Playing with the gift of time in November

12/30/2024

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This blog, this post, and all related accounts are not an official Department of State publication, and the views and information presented are the Grantee’s and do not represent the Fulbright Program, ECA, the Post, Fulbright Commission, or the host country’s government or institutions.

“Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back everything is different?”
C.S. Lewis

. . .

I chase after time as desperately as I chased the falling maple leaves in my backyard as a child. This tree began as a sapling that my great-grandfather planted in 1957. It grew into my home’s stoic shelter. Its winding branches slowly breached the barriers of my neighbors’ yards. For decades, it was the largest tree on the block. We, my grandparents and parents, never tapped sap from it. I don’t know why. However, the grand Maple selflessly offered other seasonal gifts. Its branches gifted shade in the summer for patio cookouts. Its trunk and roots served as first base in fourth-of-July wiffle ball tournaments. The fly balls my cousin and I hit into the Maple’s outstretched arms were always returned.

Every autumn, our strong and playful Maple tree released thousands of amber yellow leaves. They fell in bursts and trickles, swirling in the same formation as their helicopter-shaped seeds in the crisp wind. As a little girl, I accepted this invitation wearing a purple fleece jacket, jeans, and thick-toed Keen shoes. I sprinted from one side of the yard to the other. I circled the tree countless times, chasing the leaves as they spiraled down. I giggled in delight as I dove for my next amber gift. The leaves slipped through my fingers every time. It appeared the Maple would win the game.

But I tied the score when it was time to rake the leaves. Mom and Dad would divide and conquer the yard, piling the yellows into vibrant piles that burned like fire under a clear sky.

Then came my favorite part. My parents gestured me to the starting line across the yard. They put a stray stick down on the lawn in front of the aisle of arborvitae evergreen bushes that shaded pesky weeds Mom pulled every humid summer. I lined my feet up behind the stick and bent my knees as I had seen Olympic track runners do. I imagined the cartoon cloud of dust building up around me as I revved myself up for the sprint. The sun broke through the maple’s apertures and illuminated my path.

“Ready, set, go!” my parents announced. I skipped with glee on the first step before gaining my footing. I ran into the fire with a blazing smile on my face.

I flung my arms around the pile, squeezing the leaves close to smell the dirt and wet grass. The stems poked through the fleece that covered my arms. The pointed edges gently tickled my neck. Mom and Dad joined me, throwing up the leaves above my head, so I had another chance to catch them. I caught some leaves that time. Others got caught in my short platinum blond hair. The stems were braided together to form a crown. I felt like an autumn princess. I was the champion.

I am determined to capture one more amber leaf — one more memory. Each one has its storyline written out in the venation. The beginning, middle, and end are plotted in its patterned veins. So each reunion that falls through, each cancellation is a potential memory slipping through my fingers. It is a loss of something I never possessed. When I was little, I brushed off the loss of a leaf. But now, I mourn the loss of potential.

Playing with time is a game. Unlike leaves, time will never stop, drop, and pile at my feet. It is forever moving. Time offers a continuous chase. Well, that is until the time is up. I am worried that I will run in circles, chasing memories until it is too late.

However, time is a gift as well as a game. This November, time gifted me a crispy handful of spectacular memories. I cultivated my own leaf pile through photos and journal entries. I will enjoy the memories I can catch and forgive the ones I cannot.

The last candid photographs, stories, and memories are framed in maple leaf stencils. Grains of syrup sugar sparkle on their surface, giving the illusion that the stills are alive:

I see Flor covering her rainbow marshmallow-stained lips when she tried her first s’more. She stifles a laugh as the chocolate and honey graham crackers melt together on her tongue.
I stood proudly next to the U.S. ambassador on a blindingly humid Wednesday. To her, it was just another Wednesday.
Picture this: a table covered in waxy paper and golden homemade Uruguayan sweets: torta frita, espejitos, and ojitos with marachino cherry red jam. There is plenty of sugar and Coke—a sweet surprise sendoff orchestrated by my big-hearted seventh-grade students. Uruguayan and American flags crisscross on the whiteboard, sending the message, “We don’t believe in goodbyes. This is a see you later.”
I admire the decorative stands of my high school’s unusual job fair. They form a circle of bubble letters, construction paper, and quirky game prompts. It is a classic Uruguayan gathering: it is almost impossible to hear any individual voice in the roar of criss-crossing excitement. The seniors, dressed in runny eyeliner, face paint, and dress shirts, giddily gabble to their classmates who file into the hall. They are golf ball divers, mortuary cosmetologists, pet food testers, and professional huggers. They unify with purpose, joy, and relief that the project has ended. The cacophony of overlapping presentations overwhelms me, but still, I smile with pride. Hopefully, this is a memory, an English memory, none of us will forget.

The bountiful goodbyes are stacked into their distinct pile, sorted into three glittering categories:

First, the goodbyes to my Uruguayan family – my beautiful, funny, wise, and just, well, fun family – were painfully unique. I will never forget their names, but for the sake of longevity I will memorialize them here: Flor, Andrés, Agustina, Carina, Valentina, Simone, Noe, Naty, Nico, Ceci, Mirtha, Ceci, Mono, Juan, Sofie, Jose, Luciana, Nico, Carolina, Sol, Paloma, Alex, Mandy, Ryan, August, Denisha, Jacqueline, Sam, Brody, and Jack.

Second, the goodbye to independence. My first solo apartment with a balcony by the sea was an agonizing, sometimes lonesome, but altogether whimsical ride. Although going back to the things before, to my parents’ house, feels like a step backward, it is not. It is a sidestep, an opportunity to rest, reflect, and reset.

Finally, the goodbye to reality, to the home I had built and loved. Everything I worked for, every relationship nurtured, everything foreign transformed into second nature came to a sudden end. I fell in love with Uruguay, it’s true. Turning away from anything or anyone I love feels like a betrayal. Moving on feels as impossible as returning to the way things were before. But just like the end of any great love, I walk away with lessons, memories, and stories that fill two full journals pages. La Rambla, the incomparably breathtaking sunsets, steaming mate and its sacred preparation, the trademark kilogram tubs of dulce de leche in Andrés’s fridge now decorated with polaroid photos of our trio, the tranqui lifestyle, the rolling hills of Minas and Maldonado, and conversations that lasted until dawn are the main characters in a love story set in río de pajaros pintados: the river of painted birds.

In one month, my castle of familiarity slowly crumbled to the ground until all that was left was me in the center of the debris of scattered living memories. I was heartbroken, but I was never alone. Goodbyes, however painful, are never solitary. I boarded the plane home with pools of tears in my eyes. I let them fall in rivers of their own down to my chin. As I watched the cityscape disappear beneath the clouds, I was overcome with a comforting realization: I mourn now because, for eight spectacular months of chasing memories, I was happy. I was so happy.

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