A phobia conquered?

"I spoke with Paula Langston in the Foundation Fellows office, and she indicated that you were considering driving to Chile. Is this true? If so, please provide details about the trip. Be specific."

This was an interview question I received many months ago that still has me laughing. UGA was doing a piece on Fulbright-winners, and they sent me an email with a number of questions, none of them more memorable than this one. The burden fell upon me to inform the public affairs folk that Ms. Langston was misinformed, and that I would be flying to South America. Yes, flying...in an airplane...the staple of my ever nightmare.

The question nevertheless piqued my curiosity. Was it possible to drive to Chile? I discovered long ago that Europe could be reached by boat, Kansas by Greyhound, and the west coast by stick-shifting Volkswagon. I knew also that just as the Beringian Land Bridge provided a convenient route for dinosaurs and ancient man alike (thanks Ms. Bittle), the seasonal ice sheet bridging Alaska and Siberia would theoretically permit me a plane-free passage to the Orient. Most recently, I even discovered that a magical place called...Wi-sconsin! was reachable by car...in the frigid month of Febrero no less.

Making it to Chile by car would likely prove a more difficult affair. I eagerly researched the subject and was devestated to find a chink in the chain that is the Panamerican Highway. The Darien Gap, a jungly drugland along the border of Panama and Colombia is road-free. Alas, driving was simply not an option. A plane it would be.

The only problem? The same old story: my epic phobia of flight.

It's an affliction that has plagued me since infancy. When I see an plane, I shudder. When I pass an airport my heart sinks. When I fly...well, ask any one of the few people lucky enough to have joined me. What's worse than the act itself: the anticipation. In Peru, it transformed me into a vegetable capable only of VH1 en espanol consumption. In San Francisco, it had me lying on a couch in Maylee Who-weiy-helan Wu's house contemplating the delights of a 86-hour Amtrak journey. In London, it had me speaking in a British accent.

With a week to go before the big flight, just as I was preparing to settle into a phobic trance, I noticed something stange. I felt anxiety-free and oddly was not dreading the flight. So I spent my last week in the country doing what I would normally do post-Chamber, pre-Chile. First off, I watched all of my favorite television shows. This was a sad event, as I figured the closest I would come to these programs once I left would be participating in their foreign equivalents: "Andean Idol," "Latin American Apprentice" (you know that one where Donald Trump hires a Mexican), and of course Chile's Next American Plus-Sized Male Model.

After the marathon of television, I returned to Athens for one last time to move out of my "apartment" and say goodbye to amigos. To celebrate the end of an era (Athens will surely be quite different when I return), Cousin and Friends and I all partook in something along the lines of a Booze Cruise. I don't really know what that means...but it happened.

The next day, I was back in Lilburn for the final stretch. Pegster threw a fiesta for the whole family, and cousins from far and wide attended (by far and wide I mean Dacula, since that's the farthest away any of my cousins live...except for those gawd-fearing Missouri Lutherans). We ate, boozed, and were merry, and the familyfolk even bought me gifts for the road. My favorite, and the only one that actually made it into my luggage: a black leather skull cap emblazoned with the Stars and Stripes and crowned by an eagle with the sharpest talons I ever seen. "Just don't forget how great America is," my uncle insisted.

The next evening, I boarded a flight from one America to another...free of fear. Take-off, landing, and even a mid-flight equatorial storm somehow did not rattle me. Surely this dramatic end to my phobia was an auspicious sign of things to come, a signal that I would grow out of a few of my old wicked ways during my time abroad. We shall see.