Three weeks before my twelfth birthday Air Canada flew me away to the school for the blind in Vancouver. I left behind my family, my friends, Trixie my pony, Lady my dog, our farm 9 miles south of Lougheed Alberta, and everything else that was familiar to me. My folks knew it would be difficult for me to be away from them, given that I had never yet spent more than twelve hours out of sight of a close relative. They packed my luggage. They sent the essentials: cough drops and
pocket money, shortbread and shampoo, chocolate bars and Barbie dolls, raincoat and church hat, figure skates and bedroom slippers, portable typewriter and self-addressed envelopes, red 120-base Hohner accordion and pink
nighties, transistor radio with enough extra batteries to last until Christmas, bathing suit and Aspirin, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in Braille. They packed it all in an enormous trunk with my school clothes, their hopes for my future, their fears for the present and the love that made them send me away.
Both the trunk and I arrived safely in Vancouver, though the timing was off. My flight lasted about an hour. The trunk’s journey lasted about four weeks. Meanwhile I, homesick and bewildered, doing laundry really, really often, moved cautiously forward, assuring myself that this would be the most difficult transition I would ever make. For the most part people left me alone. Possibly they were waiting to see what kind of person I would be when I finally stopped crying, which I did. I look back on that experience with thankfulness. Thank goodness nobody told me how much harder it gets, later in life, when you make a big change and you have to do your own packing!
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