Farewell, Seattle!

Friends, family, friends of family, family of friends,

I’m off! (Technically, I’ve been off for several days but that’s neither here nor there.)

I want to start by expressing my deep gratitude to everyone who helped get me to this point. I wouldn’t be here without your kind words of encouragement, donation of time and energy to my transition, and insights, tips, and well wishes. It was hard to say goodbye to the previous chapter of my life and I’m so thankful that’s the case–I feel immensely lucky to have so many people to miss.

I made it to the airport on Sunday, albeit with some last-minute packing. It’d be too out of character for me to be fully packed more than a few hours before my flight.

After experiencing the fastest screening on record through TSA (good omen #1), I caught the first half of the Super Bowl and the half-time show. Then boarded my flight on Turkish Airlines.

It’s a 12-hour direct flight from Seattle to Istanbul and +11 hour time change. I was randomly assigned an aisle seat, two rows from the bathroom, with no neighbor (good omen #2), and was overjoyed by the many free goodies: pillow, blanket, headphones, eye mask, ear plugs, slippers, socks, and a mini toothbrush and toothpaste set.

As I chatted up my neighbor, Jill, a devout Christian living in Coeur d’Alene flying to Pakistan to escort a young girl to a conference as part of her missionary work, the flight attendant accidentally spilled soda on my back.

He told me to pick any seat I wanted in business class, which was impeccable timing, because 1 ) we were only an hour into the flight and, 2) I was struggling to make conversation after Jill told me her partner of 10 years confessed on the eve of their wedding that he had been married for 20 years! She lost the house and the dog but “that’s the price of freedom.” (Fear not, Jill now has a good thing going with a recent divorcee in Arizona. He looks great for 80.)

I enjoyed the remainder of my flight, fully reclined, with no seatmates and back-to-back movies (good omen #3). Sleep was hard to come by and I’m still managing my jet lag, but a great start overall.

I’ll save the journey from the airport to the hostel for another time, but I wanted you to know that I made it safely. The city is beautiful, the people are kind, the mosques are abundant… and I’m off to explore more!

Be in touch soon,

R