country

When Lukas arrived at Seacrest from Lithuania, he was a skinny 16-year-old with a lightning-quick dribble, a phenomenal shot on goal, and a way above-average soccer IQ for his age, which means he had an outstanding situational awareness and was able to “read” the game at a collegiate level. But he was skinny, so it only took a glance from an opposing defender for him to fall over. So I convinced him to work out with me after school. Within weeks, he was bulking up and able to stand up to defenders’ charges and body checks. Oh, he was also my Spanish student.

That was last decade. Nowadays, we talk about life, work, girls, Naples, old colleagues, and teachers, but we still share a passion for football. So we organized a trip to an Inter Miami game in Fort Lauderdale.

Interestingly, it was against Montreal, which was the only other Inter Miami game I had been to.

Chase Stadium is a bit of a misnomer, as the “Stadium” is a scaffolding structure, a Meccano set, surrounded by a bunch of way overpriced food trucks and bars. But we were there for the friendship, the soccer, and admittedly, to see Leo Messi play.

The game was as expected, not particularly good. Luis Suarez and Messi each scored a couple of goals, but Montreal managed to score a “dignity” goal. Although Lukas and I are both hardcore Cristiano Ronaldo fans, I must admit it was amazing to see Messi play; his skill level, how deceptively easy he made those goals look, was very impressive.

At the end of the day, driving down to Fort Lauderdale and spending a small fortune on tickets, food, and parking was well worth it to hang out with a dear friend.

It has been nine months since my last entry. In my defense, it has been a crazy year. I am at Miami International Airport and this is the first chance I have to write, it feels good.

You see, I was busy finishing and defending my doctoral dissertation, which was a very difficult but rewarding process.

As soon as classes started in the Fall I was having my twice weekly coffee with Irene, my director, to finish and fine tune each chapter. At the same time I was teaching two classes: Advanced Intermediate 204, a new class for me, and Intermediate 203, my “standard” class. Oh, and I had to write an academic article if I wanted to have any chance of applying for a university job. On top of all that I had to prepare my job search, but those items will have their own blog entries.

The work only got more intense in the spring. I was assigned an extra class from the regular Spring load of one section, this one teaching Advanced Spanish at the Gillings School of Public Health. I had to give up my volunteering shift at the Ronald McDonald House, as well as cutting down on the number of concerts and plays I went to (although I did not totally give that up).

April was when the proverbial rubber met the proverbial road. Finishing and editing my dissertation and going to job interviews. Spring Break was anything but break, driving to Charlotte and flying to Florida for job interviews.

But everything came to a head on April 8. That morning I spent two and a half hours locked up in a conference room with four of the professors on my committee, and Ana Rueda from the University of Kentucky looming over all of us, Skyping in on the massive screen, like a science fiction overlord, only much nicer and sweeter! I also had like ten spectators: old students, friends, including Mandey from Zog’s, my friendly librarians Teresa and Becky, and colleagues that came to give me moral support. Poor things, they had to endure my grilling session.

I passed. Walking out of the meeting, feeling exhilarated but exhausted and numb, I had a message on my phone. Seacrest Country Day School in Naples Florida – my top choice for work – had made me an offer while I was defending my dissertation. Coincidence? I think not.

After defending I thought things would slow down, wrong again. I still had to do edits on my dissertation, dress up as Don Quixote for a marathon reading celebrating the 400th anniversary of his death, chair a panel at our Carolina Conference on Romance Studies, teach and wrap up my four years in Carolina. My mom and my little sister came for my hooding ceremony and we had a blast. After that I moved to Florida and had only enough time to dump my boxes before heading back to Spain for my nephew’s First Communion, which explains why I am sitting at the airport now.

*with thanks to Murray Head from his song One Night in Bangkok