I am here because my family is here. If it weren't for them, I would be in a very different situation, somewhere, somehow. I can't imagine what it would be like to be without their umbrella, no matter how far I have gone to try it out. I may want to live on a cobblestoned, lamp-lit street somewhere with a boulangerie downstairs from my flat and a park across the street. Or to live in a warm town by the sea, where people surf in the day and salsa dance at night. There are a million versions of an exotic lifestyle that I can imagine, and I can curse myself for not setting it up to have the enviable career.
But if I had anything else, would there be a perfect little boy in my lap, breastfeeding in his fuzzy white sleeper, a husband who is cleaning up our dinner that I made, and we ate with wine while watching Sex in the City, the show we watched in our village, when the battery of my computer was charged and we lay together under the mosquito net, dark and buzzing all around? Would there be a community garden with chickens and eggs for us to harvest? Friends to go swing dancing with on thursdays? Mom cuddled up with her cat downstairs.
For four weeks, I once had the luck to go to Cuba. My luck to travel, my luck to see this country. Where did this luck come from and what did I do to deserve it. Cuba is picture perfect, gorgeous, and would be proud to be from such a country. The people I met, for the most part, admitted that they wanted to get out. By economics and geography and economy, they are trapped on the little island. It doesn't matter how great a place is, it is prison if you are trapped.
But we don't all get to chose our place of birth, and even having many opportunities that I have had, we may not be able to chose where to live.
I live in paradise in the concrete jungle. It feels good to be home.
Sometimes I have to remind mys
