Est-ce que tu as mon coeur?

My dad called me earlier this evening and asked me when I am graduating. Putting a date on it, pinning it down is making my stomach churn. With excitement, yes. With terror, also yes. I'm shaking as I type this and my stomach is in knots.

We also spoke about my future. I hear myself mutter the words "Ireland," "Abroad," "Work," "Independent," and my dad doesn't say a word. I keep talking to avoid the silence. He is scared, too. I can hear it in the white noise, in the space between speaking and not-speaking. But we speak about my mother also, about how she has passed her fear of life along to her children just as she has passed along the genetic traits for my toes and legs and ears. He told me as we said good-bye, "You can't pass that fear along to future generations, Carrie. You need to end it here."

I believe in my father, I believe in his words. I believe when he tells me that someone like me will figure out what to do about the demise of print journalism and books and quality magazines. I believe when he tells me not to be afraid. And so I won't. I will pack up my broken heart (so torn it feels like pieces pricked out one by one and stuffed into my throat where I hold the tears back, parts of a whole that only one person I have ever known can stitch back together) and my shaking hands and my words, and I will get on an airplane.

But then wait. I'm through pretending I'm not afraid. I am going to be afraid; I am going to be like my mother. But my fear is simply a possession I will pack away into a suitcase. And I am sure, with time, it will fall to the bottom and I will forget I even brought it. Kind of like that extra pair of high heels I never should have brought to Spain in the first place.