There are some words you imagine saying for so long that, when you finally get to say them, they don’t quite feel real.
We are in Denver.
I have typed that sentence, deleted it, read it again and smiled.
We are in Denver.
After all the waiting, all the uncertainty, all the dates that came and went, all the moments when we thought, This is it, only to find ourselves waiting again…
We made it.
Our Sunshine Suitcases finally crossed the ocean. 🇿🇦✈️🇺🇸
For so long, this journey existed in emails, medical appointments, interviews, documents, phone calls and suitcases waiting to be packed.
There were moments of enormous hope.
There were moments of crushing disappointment.
There were goodbyes I thought I was ready for, until I actually had to say them.
Leaving South Africa wasn’t simply getting onto an aeroplane.
It was looking around at a life built over decades and realizing that I couldn’t pack most of it.
You can’t put thirty years of memories into a suitcase.
You can’t pack familiar roads.
You can’t pack the people who have known you forever.
You can’t pack the smell of home, the sound of a familiar morning, or all those tiny ordinary things you never realized were precious until you knew you were seeing them for the last time.
And somewhere between South Africa and Colorado, something changed.
The journey stopped being about leaving.
It became about arriving.
🏔️ Denver. Colorado. Our new beginning.
Everything is unfamiliar.
The air feels different. The mountains are new. The weather is definitely preparing to teach this South African woman a few lessons. 😂❄️
There are new roads to learn, new shops to discover, paperwork to figure out, jobs to find, a home to build and an entirely new life waiting for us.
And yes, there will probably be days when I miss home terribly.
There will be days when starting again feels exciting and days when it feels frightening.
But this morning there is one feeling bigger than all the others:
Gratitude.
We were given the opportunity to begin again.
Not to erase the life we had.
Not to forget where we came from.
But to carry the best pieces of it forward with us.
Sunshine Suitcases began during a time when I didn’t know where this road would end.
I wrote about waiting.
I wrote about disappointment.
I wrote about hope when hope sometimes felt ridiculous.
And you travelled with me.
Today I finally get to write the post I have dreamed about writing:
We made it.
The suitcase isn’t waiting beside the door anymore.
It crossed the ocean.
It landed in Colorado.
And now the next chapter begins.
There will be mountains, snow, mistakes, discoveries, laughter, probably some tears, and undoubtedly a few stories involving our travelling Ark. 🐕🐈🦜😂
But we’re here.
After everything…
We’re here.
And perhaps that is what Keep Packing Sunshine was always supposed to mean.
Not that every day would be sunny.
Not that everything would work out exactly when we wanted it to.
But that even when we couldn’t see the destination, we kept a little hope tucked away somewhere in the suitcase.
Today, I finally get to unpack it.
☀️ Keep Packing Sunshine. ☀️
From Denver, Colorado. 🏔️🇺🇸💜
