Today I bought my ticket home.
In some ways it was difficult. It took me 3 months to actually make the move and set the date. The experience changes once your travel days are numbered.
However, in several ways it feels great. I love that I know when I will see my immediate family again. It will be great to see them and to see my friends again. It will feel good to have my own car again. (But I must keep up the walking that has been so good for me, too.) It will also be fantastic to have my real Mac again. (And my Rosetta Stone to actually study Spanish the way I had first planned.)
This is a different kind of coming home. I don’t get to open my own front door into a familiar home and plop down on my lovely leather couch or my comfy bed. My apartment belongs to someone else now. The flooring I lovingly picked is gone. My couch is in storage and I gave away my very new bed as storing a bed is never a good idea. So I come “home” to loved ones — to people, not to an actual home.
My plans for after my return? I am cooking up something I have long wanted to do. Something pretty cool. We shall see….
Meanwhile, I have longer to enjoy Panama than most Americans get for vacation in a year.