I would greatly miss Virginia, the rollings waves of the ocean in summer and the bittersweet snow days of winter, but most of all I would miss my father. It wasn´t easy to think that I would soon be thousands of kilometers away from him with email as our only reliable source of communication. Even though a massive change was about to be thrust upon me, without anyway knowing how things from now on would turn out, I still could not bring myself to regret the decision of leaving. I needed a change. This journey was the beginning of a new start.
"Okay, do you have your ticket and iterinary? Make sure you keep it in an accessible area. You don´t want to burrow through your backpack the last minute.", said Garret, my worriesome father. He always patronizing me as if I was not smart enough to know these things for myself. I guess that´s one reason I love him so much.
"Yes, dad. I have it in the front pocket of my pack, secured and safe.", I replied.
"Okay Jennifer. Just make sure you give me a call as soon as you arrive home. It´s imperative that you follow my instructions, you hear?", he said. Stressing the last word as and order.
"Roger that Captain!" I said sarcastically.
He gave me a quick smirk, and I could tell by his eyes he was thinking , "don´t be such a smart alick kiddo." We loved getting on each others nerves, it was something that we found amusing. I get it from him, of course.
"Well come over here to your old paps and give him one more last big hug!", he blurred with a less sincere tone than before.
"Geez who said it was the last? I promise I´ll be back soon pops!"
I fell into my dad´s embrace, and I knew I would greatly miss that. I tried to get last sniff of his cologne and i captured that stimulus in my mind to keep it as a memory.
"I love you dad..."
there was a long pause
"I love you too...hotrod."
When he let go I soon felt insecure and imbalanced, but shortly after I shook myself out of that state of feeling and I stepped back and gave him one last look of recovery. He shed a tear or two, something out of his character. I pivoted towards the loaded mini-van where my meticulous mother waited for me. This was it. This was goodbye.
As we drove away I couldn't help but stick my face and hands up to the back window as I watched the silhouette of my father disappear into a long distance blur of nothingness.
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