The Four Year Rule

I left Albuquerque a week ago, and stopped near Amarillo for a night with Alicia from college. We ate Bobotjie (a South African casserole type dish) and hiked around Palo Duro Canyon. It was a good night, but it reinforced just how out of shape I am. One of these days, I might actually give up beer for longer than a month. But probably not. After lunch with Kellan and Kallison the next day, it was off to Dallas to catch a flight to Pennsylvania on Friday.

I spent the weekend in Pennsylvania but I might as well have been in Poland or South Africa. I was sleeping in an attic bedroom of a (mostly) Polish-speaking family's house out in the middle of the state. The important part about this latest stop on the Nomad Natty Journey...is that this family happens to be related to my best friend Zuzka. And Zuzka happens to be one of my best friends from South Africa who I haven't seen in FOUR WHOLE YEARS!! This "long weekend" was way overdue and not quite long enough.

For some reason, Zuzka's Polish uncle loves country music. I listened to more country music in the past few days than I have in a long time. He also found it pretty funny that I used to have the accent that so many of those singers have. I demonstrated...it was a fun time. Thanks to South Africa, I no longer have that accent. In fact, as soon as I was in the presence of Zuzka, I started saying "ja" again...just like in South Africa. Funny how things come back to you like that.

Zuzka and I only make up half the foursome of my friends from South Africa. They basically saved my life when I was living there. Now, however, it is incredibly difficult to keep in touch with them, seeing as Zuzka lives in Poland, Gail lives in Wales, and Thandi is still in South Africa. Look how cute we were at age 17/18...

Thandi, Gail, Zuzka, and I

So, the least I could do was cross the country to see Zuzka. It seemed a fitting way to use frequent flier miles I'd accumulated flying back and forth to South Africa. We sat on the back porch of her uncle's house, sipping tea or Amarula and reminiscing about our school days and the nights when the four of us would sleep over at my house. We discussed how we'd changed and how things were different, and yet...for us, it didn't seem all that different. Yeah, we're in different places in our lives, we were missing the other half of our group, and we hadn't been together in 4 long years...but the whole weekend was like stepping back in time, in a way. We were 17 again, and it was like nothing had changed.

Zuzka and I on her 18th birthday drinking Sangria

(Side note about Pennsylvania: It's 10 times cooler than Texas or New Mexico. Paradise, comparatively.)

We talked about when I was a new kid in South Africa, and how we met. She helped me put together this portfolio thing in History class on my first day of school. It was one of those moments when I thought my world was going to fall apart because everything was so damn different and everything was changing without my control. And there was Zuzka...except I thought her name was Shishka at the time. Little does she know...that nearly 6 years later, that moment is still helping me deal with change. Haha...that sounds really corny. But basically, my life is a big question mark, and friends like Zuzka are how I keep such a cool head in my nomadic life.

I could be sentimental and reminiscent for pages. It was sad to leave her again, and it reminded me a lot of when we said goodbye last time in South Africa. Gail, Thandi, and Zuzka came to see me off at the airport and gave me a South African flag. It was tough, but I think we all knew that someday we'd see each other again. It wasn't the end...it still isn't.

Saying goodbye 4 years ago

So, Zuzka and I made a pact on the way to the airport that four years was long enough to go between now and our next visit. Four years went by so quickly...four more can't be so bad. So, Four years max...that's the rule.

Saying goodbye again at age 22...

 

 

 

Maybe sometime in the next ten years, the foursome will get together again in some unlikely location like...South America or Asia. Who knows.