Article 13 - Home

Three weeks home and I’m still living out of my suitcase. It’s unpacking itself, though, items gradually being removed as I need them. At this rate, I figure it’ll be about five months until I can finally put the suitcase away. I say that with confidence – I know exactly how long five months is. Five months is the time it takes to learn eenie-meenie-miny-moe in Spanish. It’s the time it takes to learn how to cross a Costa Rican city street without whimpering. It’s the time it takes to wonder if anyone else has ever felt so alone.
People ask me how it feels, being home after such a long time in a foreign country. In some ways, it feels like I never left, just small details reminding me it was anything more than a dream. The Costa Rican frog-magnet on the fridge, my hair still spiked in their style, the small scar on the side of my face from a pick-up basketball game. In some ways “dream” is the best way to put it – events that were so surreal they seem unconnected, with my curiosity usually winning out over my fear of the unknown. Looking around my kitchen now, the creased green mountains that had surrounded me in my Costa Rican home seem nothing more than the stuff of my imagination. Even the classic dream feeling of “Where am I?” underlines all my memories from the last five months, so much so that being home almost seems like it doesn’t quite fit right anymore. But there’s no question in my mind that I was awake -- no dream could change me like those five months did.
For starters, I’ve become almost too friendly. The open Costa Rican mentality has rubbed off on me, and I find myself jumping up to shake hands and hug, leaving people uncomfortable and wondering what type of favor I need from them. I have unexplained urges to offer food and drink to anyone who rings the doorbell, despite protests such as “I’m just the UPS guy.”
Though I didn’t notice until I got back to the States, Spanish has changed me as well. Friends ask me, “Why are you speaking English so slowly?” while I slip back into the rhythm of my native tongue. The switch feels like driving an automatic car after using a stick-shift for a while. I still panic a bit every time the phone rings, my subconscious believing I’m in Costa Rica as I prepare myself to explain where the rest of the family is and why I have such a ridiculous accent. Spanish spills out of me when I least expect it – just the other day I greeted the cashier at the gas station with a hearty “Hola!”, who much to my embarrassment happened to be Hispanic.
But the biggest change I’ve felt isn’t a Costa Rican one – it’s a sense of confidence. The fear of new things, failure, embarrassment, all seem to pale when I think back to my time abroad. I paused for a moment the other day, about to walk into a party of older kids I mostly didn’t know. Five months ago I might have turned around and gone home, scared of being the awkward young guy. Instead I smiled and stepped through the door, thinking how trivial this was compared to passing through the front gate on my first day of school – at least everyone at this party spoke my language. Even during the last couple of months in Costa Rica I felt a change in myself. A few days before I came home, I remember my mom asking me, “Will you be comfortable getting yourself to the airport?” Comfortable? At this point I’d try my hand at landing the plane.
But as much as I appreciate it now, that confidence didn’t come easy. If nothing else, it was the result of learning how to overcome the most unexpected pain I’d ever felt – homesickness. Homesick for my family, for English, for the beat-up Honda civic I bought last year. At first, I thought I just needed to get out more, live the Costa Rican lifestyle. I tried to fill my time with the most exotic experiences possible, and for the most part, I did. But that wasn’t the answer – I still had trouble living in the moment, the purpose of each day feeling like a contest to see how many new things I could do so I’d have something to write home about. Some nights I’d stare at the ceiling from my bed, thinking about how incredible my day had been. But the question always ringing in the back of my mind was the same: “What am I doing here?”
It took me until I got home to fully understand the answer. I didn’t go to Costa Rica for a vacation. I didn’t go to have fun, or to get a tan. (Despite the constant sun, I still blend in with our refrigerator door.) I went to grow up. To learn how to function without the safety net of my parents, to discover how to make new friends without help, to see farther into a culture that most people will never even know exists. My five months in Costa Rica were without question the hardest of my life – but also the most valuable.
I stood in front of the open fridge the other day, hungry for something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. The stacks of food we have still amaze me – so much selection. Unable to find anything I wanted, I moved over to the pantry, grabbing a cookie just because I could. Still not quite right. Suddenly, I stood up straight as I realized what I was craving. Rice and beans.