I know, it’s time. You’ve got a midnight curfew and I can’t make you late. But know that you’re leaving under heavy protest!

If you could just stay a little longer. Don’t let that thug June bully you away. You deserve far more than 31 days. What an unjust calendar system we have! February has been petitioning for years and was finally awarded one extra day but only every four years. What a scam.

All my thanks for making your annual visit. I enjoyed reaching my 24th birthday, ringing the school bell for the last time, and eating ice cream (although I don’t need you to stop by to indulge in a cone of vanille et fraise from the Star gas station.)

Why the dramatic departure, you ask? I’ve never been through such a tortured goodbye with you before. Maybe it’s because June has never scared me like it does at this very moment. If you thesaurus scared, you’ll have every emotion flowing from my head to my heart and gushing out my eyes in the form of wild tears that my roommate-brother has now gotten used to. What a guy. (Lately he’s also had to adjust to my strongly abrupt mood swings. I sit for hours pensively working at my computer or reading a book. Suddenly, he finds me packing boxes, making a spreadsheet of our souvenir gifts, and selling unopened antibacterial gel to the neighbors. Indeed, what a guy.)

So, it’s time to say goodbye to you. Oh, but how? Cue the handy acronym! We missionaries carry them around for times like these. The closure model introduced to me during my training two years ago seems like something invented by the Amazon proselytizers of old. Build a R.A.F.T. they said. Oh, but how? Make Reconciliation, find Affirmation, say Farewells, and Think destination. Practical, charming even. But I don’t have the best record for taking advice. Exhibit A: The melted hole from ironing my Adidas wind pants in 8th grade.

All childish errors aside, I have to listen this time. I have to build a RAFT because it’s I that am leaving, not you. I am moving into June with two standard issue 23-kilo Rubbermaid tubs, a few thousand pictures of this special place, and that one poisonous emotion of fear.

I have absolutely nothing to be afraid of I tell myself. Some people, much braver than I, start over with nothing. No plan. No place. No clue. Spoiled me, look at what I have. A detailed plan with an acceptance letter to a fine grad school Education program. A comfortable place I’ll call home with a bed of my own, a Pampered Chef casserole dish, a vintage typing desk, and a coffee shop within walking distance. The rest, though, is fill-in-the-blank with a few multiple choice. And I haven’t studied.

So it’s really me standing on the front porch, clutching my car keys, glancing at my watch, and sighing as I see the seconds forcing me closer to June (who will NOT receive such poignant letters like you, sweet May. I’m confident my negative sentiments toward that month will be appropriately expressed in letters about the dreaded heat, lack of daily routine, and tiresome re-runs. Ugh, June. Booo.)

You’ll always be my favorite. See you next time I pass through with my new flip flops, shimmery lip gloss (with SPF 15), and hopefully a little less fear about the unknowns.

Until then,
Amber

What am I saying? It’s not just an arrival, it’s a sweet welcome home celebration! You’re finally here! Our prodigal precipitation has returned at last! Bring robes and rings! Kill the fatted calf and let’s feast! For tonight it rained!

Far down the road we could see you coming. Oh yes, I had my suspicions when the humidity reached 80% this morning. Then the overcast skies, a dead giveaway. Plus, it’s all in the name: M-A-N-G-O rains. I’ve been enjoying about a mango a day, so I guess you just knew it was time.

Good to see you, old friend. Six months is far too long to be apart.

Right now watching your fresh drops dust off cars and trees and my dog, I can’t help but reflect on our extended absence from each other. In October I was in denial about your departure, December distracted me with its chilly 60-degree temps, and by March I was so consumed with sheer heat that dreaming of your return only made it worse. I forgot what you sound like pounding on the metal porch, your smell that covers the African stink, and how it feels to play with you “like a slippery wet toy” as my 6th grader Cole once wrote.

Inevitably all of this reminds me of AMERICA and how today’s reunion is one giant metaphor for all that awaits me in June. The mental list of Stuff I Miss has shrunk over the past 2 years. So much of it I’ve simply forgotten. The feel of carpet, driving, greasy Sonic, life sans mosquitoes, English, cushioned church pews, bookstores, Oreos and milk.

Thinking of those familiar images leads me to ask, When I finally return home and America wraps me in her arms, spins me around, and says to begin the feasting because what once was lost is now found, will I grab a fork and dig in? Or will I scan the table and realize that it’s not so appetizing anymore. What used to cause insatiable hunger is now unsatisfying? Will I discover my true thirsts are camel rides in the desert, afternoon tea, crossing the Niger each morning, and of course mango rains?

I’ll be expected to slide right back into my culture, just like I expect you to hang around for a while longer. But you understand, mango rains, because that’s not what you do. It’s your nature to come only once or twice before rainy season begins in June; you don’t belong here right now. You are just passing through to offer what you can—relief from the heat, nourishment for the ground, and a delightful afternoon of play. You won’t come back until next April when the mangoes are ripe. Then from across the ocean, I’ll think of you for the first time, all over again.

Soaking it in while I can,
Amber