Wearable Memories

7 months ago, Amanda and I began acquiring bracelets as souvenirs. She began the tradition of wearing her memories when she studied abroad in Spain in 2007, and this trip I quickly jumped on board to copy her. Overwhelmed by the incredible artisanry that lined the streets in every Central American city, we decided to put a limit on ourselves - 1 bracelet per country we said, for the sake of both our budgets and, more importantly, our physical appearance.

Now, too many bracelets later, and after too much time since my wrists have seen the sun, I´ve been thinking that it finally may be time to un-hippify myself in preparation for my return to the States...This morning as I sat in the sun soaking up some much needed vitamin D after spending my days in cloudy Buenos Aires (damn you Southern hemisphere autumn!), I decided perhaps it would be a perfect opportunity to untangle the ridiculous amount of hemp and beads lathering my scrawny wrists. I should remove them while I have a chance to even out the tanlines, I vainly thought to myself.

Yet it wasn´t long after I removed first Costa Rica...then Peru...and stared down at my foreign-looking arm, that the tears began to flow. My new Australian friend Ella looked up from her book. What´s wrong, she asked. Then she noticed my arm. Put them back on, she said. It´s not over yet. And with her help and my confusion of both laughter and tears, we tied them back on.

With exactly 1 week left of my Latin American Adventure, I find myself in complete denial that it is all coming to an end. I am currently making more plans for the month of June in New Mexico than I am spending on planning my time left here in Argentina. I already have 2 camping trips, 1 wedding, 1 job, 1 house-sitting opportunity, and 8 coffee dates planned for just June. Yet even as my calender fills up, it all still seems surreal. Every day I sit down to write in my journal and attempt to arrive at some kind of closure for this trip. And every day I fail to do so.

As I wrote a month ago (and obviously still haven´t answered): How do you cope with the finish line? Not sure. But I am sure that I will at least continue wearing my bracelets until I arrive home and have my mom to hug me and have cell phone access to Amanda. I just don´t think I´m strong enough to take off my wearable memories alone...