Right now I’m experiencing seeing North America after being away for almost nine months. As I write this I’m in a friend’s apartment in Seattle. Outside the window somebody is power-washing the moss off the sidewalks (no kidding). It’s been cloudy and/or raining since I arrived on Wednesday which is very unusual for Seattle in the summer.

Tuesday night I left Montevideo. I shared my flight with four other people from the English-speaking community. It was nice having friends to pass the time while waiting for the flight to board. Check out Chuck’s blog. I see he wrote about being back in the USA but I haven’t read his entry yet.

Miami—The flight from Montevideo arrived in Miami near dawn on Wednesday morning. According to the captain it was already 85 degrees in Miami. I lived in Miami for many years but still the humidity of the air in the jet way hits you in the face when you get off the plane. Once in the terminal the air conditioning feels good but after walking from the gate to immigration I was sweating. Coming from Montevideo, Miami is a good steppingstone since everything is bilingual English / Spanish. Even the flight from Miami to San Francisco the safety announcement was in both English and Spanish.

San Francisco—I wasn’t able to sleep much on the flight from MIA to SFO. There were many children within a few rows. One very young (about 18 months) boy was making a fuss the whole flight. The kid finally fell asleep as we were waiting to deplane in SFO.

My flight to Seattle was out of a different terminal. I took the airport’s train to the other terminal. It is in San Francisco that I knew I wasn’t in Uruguay any more. The size of the airport, the number of people moving about, the variety of the people all hit me. It was just before lunch time so after clearing security my first goal was to find something to eat. The first few restaurants had lines of people waiting to buy food. I walked past my departure gate and found a restaurant that had one seat at the bar available. My first meal in the USA consisted of a Cuban sandwich on focaccia bread, potato chips, and a cup of coffee. The sandwich was huge so I only ate half and took the other half to go.

After lunch I had over two hours before my flight was to board. This is when the death of my parents started to feel more real. When I worked for IBM I flew around the country constantly. If it wasn’t too late or too early on the east coast I’d pass my time waiting in airports on the cell phone with mom or dad. My first night in Seattle it took forever to fall asleep. Thinking about my parents, my upcoming drive to New York, seeing my brothers, spreading my father’s ashes, visiting my mom’s grave — so many things going through my head. I’m definitely still in denial about my parents. Using words like “ashes” and “grave” while discussing mom and dad just doesn’t feel real.

Being in Seattle is nice but it doesn’t feel like “home.” I’m definitely enjoying the variety of food. The food in Uruguay is generally good but there is very little variety. So far in the USA I’ve eaten Cuban, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Indian, Mexican, and American—6-inch tuna sub from Subway. I’ve had some of the spiciest food I’ve eaten for a very long time. The other morning I had a bagel with my breakfast. Yummy.

I’m both looking forward to and dreading my journey to New York. I need to see my brothers and I need to feel “New York,” to feel my connection to the past and prepare to face the future as an orphan. I want to visit the town where I was born in Westchester. That is the only place I lived with both of my parents before they divorced.

On a completely different note, today’s Seattle Times headline reads: Law lets couples be “partners” This is the part of the United States of America that I cannot stand. All the politicians scream out that this is the land of the free, home of human rights and equality for all, but gay Americans are not equal to straight Americans. Nor are we as free as straight Americans. In some states gay couples can get all or some of the rights that straight couples have. At the national level gay couples have ZERO rights. Nada, nothing. Washington State as of today granted the following rights to committed same-sex couple and opposite-sex couples older than 62 years old:

1. Have the same hospital-visitation rights as a spouse.
2. Give consent for health care if a partner isn’t competent.
3. Inherit property when there is no will.
4. Administer a partner’s estate when there is no will.
5. Authorize organ and tissue donation.
6. Make burial and other arrangements after a partner’s death.

What a disgrace! All of this struggling to allow six additional rights all of which pertain to sickness and death. When I look north to Canada or east to Spain I feel shame for my country. The only reason people who are against same-sex marriage give is that “they don’t like it” so we shouldn’t be able to do it. Any reason based on religion is not valid. This country was intentionally not created as a theocracy. The question of legal marriage has absolutely nothing to do with religious marriage. We are each free to choose our faith. We are not free to impose the preachings of our faith onto others.