Thinking only of all the fascinating beauty in the world - the vastness and mysteries of phenomena we cannot fully grasp like black holes that keep us humble, to the small fragility of life in a flower in bloom that soothes our soul - I am already overcome with a feeling that not a million kisses to the Blarney stone could make me eloquent enough to express.
More than that, to be in the select group of people worldwide that has food, warmth, a roof over my head and can only write this because I am one of those privileged enough to know how to read and write... all this makes me feel like I have much more than I am worthy of. If I need water, I just open the tap - I don’t have to walk miles and miles with a bucket over my head. If I want to talk to someone, phones, email, letters, anything can be used. The "saudade" can be eliminated briefly without much effort.
This time that technology has given to me has allowed me to spend a great deal of time studying, thinking and trying to understand some bits and pieces in the universe and trying to find ways to help patients be treated and help people, even if only a little. And for that, I am also very thankful.
I have also been very privileged beyond my imagination to receive a scholarship - to study abroad, to get to know people from across the globe from several cultural origins and customs. Sometimes I have to remind myself: "Yes, you are in Ireland. Your dream of studying abroad has not only come true, but it has come true intertwining your future into your roots". Here I have had a chance to learn of things I love, to show my work to more than the bottom of my drawer, to talk to people who's work I admire and I would never dream of even seeing from afar. These have been three crazy, crazy months of dreams I no longer believed were alive in me coming true.
If all this weren't enough to overwhelm me with thankfulness, there still is more: What makes all that worth it. After all, as Chris McCandless put it, "Happiness: only real when shared". I have a wonderful family that are there for me, that pray even from afar, that read all my nonsense about this trip. I have wonderful friends back in Brazil who still write to me - complain I don’t send news, or even just share their news, offer to help in what they can, and celebrate every joy I have here. That seek me out, and that are supportive and are with me, in spite of the space between us.
I have also met people here that have already become part of me, and that I can’t imagine life without anymore (by the way, sorry guys, nobody's going back to your home countries, you shall be kidnapped and taken with me wherever I end up!). Friends that are supportive, that listen, that show such love I no longer believed was out there; friends that have become a family, that have become part of me in the most unlikely ways, again, that I never believed possible. I'm still trying to figure out how in a few months or weeks one can become so important.
Maybe that’s what this year - more exactly, these 3 months have been: of teaching me to believe. To believe in things I didn't think were real, or possible for that matter. Of teaching me that the big dear world is so fascinating, is so radiantly beautiful and unpredictable, that it can keep alive things you never knew were alive: hope, dreams, love, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, beauty. All burning beacons lighting our way to keep us going.
I thank God for his love for us which made him give us all these wonderful things (and yet not let us forget where our real home is), for his faithfulness, for his unchangeable and yet absolutely unpredictable character. I thank him for listening to every hopeful prayer I had forgotten, every dream I had given up on, and for bringing me to where I am now: making me feel fully alive, living the best of days, feeling that I finally am doing what I was made to do, and that I am where I am meant to be.
"And I thank each person taking part in this journey of belief in the past few months, be you near or far: teaching, supporting, loving in the most beautiful ways, listening, and being as kind on the soul as that blooming flower and more complex than black holes as only a human can be in the most glorious way possible. And, well, I don’t really need to list names - you know who you are. Thank you."
