Mother's Day Musings

For my second Mother's Day in four years, I find myself in another country (sorry Mom!) observing how other people choose to celebrate the incredible women in their lives. It never ceases to amaze me how one simple holiday like Mother's Day can highlight the common threads of humanity that we often overlook. Sitting at a bench in the metro station I watched man after man, and family after family walk by with bouquets of flowers and brightly wrapped gifts in transit to visit that special mother or grandmother. Would it really have been such a different scene if I was sitting in the subway in New York? I think not. Substitute English for Spanish, spring for fall, etc., and it's hard to tell where one culture leaves off and another one begins. This past week has been full of these unexpected cultural comparisons that have caused me to think more about what it means to be a human being.

The most important moment for me involves my friend Tanja from the Netherlands that I met in the hostel my first month in Santiago. At the end of March she left Santiago and traveled to the south of Chile for a job with a Dutch company selling tulip bulbs. However, she came back up to Santiago this weekend and is staying with me until Monday. Today we spent the whole day together with our friend Viti (from Argentina) walking around the city and talking about life. We compared our "first day in Chile" experiences and it really struck me how similar they were. There were the nervousness, the tears, the doubts about our decision, and the overall feeling of being completely alone. But as each of us continued to tell our story we always ended up repeating the same sentiment: "I was really feeling [awful/sad/scared/worried] until I met [insert name of person] and then I started to feel like I was going to be okay." It wasn't the weather, or our jobs, or our studies that made the difference. It was the people we met and the friendships we created as we began to form our Chilean lives. I don't want to say that the people I've met here are more important to me than my friends and family in the U.S., but as Viti so perfectly put it "we have to take care of each other, because we're all that each other has here." So as we continued to chat and reminisce in the cafe this afternoon, I couldn't help but feel that being stripped of everything familiar in my life has actually been an incredible opportunity to re-discover the goodness in others. To make yourself vulnerable to fear and doubt, only to be lifted up by the kindness of those around you is a powerful experience.

My final thought is to my own amazing mother. Thank you for the last 23 fantastic years!!! You have given me unconditional love and support even when I choose to do crazy things like move to Chile for 10 months and for that I will be forever thankful. I owe you far more than a tap dancing lesson and hope you had an excellent Mother's Day!!!

Love, Krista