Though I had an additional month to prepare, the morning I walked out the door, I felt far from ready. My lovely family deposited me at the airport and suddenly months of planning began to take effect. I was suspiciously clad (sweatshirts are apparently a no-go for the TSA) but after a quick pat down, I was on my way. I had a little less than a four-hour flight to Dallas/Fort Worth followed by a ten-hour flight to Buenos Aires. I felt excited if not slightly apprehensive on the flight to Argentina when about four and a half hours down, I was suddenly overcome with a wave of emotion.

I expected my general nervousness and homesickness to rear its head eventually, but I did not expect it to happen before I even landed in Argentina. The main cabin was dark, my fellow passengers all mostly asleep. I was quite thankful the two men sitting next to me saw it fit to bring eye masks and ear plugs. I was listening to one of my playlists when the song, “All My Loving,” by the Beatles started to play.

I tried to muffle my soft sobs as tears began to run down my cheek. I was still so excited to get to Argentina and meet all the other people on my program. I think though, after months of waiting, flying high somewhere over the tip of South America, it finally sunk in that I already was, and was going to be, very far away.

That song is my parents’ song. They played it at their wedding, they sing it to each other all the time, I once even watched them stand on top of a bar table in a local Spokane pub and sing it to the other patrons. Upon completion of a song, the singers are allowed to sign and staple dollar bills to any free space on the walls. (In this economy, most of the bills are ones). Both my parents were pilots in the Air Force and felt that certain lyrics crooned by the Beatles matched the emotions felt when one of them was deployed, so far out of contact and halfway across the Earth. When this song began to play, I felt myself relating to it in a way I could never before.

Close your eyes and I’ll kiss you
Tomorrow, I’ll miss you
Remember I’ll always be true
And then while I’m away
I’ll write home every day
And I’ll send all my lovin’ to you