I just got done having a 2ish hour conversation with Juan
about how cool everything is (primarily biologically speaking—like how human
life is created, how we’re able to see/hear/taste, the respiratory tract of a
cockroach…). Sounds like we’ve been smoking too much dope, but the reality is
that for whatever reason we just always get into these conversations about life
that we get really animated about. Just when we think we’ve hammered out all
the topics, it’s like “OH MY GOD, BUT WHAT ABOUT THIS!?” “YEAH!!!!”. And now
more than ever it is completely clear that one great conversation can make my
life even better than I ever knew. Really, if life is nothing more than me
having a series of good conversations (with myself and others) I will be ok.
Obviously the same topics get talked about, but really I don’t feel like even
one has been exhausted (maybe during the course of the same conversation, but
in a lifetime, no). I don’t feel complete if I can’t express myself and listen
to others in conversations like this. Not every conversation should be the “we
just stayed up til 5 talking, didn’t we?” conversation, but why can’t people
talk about interesting, real things more often? Stop telling your nothing stories and start telling your life story, otherwise you won’t have one.
So after our conversation, I had to stop and wonder how on
earth did I get so lucky to get such a cool host family that is on my level to
the point that we can talk about stuff like this all the time?
I’m an only child and I’ve pretty much always reveled in
this fact, but from time to time I thought maybe I wanted an older brother.
After almost 3 months of trying to figure out how Juan and Ana could be “related
to me” (because they’re way too young to be my parents) I decided it’s like
having a dadbrother sistermother situation. It doesn’t exist very often, but
here it is. Cause really, how else would you explain a guy that asks you about
your day when he gets off work but then makes fun of you when you take the
wrong bus? And there’s definitely no other way to explain a woman that gets
worried if she doesn’t know where you are, but then doesn’t ground you when you
tell her you were out til 5 am partying. I love it. They are a really
responsible host family that takes incredible care of me in every way, but I
never feel like they’re breathing down my neck or restricting my experience.
Best of all, I can be myself with them. I can be informal, silly and sarcastic
as well as serious, vulnerable and upset and they always seem to understand and
listen to me. Which is pretty incredible considering that I’m some random estadounidense that showed up to live
with them 3 months ago. Cultural and language barriers don’t seem to be an
issue. And while my experience with my own actual family has mostly been one of
openness, I don’t think mine is representative and there are many kids who can’t
really “be themselves” with their parents/family. It’s the best of both worlds
without any of the detractors. I have no idea how ISA chose this family for me,
but however they did I am so grateful. Even on days when I’m not out doing something
in the city, I am still so happy to hang out at home because every day is a new
conversation and a new scenario where we get to know each other better, and in
doing so, I get to know Buenos Aires, Argentina, myself, the US and well,
EVERYTHING better. Even if I never did anything else here, I think I’d still
leave happy knowing that I got to spend time with such incredible people who
were kind enough to not only open their home to a total foreign stranger, but
also to open up themselves and their lives up to her too. I’ve heard of many
host families not even really being good at the first thing and I don’t even
want to imagine what that would be like. So here’s to Ana and Juan, who have
somehow put up with me for this long and haven’t gone crazy yet.
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