You might think I\u2019m finding things to complain about, and maybe you\u2019re right, but the river here is too wet. I\u2019m used to silt, mud, chunky water. Here in the Alps it runs runny instead of viscous, clear instead of flavored. Burque\u00f1os will know what I\u2019m talking about.
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And the mountains are too pointed, like they\u2019re wearing formal hats in a crowd waiting for an execution. Nothing like my Sandias, who know how to lay across the land like thick slices of watermelon.
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And on a microscopic level, the ticks have nothing on home\u2019s cockroaches. I doubt they\u2019d ever leap into the air and fly at my face. They\u2019re cowards who can\u2019t dance.
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The cows look like poor cousins of the skulls we keep at home on the walls. Even counting their ribs, I am suspicious. They moo with an accent. I can hear it when I walk in the Swiss grass. Foriegn, a tone of imperialism and helvetic judgement.
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I miss the mesa, even if it hides corpses and coyotes. I miss the Three Sisters, volcanic beauties hunched over the edge of the city. I miss the goatheads sticking deep into the flesh of my heels.
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We built an adobe mountain range with our bare hands one summer. We mixed the earth and straw and mud like witches hovering over cauldrons, and we stacked them against the heat. The taller we built, the more soothing shade the wall cast on our scalded skin. I\u2019d hide from the sun with the tailless lizards that bore wounds from battles with the neighborhood tomcat. The tails grow back, I\u2019m told, but I don\u2019t know how many times.
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I\u2019ve left the dust that settled in the thick black hair of seven generations before me. Here in Z\u00fcrich, we got caught in a windstorm colored orange by the Sahara. It tasted familiar, but like eating an auntie\u2019s version of enchiladas. Stacked, not rolled.
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When you are homesick, your brays sound spoiled. Your kicks look like tantrums. They inspect your teeth to age you when you laugh, measuring how long you\u2019ve been away and how well you\u2019ve adjusted.
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When they want me to feel better, they tell me the moon is the same, but I think she has changed. I don\u2019t recognize her here. She\u2019s lost herself somewhere in her monthly moulting. I wonder if I\u2019ll find her again, when I return to the land of enchantment.\u00a0
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Dr. Bunny McFadden tinkers with words for a living. She\u2019s written widely in academia & hosted workshops on storytelling with UNICEF and the Royal Centre School. She\u2019s the assistant editor of a magazine for incarcerated folks. After a stint in Switzerland, she found her way home. Her website is DocBunny.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
You might think I\u2019m finding things to complain about, and maybe you\u2019re right, but the river here is too wet. I\u2019m used to silt, mud, chunky water. Here in the Alps it runs runny instead of viscous, clear instead of flavored. Burque\u00f1os will know what I\u2019m talking about. And the mountains are too pointed, like … <\/p>\n