PASSAGE OF TIME


Daniel had to spend a couple days in Sao Paulo, so last night was my first night here without him. 


It turned out to be really nice to spend time with his family alone, and it forced me to speak Portuguese.  At dinner, we shared stories of culture differences, laughing at all the awkward things we've accidentally said while learning a new language.  They had just spent a month traveling through Argentina and Chile and told stories of things they’d said that, in Portuguese meant one thing, but meant something completely inappropriate in Spanish.  I had similar stories from Italy. Listening to them made me feel more comfortable trying to speak Portuguese, knowing they could all relate to the difficulties.  After dinner, Daniel’s sister brought out photos from their childhood. 

It always feels like your going through some weird time machine when looking at old photos.  Looking at photos of your parents when they were young puts almost anyone in awe the first few times.  Seeing that they were really your age once, or that they not only had a life before you, but one before each other as well.  Or worse, seeing what they dressed like or how they wore their hair (no offense of course). Looking through Daniel’s photos had a similar affect.  It really looked like he grew up in an entirely different world.

Sometimes I get frustrated realizing we don’t have many shared experiences. Like when I have to explain what Trick or Treating is, or Prom, or the still very confusing tradition of Sororities and Fraternities. It often makes me feel lonely, like he won’t ever really understand the things that are so much a part of my past.  

Looking at his pictures made me see that, of course, he too had a whole life I know nothing about. I felt so far removed from the places and things in the photos.  The atmosphere was so different. The landscapes and homes, and playgrounds looked so foreign to me.  For the first time it began to really sink in that the person I am so close to, really did grow up in a different country, speaking a different language, with different customs, holidays, foods, streets, cars, clothes, dances, games...different everything. 

I looked through a lot of photos, so curious to his past, to his present.  After awhile, the more I looked at the photos, surprisingly, the closer I felt to him, wanting to know more and more about the stories behind them. 

By the time I looked through each and every photo in the large unorganized and overflowing box, I felt I loved him even more than I did before.  Being here helps me understand him, where he comes from, his family, his life, and what it might have been like to grow up here.  

The truth is, although experiences like holidays, or things we consider “rights of passage”, seem to have a huge impact and importance to us, its really our relationship to others that shape who we really are.  And the photos of Daniel kissing his sister and grabbing her cheeks might as well have been a photo of my brother and I.  The person he is, the love in his family, and the way he sees life is really not foreign to me at all.