Finding My
Way
It’s raining hard. Very hard. A welcome sight and sound in this
drought-ridden latitude when I've wondered if I'd ever hear that rushing roar
again. The greens in my garden contrast brightly against the grey of the day.
Water swirls along the street gutters.
This morning hubby greeted me with, “Happy
14th of July.” It was his way of acknowledging that I arrived in
Chile into his waiting arms on this date forty-two years ago, unaware that I'd
be spending the rest of my adult life here. Sometimes he has thanked me for my “sacrifice.”
At that young age I didn't think of it as a sacrifice. I was naïve and in love.
It’s been quite a journey, often a rocky road, challenging and prompting me to
explore interior pathways of self-understanding. Lately, I've been reading old
letters: correspondence between me and my parents and from hubby to me before I
joined him here in his country. They allow me to step lightly back in time to
facilitate my efforts to write an honest memoir, working title: Marrying Santiago. I started writing it
over ten years ago, but now I believe it’s as ready as it will ever be, though
I have so many doubts about putting it out there for other eyes. Is it
well-written? Will someone find it of interest?
To me it’s worth it if even one soul
finds comfort, understanding or joy in my words, if she can say, “Oh, I know
that feeling so well.” And writing it was something I had to do for myself.
Would love to read "Marrying Santiago" when you put it out there. As someone who has written bits and pieces of memoir over the years I'm interested. I, too, have a filing cabinet FULL of all the letters I wrote as a bride from Chile home and other places I lived. Why do I find them painful to go back and read....that young woman who wrote them is gone. But perhaps yours will inspire me to not feel that way.
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