Holiday Season

Holiday season:

A time for intense emotions stretching over time zones.

Midnight video calls from Europe

Breakfast for them, bedtime in California

WhatsApp calls from Brazil

Smiling faces in bright summer clothes

Short days and cold nights here

A time for nostalgia:

I miss seeing the Southern Cross in the sky and the many shades of tropical green

Things you miss when you have been gone for too long

Panettone, marzipan, Lebkuchen, Christmas tree

Simple joys of a hyphened household: Brazilian-German-American

Old painful childhood memories dissolving in time

Healing sometimes happens in another language

And the pandemic ranges on:

There is a new lockdown in the Netherlands

New Years eve is cancelled in Rio

Covid cases are rising again in San Francisco

The thought of being on a plane fills me with anxiety

And I still don’t know when I will be able to hug my mother again

Proceed with caution: one day at a time

Dec 25, 2021