Eat Pray Travel

When I left my job earlier this year, a then-coworker asked me: "So are you going to do an Eat Pray Love kind of thing?" And I replied to him: "If I tried that, I wouldn't make it out of Italy."

I soon leave for the Motherland with my Mother (no, I am not sure what she calls it). And in preparing for this excursion, I find myself with an overwhelming number of emotions. Earlier this week for example, I was putting songs on my mom's iPod that included some that I hadn't heard in a very long time. You see, just short of 10 years ago, I lost a dear first cousin, Dimitri. Those of you who are either (1) Greek or (2) knew me in high school may remember him as he did spend a couple of summers with us. Dimitri was about six months older than me, putting him about a year younger than Bro, so he was able to forge a meaningful relationship with each of us. I remember my dad telling me then how excited *he* was that Dimitri was coming, because Dimitiri was a little younger than the age my dad was when he immigrated to the US, and he understood the wide-eyedness of the coming to America experience.

In time, Dimitri's dream was to immigrate here too. Back then, he and his accent were a clear hit at summer camp. He had developed a following. And he loved it. He was full of personality. And drive. He put himself through business school and was able to parlay that into a sales role with a leading Greek software company, specializing in shipping companies. His firm had occasion to make a sales call in Seattle, and given that he had family here, well, they sent him of course. I had just started a new job. Though I was driving my dad's hand-me-down, an '84 Cadillac Eldorado (dad's from the era where Cadillac used to be the actual Cadillac of the line), I was looking at buying a new Miata. And of course, while I was with D, we talked about cars. His dad, Mimi, was the car nut in the family, and his love of hotrods ended up infecting most of us. So D and I were together in the Caddy, and I asked him what he thought. He said, "Get it, and enjoy it. And buy a stick-shift."

When I ended up visiting Greece in May of 2000 after many years, I was so eager to see him. I was traveling with two friends and he came to pick us up. The material difference from the last time that i had seen him was that he had been diagnosed with cancer. It was a very aggressive kind; my family kept urging him to come to Seattle for treatment. When I saw him, he put on his best face. He picked us up in Syntagma Square and took us to one of his favorite restaurants. I forgot he was sick. And he didn't want me to remember. By year end, he did come to Seattle. But it was too late. The cancer had gotten the best of him, and on February 5th, 2001, he passed. In an act of generosity, his mother gave me the book of CDs that he brought with him. The collection he brought spanned ABBA Gold to Yiannis Parios (his favorite) to Herb Alpert. After he died, I listened to those CDs incessantly, until I just couldn't anymore. I hadn't heard the music until this week. And when I did, I wept. (Pause - as I am now.) I cry because I ache to see him again, to witness his zest for life, his passion for fun, and to talk about the latest addition to the Aston line.

While there are those who are absent, there are a great many who are present. And what I have come to learn as I have gotten older is that the richness of all of these relationships is what makes me me. I am instantly accepted when I mention who my parents are, or who my grandfather was. It's my family. It's where I come from. And it's where I need to go to. "Anticipation is the purest form of pleasure." Though I am not sure if the person who said this had ever spent time in Greece, I don't wholly disagree. The thought of seeing my cousins, aunts and uncles again delights me. It delights me to the point where I think about certain people, knowing that I will be with them soon, "να τα πουμε απο κοντα," that instantly puts a smile on my face.

So to all of you who are staying put and not headed anywhere, I urge you to pick up the phone or write a short note to someone you love. Keeping people close, no matter the distance, takes effort, and it takes less than you think. Remind them of why they matter to you. Do not wait to create joy for yourself or for someone else. You may even make someone's day in the process. My commitment to you (and to me) is to do the same.