Gratitude Series: A Letter to My Well

For the month of November, I am sharing one gratitude letter each week. The letters trace a specific time period, the Spring of 1999 through the Winter of 2000. You can read my preface to this series here and the first, second (my favorite) and the third letters as well. This letter closes the series, taking us to the Winter of 2000 when I returned to New York City from Cairo, when I just began to understand all that Egypt meant to me, not fully realizing it until quite recently.

To the nation and people of Egypt,

Though I have not seen you, visited you in 21 years, you remain in my heart, always. You have become, in fact, my well. The touchstone and experience I go back to when I feel myself pulling deep inside, far far away from anything that pushes me out of my comfort zone or requires bravery. You are the well that I go to, my her-story for those critical months, August 1999 — January 2000. Why? Because this well reminds me to be bold, brave, courageous. To use my voice. To speak my truth. To embrace the ways in which I don’t “fit”.

Yet, it wasn’t always this way. I almost didn’t make it to September in Egypt. In August, I landed in Cairo, six weeks before my study abroad program at the American University in Cairo began. I knew no one and not even one word of Arabic. (Okay, maybe I knew how to say hello). One Middle Eastern…