pos.si.ble

At 4:30am, the freeway to Flint is all but empty. It’s strange to be driving on this side of 23 at this hour. Normally, I would be coming back home after spending the evening with friends at my fave bar. Tired, smoking and singing to stay awake for the hour drive. The sky isn’t as purple in this direction, but hazier: a fine amethyst mist covers the horizon. I’m driving to the hospital to accompany my sister during her DNC. It’s the fifth day of the new year.

I found out about the miscarriage abruptly as it occurred. She’d tried to reach me but I was being evasive. When I finally picked up the call, she was conferenced with another sister, who was explaining how if L just waited 6 more months to try again, she and my other sister could get pregnant together. L had inspired her. Someone said the word “lost” and it registered. I tumbled over my tongue a bit before perception, before articulation. She said “I tried to get a hold of you.” Lost is a funny word. It’s a funny feeling.

I arrive an hour later, locate my sister and her husband on the 3rd floor in pre-op. She is laying in the bed in a lavender gown that blows up like a tent because it’s attached to a hot air shoot. The system is called Bair Paws, and we scheme ways to take it home with us. It seems to be attached to the wall, but hope springs eternal in the evasive heart. We don’t talk about the procedure. We don’t talk about her fear, which is present on her face and in her husband’s posture. We don’t talk about the sadness, cradled on the mantle of all our shoulders. She’s wheeled in at approximately 7am after a bout of relaxants work efficiently to set her to sleep. She’s just cognizant of our goodbye, not enough to see her husband watch her be wheeled away around the corner. The “removal” takes 30 minutes, and another hour and a half pass before she is roused from the anesthetic. Its effects are gone quickly, and in less time that it took to prep, we’re being ushered out of the hospital and back home.

At home we have breakfast, sit on the bed and talk quietly. Her mother in law, our mother, and my niece are in and out. We’re holding hands loosely and we favor the dramatic: “What if I didn’t wake up?” “But you did.” She considers whether she wants to try again, or if her daughter will be OK alone–happy, well loved. I say “Sisters are nice.” She says “They are.” Not usually prone to the sentimental, this moment stands mostly singularly in the acknowledgment of the significance of our friendship. We have been together our whole lives.

Responsibility creeps in steadily, and I leave to drive back home, back to campus, to begin the first day of classes. It’s lighter out now, and the freeways show signs of life. Everyone hustles and bustles and though I’m driving too, I feel the moment suspended. Isolated and dull, it hovers above my head in constant replay: a fragment of lost time, lost memory, lost possibility. Where does hope go now?

Happy Thankschicken

At my childhood house, a two bedroom apartment above my father’s store in Burton, my sister’s mother in law pulls three stuffed chickens from the oven. Her family does not favor the taste of turkey, and so she has prepared another poultry instead. They are golden brown and beautiful, but they are not turkey, this is not my family house any longer, and she is not *my* mother. My parents now live in a house, a mere 30 years after moving to the United States, and they are currently in Boston, visiting a different sister. Nevertheless, the meal is delicious, and my sister and I laze on the couch after, looking through ads for Black Friday, drinking tea. Whatever else I feel, I know this: I am with my sister; I am home.

Returning from Palestine, I spent the remainder of my summer in a daze. I cried as I unpacked my suitcases. I fell asleep sitting upright in Panera. My throat grew hoarse with telling. My throat grew hoarse from not telling. I remembered, or realized, or both, that I no longer have a home in Palestine. But what was worse, I didn’t even belong there anymore. Because you can belong someplace without calling it home. I belong many places, but home is a more slippery thing. I don’t know that I have one these days–a physically or geographically marked space–but what I have, and what I am ultimately thankful for, are amazing thoughtful people with whom I *feel* at home.

I feel at home, sitting on my sister’s porch stairs, my niece facing me on my lap, her head nestled on my shoulder as we take in the lazy July sun.

I feel at home, standing on the porch of my friend’s home as I realize she is home after all. I knocked and no one answered, but the timing was serendipitous; as I turned to leave, she arrived on her bike.

I feel at home, walking into a cabin where my friends are celebrating a birthday. They cheer, and people stand to hug me, and darling S hands me a drink.

I feel at home sitting on my couch with A, smoking cigarettes and divulging our summer in 30 minute bursts.

I feel at home across from B at our favorite Mexican restaurant, laughing as we search for our favorite waiter.

I feel at home in my favorite bar, drinking rum and coke doubles from K while JR stops to sit for a minute between customers.

I feel at home, finally, when I gather these folks together in one room, and we sit and eat and drink. For a night my heart is full and my tears are from joy.

So this November I will try to remember how fortunate I am. And I will try to remember to be thankful for all the love I receive in this world. And for all the different ways and the beautiful people that tell me: here now. You are home.

Fall Break (Down)

All three smoke alarms were going off at once. I didn’t know I *had* three smoke alarms. I’d cranked up the oven to bake biscuits, which need high heat to rise properly, and the heat must have been too much. Every time I fanned one off, another would start up until I was sure my head might burst. The cats were hiding, but couldn’t escape the sound no matter where they went. In the cacophony, the only choice was to take them all down. Then, blessed silence, but for the ringing in my ears, which eventually faded.

I had meant to stop being so maudlin on this forum. All this melancholy, melodramatic obsessive shit–I tire of it. I tire of myself, when I can’t shake it off and move on. I just want to be happy. I really do, but there’s the smoke alarms, the crazy parents, the unrelenting feeling of displacement, the loneliness. All these things combine to be more than me–shoving and pushing until I’m back where I started, talking endlessly about my feelings. I brood. I huff. I cry. I rant. I drown myself out, even as I try to stop speaking.

My mother called me. She wants to know about my brother’s sex life. These are things I deliberately don’t talk to my brother about. In fact, I avoid talking to my brother about many things, because I am constantly being mined for information. My mother calls me, 3 out of 4 times, to see if I know something she doesn’t. It’s awful, playing double agent between your brother and parents. They think he’s lost, and want to forcibly show him out of the forest. I sympathize, but I hate making him feel watched. I hate treating him like a child who can’t make his own mind, who needs to prodded into what’s “best” for him. They hate his girlfriend, and they want him to leave her. He works 70-90 hours a week, sends her money so she doesn’t have to work. I’m not crazy about the situation either, but I won’t make him choose between me and her. They will. They do. It breaks me. And even as I promise I will never make my love for him conditional, I know I’m guilty by association to both parties. My mother sees it as taking sides. If I take his, I’ll be out, too. If I take hers, I lose him. In some ways I already have, our closeness precariously wavering as we both avoid saying or doing something that can be traced, exploited. My baby brother. My beautiful brother. I think I failed him.

Whenever someone hurts me, I find a way to make their failure mine. It’s part narcissism, part control freak. If I had set the proper parameters, if I had done something better, smarter, differently–I wouldn’t feel hurt. If I control the source, I control the feeling. I can walk it off. I’ve been trying to make my way around my hurt feelings for two weeks. It hasn’t worked yet. The tenderness around my heart? It’s still there. Squeezing in my chest as I do the most mundane or elaborate tasks. What should have been something brief, beautiful and easy cut me deeper than I want to acknowledge. I don’t want to believe I let myself be so stupid, so open again. So I replay the moment over in my head, I replay the fallout every time I’m home, and I want to run screaming. Out of the house, out of the bar, out of the city. It follows me across county lines, and I bring the despair home, where I am already more isolated than I care to be.

I have friends, amazing, kind and supportive friends. I have sisters, smart and strong and loyal. I have so much, it feels greedy to want more. But I do–guilty even as I type it–erasing lines that sound too sad, too needy. I want so much my heart feels cavernous–my voice echoing so loud it’s a fire alarm, a siren’s song. I’ll swim until I drown. She’ll sing until I go down.

You’ve got your ball, you’ve got your chain

I almost got into a car accident tonight. I started to write “I almost died tonight” but that seems a little over-dramatic, given that I wasn’t actually in one, there’s no way of calculating the likelihood of death if I had been in one. I was returning from a friend’s place, from an evening where I was not my best self, and was routinely snarky with an undercurrent of mega bitch. It/I was shitty, and the most I wanted was to be home, so badly that I questioned leaving it in the first place. So I was driving, safely, stone sober when a car in the left lane slowed to turn. In the right lane, I moved along, but the car behind the turning car evidently did not see my behemoth Olds, and came within inches of ramming sidelong into my car, into me. This is no Dave Matthew’s Band crash. This would have been a “that driver is fucked” crash. My gut managed to occupy both my knees and my throat, and I shook the majority of the drive home. When I had finally stopped, another car, in the exact same scenario, nearly side-slammed me again. Michigan, why are you trying to kill me?

Constantly predicting my own death, I have long assumed that if the cancer doesn’t get me like it gets most, I’ll go in a car. Isolated in the midst of getting from here to there. It’s a kind of poetic death, if you’re into morbidity. You die without ever reaching your destination, without ever feeling the weight lift off your shoulders when you are finally home. Without time to consider your options, why you spent so much time traveling, but very little time satisfied in the journey. I’ve heard the adage about the journey, not the destination, being important. I think this is bullshit. I don’t like being lost, I don’t like movement for the sake of it. I like functionality and form, the accomplishment of doing what you set out to do. I like arriving, and the journey is just that. Tolerable, sometimes enjoyable, but not the reason I get in my car in the first place.

At home now, I can’t sleep. I used to have panic attacks at night. When I lived at home, I was convinced that if I slept, I wouldn’t wake. When I moved, I would hyperventilate, convinced that my father was ill. I would stay up all night, waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for dawn. When the sun came, I felt better. What respectable person dies during the daylight? I would call my sister, my mother, chat casually, ensuring that nothing was amiss. I haven’t had an attack like that in maybe a year? It’s hard to remember, so eagerly I put it away–tucked under the sheets as I make the bed, waiting for another night to come up, like that sock you lost but couldn’t be buggered to sift through the layers for.

So I breath. Deliberately, slowly. Wait for the shaking to subside again, wait for my body to relax its wound tension. I can feel the possibility in my bones, in every fiber of my body. I try to distract myself with happy things, a trick my father suggested when I was a girl, and had nightmares. 27 now, I still think of birthday cake. Oddly, I always imagine a white cake with a single candle in the middle, though I have no recollection of ever receiving such a cake on my birthday. If I were a different kind of person, I might say it’s the opposite of dying, that birthdays are an affirmation of living. Really, I think it’s because it was the one day where you got all the attention, all the presents. But I am not a different person. I am me, selfish, flawed, biting, sometimes brutal. I am me, but I didn’t die tonight.

the re-return

I am skilled at leaving. I left Michigan when I was 10, Palestine when I was 14. I left Michigan again when I was 24, Ohio at 26. Over the years, I’ve dropped many schools, ended friendships, forgotten names and erased the banal minutiae that make up the everyday of places behind me. It’s easy now, the process of moving on, packing up, starting over. So few things and people have survived these overhauls, their staying power a sign that perhaps I am not as strong as I wish I were. Or if holding on is harder, stronger than I know.

My last day in Ma’in is also my last day in Jordan. We awake early, per my mother’s request, and go to the main fall before it’s open to the public. The water is steaming, pungent with the smell of minerals. Against my back the fall is the strongest, hardest shower I’ve ever taken, times 100, but more erratically distributed. Sometimes a shot of cool water makes it through, shocking and a pleasant change. It’s exhausting, the lap of the water against your body, the effort exerted to stay vertical against the pressure. We stay for an hour, slowly make our way back to the resort for breakfast, where a lush-lipped beady-eyed cook stalks me around the dining hall and all the way out to the pool. I ignore him, but even my mother notices. On this trip she is realizing something she never imagined: some people actually find me attractive, charming.

From Ma’in we make our way back to Amman, where I spend the afternoon with my family and relatives,  packing my suitcases. By some miracle (my mother) everything fits, under the weight limit and then I am just left with waiting. My relatives re-emerge, playing cards on the Veranda. Mina has found three more figs on the very top of the tree, and he saves them for me, so I eat them, thank him. By now I have won him over, and as he helps me lug my bags up the stairs, he implores me, “Stay a while longer.” I say so many goodbyes. Some heartfelt–because it was good to see you, meet you, be with you. Some perfunctory, for my presence or absence means nothing in your world. At the airport, farewells abound, and we are a tiny scene in Love Actually. I pass through inspection, get my tickets, check my bags, and now I am no longer we, I am just me, going.

The hour is late, my body and brain exhausted from simply everything, so I fall asleep before the plane even takes off. I am asleep the whole way to Paris. I appreciate the beauty of the Charles De Gaulle airport before I am sleeping again, from Paris to Amsterdam. I move through customs, get questioned about traveling from Palestine to Jordan by a curious security agent, and then I am aboard a third plane, my last, from Amsterdam to Detroit. By now I have my fill of sleep, so I subtly fight with my seatmate over the armrest, watch two movies which leave me feeling desolate and convinced I will never be in love again. Never feel loved again. I try hard to focus on leaving, but it’s all ambivalent, my real feelings projected away from myself and onto the heroines cheeky faces in forgettable romantic comedies.

When I watch the little digital plane hover and land in Detroit on the small screen in front of me, I finally feel excited. I am so close, so close. The plane lands, and I make the arduous rounds of US customs, where I lie about having food in my luggage, evade search, and walk outside into the heavy Detroit air. A friend picks me up from the airport, and I feel so strange, speaking entirely in English, peppering my language with curse words, which had been excised for most of my trip. There is no hitch here but I sound foreign to my own ears. Who has this pitch? Who has this inflection? The feeling fades quickly, and by the time I am at my apartment, I am marveling at how easy it was to come back, to remember, to fall into patterns of my life, with nothing visible to suggest a change but the suntan that will surely fade by winter.

In the next few days, I will pick up my parts that fractured, reassemble them: here is my sister, here is my niece, here is my friend, my cat, my car, my beer, my mail, my Meijer. Everything is in place, everything is slightly askew. I will wonder what Rachel is doing, and remember I left her. I will wake thinking about my mother’s tea, and there will be coffee. I will go to flush the toilet, but the lever is on the front of the tank, not the top. I will field questions about my trip, speak in the past tense. I will ache in my back, my throat, my heart. I will ache, divert my attention with work, crushes, laundry, the quest for my missing tank tops. I will fret over paying rent next month, I will consider cutting groceries from the budget. I will long for the figs, for the fackoose, for Mina’s smile, for Bishara’s laugh, for Yazin’s chubby little arms, his songs. I will drive and praise higher powers for lanes. I will wake early, sleep early as my  body copes with jet lag.

I will, willing myself to be here, to be happy, to be OK, to be something besides sad and lonely and aching. I will the ache to linger, proof I went, that I cared, that I didn’t already forget. I forget what I wanted, if I ever knew. At the end, there is no answer, no conclusion, no neat tidy understanding or lesson learned. There is just me, moving along, getting on, pushing through to something I can’t foresee.

Sun, Salt, and the Sea

I have been practicing my floating. As a non-swimmer, the feeling of my body weightless and at the whim of the water is unsettling. I am much more comfortable in control, my feet firmly planted on the basin. I began experimenting in the kiddie pool of our resort in Punta Cana, when we visited in February. A mere two feet deep, I could easily find solid ground again when it became too scary. Drowning is my earliest memory; my mother taking swimming lessons at the Y with her daughter, her hands under my belly. I am before years but I recall the emptiness when she withdrew her support, my small shape sinking into the blue of the pool. I went under twice since then, once at my Aunt’s pool when I played too close to the edge, and fell in. No one heard the splash but my cousin, who came to my aid as I bobbed uselessly. Again a couple years later coming down a slide at a beach in Michigan. I had studied the other riders carefully, watched as they came off the slide, fell into the water, and buoyed up seconds later. When I went down, I didn’t come up, and they sent a lifeguard when it became clear I wouldn’t find the way back on my own.

In the Dead Sea, floating is easy. Lot’s Wife, that unnamed rebel, carries me, her body turned to such salt that it kills all the water’s inhabitants, cakes the rocks with her essence. The Dead Sea is riotous when we visit. The waves crashing against the rocks, which despite years of sanding, remain sharp under my feet. I lay in the water, moving my limbs in ways I can’t against gravity, and feel the same discomfort, nestled as it always is on my lower back. The water splashes into my eyes and I make my way clumsily back to the shore, eyes closed, blinded. A lifeguard comes to my aid with fresh water, pouring it over my face, demanding I open the eyes, wash out the burn. It’s like a baptism and I see anew; he pulls me up out of the water with one arm, hauls me back safely to the dock. I go in again later, careful to keep my head up. The Sea is luxurious, slippery over my skin. I feel wounds healing, my scars tickle. I paint myself twice with the mud from the water’s depths, letting it cake dry on my skin before heading back to the water to rinse.

The resort attached to this hunk of beach is beautiful. We tried a different place first, but their beach was closed, so we move on to the Movenpick, a Swedish import. In Amman, the shore is bought up by mostly foreign corporations that turn their chunk of land into a rich haven: upscale, expensive dining; top notch liquor; brown bodies in uniforms, fulfilling needy guests’ every whim. I won’t pretend I don’t enjoy the space, but I hate that my experience is filtered through this. Despite their best efforts, though, the sea remains as is. I am glad I haven’t gone back to the shore in Palestine, for I know that the size of the Sea is shrinking rapidly there, drained for use. The resort is a series of infinity pools leading up to the waterfront, and we watch the sun set. From afar, the Sea is as any other, but we know better. We have felt her secrets on our skin, tasted her brine, slathered in her silt.

From the Dead Sea we visit Hammamat Ma’in, or the Baths of Ma’in. They are not baths, really, but a series of hot springs cascading over the mountains. The waterfalls are fiery, and like the Sea, said to have high mineral contents, with healing properties. I had wanted to come here for those reasons, because my body still aches from my surgery. The first day at the resort, we try to visit the biggest, most beautiful of the Falls. It remains the property of Jordan, and is thus public access. When we arrive, there are no women in the water. They sit on the sidelines, many of them in full hijab, while the men run around in shorts and speedos, enjoying the hot, cascading water. My mother is upset; if we go in, we will be gakwed at, made uncomfortable. We could, and I say to hell with what they think, but even I know how unpleasant the experience will become.

We go next to the “family” fall, where a brood of women, also in full hijab sit on the sidelines still. There are only women here, and this cascade is pitiful in comparison to the last one. My mother is disgusted, still, and won’t even try the water. She returns to the hotel while Rachel and I stay, strip to our suits. The women are gaping at us. They are speaking Arabic, shocked at our attire, our desire to enter the water. I smile sweetly, say “Marhaba”, so they know I understand. We try to go into the water, but it’s scaldingly hot, and we can’t bear it. Still our presence has enervated the women, and a couple join our feeble attempts. I can tell they are amused by our presence, a spectacle. When Rachel and I decide to leave, they suggest we come back. Since I am not above being petty when they are so clearly mocking us, I tell them to enjoy the water, the heat.

We return to the hotel, and try to coax my Mother out of the room. She is going on about the disparity, how backwards she finds the behavior at the falls. Not much of a feminist, my mother’s stance surprises me: what bothers her most is how cruel this is to the women, how unfair. I am impartial on their behalf since I am more than accustomed to being stared at and judged by complete strangers at this point in my trip, but it’s a new feeling for her. We take to the resort’s Spa, which also has segregated waterfalls, also disparaging sizes. We flout the rules and hang out at the men’s, but I can tell she’s still unhappy. This fall is nowhere near the size, beauty or comfort of the main one. We end the day in the pool, where I try floating again. My ears submerged, my face just above, eyes closed, willing my body up, up.

The next day, my parents wake early, visit the main fall before it opens to the public, and my mother returns blissful, radiant. She says we have to go back again, at night when it closes to the public, or in the morning the next day. I promise her we will, though I am over the whole thing. With my departure date so close, I am childishly longing for home. I just want to go back to my life, my things, my time. Still, there is whole two more days to be spent in Jordan, and one more at the resort. We spend the day at the pool, where I continue to float cautiously, no more than a few inches from the wall. Rachel and I compete to see how long we can hold our breath without pinching our noses, and I try opening my eyes under water. It’s blurry, familiar, oddly soothing. Like most adolescents, my niece is bored easily, so the day of lounging has her frustrated, but I am content with our laziness. Later, we watch the football game in the lounge, become depressed about Brazil. We try the main fall again, but because it’s Friday, the public hours are later, and we return, thwarted again, to our rooms. I promise my mother I will wake early, go in the morning. I can tell she wants this for me, doesn’t want me to leave disappointed, because she hopes these small gifts will pull me back, like waves, more often.

Meanwhile, I drift in the water, unfettered by my usual neuroses. Weightless and light, just this once.

Do You Remember Hanna Awwad?

One of my favorite things about sitting with my father and his contemporaries is the exchange of folk songs and old stories. There’s a story about my Ammo Manawail and Ammo Fouad as boys, fighting over the dried watermelon seeds. When Fouad let go, Manawail fell backward into the tray where Taita Hilwa, my grandmother kept her baby chicks. Ammo squashed the chicks, and the seeds went flying. He immediately went into hiding, and Hilwa (which means pretty) gave chase, tying a bandanna around her head before tracking him down. When Ammo tells the story, he mimes her tying the bandanna, and we all laugh. There’s the folk song my Great Grandfather Ibrahim wrote about a cat knocking Elias Kassis’ aoud onto the wheat grinder, and his wife, Katrina breaking him the news. There’s my all time favorite old Arabic song, Al Rosana, that my Aunt Anise knows, and I forget the verses to. I sing what I remember anyway, often when I’m lonely, or putting babies to sleep.

I don’t know if the story about Hanna Awwad is true, or just a word play with rhyme. I only really remember line of the song, “titthakaree Hanna Awwad” (do you remember Hanna Awwad)? And it’s response “kharaga wa lem ya’oud” (He left and did not return).  Tony and another cousin of ours, Fadi, used to tell it all the time. In the recesses of my brain, I think he went to the store for something silly, and was never heard from again. I think it’s real, because Tony always got in trouble when he told it. The story reminds me of Tony, who I loved like my brother. Who I miss, now that everything is different, and now that I am leaving. I’ve been in Palestine for 19 days, and I have only seen Tony once. I saw a couple of school friends to whom I’m related, and I didn’t see my best friend from my years in residence at all. She was supposed to visit, but never did. I’m not surprised by her absence, or by the sadness I feel about it. Short of seeing Lubnah and the kids, everything here hurts. And though the joy I get from spending time with my sister, and the ease with which we are ourselves, exactly as we’ve always been, is huge, the reverse, the pain of our parting is huge, too.

We leave Sunday afternoon, at around 4:00. The driver to the Jisr is early, and my parents are frazzled. They are running around the house, trying to tie up loosed ends while we meander in the drive-way, waiting. The waiting makes it worse because I have time to get (more) emotional. By the time they come down the stairs, I’ve already begun weeping. I hug Lubnah fiercely one more time, and get into the van with Rachel and my parents, and two strangers. The fam is coming to Amman with me for a week before I fly off, and Lubnah is working until Tuesday, when she will fly to France for the city. We take Wad il Naar to the Jisr, as we came, and by now I’m familiar with its dips and curves. I can’t say I’m sad to part with the terrain like I once was, or perhaps I’ve used up all the sad in the reservoir on this trip already. By the time we are in Jericho, I have moved to cracking jokes and gearing up for the maze of red tape ahead.

Before arriving at the Jisr, we stop at a maktaba in Jericho to get tasareeh (permissions) for me to exit with my howiyyah. Of course, I have my passport, so the tasareeh shouldn’t be necessary, but apparently the jawaz (passport) needs a month before it’s accessible on the computer system. I marvel at this techno fail–that you could receive your passport but not use it for travel–the entire time we are applying for the tasareeh, which cost another 55 shekels. The van takes us to the Palestinian side/building/agency and chaos ensues. My father wants to make sure Rachel can travel with us because she’s a minor, we need to buy bus tickets and cargo tickets, we need to make sure the suitcases get on the bus, we need to pay Palestine 134 shekels a pop to leave, we need to show our passports and howiyyahs and tasareeh to some dude at a desk to be arrogant and troubled by. I have forgotten something crucial, something I should have considered before agreeing to all this: traveling with my parents makes all things 100 times more difficult. We leave the Palestinian border with 4 bus tickets, 5 suitcase vouchers, 4 “exit tax” receipts.

A bus takes us to the Israeli side.  Well, first it takes us to a gate, where we disembark, walk through metal detectors, and load onto a another bus. This second bus takes us to the Israeli border, where another metal detector awaits. We are let off the bus in small groups, and the Israeli guards divert me, Rachel, and Mom directly to the building without passing through security. Men and women wearing hijab are directed through this first metal detector. Inside the building, another metal detector and a baggage scanner await. All travelers go through this, and my father goes through three times: the first time he has forgotten his belt. The second time he has found a key in his pocket. The third time is beep-free. We stand in line to have our papers stamped and stapled and shuffled but the line is taking eons. There are approximately 100 travelers and three people working the booths. Like Meijer, we pick the slowest cashier. From here, we go to another station, where the woman demands proof of exit tax payment, and yet another, where a man checks our passports and howiyyahs a final time.

We get our bags, and load them onto a third bus (which also requires a ticket and luggage vouchers) that will deposit us at the Jordanian border. On the bus, we fill out a white card with some banal information which is then checked when we disembark. The suitcases are taken from us to be checked, again, and deposited on the other side of the border, to be retrieved when we complete our Jordanian stamping and shuffling. When we enter this building, we’re given a number, and for a moment I am ecstatic: no elbowing old ladies in line, no other travelers attempting sneaky “cutsies.” My enthusiasm is misplaced. Even given numbers, people swarm the windows like vacationers at the cruise ship buffet. When you do manage to hand your paperwork over, they ask you to have a seat on the chairs and wait for your name to be called. No one does this. They stand at the window staring down the workers, waiting for a moment’s weakness to ask for favors. My name is finally called, and I am cleared to go through. I pay 10 dinars for my visa to enter into Jordan.  Meanwhile, Rachel is being held back while she secures a green card. I myself have one of these, bu I don’t know what they mean, or what they are for. Merely that they are part of what Jordan wants to see.

After we all make it through, we buy various treats from the duty free, and go outside to find a taxi. My father negotiates a price to Amman, and we bundle into the four door, for an hour ride to Ammo Manawail’s. On the whole, our trip lasts 5 hours. As we’re driving, I notice things I didn’t notice 19 days ago like the spread of American fast food joints and designer labels. You can get everything in Amman, for a price, per global capitalism’s intention. Still, I feel lighter here, my heart ready to shake off some of the heaviness;  I didn’t realize it was so heavy until it lifted. I am excited for the next week, because I will be taking in Amman as I never have before: the Petra, the Dead Sea, Hammamat Ma’in (Turkish Baths). We visited Amman often, but always spent the time with family. The whirlwind schedule suits–I don’t want time to think about what I left. What if Hanna had come back, after 11 years? Would he still be lost? Wasn’t I?

Ammo’s house is mostly as I remember it with a few key changes. They have removed the small fountain from the right side of the main entrance to make a car park, and they have hired a new live-in house servant. His name is, Mina, from Masr, and he is only 22. Manawail has always stood out to me as the richest person in our family, and his house belies it. It’s enormous, well kept, not visibly rich,  but deeply, like old money. I love it, but it makes me feel dirty. I hate hearing Ammo yell at Mina (he yells as a way of communication), but Mina is new, and doesn’t know that Ammo barks at everyone. Still, I feel strange when my bags are wordlessly, and invisibly taken to my room. I inquire later about Mina’s pay, and become disgusted with myself even further, but everyone seems convinced they are doing him a favor. I try to engage him, but he averts his eyes from me, from everyone but children as far as I can tell, with whom he plays, easily, often.

That night, Ammo Manawail hears about my fig-lust, and sneaks me three straight off the tree in his garden. He tells me to eat them downstairs, so I don’t have to share, and I selfishly do. Upstairs, I hear the women talking about weight loss, how fat they are, nose size, depilatory choices. Next to them, the men play cards for dinars, smoke cigarettes and argiylah. I excuse myself from both spaces, feigning exhaustion, and walk down into the basement, into my room. The finished basement is 10 degrees cooler then the house above, and it’s a house unto itself, fully furnished, a spacious kitchen, 1.5 baths. A picture of Seedo Farid hangs in the living room, and one of Ammo Fouad sits in my bedroom. The last time I saw him was in a dream, shortly after his death. I resolve things that way, in my sleep. In my sleep, Rami forgave me for leaving him and not loving him back enough. In my sleep, Dalia and I have a Lifetime reunion, holding each other as the years recede meaninglessly.

In Amman, I can’t sleep at all so I unpack as Fouad looks on. I sing Al Rosana, my favorite verse: kolhum habibhom ma’hom wa anna habibi raah. Ya rabi nasmit hawa t’rod il habib liyah: everyone has their love with them, but my love has gone. Dear God, send a gentle breeze to bring back my love. It sounds cheeky, but it’s not. The rhythm is so simple, the register so earnest. I sing what I know to Fouad as I prepare for the next week, prepare to go back to another kind of home. Meanwhile, there are Taita’s chicks, Ibrahim’s cat, Hanna.

The answer is yes.

Yes, yes. I remember.

A Tale of a Fateful Trip (Part Three)

The second morning of our trip, Rula ignores her alarm. One of my major pet peeves is being startled awake, so hearing “Imma Be” over and over again while she sleeps leaves me…put out. Our late start (which, by my standards, is still a startling 8am) also annoys Yousef, who is clearly over our charms, and is ready to be rid of us. The continental breakfast is a bizarre mix of croissants, cold cereal, and labana. I drink two cups of lukewarm coffee before giving up on proper caffeination, and we begin our journey to Yaffa.

Like Akka, Yaffa is one of the oldest cities in Palestine, also known for its port. Yousef drops us off at the “top” of the old city, which looks out over the ocean and the new city. Yaffa is, in a word, charming. The old city’s architecture is stunning, and it’s been maintained kindly. Next to it, skyscrapers play with the skyline and it’s the easiest metaphor for Palestine: old and new, tradition made modern. Unlike other cities we’ve visited, Yaffa’s population is composed of mostly Jewish Israelis. So here, the transition into Yaffa from Arab spaces is abrupt. In other places the Arab and Israeli bleed into one another, resisting the separation we all seem so intent on.

The city has planted gardens in every available space so that every angle, every view is a postcard, picture perfect. Rula is naturally delighted by this, and I spend some time reprising my role as professional photographer. I think if you can’t make beauty here, there’s no chance for you at all. Magically, Rula disappears each time I’d like to include myself in the scenery, so I make due with landscapes and details  unmarred by my comparative homeliness. In the old city, there is a sturdy rope bridge alongside one of the gardens. The ropes are linked with bronzed cylinders, each featuring a different sun sign. Legend holds that if you stand on the bridge, look out to the sea and make a wish, your wish will come true. Not one to miss such opportunities, I make mine grand. I feel like every holy site I’ve visited has come to this, acting from hope, hope a substitution for faith, or maybe a version of it.

Rula and I decide to walk alongside the ocean, on the pebbled promenade to the Yaffa port. The sea is sparkling and seductive, each crashing wave inviting the next. I am taken with her completely, resent Yousef waiting for us, resent that we’re here only for the day, and can’t go swimming. The sea is right there. Cars park in between glass and concrete shrines to capitalism and passengers take a five minute walk to sandy beaches. I imagine cubicle bound workers coming to eat lunch on the beach. I imagine teaching nearby, students asking to hold class amidst sun bathers. Could I resist?

Our walk is long, the sun doubly reflected off the water, so we barely reach the port before Yousef is ringing Rula’s cell, trying to hurry us along to the next leg of our journey: Jerusalem. Despite my repeated attempts to enter the city, or perhaps because of them, I am completely unprepared for the Old City, the massive wall that surrounds it, the seven gates. My breath catches in my throat and my eyes well. I chide myself over how many absurd tears I’ve cried on this trip but I can’t make myself see sense. The city is so changed, so foreign, but my body recognizes it, greets it like a lost lover. Here is where Lemma and I caught taxis to Jerusalem School, here is where Jacob helped me put in my new earring, here is where we bought falafel and ka’ak on the way home from school. I’m flooded with memories and they are crushing my air channels. Even entering the city I already feel its loss.

Yousef drops us off at one of the highest points in the city, looking down on the Old City, and we walk down, stopping at the Garden of Gethsemane to marvel over the 8 olive trees that have existed since before we changed our watches to AD. Here, a man gives us scarves to drape over our shoulders as we enter holy sites. The deference, like all things, turns a profit and he demands we pay him for the service. We haggle over the price, which seems petty now, and our argument escalates to insults, at which point I refuse to pay. Rula won’t engage, shrugging her shoulders passively so I am left only with aggression, and we walk away, down the slope, his words rolling behind us.

By the time we reach a gate into the city, the Lion’s Gate, we are exhausted and over-heated. We buy water at tourist prices and make our way inside. The sook is just as I remember. Lively, colorful, fragrant. I banter with shop keepers who treat me, for the first time in my visit, as an Arab and not a foreigner. I buy earrings and a necklace, a bag of Turkish Delight. Rula and I feast on falafel sandwiches in the center of the grocery market hustle and bustle. We visit the Holy Sepulchre, where Jesus woke up. In my excitement about the sook, I honestly forget to visit the other holy sites until we are long gone. But I’m content with the trip. I fear that if I see too much, do too much, I won’t be able to hold on to my memories of a happier time here. The reality of now is already intruding with the receding then, and I can’t bear to lose anymore–the image of Jacob and I making our way through the cities arches, him holding my hand secretly as we perused jewelry. The image of a woman blessing my mother’s children, and my mother stopping mid-stride to give her money. The taste of licorice sticks on my tongue, the rich smell of the spice bins.

We make our way out of the Old City through the Damascus gate (Bab Al A’mood), the gate we used to enter through. Bab Al A’mood has remained just so-boys playing soccer in the courtyard, young and old folks sitting on the steps, smoking, speaking, being. Rula and I sit for a while, and I take in as much as I can. Its sameness is a salve for the change in the city, for Jerusalem has been excavated of most of its Arabs, and it seems like we are only here, in the Old City, a tiny bubble that may pop at any moment. We make our way back to the buses for Beit Lehem since Yousef has abandoned us for good. The bus sits 30 minutes before leaving, and I think this is enough time to pull myself together and not cry (again). I’m wrong. As soon as the bus pulls out, I cry under my sunglasses, surreptitiously sniffling so the man next to me won’t notice. I leave my lover for the third time, and for the second time, I have no idea when I can return.

The bus drops us off at Mahsoom Beit Lehem, where we go through Israeli security to return to the Palestinian territories. The solider looks at my passport, looks for a visa, but asks nothing. She hands it to me and we make our way back through the gates and turnstiles in the sun on the other side of the wall, where fruit vendors ply cucumbers at 10 shekels a tray, and a yellow taxi cab waits to take us home.

The Three Hour Tour (Part Two)

I think time moves more slowly on this side of the globe, each hour stretching into three. The day begs to be seized, over and over and you wait for the sunset like some kind of mercy. Rula, Yousef and I arrive at the hotel Wednesday night at 9:30pm, and we have managed each location on our itinerary.

***

We begin with the holy sites in Nazareth, visiting the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic church versions of the annunciation (ie, where Mary finds out she’s knocked up). The Orthodox church is small and modest, its interior colorful and ornate. It opens to the center of Nazareth, the city courtyard. I sing to Rula an old Arabic song about lovers meeting in the courtyard, she is not amused. The Catholic version is a behemoth building, a new structure built over the old church. If you descend into its bowels, you can see the old stonework, the altar. This church is a tourist hub, with opulent mosaics of the Virgin Mary lining the walls. There are mosaics from all over the world, and most of them are stunning, rendering her in the image of the people from each nation. The mosaic from the US is easily the ugliest, forged in industrial looking metals, posed aggressively as though she were priming for war.

We go next to Cana, where Jesus allegedly performed my all time favorite miracle, turning water into wine. This church is smaller, but still beautiful. We walk in the eaves, where people have left money and notes tucked into the walls, thrown on the old, fenced off foundations. There is a striking stained glass window of a woman staring straight ahead. Her face is harsh, regal, and I can’t place her. The writing on the side is in Latin. I like her suggestive stare, the coolness she emanates. Though she too is aggressive, she lacks the garishness of the American Madonna. I try the wine at the tourist shop before we leave. It is too sweet, and I’m amused by my own snobbery.

We move next to the Tabgha, where Big J multiplied fish and bread to feed thousands. By now I am over the whole religious tour thing. I can’t get worked up about these places like the other tourists can. They are bent over the old stone, doubled over in the pews, praying with a fervor I can’t conjure or emulate. It must be amazing for believers to be in these places, but all I feel is mild curiosity. The magic for me is in the antiquity, the stories these sites could tell, the lives they’ve witnessed. After Tabgha, we make a longer drive to Tiberias, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. Tiberius is mostly a night-time town: a long boardwalk and port for passenger boats. Today, the little shops are closed, the walk mostly empty. But when we were young, we would get tasareeh into Jerusalem for religious holidays. After visiting the religious site in the morning, we would go swimming in the afternoon, and end the evening in Tiberius by riding one of the boats. The boats would meander around in the sea, and on deck a DJ spun music. We’d dance and laugh in the twinkling lights strung about the boats mast, reflected in the clear, crisp water. There is a picture of me dancing on one of these trips, on the Lido, my arms up framing my face, which is over-sunned and glowing. I look happy. I was.

After Tiberius, we go to Akka (Acre in English), a port  and harbor off the Mediterranean. I have also been here before, and it’s as beautiful as I remember it. Akka is hella old, and has a long military and political history. Like certain churches, you feel time here, walking along the city’s massive wall, looking out to the water as it crashes into the stone. In its old city, there is a “sook” or market. Sequestered in the arches of old buildings, the sook reminds me of Jerusalem. Here though, amidst the jewelry stores and juice carts are residents. With one turn you can find yourself in the courtyard of the old prison, or at the front door of someone’s house, where children’s clothes are strung up to dry, and a Brazilian flag hangs over the walkway. I love it here, all this practicality, hope, and history merged into one nook. I sing here, too. A Fairuz song comparing the singer’s love to the wonders of the sea, the mountains, and so on.

We spend a lot of time in Akka, primarily because Rula is bound and determined to get a picture of herself on the wall, the sea at her back. I take pictures over and over, and each time she looks at it, makes a suggestion for improvement, and asks me to take another: get a wider shot; only capture me from the waist up; wait until the wind settles; angle the camera down. She wants to preserve her image here, perfectly, next to famous icons, but when I ask her why they are famous, she can’t tell me. I alternate between finding this travel quirk amusing and annoying, erring on the side of annoying. Her unhappiness with the photos is evident on her face, and I want to shake her, and say “maybe it’s not the fucking photographer, maybe it’s your fucking face,” but I don’t. I understand the desire to record, but my patience grows thinner and thinner. Later, Rula will tell me I am rough to travel with, that my personality is “tough.” Imagine that.

From Akka, we go to Haifa. By now, Yousef is rushing us along, wanting to be done with the day, have dinner, and he, too, is grating on my nerves. I remind myself that he’s been a gracious host so far, and that he probably has a life he wants to return to. But then I think that he offered to do this, and will be paid for it, so I want him to stop whining, and stop making me feel guilty for exploring. These two impulses directly reflect my Arab training and my American “get what you paid for-ness.” In Haifa we visit the Baha’i Shrine and Gardens. They feature an elaborate, scaling stairwell; it looks like what I imagine the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were like. We climb as far as we are allowed and turn around to look back at the city, sitting near the sea. These lands are beautiful, the view is a postcard. There is such diversity and elasticity in the Palestinian/Israeli terrain. As always, I mourn the eviction of Arabs from these spaces. In the Holy Land, the metaphor of being cast out of Eden is apt, and as in the original tale, I know it’s unfair, unjustifiable.

We dine on the coast in Haifa, at a small seafood joint run by Russian immigrants. We watch the sun set on the water, eat ice cream. I inch closer and closer to the water, and when we finally do leave, I can smell the sea on my clothes, taste it on my lips. Maybe this is what the apple was like for Eve.

***

Our hotel is back in Nazareth. Rula and I are shocked at the early hour, collapsing onto the bed in laughter driven by exhaustion and absurdity. The hotel is sparse, clean. The shower head is delightfully abusive, and before long we are shiny and fresh from the bath, hoping to God room service exists (it doesn’t) and that there is an open store close by to buy something to drink (there isn’t). We fall asleep thirsty but content with the day, anticipating the next.

hot flashes

Beit Sahour is having some kind of heat wave. Today the actual temperature is 102 degrees, and it feels hotter outside. Here, the houses are built to keep cool in the summer, and warm in the winter, so we go without AC. It’s actually fine, if you don’t move from under the high speed ceilings fans. Yesterday and the day before I made the mistake of leaving this haven, to visit the Church of the Nativity in Beit Lehem and Ramallah respectively.

***

I’ve been inside the cool walls of the Church before, crouching low to enter; high ceilings add grace to the wide, square belly of the cathedral. Ahead the altar is ornate, trimmed with gold while opulent light fixtures with red glass hang low, leading up the center aisle. Off to the right is a small room with sculptures and framed painting of saints. There are two stands filled with sand, where one can place and light a candle in prayer. Though long from my religiosity, these kinds of rituals soothe me, so I light two: first for our dead, a second for our living. Instead of a left wall, a semi-circular, steep stairwell leads to a second small altar, constructed around a star, the spot where Jesus was supposedly born (I don’t suspect the birth per se, but merely its location). Still, the room is thick with age and incense–the feeling of many old churches. I kneel in front of it, belief notwithstanding, since it feels wrong not respect what has driven and divided centuries of people. The marble is cool and hard beneath my knees, and I incline my head lower and say a short prayer from muscle memory. I cross myself, too, from habit, before standing to leave from another semi circle of now ascending stairs on the opposing side. These stairs lead to another room of artistically rendered saints, and back to the main cavern. Lubnah’s kids are supposed to be there, but they have disappeared.

Outside the light is dazzling. I hear a wedding party approach: the bride is moving slowly as a crowd of her family sings folk songs as they usher her into the church. I can barely see her amidst the crowd, and my first thoughts are whimsical. I too know these songs, love them. I want to join in, but not only am I stranger to the family, I appear as a stranger to the land, and wouldn’t want to intrude. My second thoughts are practical: she must be melting in this heat. The kids are sitting, waiting on a stone bench next to the entrance. We maneuver out of the square, past the party, and head into Beit Lehem’s old city (which was not called old when I lived here) to search for postcards and cold drinks.

***

We take tareeq wad il nar to get to Ramallah. The yellow van we ride in is newer than Saalih’s, and the driver seems to be as well, so the curves of the valley become even more exaggerated. Sitting between my sister and a stranger, my body leans side to side with each turn. The hour long trip around Jerusalem costs 18 shekels; luckily, this van has AC, so we arrive in decent condition. Ramallah positively bustles with energy. Shopkeepers stand in their doorways, inviting patrons in with “itfadaloo, ahla wa sahla.” When they peg us as foreigners, they lower their pitch with a slick “welcome, welcome.” Little boys with bubble gum walk close to your side, trying to get your attention, make a sale. They bless your father, your mother. One asked that God keep my husband safe. I give him a shekel for irony’s sake.

We stop at the Stars and Bucks for something to drink, for which I am eternally grateful. The sign, the logo, the colors are so deceptive. I love the complete disrespect for copyright here. I especially love it because Starbucks, in addition to brewing bad coffee and charging for Wi-Fi, contributes to Zionist campaigns in Israel. Here, on the other side of the wall, Stars and Bucks does a kind of Starbucks drag, and my Butlerian heart celebrates. After our cold coffee break, we meet up with Lubnah’s cousin, Abeer, and she takes us to a couple of specialty shops before the heat conquers–we plan to visit with a couple more of Lubnah’s cousins later, but kill time first by heading to an outdoor restaurant.

Sangria’s is a lush garden with a fully stocked bar; I can only assume it shares a kind of heritage with Eden. We sit in the shade, at a table under a massive raspberry tree, and each time someone picks a berry, a handful of riper ones fall. We eat fruit from the trees, Abeer and I order the only Palestinian beer available(on the menu and elsewhere) Taybeh, on draft. It’s crisp and cooling and delicious. The kids order food that the adults mooch. Marie, per her custom, befriends ever male working person in the joint, and they play an extended game of hide and seek, where the staff hides Marie’s new toy, and Marie cons them into revealing its location rather than searching in the traditional manner. In the garden the temperature slowly cools, and I am sad to leave it. I am sure it’s gorgeous at night, full of football fans watching the Cup, cheering and smoking argiylah.

We visit with Aamer and Yara for a bit in their 4th floor apartment. It’s a surreal living space, decorated in minimalist modern walnut furniture, splashed with textiles in bright, folky designs. They’re a sweet couple, albeit read as the black sheep, because Aamer is Christian and Yara Muslim. He’s a cartoonist, she works at a non-profit, and they don’t have children (so rare).  Their lives let me imagine, for a brief minute, that I too could live here. Chic apartment in the city, a lifestyle just outside the norm but not so far as to be foreign. Yara asks me if I would consider moving back, and the illusion breaks. I don’t think I could. I don’t know how to be myself here. But I also tell her anything is possible; my intentions are more often upended than not.

Aamer agrees to watch Marie and Jacob for a few hours while Abeer, Yara, Lubnah, Rachel and I visit Yasser Arafat’s grave. His mausoleum is stone and glass, guarded by a number of armed soldiers. Behind it you can see the compound where he was under house arrest in 2002. Arafat had wanted, as I understand, to be buried in Jerusalem, but was not allowed to do so by Israel. Instead, he was buried in Ramallah, with a spotlight pointed toward the city. That, too, Israel ended. Now, a sign outside the memorial reads “Jerusalem: 14.63 km.” Like Arafat, we are all so close, and yet inexplicably far.  I traveled 9640.94km from Detroit to Beit Lehem, and can’t make it another 15.

After Arafat, we visit Mahmoud Darwish’s grave. There is significantly less fanfare. In place of Arafat’s three bright Palestinian flags at full mast, is one tattered and faded one. The grave looks old, though it’s only been in place for 2 years, as though it hasn’t been cared for very well. My sentimentality is in overdrive, and maybe because death has been so close this trip, I mourn for Darwish in a way I can’t for Arafat. here, I think, is the truth. Someone and something beautiful now mostly forgotten, mostly in disrepair. We should all be so lucky, to be so loved, and maybe lucky, too, to be left in peace from armed guards and frustrated expectations.

We go from Darwish back to Aamer, pick up the kids to have ice cream at Abeer’s parents’ house. The ice cream is locally made, the name of the brand, “Baladna” means our country. The ice cream is sweet and tangy but my mood grows subdued and bitter. Baladna is a another kind of parody, a joke at our own expense. To move from one so called Palestinian territory to another there are Israeli checkpoints, even though we cannot, are not, allowed to pass through Israeli ones. The guards don’t stop our car, but I know they do stop. I know they do harass, beat, abuse, incarcerate other travelers. Palestine is a constant state of house arrest, and now, an adult, I can’t even escape into hallucinations and nose bleeds as I did as a child when we faced literal house arrests.

Ahead of us, wad il nar at night is embers, mostly black and sooty with flecks of light. I can’t see the path around me, so the movement of the car is more like a roller coaster now than it was in the day. Who knows what turns or twists lie ahead? Who knows our future?

***

Today, I am camped out on my bed, mainlining fluids and slathering my travel worn feet with lotion. My parents are doing the funeral circuit, since a second family member passed the day after mourning rituals finished for the first. They are bored with death, which is both cruel and understandable. The latest, Madeleine Salsa, died with her eyes open which signifies, in superstition, that another death is coming. Who knows what Madeleine saw? Who knows our future?