It’s scary how easy it is to pack
everything in two suitcases. For the better part of a week I’d been dreading
piling things up and pushing them into their coffins of convenience for the
flight back to Korea.[1]
There was simply too much—I knew it would never all fit, that it would be
impossible to stuff my life of the last couple months into as many bags (fifty pounds or less). I
would have to cull a few books from the packing list, or maybe leave a beloved
sweatshirt behind to loiter in my room until I got back.
Packing is my nemesis, my Captain
Hammer if you will. I hate the hard choices—I want all of those books with me
all the time! I want that stupid t-shirt I only wear when it’s frigid and I’m
eating cookies in my cookie pants (which I also want to bring, even though
Korea is lacks many cookies). It had to be done—but I knew it would undoubtedly
be difficult.
False.
After a relaxing hour of watching
Avatar the Last Airbender and completing the early stages of packing, it was
clear I had over-estimated how hard it is to put one’s life in a suitcase.
Obviously I had to leave the beagle behind (woe!) and my parents have lives to
live that aren’t in Korea, but still. It should have been harder. I should have
had to spend days—or at least an all-nighter, since I never pack more than 24
hours in advance—to figure things out. I should have been reviewing the past weeks,
sifting through experiences and thoughts and memories and getting ready to move
on.
It was raining when I left, as we
drove out of the driveway. Some people think rain at the beginning of the trip
is a bad omen, or at the very least not in the proper spirit of trip-making. I
see their point, rather like how some people say you aren’t supposed to cry
when someone leaves because the last way they see you and how they remember you
ought to be smiling. I like that idea. My family would fit in well in that kind
of tradition, not because of the belief, but because we’re simply not criers.
That’s why I like it when it rains
at the beginning of a trip. Sure it makes logistics less nice and sometimes
fouls up your hair or gets in your socks. But my parents and I don’t cry when we
separate. We—like the packing, which of
course shouldn’t take days—are logical like that. But the rain has other priorities.
Lacking a vocabulary and the practicality to know that barring freakish
misfortune reunion is inevitable—the sky is right to rain.
[1]
And I really do mean coffin. The twinkies barely
made it and the grits were mangled something fierce.
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