serendipity

I guess life has normalized; we've come off of our information junk-food diet and have rejoined our normal lives. I've got no new information to report aside from the fact that Karen and I finally submitted our aspiration statements and resumes to our host country.

Today was the graduation at MIIS. I would have been walking across the stage, receiving my degree, if I had no interest in going to Peace Corps. As it were, I was a flag-bearer. Originally I was an alternate, unworthy of first choice of flag. Then I received an email saying, "Lawrence, we've got to have you step in and carry a flag. Will Ukraine be okay?"

Serendipity.

It's nice to sometimes receive signs in your life that things are okay, that you did make the right choice.

Holding the Ukrainian flag today was an interesting experience because it was really the first time I was able to hold that powder blue and sunflower yellow field in my hands. I felt a strange, nostalgic attachment to it. Not nostalgia for the past, but some sort of anticipatory nostalgia. A glimpse into the future, and a longing for it. Holding that flag, for the first time, I knew I'd be coming back to MIIS holding that flag in my heart, feeling emotions for that flag that I cannot even understand now. It was a strange--and I cannot think of a better word than anticipatory--emotion.