2010

Tonight, I was at Chapter's to pick up a couple of extra copies of Verge Magazine's winter issue, in which there is an article published that I wrote about my experiences in South Africa. My mom and I were wandering through the store, perusing after we had picked up the magazines, and we stopped at the travel literature section, where she asked if I had enjoyed Charley Boorman and Ewan McGregor's book "Long Way Down," which she had sent me as an inspiration gift over the summer. I had spent hot summer days at my aunt's house in the woods in Middle Sackville, Nova Scotia, savouring the words of Boorman and McGregor's journals about their motorcycle trip from John O'Groats to Cape Town in between staring at my own computer screen, poring over first-draft edits of "Ekhaya."

I stopped and looked at the shelf of travel books. So many people in the world have so many stories. They've taken so many journeys. I know that I am privileged to be among those people, to be part of this world. I looked at white faces among African faces, books about people who've faced hardship and who dream about a world at peace, covers with maps of dusty, hot continents, and frozen ones. I thought about people who I care about who are all over the world right now - old friends in Sweden, acquaintances in Switzerland, new adventures in New Zealand, and friends who I'd left behind in Cape Town whose lives continue without me.

I thought about my article in Verge, and I looked over those books, and I said, "Mommy, one day my book will be here." As the New Year quick approaches, I think, Dear 2010, I hope that you bring prosperity and a little help for a little book that was a labour of love and I think deserves it.