The Return.

(Please note: Originally written on Friday, January 20th)

I find myself sitting at the window seat of a plane bound for New York City. It’s funny. I think I believed more that I would return to Istanbul when I left it than I do now, stuck on a moving vehicle which will bring me three time zones closer. I have the one way ticket. (Eek!) I have the truly loving emails from former students expressing just how excited they are to see me next week. (I got an email this morning from one of my beginners. She had her dad help write it. Adorable.) I have the winter clothes, the sweaty summer clothes, and a new list of mosques and churches I can’t wait to drag myself to. I have different expectations and a jar of herbes de Provence, as well as a jar of vegetable better than bouillon. I am prepared, quoi. Kind of?

In typical Uña fashion, I’ve been having a bout (albeit mild) of existential panic this last week. Driving to a lunch date with a friend on Monday, listening to the Turkish Pop mix Ido made me, I thought to myself: WHY? Why am I returning to a place where I know I will always feel foreign at best? Where I have to remind myself daily that my values and code of ethics are just as legitimate as the very different ones around me? Why am I choosing to put myself in a country people are constantly trying to escape? Why do I have to make things so complicated for myself? And when will the fucking rhetorical questions stop?

All the reassuring platitudes seem inadequate right now. Things older people tell me about seizing life by the horns/balls while I have the health and lack of responsibilities - those feel pretty empty. Ideals and principles and mantras are important, but they’re not making this trip back any easier. I have no job lined up. I have, as of the moment of writing this, no apartment to collapse in on Wednesday afternoon. I’d say you guys have no idea how uncomfortable that makes me, but I’m pretty sure you can use your imaginations. My safety nets are fraying.

And yet here I am, going anyway. Trying to cook up plans C, D, E, and F. Trying to believe in that little voice that once roared at me to follow my passions. Trying to follow my intuition. Feeling obstinate and grumpy instead.

Couldn’t I just stay home, hang out with my cat, eat a bunch of hummus, work on my Etsy store, and call it a life? Would that really be so bad? Sure I’d die alone and hate myself for it, but hey. That’s a while off, right?