One year ago: Part 2

One year ago yesterday we deplaned in Dublin. After running through the airport, we realized we had to actually go outside the airport and then run back in, so we blitzed the security line and sprinted into our gate just making the Dublin to Frankfurt leg of our travels. One year ago today we landed in Germany with 4 suitcases and two backpacks and next to nothing in our bank account.

Juliette:
This is the first summer in 10 years that I’m not going to the beach. No sticking the Gloucester beach sticker in the back left passenger window of the Subaru. No ice cream from Captain Dusty’s or Dick and June. No Paper Mermaid, Valentino’s, Virgilios, Atomic Café, Club Passim’s, Jason Harrod concerts, clam chowder, watching the lobsters in the market aquariums, walking on Dog Bar Jetty, greasy pole contests, or meeting friends at Starbucks down in Beverly. No more night walks on Niles Beach, winter runs across the rocks at Halibut Point, or watching the baseball games in the diamond across the street from Plum Cove beach. No more Cabot Street and no more outrigger canoes. No more cheering on friends (and remembering my own pain) at the Blackburn Challenge. No more Fourth of Julys sitting on the Ahlin’s front porch and getting the best view of all the summer firework shows. No more giving Jessie the key to go bang on the church drums, listening to the organist practice, no more junior high youth group and no more games of moose-moose. No more East Side tractor rides. No more popcorn at the Herman’s on Sunday nights or roasting marshmallows with Meg. No more shaking Phil’s hand every Sunday morning, and no more Lanesville.

Goodbye 12 hour work days. No more perilous 5:45am drives at 45mph on twisting 20mph roads trying to make it to the Rockport train station. No more commuter rail with no heat in winter or AC in summer. No more getting crushed in the T, sweating in the station waiting for the Green Line, or trying to find my inhaler as I sprint through the throngs of people desperately trying to catch the early train. No more ‘free’ newspapers. No more dreading Red Sox home games and the havoc they wrecked on public transportation. No more working in a cubicle, hoping for a professor to leave their door open so I could see if it was raining outside. No more moody laser printers and no more day job. No more seeing our breath in our own bedroom in the winter. No more dropped cell phone calls because the tower buoys at sea were dodging high waves.

Hello to learning adjective endings, the Dativ case, meeting internationals, being a marionette with red tape for strings, and hello to brotchen and wurst. Hello cash and goodbye check card. Hello bike and goodbye extra weight. Goodbye yard sales and hello Ikea. Hello garden and hello Gelber Sack. Goodbye ocean and hello river Lahn. Hello 11-digit phone numbers and German radio drama. Hello 19% sales tax. Hello hallo.

Stefan:
No more money for graduate school and no more scholarships for international students. No more face-to-face weekly mentor meetings. No more teaching Biblical Greek to grad students.

Hello to 5^th graders, teaching he-she-it in English class, and mopping up bloody noses on school field trips. Hello to living close enough to play with the dog and help out his mother. Hello brotchen and wurst. Hello to no pastorship leads in Germany and hello to a savings account for the next graduate degree.

Goodbye to wondering what would be our next step after graduation and hello to the foggy answer. We’re en route.

Thanks for reading along this past year.