A solas

As the plane was setting down on Friday, it occurred to me that this is my first solo trip abroad. I’ve managed to get alone time before when I’ve traveled, but this is the first time I’ve arrived alone. It feels strange and good and not nearly so liberating or empowering as I’d hoped. I’m a bit underwhelmed in already knowing I can get by just fine on my own here, that a solo trip to Guadalajara is nothing daring. Now Tunisia, that would have made me feel like a bigger woman, even traveling with a group of fellow lingua-nerds.

I perceive myself as a pretty solitary person. I always spent lots of time alone, even as a child (weird, nerdy little kids don’t always have friends), and as an adult I work and study alone a great deal of the time. This isn’t to say that I haven’t developed social skills, and I think I do well socially and am blessed with wonderful friends, but I also know that I start to go a little crazy when I don’t get a few hours of time alone every day. Perhaps that’s why I’m such a madrugadora, so that I can start the day out right by myself before anyone else is awake, like today. My best friend and I are opposites in this way; she needs a steady diet of interaction with people to keep from going crazy, and need a break from other people to maintain that sometimes delicate mental balance.

All that said, I can’t believe how much I missed my husband this weekend. Not that he isn’t miss-able—he’s wonderful company. I just didn’t think I’d miss him this much, this soon. We talked briefly on Saturday (when I called he was over at my parents’ house helping my Dad with some things, what a guy!) and I told him I missed him more than I thought I would, but that I figured things would feel socially normalized after the weekend when I get into a routine. The days aren’t so bad—I love walking through the city and getting my bearings and taking in all of this. There is so much to appreciate, like the faded red-and-white checkerboard sidewalks and the sounds of mass and singing coming out little corner churches in the morning, and how it’s so green and things grow everywhere, and oh, the people. Watching the people is the best of all. The nights are harder, though, and I realize that I’ve become accustomed to spending my evenings, even just the last few minutes before sleep, winding down with my husband, and to falling asleep curled up with him. I also miss my cell phone, and feel strangely disconnected without it (though I’m getting used to that, too). I’m one of those people in the habit of calling someone and making commentary when I see something funny. Usually it’s my brother or my best friend, or my husband if he’s not busy at work or in class. Countless times this weekend I saw something striking or amusing and wanted to tell someone, only to remember that I didn’t have a cellphone capable of calling the US. It occurs to me that maybe this is how I manage to spend so much time alone these days; I’m still just a ring away from the people I love most and who appreciate/share my twisted take on life’s little oddities.

On a humorous note, shortly after I left on Friday my husband locked himself out of the house, maybe because I couldn’t make him check for his keys as he left, and on Saturday I ate popcorn at the movies (yes, I went to the movies alone) and got stomach cramps because my husband wasn’t around to remind me not to eat movie popcorn. Funny how we otherwise “independent” people let ourselves slip into dependence when we marry.

Yesterday evening I made a friend. I was in the kitchen fixing a light dinner (I’ve moved into the University guest house) and there was a nice Argentine girl there. We started chatting and talked for a while. She’s also married, here alone without her husband, close to my age, and studying something different than the kids from the US. It’s good to make another friend. Of course, being Argentine, she’s totally useless from the standpoint of my improving my hypothesis-in-the-making about patterns of Mexican speech, and that’s nice. I can enjoy talking to her without trying to observe the little nuances of her word choices and intonation.

I have to get ready for school. I’m glad I already made friends with the Argentine because I’m not sure how much I’m going to have in common with the other students here. I’m kind of an old woman. More to come.