A Phoenix's Spirit Animal Is the Butterfly: Part 3

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Although we had been to Santiago countless times before (for my aunt’s wedding, family reunions and numerous vacations), this time everything seemed strange and unfamiliar. Because we were living in the opposite hemisphere, February meant the end of summer. The school year began in March, which felt absurd, like an alternate universe.

In what was undoubtedly an effort at creating normalcy, my father insisted we go shopping for school supplies as a family. It was a sweltering day and the shop we were in didn’t have air conditioning. Everything about the outing annoyed me, including the name of the shop, Mon Amie. What a stupid name for a store that sells pencils, I thought scornfully. And p.s., you’re not my friend.

I was angry and I wanted to fight with someone. I chose my father.

“I hate you,” I spat. I willed my heart to turn to stone as I watched the saline pool in his eyes, making the blue of his irises a sad, watery gray.

He swallowed hard and looked at me, miserable and defeated. “I know you do.”

I crossed my arms over my chest and turned away, pretending that I couldn’t stand to look at him. The truth was that it broke my heart to see the hurt in his eyes. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt worse than I did that day I made my father cry.

I think the hardest adjustment was attending Dunalastair, the private school my father had picked out for me and Monica. He had some ridiculous idea that by putting us into a Chilean school, we might learn the language quicker and thereby blend into the culture more easily. He called it immersion; I called it cruel and unusual punishment.

Monica and I lasted six months at Dunalastair. It was, in a word, grueling. Even their grading system was different. An “A” was a “7;” an “F” a “1.” And of course, it couldn’t be that simple. Teachers were apt to give you a “6.7” or a “4.5.” It meant nothing to me.

So, after spending my days at “school” doing nothing but writing letters home, wallowing in my misery and having an emotional breakdown of sorts, my father and I ultimately worked out a compromise. He abandoned his original idea of immersing Monica and me in the culture and transferred us to an international school. All of the teachers there were either American or Canadian and—hallelujah!—speaking any language on campus other than English was forbidden.

I swear these letters were shiny and brass
when I was there.

I remember climbing the hill to the massive school’s entrance in our newly-acquired Toyota 4Runner the day we decided to enroll. Nido de Aguilas, I read. The shiny brass letters leapt out at me from the concrete wall bordering the front gate. An American flag danced in the breeze alongside a Chilean one in the courtyard. I realized in that moment that both are red, white and blue. I smiled as a guard tipped his hat at us and my family and I drove in.

“Nido de aguilas” means “eagles’ nest.” In this “nest,” Monica and I met other teenagers who had already experienced and conquered the disorientation we were currently suffering through. It was warm and welcoming, like a hot shower after standing in the rain.

As the months passed and my time in Santiago grew less and less painful, I let myself succumb to its offerings. Everything became easier. School, which at Dunalstair had been a waste of eight hours each day, became a priority again. I became grateful for things I had naturally taken for granted in Florida, like being able to comprehend my teachers’ sentences. Even having homework assignments put a smile on my face. I had regained a sense of purpose.

“I understand this!” I exclaimed one day, poring over a textbook. It made me giddy. I felt accomplished, and when I would bring home test scores of “90%” or “94%,” it meant something. I was proud of myself again, and Daddy was the first person I wanted to share my success with.

With my education finally under control, I decided my next goal was to take back my power and my personality, which I had left somewhere on the wretched journey from Miami to Santiago. [Looking back, that probably should have been my first goal]. While I still felt like an outgoing person, I didn’t actually converse with anyone at school except for my sister. I definitely need friends, I thought to myself one day as I walked alone from first period to second.

I immediately ran into a problem, however. I didn’t know the first thing about meeting girls. I’d had my friends in Coral Springs nearly all my life. They were practically built in. Luckily, my classmate, Nina, eventually took pity on me. She and her five-gal clan were quick to befriend me.

“Do you want to eat lunch with us?” Nina asked me one day after our English class. Her thick South-African accent and warm brown eyes helped me to trust her immediately. After all, eating lunch alone in high school can be brutal.

I had smiled at her, grateful for the invitation. “Sure.”

That night at dinner Mommy and Daddy asked us the usual question of how our days had gone.

“I met a bunch of girls,” I piped up.

Daddy’s eyes lit up. “That’s great, Niks! I’m so glad.” He grinned, and I felt a sense of peace knowing he was happy for me.

As it turned out, however, Nina and Company were not exactly my crowd. They were nice enough, but they laughed about things I found more stupid than funny. I realized quickly that I didn’t fit in with them. Even the way we dressed was noticeably different. Being “fresh” out of the United States meant I knew what was still “in” and what wasn’t, and for the love of God, my belt always matched my shoes.

I was also older than they were, because leaving my high school back home in the middle of the semester and the mess with Dunalastair had set me back a grade. I didn’t think our age difference would matter, but it eventually began to grate on my nerves. And while I was grateful to them for taking me in and trying to show me a good time, I was often un-amused or bored when I was with them. I found myself wishing they at least had some cute guy friends.

I was fervently taking notes one day during Environmental Systems when my lab partner leaned over and asked, quite disdainfully, “Why do you hang out with those girls? You don’t fit in with them.”

I looked at my Swedish classmate and shrugged. “They’re nice,” I said lamely. I narrowed my eyes at him. “Why, Pontus? Who do you think I should be hanging out with?”

He gave me a sly, cocky smile, one I would soon become affectionately familiar with. “Me and my crew.”

And so began the introductions. I politely—well, as politely as I could, anyway—stopped hanging out with Nina and Company and met Pontus’ “crew.” When I began spending more time with them, Monica, who was a freshman, could hardly believe it.

“In Nido,” my sister explained to me, “there is the ‘cool’ group, and the ‘super cool’ group.” She looked admirably at me. “Nicole, you and your friends are in the ‘super cool’ group.” I could only laugh. Looking back, I suppose we were.

There were the sisters, Georgina and Estefa, two Mexican beauties I eventually became very close with. We had a Californian, a New Yorker, a Japanese, a Colombian, two Chileans, and of course, Pontus from Sweden and his best friend, Mark from Toronto. And then there was Katie from Ontario, who became my new best friend.

A blurry selfie of me and Katie before selfies were a thing.

She had been absent from school for the first four weeks with a bad case of mono, which is why I hadn’t met her before. She was a year younger than I was and in Nina’s class, but we had a sincere, authentic connection from the very start.

My parents loved her. She soon became a familiar face around our house, and now I know part of the reason my parents adored her so much was because of the positive change she stirred in me. I understand now that Daddy never wanted to hurt me, and seeing me laughing with Katie and going out again must have been a huge relief. We were even able to share clothes, which he knew was very important to me.

With Katie and Pontus at one of Genevieve’s parties.

One of the Chileans in our crew, Genevieve, was infamous for throwing big parties every year. Her yard was ginormous and she successfully filled it with kids from Nido every time. My first ever experience at one of her extravaganzas had been with Nina and Company when I knew hardly anyone. By the time Genevieve’s next party rolled around, I was helping her pass out flyers and was there two hours early with Katie and the rest of the girls, helping her set up. When the last guests had gone for the night, I stayed at her house with Katie and everyone else in our crew and slept over. It wasn’t long before I felt completely comfortable with the crew, enough to call them mine, and I owed it to Katie. I had created a new normal. I was, dare I say it, happy. Comfortable, even.

I slowly loosened my white-knuckled grip on my old life and began to relax into my new one. Although I still kept in very close contact with my friends in Florida, and no one could ever take Marin’s place—not even Katie — I took that old life off its pedestal. Going back to Florida became something that put a smile on my face without a pang of longing in my throat.

Eventually, as gritty, resilient humans tend to do, I healed my heart and ultimately, I grew to love Chile.

Growth is impossible without change. Turning our lives upside down and starting over in Chile taught me that. Looking back, I think it was hard for all of us, even Daddy, but I can only say with certainty how deeply it changed me. I remember my time in Chile as a battle and a renewal—at times between my father and I; at others, between my old self and the one who emerged.

After spending a year and a half in a place I had never truly known but that had always been part of my heritage, I realize the impact of my experience. I am no longer unworldly, nor do I view life from within a bubble in which the most important thing is whether my shoes match my belt. I have a new appreciation for people of other cultures and countries. I speak a second language, a tie that binds my father and I in a way we never were before.

These things are precious to me. My experiences in Chile were had at the expense of those I could have had with my childhood friends, yes, but I would never trade them. The lessons I learned in that year and a half made me who I am.

So that’s my origin story. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed publishing it. It was an absolute treat for me to relive these moments, even the ones that still make me cry. I guess I was gritty before I knew what grit was.

I thought it would be fun to put some faces with all of those names. These photos are from our most recent trip to Chile. It was also the first time my kids had ever been. Coming full circle in that way was so beautiful, at times, it took my breath away.