Bittersweet

I booked my flight to the US tonight.  I'm leaving on October 4 for Jacksonville, Florida, where I'll be doing a month-long observership with a Filipina cardiologist.  I'll be staying at the home of my dad's godson.  Who knows where the Lord will take me after that.  It depends on which hospitals invite me for interview.  But I do plan to be based in California after my stint in Florida.

As I clicked on the 'purchase ticket' button at the Northwest Airlines website, a wave of melancholy swept over me.  I realized that I'll be away from home for a little less than 6 months.  This certainly isn't like your usual vacation or holiday.  During this time, I will be dependent on the kindness of distant family and close friends for shelter and food.  I will basically be living out of a suitcase for the better part of those 6 months.  But the part that really saddens me is that this trip is a prelude to a longer, more permanent one.  Should the Lord allow me to match at a hospital in the US, I'll make one more trip back to Manila in March.  Time enough to fix my visa, take a short break before toxicity creeps back into my life, and say goodbye to family and friends.  Come June 2009, I'll be handing a one-way-ticket to take me back to the US, where I will stay for about 7 years.

Don't get me wrong.  This is my dream.  This is what I've worked for this past year, with all that studying and the exams that I took.  But now that everything is finally falling into place and it looks as if the dream might finally come true, I am hit by the reality that I'm finally leaving home.  It's a bittersweet realization, this one is.  One that came earlier than I would have preferred.