“Hi honey, how was school today?”
”Good, I got picked to go to France next year as exchange student!”
”That’s fantastic honey! Could you put your mother on real quick?”
It looks like yet another journey is about to begin.
It seems that her school has a yearly program where about twenty to twenty five students trade places for a couple of weeks each year and try to absorb other cultures and traditions. I figure with college fast approaching it couldn’t hurt to have these types of things on her transcripts and resume. After all, these days you never know what’s gonna push someone else over the top or become a deal breaker. Every little bit helps.
So after talking with her mom over finances we decided we could swing it. After all is said and done it should cost around two grand. Me and her mom figured we’ll split the cost and she’s gonna have to save some of her own money for things like souvenirs and entertainment.
Freshman year has been pretty easy so far for her. Made the honor roll twice with a 3.85 GPA while taking advanced Math, Science and English, got elected to Student Council, played junior varsity soccer and is in a shitload of book clubs. All of this while managing to keep hold of her first real boyfriend. Things are looking up.
Given our well chronicled set of circumstances, I’m constantly amazed about the things she’s managed to overcome in her short fifteen years. A lot of other kids might have long ago packed it in and blamed their troubles elsewhere. Parents divorced, friends constantly changing, not having what most other kids now take for granted, the list goes on and on.
And yet, she not only preserves, she thrives.
I sometimes have a habit of finding myself wallowing in prolonged funks where whatever I seem to attempt doesn’t work out the way I planned. I guess it’s something like buyer’s remorse because I always thought that what I was doing at the time was the right thing. I get down on myself, my friends and my work suffers from it. I hole up indoors and try and shut out the rest of the world and drown away my sorrows. I often wonder if my life is just one big if statement. It’s the whole coulda, shoulda, woulda, didn’t scenario that most of experience at least once in their lives.
But sometimes there's the light at the end of tunnel that makes it all worthwhile.
If there’s one thing that there’s no regrets about, it’s that.
So now I’m digging around on the Internet trying to find out as much as I can about some place called Le Harve and what the city and surrounding countryside is like. We all need distractions every now and then and this is one that will be shared between the both of us. Maybe that’s the best kind.
So if anybody out there has some firsthand experience with the daily going’s on in Le Harve, please feel free to share it with me. I’ll be sure to pass it on.
Thanks and peace
borgo