Heartcrossings

A few weeks ago, I received news that my niece is getting married this summer. When I saw her last she was younger than my daughter is now. The idea of her being old enough to be married filled me with maternal feelings of love and loss such life events bring. The years and distance had turned this child into a woman I did not know at all. In the nights following, there were many restless, anxious dreams.  Returning to the motherland after a decade and a half is daunting even without being in the harsh spotlight of a family wedding. I realized how many names I had forgotten by now and how relatives further from the main family tree had turned into ghostly wisps from the past. Many births, weddings and funerals had come and gone in the years I was away. Some of my favorite people are no longer alive and there will be empty spaces in homes I spent a lot of my childhood and youth in. This summer I would meet many young people for the first time, sometimes I would struggle to connect...