully under the weight limit. A rapid debriefing for Mom went better than expected: she is more nervous than excited (oddly enough I’m not yet either…) but proud for sure. Goodbyes with Gerry were touching; he is as happy to call me a stepdaughter as I am to claim him as a step dad. His pride and worry were very evident, much appreciated.

6:20am, 24 June 2006, Cincinnati airport

Goodbyes don’t have to be painful; leave it to my crazy family to break the stereotype. At the airport, Mom can’t work her camera phone, and Joe and I poke fun, striking poses for an eventual photo. We quote Forrest Gump till the moment I walk through security (if you get in trouble, he advises in his brotherly slash fatherly slash Gumpy voice, run Forrest, run!). I walk down the terminal, painfully empty for want of early bird travelers, and turn to see Mom and Si. They watch me from the entrance, expectantly. I raise my hand casually and call out, “see you later,” as I embark on my journey.

I think I’m really going to do this. I am going to move to Africa. Just five minutes ago, I confessed to Mom I had no idea what I was doing. Glad I said it, since one, it’s good to be humble about your life’s trajectory; two, it eased her mind to know that I had doubts; and three, it’s the truth.

As I walk down the hallway, I notice two things. First, my mind is a slideshow, not of recent events, but of recent faces: Mom, Gerry, Si, Jon, Frances. I am filled to bursting with love and some preemptory missing. Blessed with their unwavering support, but robbed of their presence, I feel alone but prepared. Second thing I notice, my hands are shaking. Part of this, I attribute to the subzero temperatures in the airport. The other part surely belongs to nerves. Estimated percentages, 80-20, respectively. Subject of course, to future revisions.

10:40am, Philadelphia Holiday Inn

What a strangely serendipitous beginning to an amazing adventure. Morning showers make downtown Philly traffic unnavigable, forcing our airport shuttle through the suburbs in a full scale, cross-city tour. Luck would have it that three of four passengers are not pressed for time and that one of four passengers – who is a doppelganger for Mme Goulet, an enchanting professor I had in Paris – is silent in her frustration. As my frost bitten toes recover from the plane’s overzealous air conditioning and the damp morning, I share stories with an African American woman. She strikes me as thoughtful, dignified, maternal as she describes her recent visit to Senegal, a country just south of my own destination.

The driver pipes in over squealing windshield wipers and the low murmur of the BBC: he is originally from Ethiopia and how amazing to serve Peace Corps in Africa and he knows a thing or two about Mauritania… Suspended between a native’s account and a tourist’s perspective, Firew (pronounced Frey-yoo) bubbles over with advice on sand and heat, hints at future language hurdles (he barely knows the 80+ dialects spoken in his own country, much less the hundreds throughout the continent), defends the vibrant yet still conservatively Islamic music scene, and boasts of the African education system especially in regards to history and geography. It was a smorgasbord of factoids and enthusiasm that I digested as greedily as I could. My departure prompted well-wishes from all the passengers and the assurance that this experience would change my life. I’m banking on it.